The "Cultural Marxism" concept is used by conservatives to justify hatred towards ethnicities, feminists, immigrants, LGBT Americans, and all liberal ideas.
“I don’t know about Cultural Marxism,” I remarked to myself, “Let me just check it out.” The learning experience that followed wasn’t pleasant, but it was certainly enlightening.
I catch a lot of flak on Twitter these days. I’ve only been writing political perspectives for a few months now, but already there are plenty of people who tweet hatred at me. While it was a little jarring at first, I got used to it quickly. Indeed, it’s become a regular source of material.
So the other day, I got attacked because I tweeted an article about immigration. The account called itself End Cultural Marxism. Sure, whatever. I rarely engage these folks, there’s no point, although I do check out their feeds and get a feel for who they are and what they’re all about. This particular account ended up leading me down quite a rabbit hole.
“Cultural Marxism has been dubbed “the greatest cancer in the Western world” but few even know what it is.”
True that, hence the click on your link. Lay it on me.
Cultural Marxism: An offshoot of Marxism that gave birth to political correctness, multiculturalism and “anti-racism.” Unlike traditional Marxism that focuses on economics, Cultural Marxism focuses on culture and maintains that all human behavior is a result of culture (not heredity / race) and thus malleable.”
It came off as an anti-political correctness rant so I was going to close out when anti-racism caught my eye. If the site was against anti-racism, did it then support racism?
“Cultural Marxists have promoted ideas that white people, instead of birthing white babies, should inter-racially marry or adopt non-white children. Samuel P. Huntington maintained that Cultural Marxism is an anti-white ideology.”
Oh yeah. Racism supported. Unquestionably. While it claimed to be about “taking pride in the white race,” and preventing “white genocide,” it was a cesspool of hate and ignorance. It’s hard to argue someone isn’t racist when they post pictures like this:
And that’s just one image. There were plenty more.
So I decided to follow the ideology further. There’s a ton of sites out there dedicated to opposing Cultural Marxism, and the concept varies slightly from author to author, depending on the writer’s agenda. Pat Buchanan claims American culture is ebbing away due to Cultural Marxism, for instance. But it is used to demonize all ethnicities, feminism, immigrants, LGBT Americans, and liberal concepts.
The idea basically cuts right to the heart of conservative rhetoric about “taking America back.” We’ve all heard that line. And it also ties in to how Republicans talk about an idealized time when America was “good.” Family values. Church on Sundays. Wally and the Beav. All that.
That America never existed, not really. Post War America was Pre-Civil Rights. Senator Joe McCarthy and his Communist witch hunts were the undercurrent of society. If you were a white middle class man, then you were on top of the world. Everyone else? Not so much.
Even comic books of the day were sanitized. When you look through the issues of the late fifties, the picture painted is clean, crisp, and wholesome. But that’s by design, and it didn’t happen naturally.
Frederic Wertham was largely responsible for the implementation of the Comics Code Authority. The CCA largely eliminated violence, sex, and horror images as it apparently caused juvenile delinquency. What the CCA actually did was give corporate dominance to a handful of companies while eliminating their major competition. This helped make America “good,” remember.
But this is what conservatives point to when they talk about the country they want us all to go back to; a facade. “Leave it to Beaver” wasn’t real. It was a TV show. Nostalgia isn’t real. It’s good memories replacing history. The country conservatives are imagining is only a fever dream. That America only exists now as an incredibly sanitized Utopia of what never was, passing for what used to be.
“Cultural Marxists have taken over the institutions of the media, education, mainstream Christianity (conservative and liberal), law, and finance. Their goal is the annihilation of Western Civilization in general and white people in particular.”
So here you have this movement, blaming the disappearance of a non-existent “Father Knows Best” kind of USA on Cultural Marxism. This was planned, they argue. America has been taken away from white people. But by whom?
Again, the Cultural Marxist antagonist varies from site to site, although they are always liberals. Feminists, homosexuals, non-white ethnicities are among the enemy, yes. But who started this? Where did Cultural Marxism come from? The Jews.
From Bill Berkowitz, at The Southern Poverty Law Center:
“In a nutshell, the theory posits that a tiny group of Jewish philosophers who fled Germany in the 1930s and set up shop at Columbia University in New York City devised an unorthodox form of “Marxism” that took aim at American society’s culture, rather than its economic system.
The theory holds that these self-interested Jews — the so-called “Frankfurt School” of philosophers — planned to try to convince mainstream Americans that white ethnic pride is bad, that sexual liberation is good, and that supposedly traditional American values — Christianity, “family values,” and so on — are reactionary and bigoted.
With their core values thus subverted, the theory goes, Americans would be quick to sign on to the ideas of the far left.”
What do all people railing against Cultural Marxism have in common? They are white. They hold conservative values. Many of them call themselves Christian. And what policies do they support in order to “take America back?”
Secure the borders. Stop immigration. Shut up feminists. Put an end to interracial relationships. Oust homosexuals. Guns, guns, guns. Get Americans back into Christian churches. Distrust the Jews.
Berkowitz again:
“The very term, “cultural Marxism,” is clearly intended to conjure up xenophobic anxieties. But can a theory like this, built on the words of long-dead intellectuals who have little discernible relevance to normal Americans’ lives, really fly?
As bizarre as it might sound, there is some evidence that it may. Certainly, those who are pushing the theory seem to believe that it is an important one.”
There’s no such thing as Cultural Marxism. That’s because Marxism is an economic argument against the capitalistic system. Therefore, if you aren’t dealing with capitalism, you aren’t dealing with Marxism. This whole thing is just a conspiracy theory used to justify White Pride. You aren’t racist after all, everybody else is racist against you!
The appeal of conspiracy theories is that they explain things from a specific viewpoint. They are informative only to those who subscribe to a specific agenda. The theorist does not see themselves as lying because in their eyes they aren’t. Instead they see themselves as serving a higher purpose.
These are the people who vote. They turn out for every election and primary. What makes people like this extremely dangerous is their absolute surety of moral correctness. They are right. They will not be swayed. If you oppose them, then you are the enemy. You are beneath them.
Essentially, this concept can conceivably be traced as the root of much conservative rhetoric. Resistance to change. Denial of facts. Refusal to compromise. Blind hatred of all things liberal. Fear and loathing of immigrants, non-white ethnic groups, homosexuals, and empowered women. It helps explain why people vote Republican even when it is economically harmful for them to do so. Hatred is a powerful motivator.
And, yes, it gets to to the roots of the rampant racism on the right wing. Look at all the hate groups that have sprung up throughout America since Obama took office. One would be foolish to say there is no connection. One would be even more foolish to ignore the dangerous potential of this situation.
It would be a stretch to say all conservatives subscribe to the Cultural Marxism fairy tales, but not untrue to say that very few liberals do. You can be sure Fox News is on in the homes of the hateful, and that a Gadsden flag has flown over their heads.
They may call it the Liberal Agenda or blame Mainstream Media, amongst other talking points, but all everything boils down to is fear and hatred of The Other, and the need to feel superior to everyone else. Blaming the nation’s issues on Cultural Marxism gives one the justification for all of that. Your issues are someone else’s fault.
Here’s the kicker, conservatives may not even be aware of the Cultural Marxism fantasy themselves. They just hate. Having someone to hate is justification enough. The Cultural Marxism story really only explains why many conservatives already hate as much as they do.
So, the next time you hear a Republican talk about “taking back America,” or complain about those who are “racist against white people,” think of that half-baked conspiracy theory. Yes, these people are willingly and terribly deluded. If they weren’t, they would have to face themselves.
In the meantime, there’s a subset of conservatives out there using a fallacy to justify racism. Now that you know about it, it will seem to apply to all of them.
‘It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one most adaptable to change.” ~ Charles Darwin.
The intent of Cultural Marxism is Cultural Corruption. The Soviet Union recognized: they were incapable of defeating the United States, thorough Military Action. As a result, they targeted the culture of the United States. One must remember, Global Communism is the goal of the Soviet Union. It is necessary to destroy Capitalism, and the 3 class system, to create a Communist. Cultural Marxism is the instrument Progressive Democrats use, to create the racial issues needed, to force an end to the class system. FemInism is another focus of Cultural Marxism. The educational system is the means used to indoctrinate students in the Critical Theories of Cultural Marxism. Remember it’s the Democrat that promotes Social Equality and Distrubution of Wealth. These are Marxist theories found in the Communist Manifesto. Terms commonly used by Barack Obama.
I encourage you to read about the Frankfurt school (from primary sources) before dismissing cultural Marxism as some sort of “conspiracy theory”, sincerely. If it only takes a quick glance at perspectives to develop your own, then you’re simply perpetuating, i’d argue, the ignorance which you & your blog seek to dissolve.
“It came off as an anti-political correctness rant so I was going to close out when anti-racism caught my eye. If the site was against anti-racism, did it then support racism?”
If you are against animal shelters,does that mean you support leaving baby kittens out in the rain?
If you are against using pesticides on crops, does that mean you are FOR mass starvation?
If you are against Muslim terrorists shooting up gay bars, does that mean you are for Donald Trump’s Muslim ban?
If you are against the Ku Klux Klan, does that mean you support the U.N.-recognized Boer Genocide?
“But this is what conservatives point to when they talk about the country they want us all to go back to; a facade. “Leave it to Beaver” wasn’t real. It was a TV show. Nostalgia isn’t real. It’s good memories replacing history. The country conservatives are imagining is only a fever dream. That America only exists now as an incredibly sanitized Utopia of what never was, passing for what used to be.”
Oh,you mean sort of like the institutional racism and White Privilege leftists are constantly screaming about?
“Essentially, this concept can conceivably be traced as the root of much conservative rhetoric. Resistance to change. Denial of facts. Refusal to compromise. Blind hatred of all things liberal. Fear and loathing of immigrants, non-white ethnic groups, homosexuals, and empowered women. It helps explain why people vote Republican even when it is economically harmful for them to do so. Hatred is a powerful motivator.”
The awesome thing about this article is all the proof you provide for fantastic claims you make about what motivates people who are different from you. Obviously since you believe it, and you are liberal and therefore never wrong about anything, it’s 100% true.
“That America never existed, not really. Post War America was Pre-Civil Rights. Senator Joe McCarthy and his Communist witch hunts were the undercurrent of society. If you were a white middle class man, then you were on top of the world. Everyone else? Not so much.”
In that time, how many laws were on the books which codified a White middle class male advantage in society into law,an advantage equivalent to Title 9 or Affirmative Action or racial set-asides in housing or medical care?
Since there are laws like that for non-Whites and have been for 30 or so years before I was born, why should I give a crap about “everyone else”?
When America was founded, it was 90+% White. None of the ideas this country was founded on came from non-White people,they all came from European White people. Ideas like the “melting pot” and “give us your wretched refuse” were introduced into the culture and a concerted effort was made by anti-American agitators,such as the Communists (who were mostly jews) McCarthy talked about,which have been confirmed to have been real by papers released by the Kremlin, to change America from a Republic for White Europeans to a democracy (communist-lite) for people from backwards communist-leaning cultures,and finally into a globalist oligarchy run by and for jews, which liberals serve as willing poodleboys.
There are over 50 nations for black people. No one is ever going to tell them to accept being a minority in any one of these nations.
There are over 50 nations for Arabs. No one is ever going to tell them to accept being a minority in any one of these nations.
There are a score of nations for Asian people. No one will ever tell them they have to accept being a minority in any one of these nations.
There are nations all over South and Central America populated almost exclusively by Latinos, no one will ever tell Chileans they must accept being a minority in Chile.
Jews are the world’s tiniest minority, at around 2% of the global population. There is a nation for Jews.
Blacks nations have the most people, followed by Asians. They are allowed to have countries where only people of their race live and are never called racist or xenophobic for this. Jews have the smallest population, and they are allowed to have a Jewish nation.
European White people are 6% of the world’s population.
In every single nation founded by White European people,they are told that they must accept being a minority in their own nation or they are racist and hateful. Essentially, what liberals are saying to White people is that their existence is hateful and racist and they must be exterminated.
They cannot be saying anything else.
Blacks have a greater world population share, and there’s no issue at all with them having countries exclusively for blacks.
Jews have fewer numbers and half of them think they’re White from time to time, and nobody with any clout tells AIPAC or the ADL that they’re racist Jewish Supremacists.
Nobody goes to these people’s countries, changes their laws and culture to the point where they are unrecognizable and then sneers “You’re just afraid of losing your black supremacy”.
I mean, let’s be honest here. What you guys call institutional racism and White supremacy is simply a function of the fact that you’re non-White people squatting in a country founded and built by White people.
If a White person were to go to any black,latino,Arab or Asian nation.They would experience the same “othering” (as it’s called in your faggy postmodern jewspeak) that non-Whites complain of in the U.S.,Canada,Britain,etc.
And they have every right to do this, apparently. None of you ever complain that China is too Chinese. Whites have every right to have a country made up of and governed in the interest of Whites. There is absolutely no good reason why they don’t. None of us ever voted to become a minority in our own countries.
If you put the vote to the people, they would vote no overwhelmingly and so would every other racial group.
tl; dr
so much wrong, here
Question: Has your family finally hit the level of inbreeding necessary for asexual reproduction? And if so, mitosis or meiosis?
The fact of the matter is that whites destroyed the original owners of this country in order to make their white homeland. It’s not ours to own.
you may look at the “Sad Puppies” & “Rabid Puppies” whackiness in the light of the cultural
marxism thing. Lots of weird right wingers went off the rails screaming about
the Hugo Awards and “SJW” or “Social Justice Warriors”… and whinging
about how cruel the Hugo’s and Science Fiction Fans are.
Jurgen Habermas and Michael Foucault were also critical theorists of the Frankfurt School evolving out of Marxist theory but I would not use the term “cultural Marxists” to describe them.
You realize this upshot of “white pride” is directly related to the militant activities of the Black Lives Matter organization?
Yes. Racists, historically, tend to get especially active any time black folks start organizing around civil rights.
And the funny thing is, the same people who claim superiority (meaning… superior in every way), claim that they are being overtaken/overrun. I feel like superiority would imply absolute dominance without a need for fear.
What a bunch of fags, always knew you Commies were ankle-grabbing dick suckers.
Deo Vindice
Sic Semper Tyrannis
Molon Labe
Vote Trump! Help expel the diseased Mestizos, corrupt Asians, primitive Africans & bloodthirsty Muslim hordes that have entered the USA illegally.
Too late gringo. You will be assimilated, resistance is futile. You will know in your own flesh the horror you Imperialist dogs put us through.,
Well you sure proved the point!
You should apologize… for calling yourself an American.
Cultural Marxists write sophistry like “Repressive Tolerance”, sane people , of all races creeds and colors, wish you would either return to the asylum or learn how to reason.
They reason, fine. IF ONLY you did. FIRST lesson for you, Mr. Burns, there is only one race. People IGNORANTLY think pigmentation denotes different races but they are wrong. THAT MEANS, people like me are not required to pretend this FALSE belief is relevant or real
I was under the impression that ‘cultural marxism’ was originated with the John Birch Society. As is much of the current Tea Party platform.
“cultural marxism ” is made up concept as well as culture is socially constructed. Marx, yes talking about the relation of men and women, famility, the role of women in our capitalist society, but all and everything together have to do with the relation of production, the modo of production, and the place of the individual in in the modo of production. The relation of production and the modo of production are the forces that determine the social economical-cultural relation of individuo and society. Values and culture are established by the ruling clases and its institutions which are used as instrument of force to coerce and subordinate men and women and their way of thinking and inducing us to fashionable consumption.
so, if you dislike it, you then just sweep that which is disliked as “socially constructed”, per tenets of Marxism, which the author of this blog clearly has never read from primary sources
Any concept can be used to justify any viewpoint if interpreted favorably to your cause.
In the case of Cultural Marxism being used to justify hatred of the people you mentioned I would concede that some people on the right are hateful – I have certainly met many on the left who are nasty and intolerant too. The problem is that because being a true conservative and traditionalist is increasingly becoming demonized – the remaining right wingers are just the extremists with nothing to lose. And where is the demonisation coming from ? Decades and decades of Cultural Marxism. And you could also argue that covert KGB influences from the 1930s have also directly eroded and attacked America to bring it to where it is today.
So effective and real is this force that you can see how being a white heterosexual male is somehow deficient. If you are anti-immigration you are a racist. If you are anti-gay-marriage you are homophobic. If you believe that it is a noble thing for a woman to stay at home and be a full-time mother you are sexist. If you somehow highlight that key positions in media, finance, and politics are disproportionately occupied by Jewish people, you are an anti-semite, The list goes on and on. The technique of name-calling is used to jam the arguments and to shame you in to silence. To keep the truth muffled. Intelligent people do not name-call they win with a better argument because they are confident of their case. But intelligence is dangerous and also the enemy of CM.
Another point is that when we discuss these issues we can be assured that CM is effectively the same as multiculturalism and also political correctness. You can use them interchangeably.
Ironically multiculturalism promotes, what is seeks (at least on the packaging) to destroy, and that is racism. Can anyone tell me how much racism would exist in a country that was populated by a single ethnicity? Can anyone tell me how many race-riots have been experienced in Japan – an ethnic monoculture?
So in summary – yes there are nasty elements to any political agenda – but to deny the existence of Cultural Marxism is truly the biggest self-denial. And while the romanticized past is not necessarily the truth, I can tell you the dystopian future is now. Open your eyes and see the real effects of mass third world immigration and the corrosive damage of CM.
>>>”These are the people who vote. They turn out for every election and primary. What makes people like this extremely dangerous is their absolute surety of moral correctness. They are right. They will not be swayed. If you oppose them, then you are the enemy. You are beneath them.”
I agree. The problem is people who think they’re right, think they’re right. They never take one second to question their beliefs. They don’t have tolerance towards ideas they disagree with. That’s the danger of ideology whether its left or right.
>>>”Essentially, this concept can conceivably be traced as the root of much conservative rhetoric. Resistance to change. Denial of facts. Refusal to compromise.”
If there was a study released today that said men were able to process mathmatics faster than women what do you think the reaction would be? Lets say for the sake of argument that this study was vetted and passed the rigors of peer review and most experts in that field said it was very convincing.
Do you think feminists would be against it? Do you think feminists would give a damn about the actual science? No of course not. They would just be pissed at the mere argument of men being superior than women at something, even though the study didn’t make that argument, it was just reporting facts.
I think what you’re doing is seeing other people’s dirty houses but have a inability to see look around and see your dirty house. Both the right and the left deny facts when its goes against their ideology. Both sides refuse to compromise because of their absolute nature of their ideology, and both sides hate various identity groups. The difference being that cultural marxists don’t see hating white people as anything objectionable or if hating white people is even possible because as a oppressor class they can’t be oppressed or some junk like that.
>>>”What do all people railing against Cultural Marxism have in common? They are white. They hold conservative values. Many of them call themselves Christian. And what policies do they support in order to “take America back?””
I’m not white. Someone like Shelby Steele isn’t white. Thomas Sowell isn’t white. Not that it should matter. Of course if you’re not white you’re immediately labled a Uncle Tom or “person brainwashed into loving their oppressor” according to cultural marxists.
>>>”It came off as an anti-political correctness rant so I was going to close out when anti-racism caught my eye. If the site was against anti-racism, did it then support racism?”
No. Its like “Anti-terrorism”. It would be like someone like Dick Cheney using “anti-terrorism” to get everything he wants. So lets say Dick Cheney produces the “anti-terrorism bill”. Its worded in a way so anyone disagreeing with that bill can be labled as “pro-terrorist” because anyone against “anti-terrorism” is by definition a “pro-terrorist” right?
Basically its word games.
Now “anti-racism” I don’t think is used by the actual anti-racists but basically I interpret it to mean people who are zealously anti-racist to the point where they’re not even fighting real racism but imagined racism and destroying a lot of innocent lives in the quest to hunt down racism (real or imagined). Its the same thing with “social justice warrior” a seemingly complimentary term that means the opposite.
Ok I guess my reponse was so long it wasn’t allowed to be posted. I’ll have to split it into smaller posts.
My reponse to this.
>>>”There’s no such thing as Cultural Marxism. That’s because Marxism is an economic argument against the capitalistic system.”
You are wrong.
Lets break down Marxism. Yes its superficially about economics and materialism. But lets go deeper.
“The history of all hitherto existing societies is the history of class struggles.”
“Hitherto, every form of society has been based, as we have already seen, on the antagonism of oppressing and oppressed classes.”
Source: The Communist Manifesto
You can easily change a few words and get this.
“The history of all hitherto existing societies is the history of racial struggles.”
“The history of all hitherto existing societies is the history of gender struggles.”
Oppressed and oppressor. You think if you walked into a feminist class today that those two words would be used ad naseum?
What Marx was talking about wasn’t just economics. That’s not what inspired the masses. What he also was talking about was one group of people mistreating another and adding a conspiratorial flavor to it. The burgeoise have always been exploiting the proletariat. And this isn’t because its God’s will but because of a massive effort (conspiracy) by the burgeoise to exploit the workers.
The averge worker might not understand concepts like “exchange value” but they could understand they were being screwed over (they had the personal experience to back that up). All the jargon and elaborate theory was just gravy.
In the same way cultural marxism just exploits people’s existing antagonisms. For example a african-american teenager who is angry about white racism towards blacks is taught by a professor that racism was a “systematic” thing, not just individuals but the entire society that produced it.
Or a woman going to a feminist classroom and learning about the history of men treating women poorly and this wasn’t due to merely bad eggs but the entire structure of the society creating the hostiliy that fostered that mistreatment.
Sorry for being longwinded but basically Marxism wasn’t just about economics, it was about jargon, eleborate theory, dialectical and conspiracy oriented. Which is exactly whats happening now with cultural marxism, only switch “workers and burgeoise) with “whites and nonwhites” or “hetero and homosexuals” or “cis and transgender” or “men and women”. In a nutshell its basically “oppressor and oppressed” theory. If you’re white you’re basically born with the original sin of racism and slavery whether you actually committed those things or not. Its just a neat way to justify hating a entire group of people based on the (past) actions of a few. I think there’s a word for that…
Sorry if I end up triple posting my long reply. Its not showing up so I assumed it didn’t post so I tried to post again and again. I must be heard!
I am soooo misinformed. All these years I thought Marx simply wrote a criticism of capitalism!
“Few people know” what “cultural Marxism” is because it is a figment of the conservative mind.
“Chauncey,” Well said. -dlj.
Nope. I’m sure people thought communism and marxism were nutjob figments of someone’s imagination too back in the 19th century.
Nope, but nice logical fallacy, Fernando. Try again.
Excellent work! Shared~
Chad–
Couple of quick hits. First, I disagree with some of Rusty Inman’s response…but not enough to get excited about.
I think Rusty is correct there is such a thing as “cultural Marxism,” but that refers to writers who focus on changes and impacts on culture, that come from a “Marxist” model of how societies grow and change. Arguably, As Rusty points out, Eric Fromm could be considered such a person. But I think Herbert Marcuse would be a better example, especially in his book, One Dimensional Man.
THAT SAID…when Marx published the first volume of Capital in 1867, his main focus was that societies and economic systems changed/evolved, similar to the model Charles Darwin suggested in On the Origin of Species (Capital was dedicated to Darwin, for helping to inspire Marx). So, Marx was trying to show societies were dynamic, not static; that economics was the driving force for change; and that those changes/adaptations were materialist…meaning, the proverbial hand of god was not a factor. Radical stuff in 1867…now, not so much.
So, when you say “Marxism is an economic argument against the capitalistic system. Therefore, if you aren’t dealing with capitalism, you aren’t dealing with Marxism,” that’s not correct. Marx would argue that capitalism was a tremendous improvement over feudalism (which itself was an improvement over slavery based economies). However, as methods of production become more efficient, and the division of labour becomes greater, production will become “socialized”–meaning, you don’t weave your own clothes or cobble your own shoes. In fact, people don’t make any one thing, because it’s more efficient to have an individual worker perform one small part of a job.
As production becomes more socialized, then other forms of economic organization become equally socialized….for example, you have fire insurance not to create a savings account somewhere if your house burns down, but because it makes economic sense to “share” and pro rate the risk of a catastrophic disaster–like your house burning down.
If anyone reading these comments has any interest in this topic, I strongly recommend James Burke’s excellent book, The Day the Universe Changed. The chapter “Fit to Rule” is a wonderful summary of what led up to Darwin’s publication of On the Origin of Species, and how Darwin’s theory was used by Herbert Spencer and the Americans; by Marx, and how Marx was (sort of) adapted by the then “Socialist bloc;” and finally, how Darwin was used to justify existing trends of racism and antisemitism.
Again, I quibble. Chad is correct that when the folks he’s writing about say “cultural Marxism,” what they really mean is “peepee poopoo head,” only they’re concerned that sounds undignified–or won’t adequately express their level of concern on the loss of white male supremacy….which is really the main point of his article.
Bill,
Marxism has two components.
One is a strictly 19th century materialist view of reality, which was blown away in the wind of quantum mechanics in the 1920’s.
The other is that “Hegel turned on its head” dialectic which was going to make the proletarian revolution automatic. Even if a person took the turgid, slightly warped Hegelianism seriously, the experience of proletarian Germany and Britain, and agricultural Russia and China, during the twentieth century finished off the Karl Marx version of it.
“Cultural Marxism,” this supposed fad sweeping America, is a recent invention of the wingnut wind machine, and what it means is their peculiar version of “Political Correctness.” It doesn’t exist outside the right-wing blogoswamp.
Culturally Marx was a zero, a very dull thudd. He was a book-bound atheist who got the maid pregnant and spent a lot of time in the library, so the idea is mildly amusing.
Nothing more. Not worth worrying over. Goes on the compost heap, along with Social Credit, the Illuminati, and “Mitt Romney Elected!” Will rot and dissolve into the ground like the rest.
-dlj.
>>>“Cultural Marxism,” this supposed fad sweeping America, is a recent invention of the wingnut wind machine, and what it means is their peculiar version of “Political Correctness.” It doesn’t exist outside the right-wing blogoswamp.”
Lets use get out of abstract theory and use a real life example.
Lets say a man was accused of rape by a woman. This man was rich and white. A feminist group then campaigned viciously to get this man arrested and convincted of the rape. They banged pots outside his house, they launched social media campaigns.
The man’s defenders laid out a case that he wasn’t guilty and they provided a logical argument and even evidence for why the man was not guilty of rape. For the sake of argument lets say the rape was specifically violent forceful rape between strangers.
Eventually the man is arrested, charged, then found guilty in a court of law and sent to prison.
Later its revealed that the man didn’t rape the woman based on inconclusive evidence. The man is set free. The woman who falsey accused the man of rape gets no punishment and the feminist group that viciously launched a campaign to get the man arrested and sent to prison doesn’t apologize, the most they come up with is he’s a privileged white man who only spent a few days in prison so he wasn’t harmed.
Now what was in the minds of those feminists that lead them to launch a campaign to get that man in prison? What was in the minds of those feminists that closed their minds to any evidence or argument that the man was innocent?
I would content its the ideology of cultural marxism. If your entire worldview revolves around oppressor and oppressed. That men oppress woman (never the other way around) then OF COURSE you’re always going to believe a man (especially if he’s rich and white) raped the woman. If fact its inconcevable that he couldn’t have raped the woman, that possibility is beyond the real of their imagination.
Cultural Marxism is just one form of ideology only its sprinkled with marxist jargon and theory. Just because conservatives are wrong about a lot of things doesn’t mean everything they say is false.
@Bill: I think your reference to Marcuse is right on target. He did, indeed, come to mind when I was thinking about Chad’s article but, being more familiar with Fromm and Horney per Critical Theory and feeling more at home with fundamentally therapeutic practitioners such as Fromm and Horney, they more came to mind and I felt on more solid ground when discussing them.
I look forward to taking a look at the volume by James Burke that you mentioned. It sounds both pertinent and illuminating. Thanks for the heads-up.
Chad,
A good piece on a topic which is, like many culturally tinged dust-ups, a wilderness of mirrors. Well done.
-DLJ.
I very much appreciated your column. It occasionally devolves from illumination into rant but, given the voices arrayed against what is clearly an agenda-driven, revisionist, straw-man version of “Cultural Marxism,” an occasional descent into rant may well be justified and even applauded.
I am interested in your assertion that “there is no such thing as Cultural Marxism.” The statement seems to be based on the belief that Marxism was/is limited to economic theory in general and an economic theory based on opposition to capitalist principles in particular, which would be a simple if not simplistic understanding of Marxist and neo-Marxist thinking/theory.
While more orthodox and, in my opinion, limited Marxist thinkers would disagree, it seems intellectually untenable to imagine that the economic theorems developed by Marx could in any way, manner or form be understood apart from his societal and political theorems—they exist as one and, indeed, are each part and parcel of that which is referenced as Marxist thought. That cultural critique would inevitably be the offspring of such a union is self-evident; i.e., one cannot think of an established social, political and economic order not sharing its DNA with particularized cultural forms. Hence, to the horror of classical Marxists, their iconic figure carries, among scholars, as much weight in the field of social science as he does in the field of economics.
My own introduction to Cultural Marxism as a hermeneutic came with an early fascination per the work of Erich Fromm and, to a lesser extent, Karen Horney. Though later criticized—both rightly and wrongly, depending—by strict Freudians as having minimized aspects of Freudian theory, Fromm’s “Escape from Freedom” and several of his later works are considered foundational for Critical Theory. I, oddly enough, employed elements of both Fromm and Horney per theological studies.
That “Cultural Marxism” has become a target for social and cultural supremacists and xenophobes was eminently predictable. And the cringe-worthy assessments of it popularized by ideologues posing as intellectuals is laughably projective, given that the American Right is an ideologically-driven movement criticizing as “nothing more than another leftist ideology” a context of thought that holds ideology to be one of the foremost barriers to human freedom.
It has been some time since I was provoked to think at much depth about “Cultural Marxism.” Your column was exactly the encouragement I needed to stop watching old offensive cut-ups from coaching days and dive back into piles of yellowing notes and papers that remind me of grand times as a graduate student who could probably have been quite content to remain in that role forever.
“That “Cultural Marxism” has become a target for social and cultural supremacists and xenophobes was eminently predictable.”
I would agree with that 100%. A consistent theme we see from the far right, whether it be 2nd amendment rights or women’s reproductive views is one of finger pointing at the destruction of there already held belief in what society should be. The right often employs God or other social mechanisms in an attempt to justify its’ already intransigent views. Having any excuse to use the term ‘Marxism’ is a golden feather in their sheath of arrows. It harkens back to the Mccarthy hearings of the 50’s. The despotic view that all views counter there own are inherently evil in nature and anti-democratic in nature. Any discussion of Marx or for that matter any political and historical figure that does not sit neatly into there belief system is castigated as being un-American. The truth of the matter that many of these right wing’nuts’ disregard any pretence of understanding anything beyond the scope of what they already believe to be true. There is no and will be no attempt to listen to other opinions regardless of the evidence presented before them. The are set in stone and not even a covering of lime could erode there belief in the moral wrongs in society and the sources of it being liberalism.
“‘Marxism’ is a golden feather in their sheath of arrows. It harkens back to the Mccarthy hearings of the 50’s.”
I would agree with this. The problem is there is no word that has been invented for IT yet so “cultural marxism” is what I use because its the closest word to IT. Now to liberals like yourselves and everyone else here IT isn’t even a thing. IT is a figment of a racist conservatives imagination but I assure you IT is a thing.
The problem with “cultural marxism” as a term is its too tied up in the Frankfurt schools and Jews and all that so invalidates the legimimate things.
My definition of cultural marxism: a theory using marxist jargon where everyone is grouped into either the oppressor or oppressed class. With the classes involving race or gender instead of economic classes.
Thats it. Are you going to tell me that doesn’t exist? Please go to a feminist class in a university near you and tell me that’s not what they’re teaching. They’re not teaching Mary Wollstonecraft that’s for sure.
so, if you dislike it, you then just sweep that which is disliked as “socially constructed”, per tenets of Marxism, which the author of this blog clearly has never read from primary sources
Factual Error or Typo >>>
“Frederic Wertham was largely responsible for the implementation of the Comics Code Authority. The CAA largely eliminated violence, sex, and horror images as it apparently caused juvenile delinquency. What the CAA actually did was give corporate dominance to a handful of companies while eliminating their major competition. This helped make America “good,” remember.”
That should Be CCA…. not CAA !!!
Corrected. Thank you.