A notable characteristic of the contemporary left is that they engage in projection – everything they accuse their enemies of is something they themselves are guilty of. An example frequently used to illustrate this is that of Hollywood –   Hollywood figures constantly promote left-wing causes like intersectional feminism, yet sheltered Harvey Weinstein (hardly a promoter of women’s rights) for decades.

Among Hollywood’s output in the last decade-and-a-half (the same time span as the most recent ‘culture wars’ surrounding ‘woke’ and ‘social justice’ topics) was an action-horror franchise called The Purge. This franchise was premised upon the USA electing a totalitarian government that instituted an annual ‘Purge’ – a period of 12 hours during which all crime including murder was legal. Publicly, the Purge was justified as an act of mass catharsis, but in reality the government used it to eliminate poor people and ethnic minorities. The franchise is commonly interpreted as a criticism of conservatives and libertarians, given how the totalitarian (yet still democratically elected, and even re-elected in later instalments of the franchise, rather confusingly) government is called the New Founding Fathers of America (slighting both conservatives and libertarians), hosts a ‘Purge Mass’ coinciding with the event (slighting conservative Catholics), and suspends the rule of law (slighting and misrepresenting libertarians). And if the message weren’t sufficiently blatant, the poor people targeted in the Purge who get depicted on-screen are all portrayed as ethnic minorities and every member of the government is white. Even TVTropes – a media analysis website with a notable leftish lean – concedes that the franchise takes a lot of artistic licence with the underlying economics of having one night in which all crime (including murder) is legal.

The Purge franchise accuses the right of anarcho-tyranny (the selective suspension of the rule of law in order to maintain power). However, the franchise itself is yet another example of leftist projection. After all, anarcho-tyranny is something that the Anglosphere left has demonstrated quite a fondness for. Allow me to offer three examples.

Let us begin with the UK’s grooming gang scandal. Organised groups of men (almost all Muslims of Pakistani origin) were, for years, essentially allowed to rape young English (and other ethnic-European) girls. The protection of the law was withheld from these young girls, and enforcement of the law against the perpetrators was suspended, precisely to conceal the failure of several left-wing policy priorities (primarily surrounding immigration and multiculturalism) and avoid accusations of racism (accusations which are mostly made by the left against their opponents). The Purge may focus on murders (it is, after all, a horror franchise) but it turns out that suspending the rule of law can enable sex crimes just as effectively.

Immigration enforcement in the USA is another example. Even if one agrees with the common sentiment that Trump’s deportation campaign has had substantial excesses, the reality is this campaign is a response to an exceptionally long period during which immigration law at the US southern border has been under enforced at best, and unenforced or undermined at worst. This lack of enforcement served nakedly partisan interests, as the ultimate goal of it was to increase congressional representation in Democrat-dominated states such as California whilst also importing people seen as natural Democrat voters into Texas (which has been explicit Democratic party strategy ever since Judis & Teixeira’s The Emerging Democratic Majority). The most recent film in The Purge franchise – The Forever Purge – may have centred upon a pair of illegal immigrants living in Texas, but in real life such immigrants are not the victims of anarcho-tyrants but rather what anarcho-tyrants want.

Yet perhaps the most striking example of anarcho-tyranny in recent memory occurred during the days of the Covid lockdowns. Whilst the lockdowns themselves – the severity of which was almost always a function of how left-wing the government imposing them was – were just standard-issue tyranny, the ‘anarcho’ aspect can be found at how civil unrest during that time period was treated. Unrest against these lockdowns themselves was met with ruthless punitive retaliation from the government (see for example what happened to the Canadian freedom convoy). However, the contemporaneous unrest that occurred in the name of Black Lives Matter (or, as many of BLM’s critics like to call it, the ‘Patrice Cullors Real Estate Investment Trust’) was allowed to proceed at will. Indeed, the support BLM received from the same establishment left that pushed the lockdowns went beyond tacit – the same medical organisations and bureaucracies that lined up behind liberty-shredding lockdowns were willing to say that BLM protests were justified because racism, too, was a ‘public health crisis’. And, unsurprisingly, those who engaged in looting and vandalism during riots carried out in the name of ‘black lives’ were frequently spared prosecution. In The Purge series, anarcho-tyrants want to kill off ethnic minorities, but in reality you’ll find anarcho-tyrants writing blank cheques for those who claim to speak for said minorities.

A new film instalment of the franchise is currently under development, and apparently it will be set in the aftermath of the break-up of the United States (or something approximating such a break-up). It is almost certain that, just like the recent film One Battle After Another, it shall blame this break-up entirely on the Republican-voting slice of America. If only they just submitted to Fauci! If only they just accepted being disenfranchised by their own ruling class! If only they stopped complaining about how every new television show, movie or video game centres around a black lesbian who lectures the audience about white male privilege! Yes, it would be easier for any subgroup within society if the rest of society were to just shut up and comply with that subgroup’s demands, but the reality of pluralism instead requires society’s subgroups to rely on persuasion, negotiation and compromise.

Ultimately, the real value of The Purge isn’t found in its social commentary (which is devoid of nuance or insight) or in its entertainment value (which is a matter of personal taste), but rather in what it illustrates about its creators. The franchise was clearly excreted from an hermetically sealed establishmentarian-leftist bubble, yet what is most striking is how its central premise accuses the right of plotting to indulge in the same thing that left-wing governments across the West have been bingeing on like cocaine at a Hollywood wrap party. As the proverb quite rightly states, every accusation is a confession.