Tablet Magazine tries to explain the nuances found among Nazis, illuminating various forms of antisemitism taking over the GOP.
By hosting Fuentes, Carlson offered his audience two flavors of antisemitism: explicit and denied. Fuentes names the Jew; Carlson insists he has nothing against Jews at all. But the coordinates are identical, and preferring one or the other is simply a matter of taste. They coexist comfortably because both point to the same destination. Antisemitism is not dangerous because it’s mean or offensive to the feelings or sensibilities of Jews; it is dangerous because it creates and circulates lethal fictions. It produces a weaponized alternate reality, one that leads inexorably to Jews being harmed or killed.
The GOP now is positioned to move into ethnic cleansing as either adoption of explicit Nazism, or implicit Know Nothingism, or both.
Some don’t seem to understand why Fuentes lauds Hitler and praises Stalin together as a compatible ideology of mass atrocity. His performances, desperation for the kind of absolute attention that both Hitler and Stalin craved, are consistent in raw aspiration to seize power for purposes of abuse.
Fuentes is open about his love of Hitler. He has called Hitler “cool” and “awesome,” describing himself as “just like Hitler.” He gives the Sieg Heil salute. He has commented “They compare Putin to Hitler like it’s a bad thing.” Polish people have “the bad habit of hating Hitler all the time,” he says. Asked directly whether Hitler was bad, Fuentes refused to respond directly, saying that if Hitler was “bad,” Churchill and Roosevelt are also “bad.” [Fuentes wrote about a Black man in his neighborhood] “I’m supposed to be mad at Hitler? I’m supposed to be cross with Hitler? I want this guy dead. And I wish Hitler would kill him. I wish Hitler would have killed him, you know? … That guy should be KILLED! That guy should be killed for that. That guy should be dragged from his car and beaten to death by the public. And I’m supposed to be mad at Hitler because of some fantastical Hollywood story about a gas chamber that looks like a shower? Give me a break. If I was in a room with Hitler and that guy, me and Hitler would team up and fuck that guy up! We would kill that guy! Hitler would hold him down and I would beat him to death… And we’d high-five at the end.”
You see, Fuentes openly fantasizes about vigilantism and capital punishment of non-whites. Who he praises is consistent with ugly desire for the kind of power that would allow him to achieve ethnic cleansing.
The most likely explanation for Fuentes making odd pairings of politicians is therefore that he’s too lazy to understand differences between Hitler or Stalin or anyone else committing atrocities. He sees only the atrocities part, and likes it. He showers abusers with equal praise because, like a frightened Hitler Jugend, there is zero depth to Fuentes’ grasp of history, only a sad cry of a scared little boy who needs someone to be his “daddy”.
