There is a real desire of many Americans to turn the country over to fascists – strong, authoritarian, intolerant, cruel men (with some women vying to be included and be leaders). Why?
One thought is the feeling that the hierarchy of manly leadership has been destroyed by women and their surrogates, touchy feely idealistic socialists who are impractical and disastrously incompetent. In other words, the strong men have been pushed aside and made fun of and it is time for manly, hardheaded, morally upright men to come back to take charge.
Another thought is the disgust reflex that is much stronger in right-wingers than in left-wingers. I can relate my own experience of having taken a wrong turn in Vancouver BC and ended up driving through the hard section of town along the drug streets and saw shocking and truly disgusting people who were not only homeless but destroyed by drugs and living in their subsequent filth. I think many right-wingers think cruel intolerance and punishment and getting them out of sight is what is needed.
Another disgust reflex of some right-wingers seems to be an obsession about homosexuals. Normal people, or at least normal liberals, don’t pay much attention at all to gay men and women other than to treat them the same way they treat anyone – with no concern at all about their sexuality. But the homophobic seem to be plagued with images of genitals and anuses and are likely fighting the rise of personal sexual energies in themselves at these images. And they have been trained to feel shame about these feelings and they abreact with cruelty and oppression.
Maybe the core of it all is a terrible mistaken idea of what it is to be a man. The feminine manifestations of compassion, empathy, tolerance, softness, caring seem to be a violation of the mistaken notion of manhood which are manifest in hardness, cruelty, intolerance, demanding, bullying, instilling fear, dominating. They think to be a man is to dominate with cruel strength. And to be caring and cooperative is a failing of manhood.
I think we need to see the whole picture of what it is to be a man. Jesus gave us his image through his life and teachings. Budha did the same. Not insignificantly, Mr. Rogers on children's TV did much the same for decades and was portrayed beautifully by Tom Hanks in a recent movie. Manhood certainly includes tenderness, empathy, caring, nurturing and protecting, as well as the will to do difficult and courageous things.
Why is fascism attractive? A mistaken notion of manliness, might be the heart of it.
