Magic the gathering, Warhammer, Video Games, even fantasy and scifi fiction, they all have had big I fights with right wingers in the last decade. The only exception I can think of maybe (MAYBE) would be DnD. Thoughts?

  • shitshow [any]
    ·
    4 years ago

    Umberto Eco has 14 points about the aesthetics of fascism. Some of them apply to 40k fashies and the like.

    6.] Ur-Fascism derives from individual or social frustration. That is why one of the most typical features of the historical fascism was the appeal to a frustrated middle class, a class suffering from an economic crisis or feelings of political humiliation, and frightened by the pressure of lower social groups. In our time, when the old “proletarians” are becoming petty bourgeois (and the lumpen are largely excluded from the political scene), the fascism of tomorrow will find its audience in this new majority.

    11.] In such a perspective everybody is educated to become a hero. In every mythology the hero is an exceptional being, but in Ur-Fascist ideology, heroism is the norm. This cult of heroism is strictly linked with the cult of death. It is not by chance that a motto of the Falangists was Viva la Muerte (in English it should be translated as “Long Live Death!”). In non-fascist societies, the lay public is told that death is unpleasant but must be faced with dignity; believers are told that it is the painful way to reach a supernatural happiness. By contrast, the Ur-Fascist hero craves heroic death, advertised as the best reward for a heroic life. The Ur-Fascist hero is impatient to die. In his impatience, he more frequently sends other people to death.

    1. ]Since both permanent war and heroism are difficult games to play, the Ur-Fascist transfers his will to power to sexual matters. This is the origin of machismo (which implies both disdain for women and intolerance and condemnation of nonstandard sexual habits, from chastity to homosexuality). Since even sex is a difficult game to play, the Ur-Fascist hero tends to play with weapons – doing so becomes an ersatz phallic exercise.

    I think these three points generally apply to the "don't put minorities and women into muh vidyagaymes" crowd. As "nerd culture" became more mainstream, they went harder into their niches, feeling they lost control of a subculture that was once overwhelmingly white and male.