Neoreaction a Basilisk: Essays on and Around the Alt-Right

by Elizabeth Sandifer

More broadly, the historical precedent for incompetence being a useful check on would-be autocrats is minimal to non-existent, at least in terms of the general population. Sure, his capacity for shooting himself in the foot can and will frustrate his agenda from time to time, but his agenda isn’t the only horrific thing about him. Just as ominous, if not moreso, is the corrosive effect of his very presence. This includes, obviously, the material problems of emboldened white supremacy, long-term damage to social norms, and, most importantly, the human misery inflicted by a government whose law enforcement agencies are under zero pressure towards basic humanity or decency. But it also includes the raw allostatic load of living under his rule; the basic psychological wear and tear of waking up every morning in a post-fact world dominated by a bullying narcissist. The act of living in a world where the basic validity of your identity is contingent and perpetually imperiled, where the very definition of “fact” is in dispute, and where a brutish logic of dominance and humiliation pervades the entire social order. There is no upside here. Nothing makes it better. Even the good outcomes are destructive beyond easy comprehension. One is left clutching at self-evidently absurd thresholds of acceptability—maybe it won’t actually be a nuclear war—the very contemplation of which represents a fundamental degradation. The truth is cold, brutal, and inescapable: we’ve lost.