Two years ago I wrote about a progressive moral panic prompted by the election of Giorgia Meloni to the premiership of Italy. Progressives thought that she is a fascist and the return of Mussolini. They were able to trace her fascistic leanings to an interest she has in the works of J.R.R. Tolkien, also to her attendance of at least one Hobbit Camp in her native country. Tolkien will come up again before the end of this article, so be on the lookout for him.
Now here it is two years later, and though times have changed, times have also not changed. Signora Meloni has been in office for a while now, but there hasn't been any return to fascism, even if she supports, as Mussolini did before her, war against Russia and in Ukraine. I would call that a dark spot on her record. Anyway, Europe was against her ascendancy, too. In September 2022, at around the time of Frodo and Bilbo Baggins' birthdays, Ursula von der Leyen threatened the use of "tools" against Italians and the workings of their democracy, should they choose her. As we all know by now, we're supposed to be in favor of democracy unless it doesn't go our way.
A few weeks ago, Signora Meloni and Frau von der Leyen were at the G7 Summit along with a lot of other people who are called leaders, including our own president, John Gill. Both wore pink. Being Italian, Giorgia Meloni was dressed very stylishly in an outfit that was at once odd, flattering, and very attractive, if not stunning (an overused word). She pulled it off with daring and panache. (Not the outfit, the wearing of the outfit.) Her German/European counterpart was actually only in half-pink. Her bottom half was clothed in Nazi-gray.
In looking at pictures from the summit, I don't see any in which the two were standing very close to each other. I doubt that was mere happenstance. The Italian prime minister is very expressive. Her eye rolls are epic and her glaring is devastating. You don't want to be on the wrong side of her. But very graciously and very gently, she rounded up poor, befuddled John Gill when he started to wander off and brought him back into the group. (She probably saved him from going down a gently sloping surface. We know how dangerous those can be.) Now it turns out that Frau von der Leyen has secured a second term as president of the European Commission, even though Italians, in their wisdom, voted against her. Giorgia Meloni was politic in her response. "We have cooperated so far," she said in an interview with Corriere della Serra, "and will continue to do so in the future." As in France, it took the formation of a coalition of supposed moderates with socialists and other leftists to thwart the people who oppose them, people who love their families, their lives and livelihoods, and their country more than they could ever love an ideology.
We have some of that here, too. All of it actually. Last week, the party of Abraham Lincoln chose its candidates for president and vice-president. And once again--or I should say, continuously--progressives are in a moral panic about all of it, but about one thing in particular. As it turns out, the man who will probably be our next vice-president, like Giorgia Meloni, is a fan of J.R.R. Tolkien. He even named his company, Narya Ventures, after a place in Tolkien's Lord of the Rings saga. But guess what happens when you move--like puzzle master Wil Shortz--the N in Narya to the end of the word? You get Aryan. ARYAN! Yes, the Republican candidate for vice-president, is, like his master, a Nazi! We have the evidence! One of the geniuses on a mainstream media outlet (which will remain nameless in this space) has discovered this bit of knowledge and believes it a key to our understanding of what she calls the far right and the alt-right, "both in Europe and the United States." Watch out, Giorgia Meloni, she's onto you!
J.R.R. Tolkien was without a doubt a conservative thinker and author. He was also a Roman Catholic. To be the one makes him, in the minds (a big word in this case) of progressives, a right-winger, maybe even a Nazi, or at least close to being a Nazi. To be the other makes him more or less a terrorist. Progressives despise conservatives and will do anything, including inciting and carrying out acts of violence, to prevent conservatives from gaining and holding power. (These are called "tools.") They also despise the Catholic Church as a rival belief system: progressivism, leftism, and socialism are jealous gods and will have no other gods before them. They of course also violently resent the power and the prestige of the Church. They believe these things should be theirs and theirs alone. All of that aside, they show themselves to be ridiculous when they say or imply that people who like Tolkien and his works are fascists or Nazis or right-wingers or white supremacists. What's wrong with just liking a story because it's good or powerful, exciting or edifying, or--maybe most important of all--because it carries us away?
Original text copyright 2024 Terence E. Hanley
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