Over at Pharyngula, PZ has a post up about the recent, appalling Nazism of Rep. Steve King. Part of my comment was:
D’ya suppose any of these gits realize that they are adherents of Charles Manson? I guess that wouldn’t bother them much.
At the time I wrote it, I wondered if people would get that reference at all, because Manson was a long time ago, along with his attempt at inciting a race war, whereupon all the brown peoples would destroy one another, leaving all the white people triumphant. I’m more than pleased to see that I wasn’t all alone in that thought jumping into my head:
@CNN sounds like something CharlesManson would say
— Oswald Rojas (@mrpresident650) March 14, 2017
@jbouie this is Manson-level racist delusion, the suit-wearing version of "whites dig a hole in the desert, hide, then emerge to rule."
— Robin Kimball (@RobinKimball) March 14, 2017
And they weren’t the only ones, either.
You can read more at Raw Story.
We youngins (OK, at least I do) hear the term “Helter Skelter” now and then as it has become a cultural reference, but it’s never really clear what it is a reference to. I’m pretty sure I have read before what that meant and where it came from, but it’s been a while.
So, I was just thinking.. and did a snapmix face-swap between Charles Manson and Ayn Rand. And they pretty much don’t look any different.
I suppose I should post the results. But it’s kinda scary. They both have the same stare, the same straight-line mouth. Rand’s swastika tattoo on her forehead isn’t visible (and why isn’t Manson’s visible on the cover of the magazine?)
Leo,
Manson had a thing for the Beatles’ White Album, in particular, their song Helter Skelter, which was about an amusement park ride, but it said something very different to Manson. He detailed in length at one point, how it was in a dream, or the album speaking to him or something, that it was really about a race war, and the necessary domination of white men, and the white race at large.
It was his idea to get his followers to commit these murders, which the cops and people in general would attribute to black people, which would incite the war, all the brown people would kill each other, the white race would rule, with Manson as King, natch.
It was all a fucked up mess, tied in with Manson’s long belief that he was “Man’s Son” (Jesus). Of course, The Beatles were appalled, but it was a done deal by the time it all came out. The murders were horrendously shocking. I still remember being woken up, my family in shock, and seeing the newspaper -- it was red letter, and I hadn’t seen that since the assassination of RFK, with all the photos of those murdered. Rocked the world that did, and that pleased Manson, although it didn’t incite his cherished race war.
Marcus:
He didn’t have it then. He did that later, during the years of trial.
He didn’t have it then. He did that later, during the years of trial.
Ugh, yeah, I was just a bit too young to encounter that whole episode.
I was 11 or so when it happened, and there wasn’t wall to wall televised coverage of such things back then, but it was in the papers every day. Much later, I read Vincent Bugliosi’s book, Helter Skelter, which has the enormity of all the details involved in prosecuting him. That was one hell of a read.
I read the book ages ago (high school?) due to an interest in serial killers. Used to be quite an authority on several big names, and that might have something to do with my eventual career choice.
Charles Manson terrified me -- his violence, yes, but esp. his cult and its following. Something far more terrifying about his ability to brainwash and convince people about his vision for the future (about anyone who can do that, really).
And now… I mean, well, fuck.
(Incidentally, one of my comfort movies is Gladiator, so it’s on my computer and I had it on last night while taking the travel stress off. The emperor, with his emotional immaturity and incestuous lust (sister, daughter, what’s the big difference…), took on a very eerie resemblance, one that I was not expecting -- creeped me out, more than ever.
Anyway, that’s neither here nor there.)
Creepy. A couple of years ago I read that biography of Manson by Jeff Guinn. He managed to interview some relatives of his that had not been before. He knew how to manipulate his followers all right -- drugs, hours of speeches, isolation at the ranch… Bizarre, isn’t it, how Manson’s cultish ramblings are being echoed by politicians like Steve King?
So, voters from King’s district in IA -- you have been sending this idjit back to Congress several times. Are you going to embarrass yourselves by doing that yet again, knowing he is a full on white nationalist, or are you going to do the right thing in 2018?
I never read the book nor saw any documentaries about Manson, but the impression I recall from newspaper/magazine stories at the time involved him convincing his (white) followers to commit those murders to spark a race war -- in which he (Manson) would assume the leadership of the black revolutionaries.
Did my memory circuits misfire again, or did Charlie have a more complex plan/delusion than summarized here?
Pierce:
I don’t think so, but it has been so long…I think Charlie’s dream was more along the line of slaves, not leadership of revolutionaries. Could be wrong about that, but Manson did see virtue in slavery.