So yesterday, I wrote a post about Trump supporters who are talking about bringing guns to rallies and polling places — and some who are even talking about starting up what would amount to an unofficial Trump militia.
I illustrated the post with a striking photo (see it here) of right-wing “journalist” Milo Yiannopoulos and a friend brandishing guns while holding a Trump banner. Given Milo’s unctuous and theatrical support of Trump — he calls the Orange One “daddy,” as in “Daddy is going to win and then he’s going to make America great again and there’s nothing any of you can do about it” — I thought the pic was apropos. But aside from the caption to the picture, there were zero other mentions of Milo in my post.
It didn’t take long for Milo — apparently quite attentive to all news involving him — to learn about my post, and after he mentioned it in a tweet, Milo’s unofficial Twitter militia descended upon my Twitter mentions. (I also got a request to take the photo down from the apparent copyright holder, DJ Pop A Titty Out; I removed the picture, and popped a titty out for good measure.)
Here is some of what Milo’s fans had to say.
You may find yourself wondering — as I did, for a moment — what on earth Milo’s sexual orientation (or the color of his boyfriend’s skin) has to do with my post. The answer, of course, is nothing. The picture I (briefly) used to illustrate my post depicted Milo simultaneously holding a gun and a Trump banner, not marching in a pride parade or having sex with a man or any other stereotypically gay activities.
But Milo’s fans, or at least a chunk of them, apparently feel that by mentioning Milo’s gayness they have, as if by some magical incantation, rendered any criticism of him moot. They evidently think that — according to the official SJW rules, spelled out in the Official SJW Handbook — any and all criticism of particular gay people, at least by SJWs, is intrinsically homophobic, and strictly forbidden.
Indeed, one of Milo’s fans went right for the H-word:
It’s no coincidence that the person making this accusation is a #GamerGater — or at least a pretty fervent defender of #GamerGate — because this is one of that, er, consumer movement’s standard rhetorical ploys. #GamerGaters often attack so-called SJWs for using women, people of color, LGBT folks and others who suffer from some degree of discrimination as “shields” for their own allegedly evil beliefs.
Obviously, this does happen sometimes. But it’s #GamerGaters, not progressives, who are the all-time champions when it comes to using this tactic, which they do so opportunistically and cynically it can take your breath away. GamerGate’s #NotYouShield hashtag may well be the most inadvertently ironic thing ever conceived by a human being.
When they’re not trotting out female #GamerGaters to “prove” that #GamerGate can’t be misogynistic — thus using these women, yes, as shields — they’re trying to convince critics of Milo that they’re evil homophobes for criticizing his noxious beliefs.
In this case, Milo’s defenders are also trying to use Milo’s gayness to “prove” that he couldn’t possibly be the “gay nazi” they accuse me of calling him.
Apparently MatanJeda doesn’t know that Ernst Röhm, the literal boss of the literal Brownshirts in literal Hitler’s literal Germany — was in fact gay. Or that having interracial sex does not magically render someone not a racist. (White slaveowners used to routinely rape slave women, for gods sake; that didn’t somehow make them paragons of racial tolerance.)
And never mind that I never called Milo a “gay nazi” — though, in response to MatanJada’s pestering, I reminded him and anyone else who was listening that Milo, FWIW, used to call himself “Milo Wagner” and sometimes wore a German Iron Cross.
I’m not sure why I bothered, though. Trying to discuss anything with these people is utterly pointless, what with the endless straw-manning and their utter unwillingness to take in any new information. One of Milo’s militiamen — note to the literal-minded: I’m using this term figuratively — accused me of lying in my post yesterday. I asked him for examples of these lies. This is what ensued.
To paraphrase George Orwell: if you want a picture of the future, imagine a head banging on a desk — forever.
I think the “marginalized people can do no wrong” straw SJW comes from an unintelligible mix of two common misunderstandings among bigots:
1. “Criticizing a person from marginalized groups is bigotry!”
This is not only the “score game” mentality, in which being marginalized or “PC” towards the “scores” points, but also because, as GG proved once and again, bigots usually can’t tell the difference (or won’t bother, or know it and pretend they don’t ) between bigoted abuse and legitimate criticism.
In fact, I don’t think many of them get past the idea that any criticism of an individual is an ad hominem.
We’ve seen plenty of trolls here -and elsewhere- saying X person can’t say something sexist because they “aren’t” sexist. They try to disprove criticism by protecting the person from being defined as a bigot, and they understand any criticism as being an attack on,the person.
The idea that a person can be ok, or even admired, and still criticized, is alien to them.
And 2. “There’s no discrimination against privileged groups, according to SJWs, so it must mean people from marginalized groups cannot ever be bigoted!”
Of course, they don’t ever consider, or care, that there might be more than one marginalized group, or that a person can belong to several marginalized groups, even while also belonging to one or many privileged groups.
This level of complexity is too much for their stereotypes us vs them mentality.
So all they get from these two is “gay people can’t be criticized because that’s homophobic, and also gay people can’t discriminate because gay! Checkmate, esjay doublius!”
It reinforce my hypothesis they don’t retort to convince anyone, but to increase their social status within their group of bigeot. So they don’t really care how stupid it look for outsider ; they already decided that outsiders did not really exist for them.
@Kat :
Pour réaliser cette recette de crêpe Suzette, commencer par préparer tous les ingrédients.
2 Dans une poêle (de préférence en cuivre)…
3 …verser le sucre en poudre. Puis la placer sur feu modéré.
4 Presser le jus des oranges et des citrons à l’aide d’un presse-agrume.
5 Au bout de quelques minutes le sucre se met à fondre et à se transformer en caramel.
6 Ajouter le jus d’orange de façon à décuire le caramel et pour qu’il se dissolve dans le jus d’orange.
7 Ramener la préparation à ébullition pour faire fondre le caramel en totalité.
8 Ajouter enfin le jus de citron.
9 Laisser réduire quelques minutes.
10 Ajouter le beurre coupé en morceaux.
11 Mélanger soigneusement avec une spatule Exoglass de façon à bien incorporer le beurre.
12 Ajouter le Grand-Marnier, porter à ébullition, puis flamber en approchant une allumette au bord de la poêle.
13 Disposer une crêpe au centre de la poêle de manière à bien l’imprégner de sauce Suzette.
14 Retourner délicatement la crêpe afin d’imprégner la seconde face.
15 Plier la crêpe en deux.
16 Replier la crêpe en deux pour obtenir une crêpe pliée en quatre (en forme de triangle). Faire de même avec les autres crêpes. Veiller à garder les crêpes déjà préparées, dans un coin de la poêle, ainsi elles resteront dans le jus au chaud !
17 Dresser à l’assiette. Vous pouvez agrémenter la crêpe Suzette de quelques zestes d’orange confite.
It don’t seem too annoying indeed. Maybe having a bunch of french words is an irritation for non french speaker ?
That’s a very interesting analysis, Luzbelitx.
Your point 1 also touches on another large part of #GG vocabulary: the fact that they seem to regard “criticism” and “ad hominem” as simply being the first-person / third-person declensions of the same word.
How objective of them.
Now I want crepes. But not orange ones — I’ll just drown mine in maple syrup.
*conjugation, not declension.
I can’t linguistics.
Eh, no.
Göring was also, a fearless WW1 flying ace, bon viveur and art thief. None of that excuses him, Hitler, or the brownshirts. That’s just history for you.
@EJ
I remember a post from David about Zoe Quinn, in which #GGrrrrs were asking what “made her above criticism” because people thought harassment was ugly and should stop.
I think above everything, and beyond any rationalization, they’re just a bunch of angry assholes.
Guffaw.
I get the impression that Der Drumpf’s hair would be completely white if he didn’t spray-tan it to match his orange skin. I just pity whoever has to see him naked during his salon appointments.
ETA: Come to think of it, what is it with these racists and their obsession with tans?
…
Wow, and they say male feminists are “cucks” and “betas”? That women seek ” big daddy government” to be their “alphas”?
That sounds incredibly like gay domination porn or yaoi (not that I watch that or anything). How alpha of Milo.
There’s something amusing about them insulting anyone for being a furry when they’ve just registered the domain and twitter name lionsoftrump. Or to add the spaces back in… Lion Soft Rump.
Fascist and “lite Fascist” movements usually take on specific cultural forms depending on the country, so the degree of intolerance for LGBT people and other minorities will vary (e.g., Benito Mussolini wasn’t really into anti-Semitism). So it’s okay for Milo to be gay and have gay sex as long as he doesn’t criticize intolerance or allow his identity as a gay man to inform his political views.
Re right-wing hair dudes–don’t forget about Boris:
http://beurs.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Boris-Johnson.jpg
“This is a picture of a gay journalist…”
Wait. I thought it was a picture of Milo. Did a journalist photobomb it?
I want crêpes now too. But neither orange nor maple syrup (although those are awesome too). Gimme some with sour cream and cherries!!! Or, as I would have ordered in Saint Petersburg, блины со сметанами и вишнами.
*And then she realizes just how long it’s been by the sheer force of how many words she still knows how to say but has completely forgotten how to spell :))
When is Milo going to ditch that bleached ’80’s hairdo? That’s all I want to know.
“Just because someone’s a member of a minority doesn’t mean they’re not a nasty, small-minded little jerk.” – Sam Vimes
I have enough experience as a gay man to know that a white gay man attracted to MoC is not necessarily not-racist. Such men express their racist views in non-standard ways.
The analysis of the rhetorical claptrap being peddled by the Milosophers is spot on. They do seem to think that communicating beliefs and viewpoints is a type of competition, and they’re using words in ways that are supposed to defeat enemies. Reminds me of the Sovereign Citizens, who treat the legal system as a form of ritual magic.
Indeed.
Another narcissistic UK Tory MP:
Michael fabricant
http://i381.photobucket.com/albums/oo252/Pursuivant/Michael-Fabricant_0_zpsdwqsljke.jpg
I don’t know what makes for a good daddy, but I’m fairly confident Milo has shit taste in them.
(Is it homophobic for a het guy to criticize a gay guy’s taste in other guys?)
I just wanna add that one does not even have to be marginalized to apply for this line of thinking.
For instance, a bully or an abuser who is a bullying/abuse victim themselves and feels that this somehow justifies taking their anger out on others.
Then again we’re talking about people projecting this logic onto others rather than themselves, so this might not be the same thing.
There were actually a few openly pro-gay Neo-Nazi groups in the US, but the “mainstream” Neo-Nazi movement never accepted them.
Has anyone ever read Blinded by the Right by David Brock? It’s quite a fascinating insider look at the right wing machine. He used to be part of it but converted to progressivism later. He’s also gay. He wrote a lot about how it’s common for right wing movers and shakers to be gay. The straight members of the community mostly didn’t care. The expectation was just that it wasn’t brought up in the media. They aren’t personally socially conservative for the most part, they just need the bigot base of the GOP placated.
I recommend it to anyone interested in this subject. It’s over a decade old so it can probably be obtained inexpensively.
http://i.imgur.com/R3LUrvi.gif
http://www.reactiongifs.com/r/jcn.gif
Because Donald Drumpf is no one’s daddy ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever EVER ever ever ever
http://i.giphy.com/ruw1bRYN0IXNS.gif
The illimitable wisdom of Vimes.
(His Boots Theory is my favorite.)