Jason Reza Jorjani | |
|---|---|
 Jason Reza Jorjani | |
| Home Base | New York City, New Jersey |
| Published By | OPP HQ |
| Published On | December 26, 2016 |
Arktos Media is one of those neo-Fascist outlets that tries to play dumb about the fact that they are neo-Fascists. Founded in 2009, they are known for publishing books that cater to the far-right/racist campaigns in Europe and co-sponsored a conference in Budapest, Hungary with the White Supremacist National Policy Institute (NPI) in Oct. 2014 that was shut down by police before it even began, resulting in the arrest and expulsion from Hungary of NPI’s Richard Spencer, who was then told he could not return to Hungary or much of Europe for three years. They see themselves as the providers of “the resources necessary to discover for themselves a true alternative to the onslaught of modernity,” that “alternative” to them being pro-white and anti-immigrant.
Now if you want to find where their neo-Fascism takes that sharp right turn into neo-Nazism, Jason Reza Jorjani might be the person to look at. He’s a lecturer at the New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark, NJ, and his bio on the NJIT website lists his Arktos-published book, “Prometheus and Atlas”. Published in March 2016, it’s a book where he fashions the two Greek titans as Aryan gods that the world should be worshipping, rejecting all other religions. Yes he is talking about Christianity and Judaism, but in this day and age that means that Islam is going to have a very special target on its back, and Jorjani, who is described in online bios as “Iranian-American and native New Yorker of Persian and northern European descent” (and we should make note here that he believes that Iranians – particularly Persians – are White), has made it clear that he feels that Islam in particular has no place in society or as the White Power podcast Red Ice put it, “no place in a world governed by Atlas”.
Jorjani made his neo-Nazi buffoonery all the more apparent when he spoke at the National Policy Institute Conference in November, 2016 where he discussed how he was taking Arktos Media into that abyss as the new Editor-In-Chief. “The first principle of the Arktos worldview is an affirmation of the Indo-European tradition,” he said, going on to say that it is those “Aryan cultures” that are at the root of the world’s development. And minutes later, he goes on to declare this:
“Our authors offer constructive criticism of the ill-conceived and bankrupt sociopolitical philosophies of liberalism, democracy and universal human rights. We draw inspiration from classical political thought such as that of Plato and Aristotle and seek some workable form of what Nietzsche called aristocratic radicalism.”
Now if you are about the particular facet of Nietzche’s worldview that the Nazis drew inspiration from, you are going to start sounding like them when you find a certain religion you don’t like and Jorjani did not disappoint when he started to espound on his belief that Islam is incompatible with Western society because he did it in EXACTLY the same language that the Nazis used against Jews:
“As a longtime student of the glorious history of the Aryan nation of Iran, and as a leading participant in the contemporary renaissance of Aryan identity among the Persians and the Kurds, it’s clear to me that Shi‘ism is no more of an ally of Europeans than Sunni Islam. Nearly everything allegedly ‘glorious’ (he uses air quotes here) about Islam was parasitically appropriated by Arabs and Turks from the Caucasian civilization of greater Iran. Moreover, this parasitic appropriation of a mutilated Iranian civilization took place in the wake of a murderous campaign of conquest, rape, plunder and destruction that can only be described as history’s first and greatest White genocide…As Editor-In-Chief of Arktos, I’ll make sure that it’s clear to everyone in the nu-right, or alt-right or whatever you want to call our rising rebellion that sometimes the enemy of your enemy is just another enemy.”
Of course, now that Jorjani is in the public eye after speaking at the NPI conference, the heat’s on him and he now needs to do some damage control. Upon learning that he is associated with Nazism, some at the State University of New York at Stony Brook where he received his PhD in 2013, want to review his scholarship. According to the minutes of one of that school’s philosophy department meetings, one unidentified speaker voiced concern about Jorjani’s revealed associations. “One of our Ph.D. alumni is involved in the Aryan white supremacist movement,” read the minutes. “Is easily accessible on the internet. I have watched a couple of his videos and they are appropriately described as Aryan white supremacist, couched in Western philosophical tradition. This has come to my attention and many people are concerned. We are going to review his research, his dissertation, and we may or may not issue a statement, though this runs the risk of giving the issue more oxygen.” While Jorjani wasn’t named in the minutes, he was sure that they were talking about him, and he responded with an open letter on the White Supremacist blog Right On, where he laughingly demanded for an apology. But he had some rather weak responses to being called a neo-Nazi, such as:
“To put my relationship to National Socialism in the language of the Left, since most of my accusers fancy themselves of that political persuasion, to call me a National Socialist is like calling someone a Stalinist simply because he is a Marxist. A Trotskyite would certainly be defamed by such an epithet, and would be rightly outraged to be subjected to that kind of slander. I am not any kind of nationalist.”
In other words, he shouldn’t be called a neo-Nazi because of technicality?
And as for him being associated with Dick Spencer, he says:
“It makes no more sense to equate my views with those of Richard Spencer (let alone Adolf Hitler) simply because he patted me on the back on stage for a minute than it does to claim that Barack Obama is a Wahhabi responsible for all of Saudi Arabia’s routinely inhuman barbarity because he knelt and kissed the Saudi King’s hand or sheepishly accepted a medal from him. In fact, the latter is far more evidence of Obama being an Islamic fundamentalist traitor than my interaction with Spencer is evidence supporting any description of me as an “Aryan White Supremacist” or “NeoNazi.”
Except Spencer did more than pat Jorjani on the back for a minute. Lest we forget, the reason why he was on that stage in the first place was because he was invited by Spencer to speak! And it doesn’t help Jorjani when he posted pictures online of him with Spencer from two separate occasions calling him his “new friend and colleague”! So if Obama accepting a medal from the Saudi king is evidence of him being a traitor, then Jorjani’s association with Spencer would make him Public Enemy #1.
NJIT issued the following the statement when we reached them for comment:
“Per your inquiry regarding Professor Jason Reza Jorjani, NJIT is among the leading universities in the nation in terms of diversity and, as one of the top polytechnic institutions in the United States, we continuously are striving to attract greater numbers of students and faculty from diverse populations. While we will not publicly discuss individual personnel matters, we are very concerned by any statements of apparent bias made by a member of our community. Such a mindset is not consistent with our beliefs and ideals. NJIT also is a place where the civil exchange of ideas and opinions is valued, even when we disagree vehemently with the positions being expressed. That is because disagreement can spark further investigation, vigorous analysis, debate and deeper learning.”
It’s going to be real interesting to see how the Jason Reza Jorjani drama plays out.
Categories: JPerson
Tags: Arktos Media Aryan hate Jason Reza Jorjani NJIT racism