re: #177 Joe Bacon ✅

Gee what is Christopher Rufo up to now?

No enemies to the right’: DeSantis ally hosts debate hedging white nationalism

Christopher Rufo’s Twitter space discussed conservatives cooperating with extremists ‘to destroy the power of the left’

Conservative activist Christopher Rufo, who is a close ally of Florida governor and Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis, hosted a social media debate in which one participant argued that conservatives should cooperate with a hypothetical white nationalist dictator “in order to destroy the power of the left”.

Rufo, a Manhattan Institute fellow who has been a hugely influential figure in DeSantis’ culture war policies in Florida, did not disagree with the sentiments. Instead he commended speakers for their “thoughtful points” and presenting the discussion as a model for engagement with “the dissident right”.

Rufo is a high-profile conservative activist who in books, columns, media appearances and a Substack newsletter has encouraged conservatives to oppose “wokeness”. He has been credited with mobilizing conservatives against communities of color, first with a distorted version of critical race theory; then by linking LGBTQ-inclusive education practices to pedophilic “grooming”.

Rufo hosted the debate on X, the social media network formerly known as Twitter.

Participating in the debate was Charles Haywood, a former shampoo magnate who the Guardian previously reported is a would-be “warlord” who founded a secretive, men-only fraternal society, the Society for American Civic Renewal (SACR).

The debate concerned Haywood’s promotion of a strategy he calls “no enemies to the right”, which urges people on the right to avoid any public criticism of others in their camp, including extremists.

Early in the Rufo-hosted discussion last Tuesday, Haywood raised the hypothetical possibility early in the discussion: “Let’s say a real white nationalist arose who had real political power … and therefore [could] be of assistance against the left.”

Responding to the hypothetical, Haywood said: “I think that the answer is that you should cooperate with that person in order to destroy the power of the left.”

Later in the broadcast, Haywood responded to concerns about rightwing authoritarianism by saying: “When we’re talking about people like Franco or Pinochet or even Salazar … they did kill people. They killed people justly, they killed people unjustly, and that’s just a historical fact.”

“But,” Haywood added, “they saved a lot more people than they killed.”

You know who Haywood wants to kill first. Hint—a 4 letter word that starts with…”J”…

Isn’t Rufo now in charge of Florida’s formerly-functioning New College

I wonder how the students feel about the school leadership hanging out with Nazis in his free time?