I Hosted the Hegelian E-Girl Party and All I Got Was Called a Fascist.
And wrote this because people kept on asking "what is a Hegelian E-girl?". I try to answer that question.
I hosted the Hegelian E-Girl party and penned this to stave off the inevitable flood of Facebook group, Twitter group chats, and Instagram inquiries. Fair warning: it's packed with niche references because that's where we are culturally. I’ve attached Twitter screenshots where most of the discourse unfolded, memes, and lots of name drops.
So, I went to this public-turned-VIP party, meaning you could only attend by securing a "VIP" guest list spot. This we learned was thanks to bomb threat rumors—some swore it was real, some saw it as a PR stunt à la angelicism's identical fake threats at their film premiere. It seemed clear, no one felt truly threatened. They even tried to pay an actor friend to heckle the symposium and did their recruiting for hosts like myself at a event featuring Norm Finkelstein. I agreed but had no clue what the symposium was—just some theorycel friends from a group chat called Laetitia who said they were creating an alternative to Red Scare, the organizers were Hegelians, and communists. And, it turned out even before the event, it was quite certain that it would draw people after going viral on Twitter.
The party was a wild, ideological cocktail—engagement felt more performative than substantive. The Platypus Affiliated Society members in attendance? They bailed early, leaving only a trail of pamphlets behind. The MAGA Communists? Mostly a meme, but with some ideological kinship to the Infrared Collective led by Haz, and cross-pollination with the Larouche/Schiller Institute according to Mike Crumps, explaining that Haz spoke at a Schiller Institute event. Infrared-Haz seemed to be the closest thing to a coherent political project that the HEGs leaned on, while, according to a former member, their talk of political pluralism I was interested in, draped in deliberate vagueness, was a ploy to attract a broader array of political groups. One member of this faction troll-harassed my friend Jamie Peck, but another friend intervened to defuse the creepiness.
Leftish commentators like Jreg, J.J. McCullough, Crumps, Ross Wolfe, and Joshua Citarella lurked about, seemingly out of morbid curiosity rather than serious engagement. Most attendees were there to socialize—non-political but perhaps hyper-online, enjoying the free alcohol and DJs like twitter personality Dull under the neon light of a hammer and sickle. To put this in perspective, I later discovered that the restaurant space is rented out by the owner, who was involved in the Iranian Revolution. After the event, he quipped that the so-called communists had ideas that didn't seem very communist to him. It's amusing how all these groups (Platypus, Maga Communism, and the like) get tangled up in their own definitions that people part of the historical project would reject!
Everyone I asked concluded it was a fantastic party with lively discussions across opposing viewpoints. My friend Mary E. Vogt, equally clueless about the Hegelian e-girl phenomenon, said she could chat openly without fear of sparking a heated debate—though I did witness several, including one guy shouting, "Don't ad hominem me!" before storming off. For instance, the person I quibbled with, a MAGA communist who believed the MAGA movement would unite the working class and bring about a workers' revolution, citing North Korea as a model of communism.
Challenging dead dogma by mingling with those of opposing political beliefs doesn’t make you anything but a curious human being—perhaps even a wiser. Consider an Oxford study highlighting our information silos: liberals and conservatives, marinating in their echo chambers, when faced with dissent, double down rather than open up. The smarter move? Letting our epistemic bubbles burst and inviting a breath of fresh perspective, especially considering how alienating it can be to be heterodox in any fashion.
However, there’s a risk: attend a party with reactionaries, and you might be branded a fascist by association. The overuse of the term "fascist" parallels Godwin's Law, diluting its significance and rendering it ineffective as a rhetorical tool by stripping it of its historical and ideological weight. Unbeknownst to me, the HEGs were essentially a psyop for MAGA Communism, so the implication was that every attendee was a closet fascist.
Hilariously, politics barely entered the conversation. Most people were too busy mocking the MAGA Communism meme to engage in any serious debate. So, it seems, hanging out with political opposites doesn't brand you a traitor—just a nuanced, slightly more enlightened individual navigating the absurdities of ideological purity. I’ve ridiculed this sentiment with others deeply engaged in political advocacy, like my friend Geeta Minocha, a lawyer championing public banking. Of course, many went to people watch, hatewatch, or just because it was a spectacle.
The people who were political at the party were an odd mix—attempting to concoct a post-left, non-ideological, horseshoe politics with a cryptofascist mystique. The vibe? We’re at the end of history, leftism is cringe, and reactionary provocation (plus slurs) is the last bastion of genuine expression. Matty Colquhoun aka Xenogothic dub this an edge-lording trend—a downstream effect from 2018 London based post-left scene of Nina Power and Justin Murphy (though he's more theory-bound and, luckily, detached from the NYC version of this scene relates to Red Scare). While other Twitter users critiquing the show said to consider an apt comparison to Rachel Haywire’s socially liberal yet spiritually fascist ideology or the ever-annoying post-leftist Aimee Therese. Dimes square at al. anti-wokism can be traced back to the founder of Vice, Gavin McInnes, and his arc from punk to neoconservative to alt-right. Similarly, the trajectory of contrarians morphing into status quo defenders—think IDW, new atheists, etc.
I wouldn't mistake this for a theorycel gathering—except for the core Laetitia group chat members who some like Hunter Hunt-Hendrix now disavow their association with the HEC Council—calling them cryptofascist. Otherwise, the ideological cocktail was the usual right-wing Dimes Square concoction: Dugin, Nick Land, Evola, Yarvin, Zizek, Logo Daedalus, Christianity, etc. as far as my limited interactions could tell. But do they even stake a claim? Skimming the preliminary Hegelian e-girls manifesto, it seemed nascent, a work in progress, even post-symposium1. They might have flirted with fascism, vaguely self-identifying as "cryptofascist," but like most hyperindividualist internet niche politics, its salience was utterly inane as of now and was traded for gamifying internet attention.
Nikki, one of the founders, insists they’re not just another Dimes Square (DS) vanity project:
“Dimes Square is a dead-end of expression and hedonism—rich kids in a liberal circlejerk, prancing about without transcending their own conditions. It’s all right-wing aesthetics as a shallow critique, a reverse wokeness where radical liberalism preserves their hedonistic party-drug culture. Our project seeks substantive impact and genuine consequences.”
Here’s the crux of it: Nikki has nailed the contradictions in the so-called DS trend among traditional Catholics. She’s calling out the irony of their supposed commitments, showing that their so-called "reactionary" stance is anything but a bid for a attention. Nikki’s point is simple: she wants these alleged principles to be genuinely applied, not just paraded around as empty rhetoric.
One could argue that Nikki hasn't received enough credit for her insightful critique. However, her analysis should alarm anyone who prefers these so-called reactionaries—who are really just Hillary Clinton-style opportunists—to keep up their charade. It’s reminiscent of that interview with Russian philosopher Aleksandr Dugin on American late-night TV. When asked why he supports Putin, a dictator, Dugin responded that Russians actually want him to be even more authoritarian. The point was that Western elites, like the interviewer, can't grasp this perspective because they’re out of touch with the reality of the situation.
She’s calling out contradictions, but it’s sort of hilarious because the event she’s critiquing was essentially a party—self-funded, full of political mishmash, and aimed more at being an accessory than challenging the Red Scare crowd. Meanwhile, Mike Crump’s writing, despite some critics labeling it as another superficial appendage to the downtown scene, actually strives to shed light on the mind-numbing banality of predictable contrarianism. It’s the difference between genuine critique and a superficial commentary pretending to be a populist revolutionary like MAGA comminists.
Despite dismissing the event as just a party, the next day it took a sad interpersonal turn. I learned about the "e-girl council" defection: Sanje Horah’s quip that leftist ideas weren’t taken seriously, such as in the case of Morgan on Twitter or Emily gripe about being tagged a "dumb woke leftoid" for objecting to Palestinian mockery while Evola was lauded2. This underscored the event’s zero-stakes nature—attendees could leave, unscathed and unaffected, but the two main organizers, who seem to be the only real members of the council seem to leave some scars on their friends. I’m sure this wasn’t their intention, they seem like perfectly nice people from my experience, events of this nature often lead to fallouts even, but sadly, this is likely how most online will remember the HEC.
Regarding Hegel, after reading their Anna and Nikki who founded, HEC’s speeches they want their own "vibe shift"—think Hegelian sublation, but with memes, spectacle, and parties—hoping to overcome NYC's stagnant social unconscious. Their approach mirrors Julius Evola's mystical spin on Hegel’s dialectics infused with concrete philosophizing. They envision themselves as concept-warriors combating liberal nihilism and hedonism by applying abstract ideas practically, fostering a cultural discourse that mediates social contradictions without scapegoating. Nikki's grand claim of memetic power and breaking Hegel out of the ivory tower sounds inspiring, until you realize it’s more academic navel-gazing than actionable philosophy. They strive to transcend static political dualisms, advocating constant self-undermining and material change à la Marx, yet their verbose prescriptions seem detached from real praxis, people, and conflict--unless you consider Nikki being "one of Infrared's greatest soliders" advocating for maga communism.
The irony is palpable: they extol trust and resolution while indulging in fantasies of intellectual dominance, enacting power plays cloaked in a cryptofascist mystique, and grappling with the notoriously complex figure of Hegel through a haze of academic illegibility. Their vision of philosophical intervention in downtown NYC and the digital sphere is ensnared in its own grandiosity, exacerbated by the cybernetic attention economy. In reality, it seemed less a genuine engagement with Hegelian dialectics and more a calculated attempt at virality—engineered controversy, an alleged bomb threat, a New Yorker article, and the inevitable book deal. It's the tragicomedy of our times, where profound discourse is sacrificed at the altar of spectacle, and where the pursuit of intellectual clout overshadows any meaningful philosophical intervention besides in our own sphere of influence.
As my friends responded to my original article in opposing ways, Sean Kennedy said, “parties won’t save us,” while Willow argued they might offer a brief refuge for solitary, stranded heterodox thinkers. Imagine a space where people from incompatible or antagonistic political backgrounds collide—like subatomic particles in a cerebral collider—generating not just heat, but new social realities. This clashing of affinities embodies a raw Hegelian idea: a dialectical risk where perspectives ricochet, fuse, and mutate. It transcends a mere social event, becoming a space for humbly reckoning with our own delusions or a crucible for having the conversations we've been afraid to have. These encounters might dissolve in sudden laughter, paranoia, unimagined new positions, or, in rare cases, the ultimate freedom of permanent idiocy.
I did take a survey on Twitter the next day, which I would say is usually anti-anything new, highly online, or overly meme-ified. The results from only 100 votes were as such:
In the end, the HECs garnered their fifteen minutes of internet fame as the meme-worthy party buzzed on theory Twitter and Facebook. This is no small feat in today’s echo chambers, where most new ideas rarely cross the abyss to academic Facebook, filled with older, less online thinkers. So, this isn't what I would call progress but it won’t be the last we hear of the Hegelian E-Girls, I’m sure.
Other Blogs on The Same Party
Ross Wolfe, Founder of the Marxist Facebook Group Aftermath
Mike Crumps, Scene Reporter on the New Right
For those who read this to learn about Hegel, it’s best to start with primary sources like Phenomenology of The Spirit, join a reading group to struggle through the hard texts, and also modulate between primary and secondary texts. Ross Wolfe, founder of the Marxist Facebook group Aftermath, recommends Herbert Marcuse series of essays on Hegel, "Reason and Revolution."
2024. X (Formerly Twitter). 2024. https://x.com/tenshi_anna/status/1819922668704944403.
2024. X (Formerly Twitter). 2024. https://x.com/sanjehorah/status/1820166653226725734.
Dusty calling Jreg a “fascist” is absolutely ludicrous. He’s basically the Zoomer Weird Al Yankovic of internet meme ideologies. He’s barely a political figure at all. I personally interpret his real purpose as advocating for Christian communitarian localism, and for disengagement from social media. He doesn’t have any grand political ambitions. I mean, if that’s “fascism,” then that word has lost all meaning.
I needed this post in my life lol thank you. Insightful, hilarious, vaguely depressing