#Austrian conspiracy theories

[josefavomjaaga]

“I’ve read elsewhere that Fouché and Josephine were initially friends/allies, so I’m wondering when and why exactly their relationship started to go south [...]”

I’ve read that, too, and I’ve wondered the same. I could imagine it was when Josephine started to invite all those émigrés to come back. Fouché clearly was on the “left” of the political spectrum during the Consulate, Josephine (and her family) on the right. (I’ve read that she always remained a royalist at heart, even as an empress 😁.) All those returning émigrés had a bone to pick with the revolutionaries of old, of which Fouché was a rather prominent one. So maybe there were no intrigues necessary at all? Though I guess Fouché and Murat felt in a similar way about those émigrés (Thiard once mentions something to that effect, I believe), so they may have been allies in trying to stem in the flow?

“I’d rather read more details about this kind of stuff than more tedious play-by-plays of the battles by military historians any day”.

I would like to second that. And to third and fourth, too 😋.

But actually I wanted to add some brief snippets from Austrian books that, as I mentioned above, seem to hint at unrest or even conspiracies against Napoleon within the army during the campaign of 1809, and that mention Eugène (who, just for context, still was on his march from Italy at the time of Aspern-Essling). These things may point in a similar direction as Hortense’s story:

From Carl-Wilhelm Böttiger: “Die Weltgeschichte in Biographien”, Volume 7, 1843

[…] Soon after this battle [Aspern-Essling] it was also when Napoleon sank into that wondrous 36-hour sleep at Kaiser-Ebersdorf, and some already had the idea of proclaiming Eugen as emperor and delivering Napoleon dead or alive to the English in Fiume. It is known that several officers were shot around that time on the Schmelz [then a parade and drill ground] near Schönbrunn.

Napoleon sleeping - or being in a coma - for almost 36, sometimes only 24, sometimes even 48 hours, after Aspern-Essling is an Austrian legend that seems to have been already well-established in 1843, guessing from the casual way it is mentioned above. The fun part is that in the published correspondance there happens to actually be a marked lacune after the battle of Aspern-Essling… Mysteries… 😁

Franz-Anton Lubojatzky: “Der letzte deutsche Kaiser und seine Zeitgenossen” from 1860 has a longer account of the same desperation in the French army after Aspern-Essling:

The victor of the century was overcome, under the curses of his own soldiers, who now recognised him as a mere mortal, fleeing in a barge across the Danube to his headquarters at Kaiser-Ebersdorf. The human nature in him imperiously demanded its rights, a thirty-hour sleep bound him, who had given the command not to wake him.

Crushed by the fate of being defeated, facing the prospect of becoming prisoners by a second such defeat like the one just experienced at Aspern and Essling, his grand officers held secret meetings, and the plan was put forward, if Napoleon perished or was captured, to place his stepson, Viceroy Eugene de Beauharnais, at the head of the army in order to conclude a general peace and to lead the army back to France.

Many an accursal against the helplessly sleeping emperor flew from the lips of these enraged men, who longed for the happiness of living in the bosom of tranquillity and their families and of peacefully enjoying the fruits of their efforts.

He also repeats the idea of handing over Napoleon to the Brits in Fiume, which makes me believe his account is based on the one above.

At the root of all this may be a particular productive and not necessarily reliable author named Joseph Freiherr von Hormayr, who had helped organize the Tyrolean uprising during the same war and from that time on engaged in publishing lots of propaganda writings. In a book »Lebensbilder aus dem Befreiungskriege« from 1841, he gives a rather confused account of the anti-Napoleon conspiracies (for example, he claims that when the French army chased the British troops of Sir John Moore to La Coruna, some men had agreed to capture Napoleon, “who in his impatience showed up every other moment among the sentries” and to deliver him to the Brits for money – a somewhat difficult plan, considering that Napoleon was miles away from that corps and preparing his departure for France at the time - so whoever showed up at the sentries clearly was an impostor 😋). He even lists some names of people involved: a colonel Meriage, from Andréossy’s entourage, and his confidant Guesniard, the latter among those shot on the Schmelz. The only name I could verify was colonel Jacques Joseph Oudet, who was said to have ties to the Philadelphes conspiracy and who was killed at Wagram - “certainly not by an Austrian bullet”, as Hormayr says.

Hello! I was wondering if you’ve ever come across anything regarding Eugène’s relationship with Fouché? I was just browsing Hortense’s memoirs and she off-handedly mentions that Fouché disliked Eugène. It’s the first time I’ve seen either mentioned in regard to the other so now I’m curious. Here’s the excerpt; the “attempt” in question was when Friedrich Staps tried to murder Napoleon in 1809:

“The generals and other officers, shocked that such an attempt should have been made and alarmed at the idea of what might have happened, had considered seriously the situation arising from the absence of any direct heir to the imperial throne. They debated who might have been chosen as the Emperor’s successor had the attempt succeeded, and unanimously voted for the Viceroy. Public opinion throughout France indorsed the verdict. Rumors of this reached the Emperor and displeased him. They revived all his ideas concerning a divorce and later caused him to say to me during one of our conversations: “It became a necessity; public opinion demanded it.” I believe also that Fouché, with his skill for intrigue and dislike for my brother, took advantage of the episode to bring the matter of a divorce again to the Emperor’s attention. He perhaps even mentioned that my mother and I were deliberately engaged in promoting Eugène’s popularity.”

Hi, and thank you for the Ask! 💖

Of the top of my head, I could not point my finger to any particular interaction between the two, neither negative nor positive. Once Eugène was in Milan, while Fouché stayed in Paris, there was barely a chance for them to be at odds with each other, at least directly. And before that, Eugène simply had not had a high enough rank (officially) to be of much importance.

That Eugène was not fond of Fouché, especially after Fouché had tried to talk Josephine into a divorce in 1807, that I will believe. Josephine wrote to Eugène in detail about it. When Fouché in 1813/4 went on his mission to Italy, he not only saw Murat but also Eugène, and in his memoirs he (or whoever wrote in his name) claims that only after Fouché had explained it to him did Eugène understand that his future, too, was in jeopardy should Napoleon fall (which, I believe, is somewhat contradicted by Eugène's own correspondence with Auguste and their constant worries about the future of their children). 

And then, during the second Restauration, Fouché, on the run and kicked out of France, asked Eugène for protection and an asylum in Bavaria. Which Eugène politely but very firmly declined. And that's rather unusual, for him.

As to the events Hortense relates in her memoirs, being the malicious person that I am I always read that a little differently 😊:

First of all, I assume it to be blown somewhat out of proportion, with Hortense trying to give Eugène more importance than he truly had. Though, in fairness, there are Austrian sources that point in the same direction, so something may really have gone on in the army (Napoleon's main base of support!). That there was a huge portion of dissatisfied men and officers ever since the Polish campaign, that much at least seems to be clear (the "Roi Nicolas" affair in Portugal, with several high-ranking officers either conspiring with the enemy or at least revolting against Soult, happens almost at the same time). It's possible that they (or some of them) picked Eugène as a rallying figure, as somebody who might bring some calm and restraint for the future.

And secondly, I always understood this to mean that Josephine and Hortense of course really had intrigued on Eugène's behalf and tried to win public support for the idea of Eugène as Napoleon's successor. Fouché had reported to Napoleon about it - as was his job! -, Napoleon had not taken it well (as was to be expected), and now Fouché was an enemy of Eugène's in the eyes of Josephine and Hortense 😁. (Napoleon did react badly to all signs of Eugène gaining a reputation of his own at this time, there's also Eugène's panicked reaction about a book someone had written about his campaign and that he had not managed to seize in time before it reached Paris. And as to Hortense and Josephine pushing Eugène into the limelight, there is another incident during the Russian campaign, when an account of the Battle of Malojaroslavetz praising Eugène and the Army of Italy to the sky "accidentally" found its way into a French newspaper...)

So, from the little evidence we have, I'd argue Fouché was rather Josephine's enemy, and only in extension that of Eugène (Eugène being designated as Napoleon's successor would of course have resolved the question of a divorce forever). If he acted in opposition to Eugène, it surely was in accordance with Napoleon's plans (which may or may not have coincided with Fouché's own). 

As usual, I wish I had a better answer. But I'll pay attention from now on, maybe I come across some more actual interaction between the two in the future. Thanks again for the Ask!

[mangoxangel]

And of course we got a safety car

[junadeo]

NOOOOO THE WORST PRESIDENTAL CANDIDATE IN ARGENTINA HAS *WON* THE ARGENTINE GENERAL ELECTION. THE WORST GUY IMAGINABLE

[foul-milk]

Are Mercedes still sabotaging George? 🤔

yes. next question

[davidcashuk]

Adolf Hitler, led his nation and many others, in a cataclysmic war based on an unproven conspiracy theory - the stab-in-the-back myth.

A lack a critical thinking can kill millions.

Adolf Hitler in WW1

These are some facts and curiosities about Adolf Hitler during WW1:

He enlisted as a volunteer at the age of 25 in Kaiser Wilhelm II's Bavarian army, being assigned to the 1st Company of the 16th "List" Infantry Regiment, belonging to the 6th Reserve Division.

On 29 October 1914 he made his field debut on the edge of the first battle of Ypres, in the Flemish village of Gheluvelt.

 He was present at the First Battle of Ypres, the Battle of the Somme, the Battle of Arras, and the Battle of Passchendaele, and was wounded at the Somme.

During his service at headquarters, Hitler pursued his artwork, drawing cartoons and instructions for an army newspaper. 

On 15 October 1918, he was temporarily blinded in a mustard gas attack and was hospitalised in Pasewalk.While there, Hitler learnt of Germany's defeat.

He described the war as "the greatest of all experiences", and was praised by his commanding officers for his bravery.

 Like other German nationalists, he believed the Dolchstoßlegende (stab-in-the-back myth)

Sources:

Hitler and his loyalists by Paul Roland

Wikipedia: Adolf Hitler

Military Wiki: Adolf Hitler

I DON'T SUPPORT NAZISM,FASCISM OR ZIONISM IN ANY WAY, THIS IS AN EDUCATIONAL POST

[mariacallous]

Last weekend, former President Donald Trump posted another anti-immigrant screed to Truth Social. It would have been unremarkable ― at least, graded on the Trumpian curve of extreme xenophobia ― except for one word.

“[We will] return Kamala’s illegal migrants to their home countries (also known as remigration),” he wrote. “I will save our cities and towns in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and all across America.”

Many people might have glossed over his use of “remigration.” White nationalists did not.

“#Remigration has had a massive conceptual career,” Martin Sellner — leader of the Austrian chapter of Generation Identity, a pan-European white supremacist network — tweeted in his native German. “Born in France, popularized in German-speaking countries and now the term of the hour from Sweden to the USA!”

It was a succinct and accurate history from Sellner, a 35-year-old who typically trafficks in vicious lies and conspiracy theories, particularly about Black and brown people. He has been at the vanguard of pushing “remigration” — a euphemism for ethnically cleansing non-white people from Western countries — into the popular political lexicon in Europe.

Now Sellner was seeing his favorite little word all grown up, moving overseas in service of the 45th president of the United States, who has promised to implement the largest mass deportation of immigrants in U.S. history if elected back to the White House in six weeks’ time.

Trump’s use of “remigration” is the latest instance of the GOP’s intensifying anti-immigrant rhetoric in the run-up to November’s election, underscoring the degree to which one of America’s two major political parties is sourcing many of its talking points and policy ideas directly from neo-fascists.

“Trump’s rhetoric about ‘remigration’ has its origins in the international far-right,” Jakob Guhl, a senior manager of policy and research at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, explained to HuffPost in an email. “The term remigration was popularized by groups adhering to Identitarianism, a pan-European ethno-nationalist movement, as their policy to reverse the so-called ‘great replacement.’”

“The great replacement theory is a conspiracy theory which claims that ‘native’ Europeans are being deliberately replaced through non-European migration while suppressing European birth-rates,” he continued. “This theory has inspired numerous terrorist attacks, including the Christchurch massacre, where 51 people were killed, as well as attacks in Poway, El Paso, Halle, Buffalo, and Bratislava.”

Pat Buchanan, the onetime presidential hopeful and former aide to President Richard Nixon, used the term “remigration” to whitewash his own call for ethnic cleansing as early as 2006, in his racist tract “State of Emergency: The Third World Invasion and Conquest of America.” But the term’s journey into the Trump campaign’s vernacular more likely got its start in November 2014, when 500 far-right activists gathered in Paris.

The inaugural Assises de la Remigration, or Annual Meeting on Remigration, was organized by Generation Identity. Its featured speaker was Renaud Camus, the travel writer-turned-philosopher who coined the term “great replacement” in his 2012 book by the same name. Camus’ book built off the work of another French author, Jean Raspail, who wrote “The Camp of the Saints,” an extraordinarily racist French novel that depicts a flotilla of feces-eating brown people invading Europe.

“The Great Replacement is the most serious crisis that France has witnessed in 15 centuries,” Camus told the crowd, eliding many bloody episodes in the country’s history, including a pair of world wars that killed nearly 2 million French people. For Camus, “remigration” was the best solution to the imagined crisis of the “great replacement,” the two terms essentially joined at the hip.

Camus and his fellow subscribers to identitarianism “have always been quite clear that the objective of ‘remigration’ is to create greater ‘ethnocultural’ homogeneity,” Ruhl told HuffPost. “For them, culture and ethnicity are inseparable, and they view (white) European identity as being fundamentally threatened by the presence of migrants ― necessitating drastic, far-reaching responses.”

According to a study by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, the term “remigration” was “used over 540,000 times between April 2012 and April 2019” on Twitter, particularly from accounts in France and Germany. Usage of the term skyrocketed after the Annual Meeting on Remigration in Paris. Camus himself was one of the main promoters of the word online.

As “remigration” became an increasingly discussed term, militant far-right groups adapted it as their own. In 2017, police in France arrested 10 far-right activists over a suspected plot to kill politicians and migrants and to attack mosques. Officers found a shotgun and two revolvers in the home of the group’s ringleader, who’d sought to create a militia, according to a post on Facebook, to kill “arabs, blacks dealers, migrants, [and] jihadist scum.” Per French investigators, the group, known as OAS, was formed to “spark remigration.”

The term made an appearance in Canada, too, where a far-right fight club called Falange — named for the fascist group that served under the Spanish general Francisco Franco during the Spanish Civil War — put signs with the word “Remigration” across Quebec City.

And that same year in the U.S., the group Identity Evropa — modeled after Generation Identity in Europe — burst into the public consciousness for its participation in the deadly white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. Identity Evropa’s proposed policies included “remigration,” and when its members marched in Charlottesville, they invoked the “great replacement” concept, chanting “You will not replace us.”

Back in Europe, in March 2019, Sellner started a channel on the chat app Telegram called the “European Compact for Remigration,” the beginning of a campaign, he announced, to influence far-right parties across Europe to support “de-Islamisation” and “remigration.”

That same month, a white supremacist in Christchurch, New Zealand, livestreamed himself walking into two mosques and opening fire, killing 51 Muslim worshipers. He’d posted a genocidal screed online before the shooting. Its title was “The Great Replacement.” Nevertheless, one week after the shooting, Sellner’s Generation Identity group in Austria staged a protest against the “great replacement,” again calling for “de-Islamisation” and “remigration.”

A couple of months later, it emerged that the shooter in New Zealand had communicated with Sellner only a year prior, donating over $2,300 to Sellner’s white supremacist group. “Thank you that really gives me energy and motivation,” Sellner wrote to the shooter in an email.

“If you ever come to Vienna,” Sellner added, “we need to go for a café or a beer.”

Despite these revelations, Sellner’s efforts to get far-right political parties to support remigration started to see results in the following years. In 2019, Alternative for Deutschland — which recently became the first far-right party since the Nazis to win a state election in Germany — inserted “remigration” into its list of official policy proposals.

Four years later, an investigation from Correctiv found that AfD members held a secret meeting with neo-Nazis and wealthy businesspeople to discuss the “remigration” of asylum seekers, immigrants with legal status, and “unassimilated citizens” to a “model state” in North Africa. The plan — which bore an unnerving resemblance to the Nazis’ initial idea to mass-deport Jews to Madagascar, before they settled on a wholesale extermination campaign — was Sellner’s brainchild.

That same year, as noted recently by Mother Jones, a jury of linguists in Germany selected “remigration” as the “non-word” of the year. “The seemingly harmless term remigration is used by the ethnic nationalists of the AfD and the Identitarian Movement to conceal their true intentions: the deportation of all people with supposedly the wrong skin color or origin, even if they are German citizens,” one guest juror wrote.

Mother Jones also noted that earlier this year, “an AfD candidate in Stuttgart campaigned with the slogan ‘Rapid remigration creates living space,’ a nod to the concept of Lebensraum used by the Nazis to justify the genocidal expansion into Eastern Europe.”

And finally, this year in Austria, the far-right Freedom Party (FPOe), founded after World War II by former Nazis, and which recently enjoyed success in national elections, called for the creation of a “remigration commissioner” in the country.

Still, very few, if any, U.S. politicians have uttered the word “remigration” in recent years. Trump’s use of the term stateside has coincided with his renewed embrace of dehumanizing language when talking about immigrants.

The former president’s promotion of a false story about Haitian immigrants eating pets in Ohio was classic fascist fare, depicting an entire category of people as savages. And earlier this year, the GOP nominee said immigrants were “poisoning the blood” of the nation. Historians quickly noted that Trump’s language echoed the words of Adolf Hitler. “All great cultures of the past perished only because the originally creative race died out from blood poisoning,” Hitler wrote in “Mein Kampf.”

But who in Trump’s orbit might have introduced him to the term “remigration”? The Trump campaign didn’t immediately respond to HuffPost’s request for comment. One possible culprit, though, might be Stephen Miller, who served in the Trump White House as an adviser and speechwriter. Miller’s ties to white supremacists are legion, and while working as an editor at Breitbart in 2015, according to leaked emails obtained by the Southern Poverty Law Center, he suggested the website publish articles about “The Camp of the Saints,”the racist French novel that inspired Renaud Camus.

Miller, like Sellner, was thrilled with Trump’s use of “remigration” last weekend.

“THE TRUMP PLAN TO END THE INVASION OF SMALL TOWN AMERICA: REMIGRATION!” he tweeted.

[dontforgetukraine]

"When encountering the propaganda of the Kremlin and its allies—whether blatant or subtle—we often focus on social media. Some also highlight false balance reporting or talk shows in mass media. But what sources and channels do we often overlook? Let's take a closer look. Sorry to say, but books. I know I've mentioned them before, but they are so often overlooked in this context. There are countless books filled with anti-Western conspiracy theories out there. Did you know there's a book called God Bless You, Putin, written by an Austrian author? Maybe you recall some of the worst books you've seen in recent decades? They defend Putin, blame the West for everything, spread 9/11 conspiracy theories, and let's not forget what they propagated during the pandemic... Then, as ridiculous as it sounds: lunch break discussions, coffeehouse chats, or even cigarette break talks during club parties—word of mouth still plays a huge role. Some 'useful idiots' and conspiracy theorists are very well-prepared to sound 'reasonable.' Experiences? I'll give you one example: Outside a bar in Bansko, Bulgaria, a guy approached me, handed me a bottle of whiskey, and said, 'I have to say, we Bulgarians hate the US and love Russia.' You can imagine that it was the start of a very interesting discussion. Teaching staff in schools and universities are often overlooked. They can be the most dangerous agents of influence when following a radical agenda, as students and society trust them a lot. Movies: I'm referring to films that are fictional but fuel 'conspirological thinking,' as well as those that claim to be 'based on reality' but are actually based on the ideology of the screenwriter and director—no names mentioned ;-) Last but not least, relatives, friends, colleagues at work... Over the past few years, many people have approached me and asked, 'How can I tell him/her respectfully but clearly that this is disinformation and propaganda?'" —Dietmar Pichler, disinformation analyst

Screenshots of tweet thread under the cut.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Christopher Mathias at HuffPost:

Last weekend, former President Donald Trump posted another anti-immigrant screed to Truth Social. It would have been unremarkable ― at least, graded on the Trumpian curve of extreme xenophobia ― except for one word. “[We will] return Kamala’s illegal migrants to their home countries (also known as remigration),” he wrote. “I will save our cities and towns in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and all across America.” Many people might have glossed over his use of “remigration.” White nationalists did not. “#Remigration has had a massive conceptual career,” Martin Sellner — leader of the Austrian chapter of Generation Identity, a pan-European white supremacist network — tweeted in his native German. “Born in France, popularized in German-speaking countries and now the term of the hour from Sweden to the USA!”

It was a succinct and accurate history from Sellner, a 35-year-old who typically trafficks in vicious lies and conspiracy theories, particularly about Black and brown people. He has been at the vanguard of pushing “remigration” — a euphemism for ethnically cleansing non-white people from Western countries — into the popular political lexicon in Europe. Now Sellner was seeing his favorite little word all grown up, moving overseas in service of the 45th president of the United States, who has promised to implement the largest mass deportation of immigrants in U.S. history if elected back to the White House in six weeks’ time. Trump’s use of “remigration” is the latest instance of the GOP’s intensifying anti-immigrant rhetoric in the run-up to November’s election, underscoring the degree to which one of America’s two major political parties is sourcing many of its talking points and policy ideas directly from neo-fascists.

“Trump’s rhetoric about ‘remigration’ has its origins in the international far-right,” Jakob Guhl, a senior manager of policy and research at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, explained to HuffPost in an email. “The term remigration was popularized by groups adhering to Identitarianism, a pan-European ethno-nationalist movement, as their policy to reverse the so-called ‘great replacement.’” “The great replacement theory is a conspiracy theory which claims that ‘native’ Europeans are being deliberately replaced through non-European migration while suppressing European birth-rates,” he continued. “This theory has inspired numerous terrorist attacks, including the Christchurch massacre, where 51 people were killed, as well as attacks in Poway, El Paso, Halle, Buffalo, and Bratislava.”

Donald Trump takes inspiration from far-right European anti-immigrant extremists by using the term “remigration” to call for the deportation of undocumented immigrants.

[jewishbarbies]

I think a lot of people believe that hitler was the first person in Europe at the time to hate Jewish people and that no other German or Austrian at the time hated Jews, that he managed to radicalise people only during his ruling, that no one hated Jews before then.

They don’t understand that people were suspicious of Jews and hateful towards Jews prior to hitler. Antisemitism in Germany and the rest of Europe did not originate from hitler, Jews have been scapegoated prior to him.

Even further back than Martin Luther.

Violent antisemitism in Germany can be said to have kicked off in earnest in the wake of the First Crusade. It only got worse with the Black Death as Jews were then accused of poisoning the wells.

Antisemitism has a long and storied history. The end of the 19th century and early 20th century showed an uptic in anti-Jewish sentiment.

The Nazis did not invent anything and there was nothing particularly special about them or Hitler. “Scientific” race theory, extreme nationalism, ethno-centrism and antisemitism were the greatest hits of the day. The Nazis were a product of their time, Hitler wasn’t some mysitcal evil genious.

Conspiracy theories about Jews have been around since antiquity. In medieval Europe handling money was seen as sinful, Jews were seen as collectively guilty for murdering Christ (despite it being the Romans) and in most cases they were forbidden from owning land. So they turned to banking and trading and other professions that Christians found sinful. When Capitalism hit, a lot of prominent Jewish families came out as winners of the new system. Lots of Jews were highly educated, progressive and supported all sorts of rebellious movements.

So by the 1900’s they were viewee both as Socialists, Communists, Anarchists, Occultists, and as people of influence and money. Both groups were viewed as agents trying to undermine the state. Following the defeat of World War 1 it was a common conspiracy theory that the German Army did not lose militarily, it was the Jewish politicians and industrial elite and socialist sympathisers who sold the country out.

Jews are very familiar with being considered “evil elites” by conspiracy theorists. It just so happens that most people are conspiracy theorists, they just don’t realise it.

yeah, the lack of education on antisemitism along with holocaust education is a big factor. I also think that the normalization of phrases like “bush did 9/11” and the lizard people shit has made people less turned off and aware of conspiracy theories and the antisemitism they lead back to. At the very least, it’s made people irresponsible with them.

[tomicaleto]

Wait you’re from Argentina, I’m so sorry about your election :( I read somewhere that this was just a primary, but ppl are acting like the fascist won the whole thing! Who is this fucker and are you all going to be okay?

Hi Anon, yeah I'm from Argentina 🙃

The thing with these elections are that, while they are a primary election, they also give you an idea of what to kinda expect for the general elections. These results are disheartening to say the least.

Here are some snippets from Milei's (the man that came out first in the primaries) wikipedia article in English, so you can have an idea of his ideals and politics and why he's like, the worst from right-wing politics in Argentina

"Politically and economically, Milei is a right-wing libertarian,[4][5][6] and he is supportive of the Austrian School of economics. Milei considers himself to be a short-term minarchist or liberal-libertarian [es; fr] but philosophically an anarcho-capitalist.[7][8] He believes that Argentina is a tax hell and advocates for a fast reduction in government spending in order to balance the budget."

"Several of Milei's political positions have caused controversy,[13] such as his opposition to abortion even in cases of rape,[14] the rejection of sexual education in schools,[15] scepticism about COVID-19 vaccines,[13] support for the freely possession of firearms by the civilian population,[16][17] promotion of the far-right Cultural Marxism conspiracy theory,[18] and climate change denial.[19] Due to those controversies, as well as his far-right political positions and radical conservative economic and social policies,[13][20] his primaries win has been considered an upset, and he has been characterized as a far-right populist.[10][11][12]"

"He has been described as far right by several Argentine and Spanish-language publications, including elDiario.es,[43] El País,[44] El Mundo,[45] Perfil,[46] Télam,[47] and Tiempo Argentino.[48] Milei is a follower of the ex-Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro and the ex-United States president Donald Trump.[49] He is also close to the Spanish far-right party Vox,[50] as well as the former conservative Chilean presidential candidate José Antonio Kast.[51]"

"Theoretically an anarcho-capitalist, Milei considers himself a minarchist or liberal-libertaire.[62] An economic liberal and fiscal conservative, he often referred to Carlos Menem, the president of Argentina from 1989 to 1999, and his economy minister Domingo Cavallo.[63]"

Full article here

But that's not the end of the problem.

The thing is that following him are Juntos por el cambio (another right-wing coalition, don't let the centre-right part trick you) and Unión por la Patria, the coalition born from the one that managed to get Alberto Fernández to be our current president.

As far as my understanding goes, with the current percentage of votes, neither candidate can win on the first round, which will lead to a ballotage, that is, the two candidates with the most votes will go for a second round. That's where the speculations born from these primary elections come into play. If, by some miracle, Sergio Massa (Unión por la Patria's candidate), the "lesser evil", wins, while generally speaking some things (like some rights hard won) will remain, it doesn't mean the ginormous debt that we've been dragging since Mauricio Macri's presidency will suddenly disappear or that the politics involved in trying to fix that will magically work just because Massa won.

If he doesn't win first round, which is the more likely thing, there are high probabilities that Milei's coalition and Juntos por el Cambio will call their voters to vote for the one that goes to the ballotage and against Unión por la Patria. So the right gets the government.

As you see, the political field is at best a mess, at worst, a big fucking mess. And I'm not even entering in our current economic crisis, and how the price of the dollar gets higher every day and how that affects the society. Or how the politics are less about actual solutions and proposals and more about emotionality and punishing the coalition you dislike the most.

I'm perhaps not the best at expressing myself when talking about these topics, at least not in English. I'm sure there are other Argentinean blogs that will explain this better than me but I will say. That even if Milei wins and doesn't burn the country to the ground with his outlandish economical plans, he still is against a lot of basic human rights that were hard won in this country. And even if he doesn't win but Juntos por el Cambio does, their politics are, perhaps not equally bad, but close to his. And Massa is not a saint of my devotion either, he's the main candidate because the peronist coalition is in as much crisis as the country is.

We got our democracy back just 40 years ago, after the worst and most bloody dictatorship in this country. And now the people are voting for the man that is pushing for the same kind of politics the dictators, Carlos Menem in the 90s and Mauricio Macri in 2015 were vouching for.

I'm not sure what the future has prepared for us (nothing too good as you can see) but at the very least I can say that Argentina is resilient, I can only hope for the best and if that doesn't happen, we'll have to do our best to survive.

[enlitment]

Historical ask game!!! 7, 16, 29?

Thanks for the asks!

7. Historical dressing, uniform or costume?

Already talked about my enthusiasm for togas here!

But to expand on that and combine my two historical obsessions, I'd like to give a honorary shout-out to the Empire style. It brings together the aesthetics of the classical style of the antiquity with the late 1700s/early 1800s vibes. It also influenced the clothing in Regency Era England, which is another of my favourite periods.

I'm also big on minimalism, so I much prefer the relatively simple white dress to the much more elaborate baroque costumes. Unfortunately, I think the high waist look would look really unflattering on me given my body type.

16. Do you own some historical item? ( coin, clothing, weapons, books, ect) If yes which one is your favourite?

I don't, unfortunately! My grandmother claims to have a piece of the Berlin Wall somewhere in her house though (taken in 1989, not the ones they sell you in the many Berlin's gift shops). That said, we unfortunately cannot find it.

29. Great historical mystery you are interested in?

All of the greats I guess? Like who was Jack the Ripper, where is Alexander the Great's tomb, what happened to the Roanoke Colony etc.

To throw in there something more niche, there is a conspiracy theory that the first president of Czechoslovakia, Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk may have been an illegitimate son of some higher-up Austrian aristocrat, possibly even the emperor himself.

Though it is a wild claim - especially the last one - there may be something to it. His mum (located in Vienna at key times, mind you!) was a cook and his father a coachman, yet he always seemed to receive help from someone higher-up in his youth, enabling him to pursue higher education and become a university professor.

They even wanted to check this hypothesis by testing his DNA against that of Franz Joseph's, but his relatives ordered to stop the process. I don't really think that it's possible that the first president of our independent republic was an illegitimate son of the Austrian emperor, but it would have been wild if it were the case.

[geeoharee]

Hey, look! It's the top of a content funnel!

I was watching fucking hbomberguy so I don't know how YouTube decided I needed to hear from an economist about things Joe Biden is doing wrong. (Yes, these are my real recommendations. I use Josh Strife Hayes's MMO reviews as calming background noise, I've watched ROBLOX_OOF multiple times obviously, I've only watched the vaccines one once because it's A Lot but that makes sense as a rec cos I'm on the same channel.)

Someone or other did a 'here's how you get from barbecueing videos to right-wing conspiracy theories' which starts pretty much like this but apparently you can just jump directly from 'socialist mad about YouTube plagiarism' to 'Austrian economics'. Do they try to send people the other way, too?? Why do I think the answer is 'no'?

[leqclerc]

When Carlos talks … one would think he would be PR trained but every time we are proved wrong.

I don’t believe in conspiracy theories at Ferrari. I don’t want to believe they can be bad enough to follow Sainz and his family. But there are always weird articles coming out when Sainz needs them. It’s all really suspicious. And they always always alienate tifosi. This guy … should maybe go back to his McLaren fans for a bit.

Yeah, exactly. It almost feels too ridiculous to be true (a brand as big and powerful as Ferrari bending to the will of a politically savvy well-connected rally legend) but, like you said, there's definitely been quite a bit of unfavourable and accusatory media coverage from the Spanish side trying to push certain narratives.

Last year, in the wake of Carlos's Silverstone win and over the course of the Austrian weekend, we got some truly bizarre coverage coming out of a big Spanish national sports newspaper. The botched Google translation is truly hilarious but the implication that Charles is scared of Carlos's immense speed and superior racecraft and needs to hide behind Ferrari's skirt is pretty obvious.

Some absolute journalism gems coming out of these articles, I can't decide which bit is my fave asjdjfejf It is part of the X-Files 😭😭😭 Removing stickers from his teammate 😭😭😭 The 'Monsieur' is no longer faster 😭😭😭

Now, we don't know if they took it upon themselves to defend his honour all on their own or what but 🤷‍♀️

Good point about alienating the Tifosi. Because if Carlos intended to come across as more relatable and sympathetic then he managed to achieve the exact opposite, if the backlash if anything to go by.

Respect and affection, especially from a fanbase like the Tifosi, isn't demanded, it's earned. Through results, yes, but also attitude and demeanor. I don't recall Charles ever having an issue with, say, Kimi or Seb's popularity. On the contrary, he was happy to join in when the crowd was celebrating and cheering for Seb at the 90th anniversary event in Milan. Let's not forget that not everyone was immediately 100% on board with his move to Ferrari. A lot of people thought it was a mistake, that it's too early, or simply preferred Kimi (there were even online petitions being signed imploring Ferrari to walk back the contract and keep Kimi for 2019). Charles accepted the skepticism and worked to prove people wrong. He earned the affection and respect by endearing himself to the public and the fans.

[ravenkings]

people LOVE to go on about conspiracy theories over how eyes wide shut is all about kubrick exposing the depraved elite or whatever while conveniently ignoring the fact that it’s actually an adaptation of an austrian novella from 1926 that’d had multiple previous adaptations

[titans-thoughts]

Shredding Psychohistory

So, thanks to @hood-ex, I had to write this, because there is much of Lloyd de Mause's work which is, simply not factually true. (No relation to the fictional field of Asimov's Foundation series, though they share some similarities.)

So, where to begin? Perhaps the dearth of actual academic departments of psychohistory. (There are none. Partially because they can't decide if it belongs in Psychology or in History, and partially because de Mause is a Freudian at the end of the day. More on that in a bit.)

So, Freud, psychoanalysts are very reverent toward their founder. Freud believed in recapitulation theory (long-discredited among developmental biologists), so psychoanalysts must believe in recapitulation theory. (In particular, Freud viewed the Oedipal/Electra as recapitulating a patricidal past.) De Mause similarly sees postpartum depression as proof of an infanticidal past, and babysitters as proof of a past of outsourcing care of one's children, including pederasty.

Beyond this, Freud is solid gold to psychoanalysts, except, apparently, that part where Freud viewed homosexuality as harmless and incurable; many psychoanalysts offered quack cures to homosexuality. To his credit, and I will credit him when he is right, broken clocks and all, I haven't seen any evidence of de Mause offering such. De Mause himself says Leonardo da Vinci had visions of vultures; this is Freud's conflation of two parts of da Vinci's notes, one being a vision of a swallow and another part about vultures. (But in Freud's work, all birds are phallic symbols; there are so many Indo-European "avian" names for the penis, after all. In English, we have "cock" and "robin". Spanish has "polla". And so on in that manner.)

The simplest problem with de Mause was his hostility to peer review, regarding anyone who disagreed with him in the slightest, even on factual matters such as if children were being sacrificed to Satan in a hidden basement in a daycare center (Hey, sound familiar, anyone? Sound like Pizzagate?) and the children themselves said they were sacrificed. (Yeah, literally, the children told stories of being ritually murdered, but they're better because Jesus showed up and fixed everything. By the way, no one saw the absurdity of this until 1989, over a decade after the first claims of Satanic ritual abuse.)

The absurdities didn't end there. Per de Mause, Japanese women publicly masturbate their sons (gleaned from pages of Jungle King Tar-chan and its phallic humor), but it's a huge secret. (Apparently those two things being incompatible never came to mind.) World War I wasn't caused by imperial rivalries, nor was Nazi Germany (which de Mause conflates with World War I) caused by the culture of antisemitism in Europe; instead, it was all because of German and Austrian parenting practices.

This is actually not new for psychoanalysts. Erikson drew on secondhand reports about Luther's life in his biography of Martin Luther. And we already covered Freud, da Vinci, and vultures.

So, what do we have? People who trust the words of deviants, the words of very alive self-styled murder victims, plenty of quote mining, second-hand sources (at best), and outright fabrication. We have very discredited theories, urban legend, and conspiracy theories. I have to give psychohistory an F, but I could see how it was popular in the cult-obsessed 70s.