“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.” ― Desmond Tutu (7 October 1931 – 26 December 2021)

Humanity lost one of its most courageous and moral voices.

“Puritanism has made life itself impossible. More than art, more than estheticism, life represents beauty in a thousand variations; it is indeed, a gigantic panorama of eternal change. Puritanism, on the other hand, rests on a fixed and immovable conception of life; it is based on the Calvinistic idea that life is a curse, imposed upon man by the wrath of God. In order to redeem himself man must do constant penance, must repudiate every natural and healthy impulse, and turn his back on joy and beauty.” – Emma Goldman

“The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.”  – Albert Camus.

Since my last piece regarding the myth of “woke fascism” I have received numerous messages and emails which seem to misunderstand much of what I wrote. So, I wanted to clarify. While there is no such thing as “left fascism,” I do not deny that there are authoritarian currents in what passes as the left today. These do not amount to fascism, but I think they do pose a threat to the democratic process and often aid the far right, as I will talk about below.

In today’s social media culture, radicalism is often reduced to performative social justice or virtue signalling. The way this works is through an impulse among many self-identified progressives (and some leftists) to amplify socially accepted ethics while policing the thought and speech of everyone else. I have seen this manifest in many forms, from “canceling” a person because they may express a divergent opinion regarding gender expression, or in “mob justice” mentality where a group of people gang up on one person online and troll them incessantly for expressing something that is considered unacceptable to today’s progressive sensibilities.

Certainly, the pandemic has exacerbated much of this as well. For instance, anyone who criticizes Big Pharma or discusses the well documented crimes of the medical establishment in the past may be cast unfairly as an “anti-vaxxer,” an ableist, or worse. I may have been guilty of some of this myself. It stems from a desire to find some order and meaning in a world where neither seldom exist and in an era of mistrust and misinformation. But there is an impulse to punish anyone who dissents from this “order” because they are perceived as a threat. And it usually isn’t very helpful at confronting unhinged conspiracy theories or dispelling false information.

I have witnessed some of this myself especially when it comes to topics like sex, gender and sexuality. Many progressive-minded people, primarily Americans from my experience, appear to be on a Victorian/puritanical crusade to purge culture and the world of anything that may be considered “abusive,” might “trigger” someone, or that may make them feel uncomfortable. An urge to shut down discourse or debate. Unfortunately, the #MeToo movement has contributed to this in a rather pernicious way. And no matter what radical veneer it might display, it is liberal authoritarianism at work.

To reiterate, while “woke fascism” is nonsense, progressive or liberal authoritarianism is not. And liberalism often plays handmaiden to real fascism. Back in the 1980s, self described “radical feminists” like Andrea Dworkin launched a crusade against pornography. In the process, she and others linked arms with conservatives and the far right. Like an echo from the Temperance movement of the early 20^th century, these women were merely repeating a similar narrative of reactionaries. Their narrow focus on abuse ended up stamping out much of the incredible progress made by sexual liberation movements in the 1970s.

To many of them, almost any expression of sex, sexuality and the human body were to be defined as oppressive, immoral, degenerate and traumatic. And all of this supposed “debauchery” required severe and draconian government action to surveil, censor and punish the so-called “offenders.” This episode was like a repeat of the notorious “Red Scare” of the McCarthy years where thousands of people where labeled “perverts” or “sexual deviants” and blacklisted from jobs. Countless lives were ruined. Families destroyed. Many committed suicide due to the trauma. And it demonstrated that puritanical crusades never really died in American society. One look at the vicious battle being waged against reproductive freedom and we can see it in action today.

In addition to echoing the Temperance movement, Dworkin and others like her ironically echoed Christian fundamentalists and Calvinists. Without a doubt, most pornography produced today is a product of capitalism. It is exploitative because capitalism is exploitative. But viewing it outside of this lens renders the issue hollow. It becomes just another liberal crusade that ends up aiding conservatives, evangelical Christians and the far right.

With religious zeal, Dworkin rained down fire and brimstone on any who dared deviate from her thin line of what was acceptable and what was obscene. Unsurprisingly, she gained enormous support from the Reagan administration and notoriously anti-gay bigots like James Dobson. Today, celebrated, self described radical feminists like Gail Dines and Julie Bindel appear to be repeating this, although now it is risibly being reframed as a “public health crisis.”

Ironically, it is often the elite in the LGBTQ community who appear to be taking up this crusade today. Since marriage equality passed in the US, bourgeois respectability politics have sadly gained ground too. Now, more than in the past, prominent, powerful and wealthy LGBTQ couples seek to mimic their heterosexual counterparts. Heteronormativity, along with shaming and virtue signaling, has become all the rage in some circles.

In truth, sexual “deviance” from the norm has always been looked at through the lens of Protestant Christian purity in the US. It is seen as something to suppress, police or expunge. And with so many prominent queer people clamouring to join the mundane cultural mainstream, the avantgarde and the different are increasingly being vanished or marginalized. But there is also an increasing conservativism within bourgeois LGBTQ circles which serves to perpetuate the oppressive systems of capitalist exploitation, class and nationalistic militarism. Just look to how many Pride Parades today are inundated with sponsors or contingents from corporations, banks, police and the military sector for an idea of how far it has gone.

Despite what many might argue, there is nothing radical about appealing to authority within a deeply authoritarian society. And while we recognize the silliness of “woke fascism,” we should not ignore the abuses of progressive or liberal authoritarianism masquerading as radicalism. Opposing societal ills like misogyny, homophobia and racism should never court censorship or echo reactionary structures of oppression.

The true radical experience should always be liberating for everyone, but especially the poor, the marginalized, and the powerless. It should ultimately condemn punitive ideologies of retributive justice, because wallowing in a state of perpetual victimhood or narcissistic woundedness only ends up serving the powerful by reinforcing their hierarchical worldview. Radical liberation revels in its creative imagination to transform society from a place of trauma to one of solidarity. And anything less than that is not worthy of our energy.

Kenn Orphan December 2021

As an independent writer and artist Kenn Orphan depends on donations and commissions. If you would like to support his work and this blog you can do so via PayPal. Simply click here:  DONATE

And thank you for your support and appreciation!

How anyone could believe that “left woke fascism” is actually a thing is staggering. But I have encountered this line of thinking many more times than I am comfortable with lately, primarily among Americans.  Sadly, it has become very fashionable in some corners on the internet to bemoan and decry the supposed scourge of leftist “wokeness” and to equate it with the real menace of far-right authoritarianism, violence and brutality. It is a myth that has gained alarming traction.

Without a doubt, the politics of identity have long been used in order to maintain hegemony and neoliberal policies. It is a cynical, but effective, way to distract from issues of class and capitalist exploitation. And it has been used to silence people who may offer a differing point of view by unfairly casting them as racist, sexist, homophobic, etc. But the nonsense of “woke fascism” has been created by far-right ideologues and peddled by grifters like Bari Weiss, Bret Easton Ellis, Jordan Peterson and Glenn Greenwald who rake in tons of money off this ahistorical, erroneous and dangerous rubbish.

“Wokeness” is a new term, but it is derived from the mid 20^th century. “Stay woke” was a phrase Black American workers used to encourage attention to civil and labor rights issues. It was later revived by activists in this century. As is the case of all progressive movements under capitalism, the term was co-opted by corporations as well as the police/surveillance/military sector to whitewash real systemic inequities with feel good, empty slogans or lifestyle choices which simply amounted to more profit for their particular brand.  

But terms matter. While there are certainly self-described “left-wing” governments that are anti-democratic or even authoritarian, fascism has always been a far-right ideology rooted in the marriage of corporation and state, and maintained through violence, racial/ethnic/religious supremacy, scapegoating of immigrants and other minorities and unfettered nationalism. It is one thing to decry the excesses of political correctness or “cancel culture,” it is quite another to use terms like fascism for these particular societal trends.

It comes down to this: there are no “woke leftist fascists” who are aiming to whisk people off to concentration camps and/or wipe out mass sections of humanity because they fail to use the correct pronoun. There are, however, real fascists who would like nothing less than doing this to the people they view as genetically, culturally or religiously inferior to them and a threat to the traditional power arrangement in society. There are real fascists who dream of dropping leftists into the ocean as they did in Pinochet’s Chile. The song “Start up the Rotors” by Polish singer Kel’Thuz fantasizes about this openly and is shared widely by far right trolls on the internet. And one other recent instance is a chilling reminder of this. Following the Rittenhouse verdict, a member of the notorious Proud Boys expressed online: “The left wont stop until their bodie(s) get stacked up like cord wood.”

And yet I’ve seen an argument being used that attempts to equate mean tweets, “canceling” or even threats by a few left-identifying people on Twitter or Facebook as being evidence for “woke” or “leftist fascism.” While any kind of bullying, doxing or censorship of ideas should be condemned, these incidents do not amount to anything remotely fascist in nature.

The terrifying reality is that right now actual fascism is gaining ground. It has manifested itself in the laws that make it more and more difficult by the day for people of color and the urban poor to vote or organize. Laws that criminalize protest and grant impunity to people who plow down demonstrators with their cars. Laws that give people the right to become bounty hunters on women and those who assist them with access to a safe abortion. Lawmakers and police who openly cavort with white supremacist militias. Lawmakers who dismiss or even assist an attempted coup. Lawmakers who threaten other lawmakers with violence, rape or death. Lawmakers who deny science and ignore public safety in favor of the fossil fuel industry, corporate profit or the gun lobby. Lawmakers who pose with their family carrying assault rifles for a tweet in the immediate aftermath of yet another horrific mass shooting. These aren’t some trolls on the internet. They are elected officials and public servants.

American fascism resembles other fascistic societies, but it inhabits its own, unique sphere in history. It is the wealthiest and most powerful empire the world has ever known. And there is no indication that this will change in any way of significance any time soon. To ignore or downplay the real rise of fascism in this context or be a handmaiden to its growth is not only the height of foolishness. It invites a kind of horror words could not begin to describe.

Kenn Orphan, December 2021

As an independent writer and artist Kenn Orphan depends on donations and commissions. If you would like to support his work and this blog you can do so via PayPal. Simply click here:  DONATE

And thank you for your support and appreciation!

These photos were taken 10 years ago at a train station in China. An old man apparently died while sitting there causing alarm among others awaiting their trains. But then a Buddhist monk calmly walked up to the man, held his hand and bowed. There was silence as onlookers took photos and took in this sight of reverence.

The photos resonated with me the first time I saw them. I felt sadness for the man because he died alone. But also because I think they offer a simple and profound meditation on what it means to have a body and what it means when that body is no longer animated by a soul. What it means when time stops for you or for another. And that all of that is the epitome of the sacred.

So often we think of the sacred as being something that exists outside of our ordinary lives, something necessarily ethereal, often within a religious setting or context and only the purview of saints. And I think when we do this we often miss it in the mundane transactions, travels, rituals and routines of our daily lives.

But sometimes it tears through the cloak of our illusions just long enough for it to demand our undivided attention, as in this instance. And in the simplest of gestures we see it clearly, if only for a moment. A few quiet words of reverence. A holding of a hand. A bow. And suddenly we realize, we are all waiting for our train to arrive.

Kenn Orphan, December 2021

Photo taken on November 25, 2011. (Reuters/Asianewsphoto)

As an independent writer and artist Kenn Orphan depends on donations and commissions. If you would like to support his work and this blog you can do so via PayPal. Simply click here:  DONATE

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There is a line I keep seeing repeated on social media. It goes something like this: “They are allowed to decide what is acceptable to post and what is not. It’s free, after all.” Things like that may make snappy and snarky comebacks to people complaining about internet censorship. Only it isn’t true. Not by a long shot.

Facebook, Twitter and virtually every other social media company make billions of dollars off our personal information. Some of that information is freely given by us, most is not. Carefully crafted algorithms capture and bundle our mundane or most intimate details and sell them to advertising agencies and political public relations firms, who then attempt to manipulate our fears, desires, pleasures and prejudices to sell us a product or influence our way of thinking about an issue.

These social media giants hold a monopoly on what has become the commons for humanity. A place traditionally available to everyone in the community. They have privatized these commons and operate them without any oversight, no requirement for hearing and responding to complaints, and no democratic process.

This may sound like I am plugging for the supposed Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen. I am not. I believe that Haugen is advocating for the exact opposite of what is needed. In addition to this, her access to power should be suspect. She has been given exclusive interviews by Big Media and her testimony has been welcomed before government bodies in the US, UK and EU. She enjoys bipartisan support at a time when we are told such collaboration does not exist. Compare this with how Julian Assange, Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning have been treated.

Haugen is celebrated by the powerful because she is no threat to them. On the contrary, she made her career from the very algorithms that filter out dissent on search platforms like Google. She also worked in counterespionage in her time at Facebook, advocating for greater “protections” in the name of American “national security.”

If one reads between the lines it becomes obvious that Haugen’s “solution” to the problem of social media tyranny is to put even more control into the hands of despotic intelligence agencies and the ruling class. If she is successful, the new social media landscape will not only see the censorship of racist, white supremacy and violent nationalism, it will effectively silence the left in its analysis, criticism and resistance to the predations of late capitalism, war and ecological destruction and all of its mechanisms of oppression.

The hard truth is that none of this will be solved under the existing structures and arrangements of power. We live in an era of expansive, technological mass surveillance, by both corporations and the corporate state. The ruling class has always used this in order to quash dissent and control thought and resistance. That much has never changed. But its scope is greater than at any other time in human history. And it will use meaningless slogans like “protecting children” or “preserving democracy” to distract the public from its increasing authoritarian overreach. Therefore, putting more tools of censorship into the hands of the few and the powerful will only ensure less democracy, not more.

But we can use our own agency to resist both corporate censorship as well as data mining. We should oppose draconian legislative actions that curtail freedom of expression and speech, or put more control into the hands of corporations or intelligence agencies and the politicians who are in their service. And we can stop repeating the lie I stated at the beginning of this essay. Social media has never been a free service for any of us. But it has certainly given a lot of advertisers, wealthy investors, intelligence agents and politicians a free ride.

Kenn Orphan December 2021

As an independent writer and artist Kenn Orphan depends on donations and commissions. If you would like to support his work and this blog you can do so via PayPal. Simply click here:  DONATE

And thank you for your support and appreciation!