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I want to talk about one of the most dangerous and destructive weapons ever crafted: the myth of American Exceptionalism.
It's protected slavery, legitimized genocide, and is the reason we're failing now.
Here's what I learned writing AMERICAN RULE.
1/ https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/611439/american-rule-by-jared-yates-sexton/
It's protected slavery, legitimized genocide, and is the reason we're failing now.
Here's what I learned writing AMERICAN RULE.
1/ https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/611439/american-rule-by-jared-yates-sexton/
I went on a rant about this on yesterday's Muckrake Podcast, because it's obvious that we're suffering through this pandemic and our economic crisis because we're lost in this myth of exceptionalism, and it's destroying our country, costing us lives.
2/ https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-american-exceptionalism-turned-into-ugly-americanism/id1489093693?i=1000486358310
2/ https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-american-exceptionalism-turned-into-ugly-americanism/id1489093693?i=1000486358310
From the very beginning, America has peddled this myth that we are a chosen country, that we are the heroes of history and the arbiters of the will of the universe.
It's propaganda. It's ALWAYS been propaganda.
We're a nation. We're heroes sometimes, we're villains others.
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It's propaganda. It's ALWAYS been propaganda.
We're a nation. We're heroes sometimes, we're villains others.
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The truth is our founding was a messy moment in history. Though our Declaration of Independence declared a gospel of equality and freedom, our Constitution was crafted with an explicitly hierarchical bent by wealthy, slaveholding white men focused on protecting their power.
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To hide the control within the Constitution, the myth of exceptionalism was used to place a "holy spirit" and "divine inspiration" in our history
Our founding was wrapped in religious iconography and superstition, the presence of a God picking America as his champion created
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Our founding was wrapped in religious iconography and superstition, the presence of a God picking America as his champion created
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It is no surprise to anyone reading this that this religious myth of American Exceptionalism hides the brutal treatment of America's slaves, human beings born into bondage, tortured, raped, mistreated.
The idea that this was necessary is just...as disgusting as it gets.
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The idea that this was necessary is just...as disgusting as it gets.
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However, the myth of American Exceptionalism and America as God's hero continued, and inspired ideologies like Manifest Destiny, which have been celebrated in our culture/education for generations.
It was all a lie though, an excuse for white supremacist genocide.
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It was all a lie though, an excuse for white supremacist genocide.
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The story of America conquering the continent in the name of exceptionalism, in carrying out "God's will" is just a white supremacist trope that hides the brutal genocide of the Native people.
It makes their eradication and suffering good and necessary.
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It makes their eradication and suffering good and necessary.
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This idea of a white supremacist God choosing America, enabling genocide, slavery, and blatant white supremacy, is what animated the Confederacy, which believed it was the true inheritor of God's will.
The CSA believed they were the real America.
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The CSA believed they were the real America.
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The CSA, as I've written about, was a white supremacist, Christian fascist state. But they operated based on the ideas of the Founding and the conversations had in the Constitutional Convention.
It was continued, hierarchical, white supremacist rule.
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It was continued, hierarchical, white supremacist rule.
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With Abraham Lincoln's assassination following the Civil War, America's myth of Exceptionalism continued with its religion, making Lincoln a martyr and portraying the country as being washed clean in his blood.
It was a nationalist, Christian baptism.
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It was a nationalist, Christian baptism.
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In this "new" America scrubbed clean of white supremacy, Lincoln became a Christ figure (his death mourned on Black Easter), Washington the "Father," and Americanism our "Holy Spirit."
It was a nationalist, Christian faith, an incredibly potent and dangerous mythology.
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It was a nationalist, Christian faith, an incredibly potent and dangerous mythology.
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White supremacy didn't go away though, we weren't scrubbed clean.
We used our new position and our new religious mythology to take over other countries, particularly non-white countries, who believed were incapable of self-governance.
We were again God's chosen country.
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We used our new position and our new religious mythology to take over other countries, particularly non-white countries, who believed were incapable of self-governance.
We were again God's chosen country.
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Later, as times changed, we began internalizing the idea that we were God's chosen champion, and when "threats" like the Communist Revolution reared their heads, we believed we were under attack by evil forces.
Again, this is Christian dogma.
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Again, this is Christian dogma.
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Because we were "perfect" and "God's chosen nation," we reacted to any civil rights protests or protests in general by assuming they were in bad-faith and evil.
We believed it was a plot against us, something out of the Book of Revelation, and reacted with violence.
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We believed it was a plot against us, something out of the Book of Revelation, and reacted with violence.
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One thing you have to understand, with nationalist myths, is that there has to be a belief in "conspirators" and "traitors" that explains when things go wrong.
If the country has God's will, after all, losses and failures have to be blamed on someone or something else.
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If the country has God's will, after all, losses and failures have to be blamed on someone or something else.
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This myth of the "Knife in the Back" was used by Adolf Hitler to explain Germany's troubles. Germany, like the US, was held captive by a nationalist myth of being the universe's chosen nation and people.
This nationalist myth leads to fascism and the conspiracy powers it.
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This nationalist myth leads to fascism and the conspiracy powers it.
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In the "perfect" United States, there had to be a reason why African Americans protested for equal rights.
After all, we had been "scrubbed clean" of white supremacy with Lincoln's death and the Civil War.
The explanation was that it was a conspiracy against the US.
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After all, we had been "scrubbed clean" of white supremacy with Lincoln's death and the Civil War.
The explanation was that it was a conspiracy against the US.
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Neo-Confederate preachers like Jerry Falwell opposed desegregation and Civil Rights, preaching that God had "drawn a line of distinction" and that equality was sinful.
He portrayed protesters as bad-faith, communist actors, and claimed they were devilish.
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He portrayed protesters as bad-faith, communist actors, and claimed they were devilish.
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To understand the modern moment, you have to look at this moment in history and see that Civil Rights was portrayed as a communist conspiracy, its leaders as anti-American, as terrorists.
This is what the Right does. It relies on that religious, nationalist myth.
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This is what the Right does. It relies on that religious, nationalist myth.
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What happens is that protesters are considered traitors, terrorists, conspirators, they're motivated by anti-American actors, part of a satanic conspiracy against "God's chosen country."
They're met with brutality. Injured. Beaten. Murdered. All in "self-defense."
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They're met with brutality. Injured. Beaten. Murdered. All in "self-defense."
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Any conversation about the modern moment would be remiss if we didn't talk about how the Neo-Confederate American myth married with Ronald Reagan and how we ended up in this bizarre, dangerous situation where reality is completely warped and many Americans lost in paranoia.
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Reagan is the modern Right's inspiration as he resurrected the idea of American Exceptionalism after the tumult of the 1970's, claiming that America should be "a shining city on the hill," a beacon for the world, a champion in God and freedom's name.
It was a civic revival.
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It was a civic revival.
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Reagan's revival of American Exceptionalism and the Shining City On The Hill was planted with a myth he told about how the Founding was divinely inspired, how an angel appeared and urged Founders to sign the Declaration.
This is a cornerstone of the modern Right.
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This is a cornerstone of the modern Right.
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The only problem is that it never happened. The legend was a lie told by a guru named Manley P. Hall who claimed to divine "ancient knowledge" and gave talks to New Agers like Reagan in California.
It was all a giant hoax and it continues to reverberate to this day.
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It was all a giant hoax and it continues to reverberate to this day.
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What Hall believed, and relayed to Reagan, was that America was a project of freedom and liberty that'd been created through God's will and centuries worth of secret societies.
It was bizarre, paranoid, involved rantings about Atlantis, but it inspired Reagan.
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It was bizarre, paranoid, involved rantings about Atlantis, but it inspired Reagan.
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Reagan sold Americans on American Exceptionalism again, the idea that we were God's chosen nation, that we were in a supernatural fight against "Evil," which was whoever opposed us.
It was a supernatural world and we were continually vulnerable to a devilish opponent.
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It was a supernatural world and we were continually vulnerable to a devilish opponent.
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Because Reagan wielded the weapon of American Exceptionalism, his campaign strategists determined they needed to make him the embodiment of American myth.
They laid all their fortunes on this idea, that he could be a living embodiment of American mythologies.
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They laid all their fortunes on this idea, that he could be a living embodiment of American mythologies.
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It worked. Reagan won a landslide reelection and became a mythological character. It didn't matter that he ran up the deficit, hardly worked at all, didn't understand his briefings, and was controlled by conservative think-tanks.
He was a living symbol of exceptionalism.
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He was a living symbol of exceptionalism.
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When the USSR fell, however, America was without its Satanic counterbalance. It needed an opponent that the mythology and nationalist faith could fear and combat.
Unfortunately, the American Right found its next evil right here in the United States.
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Unfortunately, the American Right found its next evil right here in the United States.
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The globalist structure was a project of Reagan and George H.W. Bush, but it came to fruition and NAFTA was signed by Bill Clinton, with the backing of Republicans.
This new economic structure changed everything, and was turned into the New World Order conspiracy.
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This new economic structure changed everything, and was turned into the New World Order conspiracy.
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The New World Order conspiracy theory is a reprisal of antisemitic conspiracies mixed with the American nationalist, Christian mythology.
The Right once more claimed the Left were traitors, in league with a satanic conspiracy to undermine America, God's chosen country.
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The Right once more claimed the Left were traitors, in league with a satanic conspiracy to undermine America, God's chosen country.
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One of the most powerful propagandists of the New World Order conspiracy theory was Roger Ailes and his network Fox News, which quietly peddled the NWO as a constant threat to white Americans without saying it explicitly.
But it was all there. Right under the surface.
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But it was all there. Right under the surface.
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In Fox and the Right's paranoid New World Order fantasy, America was under attack by outsiders, Satanic forces, people of color being manipulated, and liberal traitors.
They were the Knife in the Back, the people responsible for any failure that might take place.
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They were the Knife in the Back, the people responsible for any failure that might take place.
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The disturbing truth is that this bizarre alternate reality is all based on the American Exceptionalism myth, the idea that we're locked in a supernatural, Christian struggle between God and the Devil and that supernatural events are determining our day-to-day evens.
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What Fox and the Right are selling to Americans is a bizarre reality where white people are under attack by traitors and evil forces determined to unseat Christianity and white supremacy.
This has been the Right's call since the Founding of this country, it's only growing.
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This has been the Right's call since the Founding of this country, it's only growing.
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And, as the Left is an antichrist-like figure, it's only natural, in the white-identity Neo-Confederate world, for there to be a balance: a messiah.
Trump is that figure because he has embraced the mantel but also because he embodies the white supremacist ideology.
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Trump is that figure because he has embraced the mantel but also because he embodies the white supremacist ideology.
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The "Deep State" is just the New World Order conspiracy theory with new paint, a brand-new "Knife in the Back" that explains every one of Trump's failing.
Like it was in 1930's Germany, it is an explanation of how a chosen, perfect country and leader could fail.
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Like it was in 1930's Germany, it is an explanation of how a chosen, perfect country and leader could fail.
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With the pandemic, the Knife in the Back tells us that traitors are either creating this crisis to unseat God's country or their using it for nefarious plans
Trump couldn't have failed, after all. America couldn't have failed. They're God's chosen. It has to be a conspiracy
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Trump couldn't have failed, after all. America couldn't have failed. They're God's chosen. It has to be a conspiracy
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This is how the pandemic becomes a satanic conspiracy, a vaccine an attempt at the Christian "Mark of the Beast."
It's another chapter in the white supremacist, nationalistic, Neo-Confederate Christian mythology. God's chosen nation under attack by Satan and traitors.
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It's another chapter in the white supremacist, nationalistic, Neo-Confederate Christian mythology. God's chosen nation under attack by Satan and traitors.
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Once more, protesters asking for protecting and their rights are being portrayed as terrorists, as threats, white supremacists claiming they have to brutalize them, shred the Constitution, and adopt any means necessary
They're evil, after all. They're out to destroy America
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They're evil, after all. They're out to destroy America
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It's this mythological worldview, that American Exceptionalism and our position as God's chosen country, that inspires extralegal measures, brutal attacks, anything to repel evil, anti-American terrorists and traitors.
This isn't just a war, it's a HOLY WAR.
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This isn't just a war, it's a HOLY WAR.
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These things aren't coincidences. They are the means by which white supremacy has protected itself for generations.
The myth of American Exceptionalism happens to be one of the most powerful weapons ever created, and this is how it maintains power
This weaponized paranoia.
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The myth of American Exceptionalism happens to be one of the most powerful weapons ever created, and this is how it maintains power
This weaponized paranoia.
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The only way we can escape this death spiral, is to disabuse ourselves of the myth of American Exceptionalism.
It is a weapon that has been used to hold us down since the beginning, and now, like all nationalist, religious myths, it's dragging us into fascism.
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It is a weapon that has been used to hold us down since the beginning, and now, like all nationalist, religious myths, it's dragging us into fascism.
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