Inside the Conservative Fever Swamp

John Nolte inadvertently lays bare the narcissism and victimology of modern conservatism.

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As a general rule, I usually don’t read the right-wing website, Breitbart. It is one of the by-products of having a functioning brain.

But I’m making an exception today because a recent piece on the site offers useful insight into the workings of the conservative mind — and the debilitating ideology of modern conservatism.

Last week Breitbart Editor-at-Large John Nolte penned a piece lamenting that conservatives are not getting vaccinated against COVID-19. He also touted the benefits of getting a shot. These days that kind of language on a right-wing website is to be applauded. But Nolte took his argument in a strange direction: he claims that Republicans are not getting vaccinated because of liberals.

According to Nolte, “leftists like (Howard) Stern and CNNLOL and Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi and Anthony Fauci are deliberately looking to manipulate Trump supporters into not getting vaccinated.”

How are they doing this?

“If I wanted to use reverse psychology to convince people not to get a life-saving vaccination, I would do exactly what Stern and the left are doing… I would bully and taunt and mock and ridicule you for not getting vaccinated, knowing the human response would be, Hey, fuck you, I’m never getting vaccinated!” “And why is that a perfectly human response? Because no one ever wants to feel like they are being bullied or ridiculed or mocked or pushed into doing anything.

It’s a helluva thing when a conservative writer takes the position that his fellow ideologues are like immature children who are so super sensitive and insecure that they will refuse to get a life-saving vaccine simply because their political opponents think they should. But that is Nolte’s argument.

It is, in fact, not a 100 percent normal human response to refuse vaccination in this circumstance — particularly if the alternative is death. Less normal is believing that Anthony Fauci, Nancy Pelosi, or Joe Biden are bullying, mocking, or ridiculing conservatives to purposely hasten their deaths. Far less normal is giving a rat’s ass about anything Howard Stern says. Nolte criticizes Stern for mocking anti-vaxxer conservative radio hosts who have died from COVID-19 — and rightfully so. It’s gross. But honestly, who cares? And who in their right mind makes a health care decision based on something that Howard Stern said? According to Nolte, conservatives do.

“No one wants to cave to a piece of shit like that, or a scumbag like Fauci, or any of the scumbags at CNNLOL, so we don’t. And what’s the result? They’re all vaccinated, and we’re not! And when you look at the numbers, the only numbers that matter, which is who’s dying, it’s overwhelmingly the unvaccinated who are dying, and they have just manipulated millions of their political enemies into the unvaccinated camp …

In another column this week, Nolte went a step further and argued that “the organized left is deliberately putting unvaccinated Trump supporters in an impossible position where they can either NOT get a life-saving vaccine or CAN feel like cucks caving to the ugliest, smuggest bullies in the world.”

I struggle to find two paragraphs that better capture the debilitating narcissism and unending state of grievance that defines the modern conservative movement. Liberals and public health officials are not manipulating conservatives into not getting vaccinating — THEY ARE TRYING TO KEEP THEM FROM DYING. That’s the rationale for imposing vaccine mandates and requiring mask-wearing: to protect people from needless death. That Nolte interprets this behavior as manipulation rather than empathy speaks volumes about the conspiratorial mindset of modern conservatism and the astonishing inability to recognize compassion and caring. It seemingly never occurs to Nolte and other conservatives railing against vaccine and mask mandates that those imposing these policies are trying to save lives.

What is even sadder is that Nolte is convinced — as clearly are his readers — that liberals like Dr. Fauci and Howard Stern are hanging out in their liberal enclaves sipping Merlot, eating canapes, and having a good laugh as they look down their noses at those silly conservatives who won’t get vaccinated. In reality, I think it’s safe to say that most liberals don’t care one way or the other. Indeed, the amount of psychic energy conservatives emit convincing themselves that liberals are judging and condescending to them is simply astounding.

The irony of all this is that Nolte is actually trying to convince his readers to get vaccinated.

How many of you were aware the CDC believes that 99.5 percent of those dying are unvaccinated? I bet not many of you. So why would the metric that is the most convincing one not be all over the place? Once you learn that 99.5 percent of deaths are unvaccinated, it cuts through all the muck. That number is startling, an eye-opener… Forget cases, forget mandates, forget masks, and Howard Stern… When you learn that almost everyone dying is unvaccinated, that’s a come to Jesus moment.

I could be wrong.

Maybe the left isn’t that evil and sly.

But when I think of the unvaccinated lying there dying, being told by their doctor, “Sorry, there’s nothing more we can do to get enough oxygen to your lungs,” I don’t laugh. My heart breaks for that person. Imagine lying there dying thinking that all you had to do was get the Trump Vaccine.

Even if this isn’t the left’s plan, who’s owning who?

There is a very powerful and easily understood argument for getting vaccinated against COVID-19 — you won’t die.

The second most powerful argument is that by getting vaccinated, you won’t get sick and die, thus causing unneeded trauma to your family and friends. Next on the list is that by getting vaccinated, you protect those around you — not just your family but those in your community who you could potentially infect.

But Nolte only tangentially touches on one of those persuasive arguments. Instead, he says that the primary reason to get vaccinated is to avoid being owned by the left.

In a way, this is almost laudable. Nolte is speaking in a language that he knows will appeal to conservative readers. Rather than telling them the vaccine will save their lives, he’s telling it will save their lives and AND will undermine the liberal plot to have them die. I hope it works.

But the “logic” of his argument offers an unsettling insight into the mindset of modern conservatism. Suspicion and hatred of liberals is its greatest animating feature — more so even than the preservation of human life.

For those of you familiar with the behavior of narcissists, the lack of introspection and accountability — and the unquenchable feeling of victimization — on display here will be all too familiar. So too will the desperate effort to find fault with anyone or anything other than themselves. Rather than look inwardly at the mindset that has allowed far too many people to die, Nolte flails for someone to blame and lands on a familiar culprit — liberals. Indeed, suppose Nolte could step back for a second. In that case, he might notice that calling Dr. Fauci a “scumbag” and accusing liberals of rooting for the deaths of Republicans is what has led us to a point where so many conservatives are needlessly dying. But to do so would mean rejecting the central tenet of modern conservatism.