Cultural Marxism and the Cathedral: Two Alt-Right Perspectives on Critical Theory

Abstract

Paleoconservatives developed the Frankfurt School conspiracy to frame liberal or progressive politics as foreign to the American way of life. The Cathedral, on the other hand, is a term to refer to the expansive institutional complex that produces and regulates public opinion to ensure the perpetuation of the “progressive” status quo. Although both movements have shaped the alt-right worldview, paleoconservatives and neoreactionaries represent incompatible ideologies. Their distinctive ideological standpoints result in two markedly different explanations for existence and practice of critical theory. The Frankfurt School conspiracy developed slowly over the past three decades, and this chapter examines four of the most influential articulations of this theory. Subsequently, the chapter turns to the concept of the Cathedral to investigate how the neoreactionary movement’s rationalization of critical theory resembles and contrasts the paleoconservative myth of Cultural Marxism.