How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them

by Jason F. Stanley

the universal ideal and the many local tribal religions as primitive and savage. In part a response to this religious oppression, the Mau Mau rebellion against Britain valorized the traditional Gikuyu religion—Mau Mau rebels took an oath to Ngai, the Gikuyu god. The Mau Mau colonialist struggle used nationalist religious ideals to fight colonialism. But the goal of the Mau Mau struggle was not to fight for the superiority of the Gikuyu religious traditions over the British religious traditions. The goal was rather to fight for the equality of the Gikuyu traditions against the British demonization of them as forms of primitive savagery. To do so, it was necessary to elevate these traditions, to hold them as sacrosanct and special, not as a means of repudiating the value of British traditions, but rather as a means to emphasize a demand for equal respect. This kind of nationalism is therefore in no sense opposed to equality; instead, despite appearances to the contrary, equality is its goal. The case is similar with the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States today.