Fratriarchy and neo-archaisms in global change: A morbid situation

In today’s interregnum, as Antonio Gramsci famously called it, ‘morbid symptoms’ mutate via what I call microfascism, specifically its gendered mode. Drawing from Celia Amoros’s understanding of patriarchy as formed through pacts and from Deleuze and Guattari’s concept of neo-archaism, this article situates contemporary manospheric culture as a neo-archaic space for the formation of brotherhoods. Social injustice warrior streamers, right-wing outrage traffickers, locker-roomesque podcasters, comedians with delusions of cancel grandeur, and meat-only diet influencers have turned their platforms and channels into rallies. These manospheric networks of brotherhoods, packs and squads have been able to bind into a more organized fratriarchy. Moreover, they revive the archaic Männerbund as fascist patriarchal pact which wages a war on women online and in everyday life. This very contemporary set of cultural phenomenon invokes something ‘primordial’ (defined as a first order or arche) in which gender is foundational to the mythical establishment of political order.