SAVE ME WHITE JESUS – Conspiracy and the illusion of traditional alt-right masculine ideal.

It is September 29th 2020, the presidential debate is in full swing. Trump fails to condemn white supremacy, instead declaring ‘Proud Boys – Stand back and stand by’.

Fast forward a few months.

It is 2021, Biden has won the 2020 US presidential election, Trump’s ‘reign’ is coming to an end. So begins, what some can only explain as an alt-right coup d’état of the US Capitol.

SAVE ME WHITE JESUS, a performative paper by Phil Barber (n.d), comprising of slides, images and text; addresses the familiar, yet unfamiliar paradigms of white masculinity. Inspired by the imagery of the Capitol Hill riots, the piece tells an abstract story of the heedless role conspiracy plays in the illusion of traditional alt-right masculine ideal.

Images from the riot revealed that the perpetrators were primarily white men, armed with anger, hate, and purpose; all provided by the Trump rally of the previous day and perhaps the alluring message sent out to the Proud Boys on September 29th 2020. They flaunted displays, of what could be seen, as white masculinity at its ultimate peak; an attraction to aggression (Scaptura and Boyle 2021). Barber (n.d.) refers to these displays and bares alikeness in them, to Captain America, Mark Wahlberg, and Connor McGregor; alluding to toxic masculinity as a driving force for the men involved in the riot.

Arguably, these men were as far from consumed by toxic masculinity, as much enthused by sheer hate for the left-wing and for skin colour that didn’t fit their ideals. Notwithstanding this, it is conceivable that the way in which they acted, was mirroring, that which the patriarchy delivers as the epitome of being inherently masculine. As Thompson (1982 cited by Polizzi 2021) suggests social imaginaries are often ideologically driven by expectations of society. The social imaginaries of the alt-right, paired with the digital environment in which the riot was manifested, resulted in a utopian idea of their own.

Utopian thinking relies on the discussion of both the dystopian as well as utopian (Polizzi 2021). In the case of the riot, the dystopian view of an entitled angry white man (Kimmel 2017) was that his country was stolen from him and he needed to take it back.

Barber (n.d) signifies the riot as, ”as much protest as it was a mass audition”. This equation between the violence shown at the riots and white masculinity, it could be contended, came from a lack of media literacy. Barber (Ibid) also mentions ‘white masculinity…pieced together via memes and chatrooms and backyard-brawl videos…”, signifying that the concepts these men have about their masculinity partially originates from digital content. Arguing they fell prey to conspiracy, through lack of media literacy (Craft et al 2017), does at a glance make sense, however, does not fully show, that had they been media literate, they would not form these toxic and racist ‘utopian’ ideologies.

Regardless of media literacy and the displays of toxic masculinity, the actions of these men should not be excused, nor should the consequences be forgotten.

References

Barber, P., n.d. SAVE ME WHITE JESUS.

Craft, S., Ashley, S. and Maksl, A., 2017. News media literacy and conspiracy theory endorsement. Communication and the Public, 2 (4).

Kimmel, M., 2017. Angry white men. New York: Nation Books.

Polizzi, G., 2021. Internet users’ utopian/dystopian imaginaries of society in the digital age: Theorizing critical digital literacy and civic engagement. New Media & Society.

Scaptura, M. and Boyle, K., 2021. Protecting Manhood: Race, Class, and Masculinity in Men’s Attraction to Guns and Aggression. Men and Masculinities.

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