I think we can classify Sweeney as a member of the Nietzschean right ...
- Richard Hanania [1]
One final thought on the controversy surrounding the American Eagle 'Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans' campaign, which I discussed briefly in a recent post: click here ...
Even if concerns that the ads featuring Sydney Sweeney appear to knowingly play on the long and troubling history of eugenics (i.e., the largely discredited set of beliefs and practices to do with genetically improving the population by promoting certain traits designated as superior and desirable over those designated inferior and undesirable) are valid and justified - and I'm not persuaded of that - the level of anti-white rhetoric that it has unleashed (in the name, ironically, of standing up to racism) is a little disheartening (to say the least); particularly when it comes from whey-faced commentators and is born of white guilt, white fragility, and self-loathing.
But perhaps, as a reader of Nietzsche, I shouldn't be surprised at this: for anti-white racism is arguably just another unfolding of what in the Genealogy he describes as the slave revolt in morality, a fateful turning point in history which begins when "ressentiment itself turns creative and gives birth to values" [2]; or, more precisely, when it inverts the values of the ruling class and in this way extracts an imaginary revenge.
For example, noble values of strength and beauty are suddenly seen as oppressive forms of evil whilst the opposite of these things are deemed to be virtues; thus we see an emergence of so-called body positivity and a celebration of DEI.
Unfortunately, things become particularly heated when framed in terms of perceived racial characteristics, such as skin colour, which is precisely how many of those who have attacked the American Eagle ads have framed things, seeing Sweeney's whiteness as inherently oppressive and offensive in itself; a malevolent and aggressive condition of being.
It's almost as if they look at her image and hear her humorous affirmation of her own dress sense (and not, as a matter of fact, her genetic inheritance or racial identity) and can only think: ea est alba [3].
Notes
[1] Richard Hanania on X (24 Mar 2024): click here to read the post in full. I very much doubt this is the case, but it's interesting that Hanania should write this 16 months ago. As far as I'm aware, Miss Sweeney has yet to declare her political or philosophical leanings.
[2] Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morality, ed. Keith Ansell-Pearson, trans. Carol Diethe (Cambridge University Press, 1994), I. 10, p. 21.
[3] I'm referencing and reversing the line from Horace's Satires (I. 85): hic niger est - literally meaning 'he is black' and often translated into English as 'he is a dangerous character' and thus intended to be understood as a warning against those with dark hair or skin.
