MT I. Theses on Mexicanism, Americanism, and Critical Patriotism

If Americans lack the courage of self-criticism, how will they find the courage to struggle towards the uncertain future?

1.

Perhaps the most defining feature of "the Discourse", as online political antagonism is colloquially referred to, is that it polarizes its participants toward the poles of absolute affirmation or absolute negation. In this way, the Discourse forecloses dialectical understanding and in-depth analysis, which, incidentally, are the same thing for Mao—as he puts it, “The analytical method is dialectical. By analysis, we mean analyzing the contradictions in things”. These polarized conflicts, which often get caught up in petty semantic squabbles, lack any horizon of understanding capable of accounting for material reality. The Discourse restricts thought to a binary back-and-forth without possibility of resolution. Such a resolution would require that we exceed the limits of this binary, that we revolutionize the poles of opposition.

2.

Revolution goes around the poles of absolute affirmation and absolute negation, and carves out the space of which they constitute together the diameter. A horizon of revolutionary activity is established by surpassing the opposition of absolute affirmation and absolute negation, and converting them into a complementarity.

3.

An instance of this “Discourse trap” can be found in the "class reductionism" debate, wherein one pole, that of absolute negation, rejected the primacy of class, setting it on an equal plane with other “intersectional” elements, and the other pole, that of absolute affirmation, gave class the first place in a hierarchy of elements. The resolution of this artificial binary, as explored in a separate essay, was the proposal of another standpoint, already anticipated in Marxist theory but hitherto unnamed: the standpoint of “class subjectivism”. This standpoint draws a circle around the poles of opposition, as it were, by delimiting a space in which concrete struggles, as they actually exist, can be accounted for. On the one hand, circumstances on the ground often push issues that do not have an overtly “class reductionist” character to the fore, as those demanding the most urgent attention, and, on the other hand, these conflicts are often best addressed through a class lens. Class, as a subjective standpoint, becomes the space in which any number of issues can be prioritized. Class retains primacy as subject, thus surpassing both “class reductionism” and “intersectionality” which seek to primarily situate it as an object of analysis. Actual, material conflicts can now be clarified within this revolutionary circle that overcomes mere binary opposition. Thus, class as an object occupying the first place, and class as an object occupying a subordinate place, become complementary possibilities of prioritization for a class subject. Sometimes this subject will prioritize issues with a more overtly class character, and sometimes issues with a less overtly class character, as its circumstances necessitate.

4.

The poles of opposition on the question of left patriotism in the United States are “Turtle Islandism”, representing absolute negation, and “Americanism”, representing absolute affirmation. The class character of these poles are identical—middle and upper class white saviors. The resolution of this antagonism, which exceeds the poles, and circumscribes a space susceptible of accounting for material reality, we call “Mexicanism”. The class character of this horizon, the subjective standpoint from which it issues, must be working class, the class which, concretely, represents the overcoming of the artificial and idealistic oppositions of mere Discourse. Mexicanism is the immanent transformation of America, both its negation and its affirmation, at one and the same time and in one and the same way.

5.

Latin America itself holds the primary title of Spanish-language culture, of what it means to be “Hispanic”, not Spain. Latin America, today, is the center, and Spain is on the periphery, a backwater province of the Latin world. There is nothing like an equivalent to the “special relationship” between the United Kingdom and the United States, as regards Spain and Latin America. There is no equivalent to the “City of London” in Spain. Spain has already lost every shadow of an empire through a combination of factors such as its conflicts with the British and French Empires, independence wars in its colonies, and the Spanish-American war of 1898. Spanish-language culture, then, is an authentically American culture. Spanish can therefore be considered, in effect, an indigenous American language (among many others).

6.

Latin America, unlike the United States, did not inherit the empire of its former colonial master. On the contrary, it is the British Empire that has succeeded in extending its imperial power over Latin America through its successor, the United States, as embodied in the latter’s “Monroe Doctrine”, for instance, or as put into practice, in our own times, by Reagan and his successors. The United States, in effect, and for all intents and purposes, is the British Empire. Americanism is another name for Anglo-Saxon imperialism. There is, on the other hand, no successor to Spanish imperialism. Seated on the real Spanish throne, the throne of Spanish culture and identity, are the masses of Latin America. Their liberation requires, as one of its preconditions, the expulsion of Anglo-Saxonism (i.e. Americanism) from the Americas, that cultural-imperial complex which Cuban poet and revolutionary José Martí has called “the monster” of North America. We call this real movement of the liberation of the Americas “Mexicanism”. The conditions of this movement result from the premises now in existence all over the Americas, North and South.

7.

By Mexicanism is not meant a literal political integration of the United States into the territory of the nation state of Mexico (though, frankly, such an option is not off the table if, at any point in the indeterminate future, it ever becomes viable). “Mexicanism” is merely a catchall term for “latinization” (integration into the cultural sphere of the Americas, which is overwhelmingly Latin—Spanish, Portuguese, French) and advocacy for a viable form of political pluralism within the territory of the United States, a revolutionary pluralism that can account for all the diverse yet equally concrete interests that inhabit this region.

8.

If “American” is taken to refer to the overall character of the Americas, then the United States is itself a bastion of anti-Americanism, an Anglo wound in the flesh of Latin American consensus. The Americanism of the United states is foreign to the Americas.

9.

The conflicts and contradictions present in the development of Latin America, as exemplified, for instance, in the historical person of Simón Bolívar, have a vital and tragic quality. They are contradictions capable of being rendered fruitful (though, no less traumatic, for this fact), as demonstrated by the relative (and there is still much progress to make on this front) facility with which Latin America has been able to integrate diverse cultural streams (chiefly—African, European, and Indigenous). This can be contrasted with the surgical and hygienic quality of contradictions present in the United States, the severing and purging of all elements which contradict the ruling tendency (as opposed to a synthesis with those elements)—an Americanist idiosyncrasy which has obviously served as a prototype for Nazism. Racial contradictions, difficult and traumatic but susceptible of being overcome, are the heritage of Latin America, a heritage that Mexicanism will seek to build upon. “Race Science”, the surgical nipping in the bud of all potentially fruitful social contradictions, the hygienic quarantining of all subjugated elements into isolated spheres, is the heritage of Americanism.

10.

Nazism was European Americanism. We have already seen, twice over, what sort of fruit the tree of Americanism bears.

11.

In “On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People”, Mao posits two fundamentally different types of social contradiction—those among the people, and those between the people and the enemy, the former of which can be very numerous. Mexicanism is proposed as the necessary precondition for resolving the numerous contradictions unique to American society. Mexicanism does not “magically” cause these contradictions to disappear, nor does it make their resolution any less traumatic or difficult, but it does make it possible to struggle toward their resolution.

12.

“Turtle Island” type initiatives can not realistically succeed because they are not sufficiently pluralist—they do not account for the concrete pluralism that already exists within United States territory—and they cannot be pluralist for two main reasons: (1) this tendency is all-too-saturated with white saviorism, and (2) Native American culture is their culture, it is neither pluralist nor meant to be pluralist, and we should therefore let the indigenous people of this land safeguard their own traditions without outside interference. It is Mexicanism alone which can act as the pluralist umbrella which integrates all the diverse tendencies found within this land. Mexicanism is the middle position between the right deviation of Americanism and the left deviation of “Turtle Islandism”, two forms of white saviorism.

13.

White saviorism is the liberal and idealist form of indigenous struggle. Revolutionary Mexicanism is the concrete form of indigenous struggle in the United States.

14.

The Americanists have already, more or less correctly, recognized the liberal and white saviorist framework that has captured indigenous struggle in the United States—but their solution is to offer a different brand of white saviorism, in the form of “American socialist patriotism”, or what would more pointedly be termed Anglo-Saxon Socialism (or “ASS” for short). Their white saviorism has no more savor than the other.

15.

“Socialism With American Characteristics” is concrete revolution for me, idealist white saviorism for thee. It is Socialism With Paul Mua'Dib Characteristics.

16.

The solution to white saviorism (liberal) is not an alternative form of white saviorism (illiberal)

17.

Mexicanism is not merely an alternative to “Turtle Islandism” and Americanism, but their dialectical sublation. If the project (or, at least, the myth) of the “Founding Fathers” consists in a break with the English, then such a break must reach its apotheosis in a rejection of Anglo culture as an overarching framework, i.e. it must culminate in Mexicanism. As for “Turtle Islandism”: if its object is the affirmation of indigeneity, not by the indigenous alone (that is, it does not leave the indigenous to affirm themselves by themselves) but in alliance with the non-indigenous, then it must affirm this indigeneity through indigenous means that include the possibility of such an alliance, without this alliance succumbing to any form of white saviorism, at one extreme, or abandonment (i.e. leaving the indigenous to “fend for themselves”), at the other—that is, “Turtle Islandism” can only attain its aims through Mexicanism.

Mexicanism is, therefore, not the opposite of Americanism. Americanism stands opposed to Turtle Islandism, and it is Mexicanism which overcomes this opposition

18.

The Mexicanization of America is an already present reality, a reality which, for the time being, represents the forward advance of socialism in America. Whether we wish it or no, this process continues apace. Americanism is tailism—it sides with the most backward elements of the present, its most illusory surface appearances.

19.

Mexicanism is concretely revolutionary indigeneity, as opposed to white saviorism which is idealistically revolutionary on behalf of indigeneity.

20.

Whether you call it “Los Estados Unidos” or “La Isla Tortuga”—Mexicanism is the way forward.

21.

“Linguistically”, Mexicanization will probably entail increasing Spanish influence and loan words into the English language, if not a wholesale adoption of Spanish. In that latter respect, there is a case to be made for Spanish constituting an official state language; namely, that it puts us into closer contact with most of the Americas, and that it would help divorce us from our cursed “special relationship” with the United Kingdom. Latinization will be a necessary avenue for integrating the political interests of the United States into the rest of the Americas, creating the possibility of a shared American community. The English language, while not objectionable in itself, has historically served as a bridge for prioritizing Atlanticist political projects.

22.

Culturally, Latin American folk culture and music could provide a powerful stimulus to working class struggle. This struggle must adopt a rooted position from which to mobilize its efforts, and the ephemeral fads of the American music industry are anything but rooted in realities on the ground, anymore than Americanism itself is.

23.

Mexicanism is capable of acting as an umbrella for pluralist tendencies and diverse national ambitions—Americanism is not. Americanism represents a single national ambition, that of Anglo-Saxon cultural consciousness, which demands the subordination of all other national consciousnesses within its sphere of influence, not only those within the United States, but, vis a vis the “Monroe Doctrine”, all those ambitions within the entirety of our “New World”.

24.

We are all, already, Mexicans. Americanism is a facade obscuring a Mexican reality, a Hollywood movie-set prop. Mexicanism is the real character of the post-colonial Americas. It is both a present historical trend and an omen from out of the inevitable future.

25.

Americanism is a paper tiger. Outwardly it is fierce, but inwardly hollow. It is an illusion with claws. Mexicanism aims to de-fang and abolish the illusion.

26.

Some have actually suggested Americanism as some sort of Maoist cultural revolution (don’t laugh!), as a mass line to be adopted within the United States. They may as well call it what it really is—a grassroots media campaign for the Coca-Cola Company, a Disney Channel cosplay convention.

27.

Americanism is a form of screendamage that takes corporate advertisement for a substantive reality. Americanism is a mirage in the desert of American corporate culture. Americanist fantasy is an impediment to confrontation with the actual existing social state of affairs, preferring the television screen to social reality.

28.

Mexicanism is the only possible authentic “left patriotism” for most of the United States, at least as an overall umbrella for revolutionary activity in what, given the nature of American reality, can only be a pluralist cause. Mexicanism is the concrete form of pluralism in the Americas. “Americanism” is nonsense invented by marketing executives in order to sell Coca Cola, and televangelists in order to induct people into their Zionist mega churches.

29.

Is there anywhere on earth more in need of a “Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution” than the United States? Everything “cringe” and debased in this nation comes from the heart of Americanism—superhero films, infantile “fandoms”, megachurch and televangelist huckstering. Americanism itself is an ad campaign, a “fandom”, a mirage for the screen. The impetus for such a revolution can neither come from outside the Americas nor from inside American-ism. Mexicanism is the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution that abolishes the Americanist ideological sewer.

30.

Communism as a revolutionary “return to tradition”, can only fructify in the soil of Mexicanism. Americanism has no tradition to revolutionize. The basis in older, agrarian, modes of production, within the Americas, belongs to the indigenous peoples. Americanism is, by its nature, “hygienically” cut off from contact with indigeneity. Only Mexicanism can carry the banner of American indigeneity in one hand, and the banner of European modernity in the other. Mexicanism is already their authentic fusion within the sphere of the Americas.

31.

Even if we take the mythos of the Founding Fathers at face value (which we are by no means obliged to do), as some prominent socialist figures have done (like Lenin, Mao, and Ho Chi Minh), and as a source of inspiration for socialist struggle, this inspiration, in our case as in theirs, can only operate at a distance. Mao and Lenin did not raise up American flags as their unifying banner for the simple reason that it was foreign to them—that is, they were not American—though they could appreciate the meaning of its myth from a distance. Mao was not an American, and had no need of the flag and aesthetic regalia of Americanism. We, likewise, do not raise up this flag because it is foreign to us—we are not Anglo Saxons—though, perhaps, in the most generous circumstances (and we are by no means obliged to be generous), we too can appreciate its mythos. What need do we, who are Mexicans, concretely and irrespective of whether we recognize it or not, have for the emblems of Americanism?

32.

All revolutionary and progressive forces across Latin America see Simón Bolívar, José Martí, Fidel Castro, and Ernesto 'Che' Guevara, to name a only few, as “theirs”, as the intimate emblems of their own struggles. Only we, in the United States, see them as the heroes of a foreign struggle, as figures we can only appreciate from a certain distance. We almost forget the physical proximity, in space, of their struggles to ours. Americanist self-consciousness is an impediment to pan-American unity. The United States is a fortress in space, time, and thought against the forces of American unity.

33.

With Mexicanism, the best of European culture, and the best in African culture, and the best in Indigenous culture, can meet together in a fruitful union. Americanism is neither really European, nor Indigenous, nor African—it is an abyss where culture goes to die. Incidentally, quite similar in this respect to “Israeli culture”, wherein the culture of Jewish diaspora goes to die an unhallowed death. Indeed, Zionism is none other than Middle Eastern Americanism. We have not only seen the fruit of Americanism twice over, through the settlement and subjugation of America by the United States, and in Europe through Nazism—we have seen it three times over. Every fruit from this tree is rotten. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me, fool me three times and we have surpassed the sphere of mere shame and entered into that of criminal negligence. Let us not be fooled by Americanism a fourth time!

34.

Latin America has already had several successful or ongoing struggles in the socialist sphere, from the Cuban revolution to Bolivarianism and MAS on the continent. Something in the “Latin American equation” is calibrated to facilitating these struggles, while something in the “Americanist equation” causes them to be stillborn.

35.

Americanism is Anglo culture presented under the guise of universality. The imperative for immigrants to conform to this false universality has been a tragedy. Cultural non-conformism, within the United States, may therefore have genuine revolutionary value, particularly on the part of Hispanics, who constitute a large portion of the population. Mexicanism as a socialist cause that aims through a sort of “Cultural Revolution” to supplant Anglo-Saxon Americanism in the United States, will undoubtedly need to look back and draw inspiration from the historical struggles of Chicanismo, of La Raza Unida, and other related streams. That is, Mexicanism extends already existent historical struggles into the force which abolishes Americanism.

36.

Mexicanism is not offered as a real universality in opposition to the false universality of Americanism. Rather, it consists in the proposition that real particularity (Mexicanism) is superior to false universality (Americanism).

37.

Mexicanism (or “Latinization”) is the real particularity of the Americas, and a launching pad toward authentic internationalist universality. Americanism is already a pseudo-universalism, and its presence therefore forecloses the possibility of merging into authentically internationalist currents of socialist struggle. The acceptance of false universality is a barrier to any entry into real universality. False universality will neither slumber nor sleep until it has imposed itself as the only “real” universality.

38.

Patriotism and internationalism, a la Mao, are natural allies—but this requires a patriotism rooted in concrete realities, in the needs particular to a living, struggling segment of humanity. It is from a real particularity that we enter into the universal. Americanism is neither a particularity (let alone a real one), nor a real universality.

39.

“Socialist patriotism” is neither an oxymoron nor something objectionable. However, hitherto, its proponents with respect to America have failed to adequately formulate its basis. Socialist patriotism in the United States can only authentically consist in Mexicanism. The Americas are Latin. The United States as an Anglo-Saxon stronghold must give way to this historically established consensus.

40.

The only real Americanist particularity belongs to some explicitly 1776 revolutionary Anglo cultural nexus, which, moreover, has marked reactionary tendencies. That is, the only real Americanist particularity is a self-consciously “settlerist” particularity, the cultural consciousness of pilgrims, settlers, and conquerors. This cultural current, however, only has relevance to a dwindling population of individuals with strong, self-consciously Anglo roots. For the rest of us it has no relevance or meaning. Mexicanism, on the other hand, due to its fundamentally pluralist character, is for everyone. Indeed, according to a sort of “historical consensus” in the Americas, we are all, already, “Mexicans”, or, in other terms, we are all already within the historical sphere of Latin America.

41.

Americanism, then, is either of the falsely universal variety—this is the kind represented by the United States government at the present time—or it is of the “1776 particularist” variety—this is a curator's Americanism, the Americanism of quaint hobbyists huffing Rosicrucian fumes.

42.

Americanism is Socialism with Disney Land Characteristics, a 1776-themed Disney Land style theme park. It is perpetually backwards looking. Mexicanism is forward-looking—without disavowal of the past. It is a future-oriented movement which takes its justification from historical consensus. It even reclaims US history as its own, and directs it towards a brighter, Mexican future (we can see something of this in the art of Diego Rivera, for instance). That is, on its way to a universal future, this real particularity of the present can integrate even the most problematic aspects of past American history, account for them, put them in their proper place. This is because it adopts a real standpoint. Universality is already beyond standpoint, but if we begin with pseudo-universality then we always remain within a particular standpoint that claims to be beyond standpoint, and therefore neither attain to nor tend toward any sort of universality.

43.

The future is the revolutionary circle that resolves the tension between past and present. Mexicanism, as the already present omen of American futurity, resolves the tension between our fraught present and our traumatic past.

44.

Mexicanism is “archaeofuturistic”, a real past, the product of fruitful historical contradictions, which serves as the ground for concretizable future aspirations. Americanism has neither past nor future. It drifts aimlessly in a present which is a Disney Land counterfeit of the past and an apocalyptic Hollywood representation of the future. The many apocalypses of Hollywood cinema are symptomatic of Americanist cynicism vis a vis the future, of its inability to perceive any possible future for itself. The Christian myth of “the Rapture” is likewise symptomatic of such a cynicism. At most, in consonance with its false universality, Americanism can aspire to a rootless fantasy of the future. The Americanist future is Socialism with Grimes and Elon Musk Characteristics.

45.

Americans are detested the world over, not only for political reasons, but on an interpersonal level. No one likes American tourists. The mocking refrain that "Americans are fat and eat burgers" possesses a certain deep spiritual truth. Something is corrupted, on a fundamental level, in American culture and in the American ethos. Even if we accept the premises put forward by promoters of Americanist socialism (ASS) in the United States, the corruption of the "average Joe" American in the present is still not something which can be readily ignored. Social Darwinism is the ethos of even some of the poorest segments of this society. The "I don't need no government hand out" mentality is not an innocent protestation of individual self-sufficiency, but contains a genuinely sociopathic insistence, implicit within it, that no suffering or ailing person should receive any consideration whatsoever. Sadism and sociopathy are celebrated qualities in America, and in American television. America is the Babylon of everything sick and perverse in the world today.

46.

If American culture can be reformed, it will not be through patriotic coddling (which, moreover, is something fundamentally condescending, and hence elitist), but through vicious criticism. This is a point that needs to be emphasized: patriotic coddling is a form of condescension, and condescension is elitist in the worst way. People will cite Mao as an instance of proletarian patriotism, but Mao coupled this with vicious social criticism, as demonstrated through the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, for instance. What people seem to be proposing now, as an avenue of political action in America, is patriotism minus criticism, patriotism for idiots (because that's what they think the average American is destined to always be: an idiot). If you really care about Americans, then you must, perforce, cease to coddle their worst tendencies. Spare the rod, spoil the child. The incapacity to receive justified criticism is not a virtue.

47.

What is necessary here is a kind of synthesis of these positions, already anticipated by Mao and Stalin (in the GPCR and Great Purge, respectively), something like a "critical patriotism". If you really “love your country”, as most promoters of left patriotism today will avow, you will be forced to concede the necessity of struggle against your nation's worst tendencies. It should also be clear that, on the other side of this “proletarian patriotism” Discourse trap, the "woke college kid anarchists” are no better. They are critics, but bad, sentimental, moralizing critics, and to make morality the basis of a political project is implicitly utopian (which isn't to say that moral thought has no place here, but that it cannot constitute the basis of a social project without devolving into utopianism). Criticism which is poorly formulated is almost worse than no criticism at all. Furthermore, if patriotism becomes a problem insofar as is it coddles, then the "woke" types are definitely included here. After all, they want nothing more than to be coddled. And if America poses deep problems at its very "essence", then how can we exclude "woke radlib" types when, as a cultural phenomenon, they are themselves so quintessentially American? Incisive criticism of Americanism must include this den of sex pests, weirdos, and liberal white saviors.

48.

Critical patriotism is the revolutionary circle that harmonizes the polarity between chauvinist, unreflective patriotism, and categorical rejection of patriotism as “reactionary”. It shows us that patriotism which is not critical is not patriotic enough, and that criticism which, in addition to being poorly formulated, seeks only to uproot without building, is an inadequately conceived criticism.

49.

Both sides, then, pose fundamentally the same problem: reticence before real incisive criticism. On one side, the fear that criticism will burst a stupidly patriotic fantasy, and, on the other, both an incapacity for incisiveness in criticism (criticism remains superficial) and the inability to perceive just how quintessentially American, in all the worst ways, "wokeness" or “radical liberal” ideology is. "Americans are fat and eat burgers" applies to this latter group too.

50.

If Americans lack the courage to look at themselves squarely in the mirror of self-criticism, how will they find the courage to struggle towards the uncertain future?

51.
The Mexicanist is an American with the courage to self-criticism. Mexicanism is Americanism-plus-cojones.

52.

Mexicanism, therefore, constitutes a stance which is both patriotic, in the most concrete sense, while being no less critical toward the present state of affairs. That is, it constitutes an authentic “left patriotism”, a critical patriotism.