Conservatives in the United States like to refer to the liberal Hollywood elite, but some very rich, very powerful stars are on the far-right end of the political spectrum.
Clint Eastwood famously spoke to a chair at the Republican National Convention. Jon Voight filmed a love letter to President Donald Trump that the POTUS pinned on his Twitter account. James Woods quit Twitter over their terms of service after being notified one of his far-right tweets needed to be deleted.
And Chris Pratt wore a symbol closely associated with White nationalist violence on a t-shirt.
Wait... What‽‽
The Revolutionary War era Gadsden flag of a rattlesnake with the inscription "Don't Tread On Me" on a yellow field has been adopted by far-right organizations including White supremacist and White nationalist groups. Similar to the Confederate battle flag, the emblem now gets seen most amongst the ultra-White—I mean right—wing ever since the Tea Party coopted it.
Gadsden flag superimposed over Old Glory
Giphy
So when Pratt was photographed wearing an updated version of the flag most often seen at White nationalist rallies or places with an abundance of tiki torches...
...people were a bit concerned.
Or mad.
Some people were definitely mad.
Hunter Harris invoked the (unrelated) words of Cher to express their feelings on the matter.
@hunteryharris
Some thought, even though White supremacists have claimed the symbol as their own, people should take it back.
But how does one do that without looking like you support White nationalism?
People demoted Pratt in the Hollywood Chris hierarchy.
Some people had not gotten the memo though.
A brief history of the flag denotes the "most common association in modern times is with the Tea Party organization, Ku Klux Klan and Second Amendment enthusiasts."
Self-identified White nationalists used the flag for their activities, including the 2014 murders of a pair of police officers in Las Vegas by a couple that draped their bodies in the Gadsden flag and Swastikas.
People expressed concern over Pratt's career trajectory following in the footsteps of some other Hollywood conservatives.
Pratt is an avid hunter and gun rights advocate. The Gadsden flag is also associated with the gun rights movement which may be the message Pratt was trying to send.
Or maybe he just liked the shirt and knew nothing about the association with White nationalism. Only Pratt knows and so far he has remained silent.
The book Bring the War Home: The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America, available heree, is "based on a decade of deep immersion in previously classified FBI files and on extensive interviews. Bring the War Home tells the story of American paramilitarism and the birth of the alt-right."
