In France’s 2017 election, Marine Le Pen, leader of France’s far-right Front National, was the second most-popular candidate. The party’s surprising electoral success may be a testimony to Le Pen’s efforts to improve the party’s reputation by shedding some of its anti-Semitic and pétainiste rhetoric since taking over its leadership from her father five years prior. Yet, writes Bill Wirtz, most of the change has been cosmetic; the “identitarian” movement that drives the Front National and other likeminded European parties remains, at its core, ugly:
[When it comes to] marketing tactics, these far-right activists have drastically improved from old-school neo-Nazi parties. Everything is hip and fresh, ranging from the websites to the banners, the music in their videos and the style of their activists. No skinheads or tattoos. . . . The movement shows off a lot of female faces, by featuring gender-balanced videos and putting women in the first row in their protests. The goal is to break with the burden of old European neo-Nazi parties, which are heavily male and unattractive to (at least) half the population.
Behind the hipster look and the inclusive marketing campaign, however, lies a deeply worrying philosophy. . . . Talking points on “race” become talking points about “blood” and “heritage.” Instead of talking about “preserving racial foundations of white people,” the new kids prefer to “defend Europeans.” In news coverage, identitarianism and neo-Nazism are talked about as different categories, but the reality is that it’s hard to tell where one ends and the other begins.
To the extent that there is a difference between the two, it may be that identitarians aren’t openly anti-Semitic. They dodge questions regarding Jews and the Holocaust, and sue TV channels as soon as there is a suggestion that they are Nazis. However, when you enter the identitarian blogosphere and chat rooms, you see different attitudes at the grassroots level. In [one] identitarian forum post, for instance, an author argues that Judaism is a dangerous religion and his (her?) commentators fill the sections with remarks such as “mohammad [sic] copied most of his shtick from the kikes” and “It’s like they are both sand-nigger religions. Imagine that.”
Earlier this year, inhabitants of the French village of La Salvetat petitioned local authorities to kick out the identitarian music group “Les Brigandes,” which writes songs that target Muslims and Jews. Back in 2003, budding French identitarians distributed pig soup to homeless people, with the intent of excluding Muslims and Jews. . . .
Read more on Weekly Standard: http://www.weeklystandard.com/nazism-for-hipsters/article/2012002