"Who wins or loses is less important than the effect," the Guardian reported. "With already two assassination attempts on Donald Trump and both mainstream parties more at rhetorical war than ever before, they see signs of hope the US government is beginning to lose control of the country."
This was highlighted, said the report, by a poll on one of the far-right Telegram channels, offering the options “Trump wins, civil war kicks off” and “Kamala ‘wins,’ civil war kicks off.”
Respondents to this survey seemed gleeful at either prospect, with one neo-Nazi user saying, “I say accelerate, I just can’t keep living in this degenerate hellhole indefinitely. I just want something to happen so a bunch of us can die trying, at least.”
Another far-right account on a different Telegram channel said voting was pointless: “You’re being deceived, get back in the bunker. Collapse is how we win.”
"Accelerationism" is the idea, popular among far-right extremists, that the whole of society must be destroyed, or at least its decline hastened, in order for a new society to be built from the ashes.
In one recent incident in Tennessee inspired by this ideology, federal agents arrested a neo-Nazi activist for allegedly trying to destroy an electrical substation with a drone armed with C-4, with the idea that the collapse of the power grid would hasten a race war.
Clara Broekaert, who studies far-right extremism around the world for the Soufan Center, told the Guardian this development spells a new risk of domestic terrorism.
“For U.S. national security," said Broekaert, "this signifies the emergence of a faction within society that believes fundamental disagreements over values and policies can no longer be resolved through democratic engagement. Instead, they view destruction — chaos, conflict and collapse — as the necessary means to achieve their goals.”
First: this is a very self-selected group of punks talking to each other online and eagerly agreeing about what needs to happen, while also waiting for it to happen for them..
These guys, IOW. The ones parading their “long guns” until nobody was shocked anymore. That’s when carrying rifles to get hamburgers became a hassle. Those two probably still get together and talk with their friends about the revolution that’s bound to come. Not that they will do anything to make it happen. They probably don’t carry their guns to McDonald’s any more, either. Why bother? Been there, done that.
Send a drone into a substation to explode? Who are these idiots. Most of the state of Texas lost power and water (without power, the pumps don’t work) for one of the coldest weeks on record. There was no race war, even though people froze to death! We didn’t even storm the Governor’s mansion and demand his head on a pike. Mostly because we were too damned cold, and we’d have used the torches for fires just to warm up.
Idiots.
They won’t even “accelerate” the collapse they want to happen. And they want it to happen because they can’t imagine it, any more than they can imagine their own deaths (one of those two is inevitable). They are steeped in popular culture portrayals of apocalypse (nuclear; social collapse; zombies; distinctions without a difference), where they will be the action heroes rather than zombie fodder.
Children and fools.
As I say, they won’t even “accelerate” this decline; they expect it to be done for them, and a handful imagine they have more power than they do, or that complexity falls if you just remove the right building block (neither structural nor social engineering are their strong suits). They’re as dangerous as the fat guys waiting for their tacos and chicken sandwiches. Ignore them and they’ll go away.
Hell, I live in Texas. This place is synonymous with gun culture. But I never see anyone packing a concealed weapon in their shorts and t-shirt ensemble. Rifles at the grocery store? Yeah, right. They made a lot of noise about carrying guns where ever they wanted. We ignored them and the guns went away. Road rage shootings are still a staple of local news, but nobody wants to start a race war over it. We don’t even get particularly perturbed about school/church shootings anymore. (When you tally up the number of them in Texas this century, it’s quite appalling). Violence will cause a race war? An election will spark a civil war? Maybe in the Turner Diaries, but not IRL.
And these idiots on Telegram think the government is “losing control of the country”? After 1000 of their fellow idiots were prosecuted for J6? They didn’t even choke the system, much less overwhelm it. About half-a-dozen were convicted of sedition, a crime charged so infrequently charged smart money said such indictments were a bad idea; until they weren’t. Sure, guys, FAFO. And then whine when you get dragged out of Mommy’s basement and stand before a judge.
These are the “wing’d and with awe, inviolable”? As if. These clowns may well believe:
… fundamental disagreements over values and policies can no longer be resolved through democratic engagement. Instead, they view destruction — chaos, conflict and collapse — as the necessary means to achieve their goals.”
They have absolutely no means of seriously acting on it. And no real desire to. They want someone else to do it, while they reap the rewards of rising to their rightful place atop the heap of the “new society.”
Idiots.
