Performing Paganism 113 I for example, to form an “aristocracy as a group that possesses special qualities in terms of mind, spirit, character and body [...]. An aristocracy with a sense of duty and service to the state”.26 Elsewhere, he stated: Our task is not to reverse Mieszko’s action and to re-baptize the Christians, to become ‘pagans’, but to long work to change the prevailing standards of organization and cultural activity, and at the same time researching, developing and propagating the Native Tradition and Culture [sic] in all their manifestations, so that in time to create a large social group that will be ready to take the role of a guide of Polish culture.27 Amongst other things, these elites were also given the task of ensuring a metapolitical reorganisation of social consciousness. The zines explicitly discuss “metapolitics” as a way to bring about “civilizational and historical changes”,28 referring to the approach conceived of by the Nouvelle Droite as a strategic pre-political phase for changing the collective awareness in a cultural revolution driven from the right by circulating and normalising ideas.29 According to Strutyński,30 this emphasis on a long-term approach to shaping public opinion and the formation of elites can be understood in the context of the unsuccessful attempts made to become a serious player in national politics. In this sense, Górewicz suggested at the time mastering the ‘inner area’, i.e., spiritual culture, to later transfer the action to the outer area, i.e., social life, politics. This is the task of preparing the ground. It consists of the idea that each participant in the ‘Zadruga embryo’ prepares the field in his own section, shaping the attitudes of co-workers, subordinates, acquaintances, in the field of views on history, politics.31 Also related to history as a field where attitudes can be changed was his previous involvement with the Zadrugian “Niklot” Association of Tradition and Culture. Being “a member of the leading board”, he described his activism in 2001 as “not purely political, but [it] deals with a number of issues influencing political choices (this is metapolitics), such as the shaping of Polish and Slavic awareness and identity”.32 Similarly, he saw black metal music, too, as a “very suitable media to spread [...] ideas”.33 Whilst those actors representing the far-right wing of the overlapping scenes of Neopaganism, reenactment and musical culture openly expressed themselves politically at the turn of the millennium, a change took place in the late 2000s. They either distanced themselves and emphasised a rejection of previous attitudes, as Igor Górewicz did, or they stopped expressing themselves in a manner that was clearly recognisable as extreme right-wing. Consequently, religious studies scholars have described this move away from overt political activism for the Polish Native Faith movement as a shift “away from the unquestioned inclusion of politics in the sacred circle and toward more cultural and artistic expression”.34 What is more, the increasing intertwining of Neopaganism with historical reenactment and Pagan metal/folk music cultures was seen here as a cause or symptom of this supposed shift away from political activism towards seemingly apolitical cultural activities. Following this line of argument, music and the popularisation of history had helped to “keep political slogans away from the sacred” because of a “growing interest in Polish Rodzimowierstwo” in areas that were described as “not primarily politically-oriented, such as the Polish metal scene or historical reenactment groups”,35 i.e. areas that had evidently had some very political tendencies indeed. This shows that these interlinked fields and their historical practices have not yet been examined in their entirety in terms of their obvious common features and their politicisation. With regard to the metapolitical strategies discussed around the turn of the millennium, this also raises the question of whether there has indeed been a shift towards this scene having an un-political – or at least a less political – character, or whether it is merely that the means have become more subtle and the images of history conveyed may still perform a metapolitical function. Popularising Paganism and rightwing links in the present day Visiting the festival in Wolin today, which now attracts up to 2,500 reenactors and tens to dozens of thousands of visitors each year,36 one might notice that there are still many visitors wearing clothes, jewellery or tattoos bearing right-wing symbolism. Here, but also at other reenactment festivals most of the major “patriotic” clothes labels in Europe that are popular with extreme-right-
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