Deconstructing Gosar’s attack
I had not heard about Attack on Titan till Rep. Paul Gosar shared an anime on twitter last week where he attacks President Biden and kills Rep. AOC. And his unapologetic behavior after that, even after many condemnations were made, eventually led to his censuring today.
While there is a lot to say about the politics behind this and how the Republican party refused to call Gosar out for this absolute horrific behavior, I am not going to do that in this post.
For my own learning and better understanding of what this anime is all about, I decided to go down the AoT rabbit hole. Just a bit.
The Premise
Attack on Titan, the Japanese manga (comic series), written and illustrated by a Japanese storyteller, Isayama Hajime, was first published about 11 years ago. Hajime wrote it in his spare time while working night shifts at an Internet cafe.
The story begins in a city with three walls. Outside the walls are massive, mindless, near-invulnerable, human-eating monsters called Titans. The city itself is populated by human beings, but they believe they are the last survivors. They are controlled by a very repressive military regime. Part of the military is corrupt, another part is a self-serving police force, a third part of the military often drinks on the job, and a fourth part which is a scout corps that hasn’t done much yet.
The protagonist, i.e. the main character, Eren, is a scout, and he discovers that he has the power to transform into a Titan. The scouts decide to capitalize on this superpower and start exploring the terriroty. The military regime is angry and starts its attack on them, which eventually leads to the scouts launching a coup d’état and installing one of their own on the throne.
Once they gain control of their territory, the scouts discover a shocking truth — That they actually live on an island. And that there is a world beyond. They learn that the people within the walls are members of a persecuted race called Eldians.
The Eldian diaspora on the mainland is scattered. From internment zones and refugee camps, they are not together and are suffering. The Eldian Empire apparently controlled massive parts of the world in the past and many people who were at the receiving end of this colonization back then, use historical grievances against them, as a pretext for prejudice against the Eldians at present.
And the twist here is that Titans are actually former Eldians, who were forcibly transformed into unthinking beasts by a nation called Marley.
Then Marley declares war on the people of the walls.
This prompts Eren to lead a rebel faction aiming to destroy all life outside of the island.
That’s the premise. Got that?
Interpretations
Even though the author refuses to admit that he has planted any reference to historical events or politics in this series, Attack on Titan is an international hit which invariably has led to fans around the world drawing various interpretations of the characters, politics, socio-cultural juxtaposition of the story background, etc.
The most straightforward interpretation of this Manga seems to be as follows:
The broad moral of AoT is that it condemns the effects of fascism and racism in society. The inequality and propaganda espoused by the fascist military regime are major obstacles that the protagonists must overcome. Even though the main protagonist becomes a bloodthirsty genocidal maniac himself, the liberals by and large see Attack of Titan to be a story they could root for.
But there is an exact opposite interpretation happening on the far right.
For the far right or alt-right to be specific, Attack on Titan is a story that very shrewdly normalizes the white supremacist ideology for a mainstream audience. In the alt-right’s eyes, the Eldians are a stand-in for white people (in western countries), punished for the crimes of their ancestors. Their lands are now occupied by besieged monsters.
The weak Eldians are brainwashed by a state leader who calls for pacifism and non-violence against non-Eldians. These weak Eldians represent the white population indoctrinated by liberals in order to feel empathy for the non-whites. And Marley, the country, represents Jews, convincing white people to hate themselves.
If you are with the story and the interpretations till now, as bizarre as they may sound, the sites that are popular among right wingers, especially alt-right, the sites like 4chan, have been breeding grounds for discussions on AoT since 2014, and they took a new and a more devious turn since 2016.
Gosar
In the video that he tweeted out, Gosar depicts himself, Boebert, and Greene as the heroes/protagonists —i.e. the scouts.
Specifically, in this video, he is Eren.
AOC, Biden, and asylum seekers at the border are the mindless monsters — Titans.
I am not sure how much of a Japanese manga fan Gosar really is, but I am certain that he works with a group of people who are, and he continuously seeks votes from a certain demographic who sees the show as a depiction of Replacement Theory — where white people are forced into walled cities because that’s the only place they are safe from the mindless monsters.
Dog Whistle
Apparently, several online white supremacy groups and individuals have been circulating anime memes and videos based of this series, edited in the same manner as the one shared by Gosar for a while. Their agenda has always been to call for action through these memes and videos.
The point is, this video, when shared by a sitting congressman like Gosar and in the context of what we know about Attack of Titan, has to be interpreted as if he is speaking directly to these white nationalist extremists in their language.
The video isn’t just bad because it depicts violence against his colleagues.
Gosar’s video is a dog whistle to white supremacy extremists, telling them it’s time to shed ineffective leadership, and fight back.
Worst of all, it’s done in their “language” — Thematically juxtaposing to trigger desired implications.
