ta-nehisi coates on "the homeland" (20260217)

The Blood-and-Soil Nationalism That Killed Alex Pretti and Renee Good | Vanity Fair

coates is a little late to the game with the definition of “homeland” but seems to catch up pretty quickly with its teutonic vibe. he’s clearly appreciating the implications that this word has had from 20+ years ago. he (correctly) notes that this was something that pretty much everyone at the time hand-waved away; never thinking that the norms would be eroded to the point where this would be exploited by unprincipled actors. but there were a lot of folks that didn’t forget their “indiana jones” and had the hairs on the back of their neck stand up with this framing. there’s a solid shout out to russ feingold’s prescience here. (though even he didn’t think it would go as far as it has.)

the deep cut here is in the discussion of viola liuzzo, who i never heard of but has interesting propaganda parallels to renee good. there’s plenty to unpack here. (archive.is link)