‘Damn Right, I'm a White Nationalist’ Declares Texas GOP Platform Committee Member

Edited

I am not a classical liberal, more of a mutant mix. but that is something else.

One:

the modern concept of nationhood goes back to the thing known as the "Peace of Westphalia" Before then, the dominant concept had the nation identified with the Monarch, etc. After, It was not so wed to the concept of personal royal property, and was a more abstract thing.

We also got things like not messing around (so much) with the internal affairs other countries, the concept of national sovereignty, etc.

Two:

the early pre-scientific concept of mankind is rather biblical, dividing human kind into the descendants of the various children of Noah, etc. Some of this reveals some cultural memories of historical events, but much of it is rather fanciful, or a dramatic re-write history. from this we get the initial division of mankind into several "races"

Note that common practice was to identify different tribal people and cultures as different races. Thus the "Irish Race" or the "German Race" or the "English Race" There is nothing technically wrong with this so long as we understand it to be a tribal identity, and recognize that there is a lot of mixing going on over the ages during wars, etc.

To this day in Europe, there is no one real "white European" identity - it is subdivided into regional and sub-regional differences, Thus in Germany we have things like Bavarians, etc not just Germans. In Europe, nationalism tends to be focused on the people.

In the United States the equivalent would be Texans vs Southerners vs New England Yankees, etc --- The different cultural regions of the country.

The identities run across the various strains of ancestry, although different regions are dominated to one degree or another by ancestry from one region or another (Scots and Irish vs English vs German)

this comes out in virulent form in Nazism. Nazism conceives of the world as a struggle between races.

Three:

As seen here https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/922202212457070592.html

Nazism conceives of the world as a struggle between races.

That's not "race" in the 20c US "black/white" sense; Jews, Slavs, Britons, and so on are all "races," too.

And Nazis believe that races have certain characteristics, which are passed on through the blood; and that they are bound to some land.

There are a few other articles of Nazi belief: for example, that acting ("the will") is better than thinking (a sign of weaker races).

And that the strength of a race is most strongly exemplified through the untrammeled Will of its leaders.

(If you're thinking, "Wait, you just made an ideology around obeying people who don't think?" you may have spotted one of the problems.)

so the American idea of a "white race" has nothing to do with any idea of race used in Europe, or even used by the Nazis. The origins of the idea of a "white race" as used in the United States originated in the United States.

Four

Looking into the history of the very idea of a white race, we have this very detailed article via http://oxfordre.com/americanhistory/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780199329175.001.0001/acrefore-9780199329175-e-262

Since the beginning of European exploration in the 15th century, voyagers called attention to the peoples they encountered, but European, American Indian, and African “races” did not exist before colonization of the so-called New World. Categories of “Christian” and “heathen” were initially most prominent, though observations also encompassed appearance, gender roles, strength, material culture, subsistence, and language. As economic interests deepened and colonies grew more powerful, classifications distinguished Europeans from “Negroes” or “Indians,” but at no point in the history of early America was there a consensus that “race” denoted bodily traits only. Rather, it was a heterogeneous compound of physical, intellectual, and moral characteristics passed on from one generation to another. While Europeans assigned blackness and African descent priority in codifying slavery, skin color was secondary to broad dismissals of the value of “savage” societies, beliefs, and behaviors in providing a legal foundation for dispossession.

“Race” originally denoted a lineage, such as a noble family or a domesticated breed, and concerns over purity of blood persisted as 18th-century Europeans applied the term—which dodged the controversial issue of whether different human groups constituted “varieties” or “species”—to describe a roughly continental distribution of peoples. Drawing upon the frameworks of scripture, natural and moral philosophy, and natural history, scholars endlessly debated whether different races shared a common ancestry, whether traits were fixed or susceptible to environmentally produced change, and whether languages or the body provided the best means to trace descent. Racial theorization boomed in the U.S. early republic, as some citizens found dispossession and slavery incompatible with natural-rights ideals, while others reconciled any potential contradictions through assurances that “race” was rooted in nature.

[...]

The construction of Native “savagery” provided a foil for Europeans’ conceptions of themselves as “civilized” and the justification for dispossession. Convergence of ideas of “savagery” with those of lineage, in turn, provided crucial foundations for the emergence of “race” in the 18th century.

[...]

While diverse Indians in the region might lump all whites together, only violence in the backcountry in the era of the Seven Years’ War and War for Independence (c. 1754–1795) brought motley Europeans—English, Scot-Irish, German; Anglican, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Pietist—to refer to one another and to themselves as “the white people.” Those whites, increasingly, despite material and spiritual exchange between Indians and settlers, insisted that Indians were inherently savage. Some settlers understood them to be analogous to “the Canaanites, who by God’s commandment were to be destroyed,” according to the Moravian missionary John Heckewelder, while others “maintained, that to kill an Indian, was the same as killing a bear or a buffalo.”

[...]

So overall, the history of the concept of the "white race" as such is uniquely american, and has an extensive and complex history. It gets complicated.

Five

Given all of the above. what does "White Nationalism" mean today?

To over-simplify this since we already have a wall of text . . .

The white identity was a major component of the Confederate Identity. In deed white nationalists often parade to this day the flag of a failed state: the confederacy. The confederacy was a nation that died in its birth.

White Nationalism draws upon the romance of a white washed memory of a white nation as a justification of their superior status. This is basking in the glories of the fading light cast by the embers of what was the Confederacy.

Thus we have something that

uses a bad understanding of race, different that was used in Europe (even by the Nazis!)
uses a definition of race that developed over time to justify the crime of slavery
uses a bad history that excuses the criminal system of slavery as it once existed.
promotes feelings of superiority based on something your ancestors may have done that you consider admirable.
Promotes success through a sort of a caste system, through the process of keeping other people down, or "in their place"

so the thing

promotes feelings of superiority based on something your ancestors may have done that you consider admirable.

is not so bad, depending on the deeds in question.

But the rest is basically foundations for a broken philosophy based on bad facts, bad history, and the establishment of a sort of caste system.

The American revolution was fought to get rid of the use of Nobility, titles, foreign interference, etc The principles of the Declaration include the phrase "all men are created equal"

The idea of White Nationalism ultimately rests on an idea that is against the most basic principles expressed in the Declaration of Independence.

Six

It's actually kind of sad, really

Your Mileage May Vary

I am not a classical liberal, more of a mutant mix. but that is something else. **One:** the modern concept of nationhood goes back to the thing known as the "Peace of Westphalia" Before then, the dominant concept had the nation identified with the Monarch, etc. After, It was not so wed to the concept of personal royal property, and was a more abstract thing. We also got things like not messing around (so much) with the internal affairs other countries, the concept of national sovereignty, etc. **Two:** the early pre-scientific concept of mankind is rather biblical, dividing human kind into the descendants of the various children of Noah, etc. Some of this reveals some cultural memories of historical events, but much of it is rather fanciful, or a dramatic re-write history. from this we get the initial division of mankind into several "races" Note that common practice was to identify different tribal people and cultures as different races. Thus the "Irish Race" or the "German Race" or the "English Race" There is nothing technically wrong with this so long as we understand it to be a tribal identity, and recognize that there is a lot of mixing going on over the ages during wars, etc. To this day in Europe, there is no one real "white European" identity - it is subdivided into regional and sub-regional differences, Thus in Germany we have things like Bavarians, etc not just Germans. In Europe, nationalism tends to be focused on the people. In the United States the equivalent would be Texans vs Southerners vs New England Yankees, etc --- The different cultural regions of the country. The identities run across the various strains of ancestry, although different regions are dominated to one degree or another by ancestry from one region or another (Scots and Irish vs English vs German) this comes out in virulent form in Nazism. Nazism conceives of the world as a struggle between races. **Three:** As seen here https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/922202212457070592.html > Nazism conceives of the world as a struggle between races. > > That's not "race" in the 20c US "black/white" sense; Jews, Slavs, Britons, and so on are all "races," too. > > And Nazis believe that races have certain characteristics, which are passed on through the blood; and that they are bound to some land. > > There are a few other articles of Nazi belief: for example, that acting ("the will") is better than thinking (a sign of weaker races). > > And that the strength of a race is most strongly exemplified through the untrammeled Will of its leaders. > > (If you're thinking, "Wait, you just made an ideology around obeying people who don't think?" you may have spotted one of the problems.) so the American idea of a "white race" has nothing to do with any idea of race used in Europe, or even used by the Nazis. The origins of the idea of a "white race" as used in the United States originated in the United States. **Four** Looking into the history of the very idea of a white race, we have this very detailed article via http://oxfordre.com/americanhistory/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780199329175.001.0001/acrefore-9780199329175-e-262 > Since the beginning of European exploration in the 15th century, voyagers called attention to the peoples they encountered, but European, American Indian, and African “races” did not exist before colonization of the so-called New World. Categories of “Christian” and “heathen” were initially most prominent, though observations also encompassed appearance, gender roles, strength, material culture, subsistence, and language. As economic interests deepened and colonies grew more powerful, classifications distinguished Europeans from “Negroes” or “Indians,” *but at no point in the history of early America was there a consensus that “race” denoted bodily traits only.* Rather, it was a heterogeneous compound of physical, intellectual, and moral characteristics passed on from one generation to another. While Europeans assigned blackness and African descent priority in codifying slavery, skin color was secondary to broad dismissals of the value of “savage” societies, beliefs, and behaviors in providing a legal foundation for dispossession. > > “Race” originally denoted a lineage, such as a noble family or a domesticated breed, and concerns over purity of blood persisted as 18th-century Europeans applied the term—which dodged the controversial issue of whether different human groups constituted “varieties” or “species”—to describe a roughly continental distribution of peoples. Drawing upon the frameworks of scripture, natural and moral philosophy, and natural history, scholars endlessly debated whether different races shared a common ancestry, whether traits were fixed or susceptible to environmentally produced change, and whether languages or the body provided the best means to trace descent. Racial theorization boomed in the U.S. early republic, as some citizens found dispossession and slavery incompatible with natural-rights ideals, while others reconciled any potential contradictions through assurances that “race” was rooted in nature. [...] > The construction of Native “savagery” provided a foil for Europeans’ conceptions of themselves as “civilized” and the justification for dispossession. Convergence of ideas of “savagery” with those of lineage, in turn, provided crucial foundations for the emergence of “race” in the 18th century. [...] > While diverse Indians in the region might lump all whites together, only violence in the backcountry in the era of the Seven Years’ War and War for Independence (c. 1754–1795) brought motley Europeans—English, Scot-Irish, German; Anglican, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Pietist—to refer to one another and to themselves as “the white people.” Those whites, increasingly, despite material and spiritual exchange between Indians and settlers, insisted that Indians were inherently savage. Some settlers understood them to be analogous to “the Canaanites, who by God’s commandment were to be destroyed,” according to the Moravian missionary John Heckewelder, while others “maintained, that to kill an Indian, was the same as killing a bear or a buffalo.” [...] So overall, the history of the concept of the "white race" as such is uniquely american, and has an extensive and complex history. It gets complicated. **Five** Given all of the above. what does "White Nationalism" mean today? To over-simplify this since we already have a wall of text . . . The white identity was a major component of the Confederate Identity. In deed white nationalists often parade to this day the flag of a failed state: the confederacy. The confederacy was a nation that died in its birth. White Nationalism draws upon the romance of a white washed memory of a white nation as a justification of their superior status. This is basking in the glories of the fading light cast by the embers of what was the Confederacy. Thus we have something that * uses a bad understanding of race, different that was used in Europe (even by the Nazis!) * uses a definition of race that developed over time to justify the crime of slavery * uses a bad history that excuses the criminal system of slavery as it once existed. * promotes feelings of superiority based on something your ancestors may have done that you consider admirable. * Promotes success through a sort of a caste system, through the process of keeping other people down, or "in their place" so the thing * promotes feelings of superiority based on something your ancestors may have done that you consider admirable. is not so bad, depending on the deeds in question. But the rest is basically foundations for a broken philosophy based on bad facts, bad history, and the establishment of a sort of caste system. The American revolution was fought to get rid of the use of Nobility, titles, foreign interference, etc The principles of the Declaration include the phrase "all men are created equal" The idea of White Nationalism ultimately rests on an idea that is against the most basic principles expressed in the Declaration of Independence. **Six** It's actually kind of sad, really Your Mileage May Vary

[–] unabashed_centrist 0 points (+0|-0)

As promised, I am just now getting to this. I am impressed - and I will read every word after I make it home from work this evening. Thank you for the answer.

‘Damn Right, I'm a White Nationalist’ Declares Texas GOP Platform Committee Member

5 comments

/s/News