Bronze Age Pervert is a twitter celebrity, whose account focuses on body-building, suntanning, pictures of hot youths (with a homosexual slant) and alt-right politics. Over the years, he developed a certain jargon meant to ridicule the ruling class and escape algorithmic censorship, using a wide array of misspellings and grammatical errors, and impersonating at times a ‘Conan the Barbarian’ warrior-type. He wrote a book, an instant Kindle best seller, Bronze Age mindset, expanding on his politics. The book, in a nutshell, is pop culture Nietzsche.
Most reactionaries pine for the 1950s or the 1900s; a minority, driven mostly by aesthetics, are nostalgic of the Classical age, the Renaissance or the Middle Ages. BAP goes further: back to the Bronze Age, the heroes of Homer and the Steppe nomads. Back to universal violence, piracy, plunder, and glory to exceptional men assisted by a small band of brothers. BAP envisions the collapse of our world, followed by the opening of a new frontier for an elite of adventurers. He rejects the system entirely, namely democracy, alongside socialism, conventional morality, law and order, etc. The System, and its “hidden masters”, the “Lords of lies”, “Leviathan”, “Babylon”, “Bugmen”. Racism against Indians or the Chinese is expressed directly, antisemitism only hinted at. Yes, it is a far-right book. It derives its conceptual frame from Nietzsche. It attempts to ground itself in biology, and is deeply misogynistic. One passage, addressing the readers, states that if Ann Coulter or Pat Buchanan were elected, “You”, would get 99% of what “You” want. At this point, it’s pretty obvious who this book is intended for: young, disenfranchised far-right men.
BAP mixes insight with nonsense (his attack on scientists is receivable, although lifted from Nietzsche), but he hints that history and geography have been falsified entirely, and that Bangkok and Mexico City are probably “the same place”. Is this humor? It’s funny. But it feels rather like a strategic move, a façade of buffoonery used to disguise potentially subversive content. What is this book, really? Drivel, as some well-meaning college professors have called it? Or a sign of the intellectual renewal of the Right? The most exciting thing about this book is that we all have to find this out for ourselves.
It could be plain trolling, a mercenary effort, clickbait in book form.
Or a coping mechanism for right-wing males.
Or a subversive pamphlet, aiming at radical change.
As for the accusation of this book being pure drivel: it’s too good for that. The chapters on Ancient Greece are lively, fun and energizing, there are many cultural references throughout the book which could open doors for young readers (Plato, Aristotle, Thucydides, Stendhal, Balzac, Baudelaire, Camoëns, Cellini, Napoleon, Talleyrand, Diogenes, Heraclitus, Tacitus, Suetonius, and many more), including several allusions to French culture (a rare feat these days). Of course, this contradicts the idea of a body-building fascist meathead writing this. All things considered, Bronze Age Mindset reads like a clever political tool, devised to re-mobilize alt-right youths and steer them toward milder political options inside the conservative movement, a classic case of bait and switch.
