If you came across a video featuring Frank Gehry ‘s frenetic Disney Concert Hall, Renzo Piano’s towering New York Times building, John Portman ‘s postmodern Westin Bonaventure Hotel, the Art Deco Los Angeles Times building, and Anish Kapoor ‘s reflective Bean sculpture, you’d probably assume you were watching a survey of some of the past century’s most memorable modern architectural landmarks.

Unfortunately, all of these buildings are featured in a video far more sinister, as first noted by Citylab‘s Kriston Capps and discussed by design critics across the internet: the National Rifle Association’s latest propaganda ad. Images of these works, along with street scenes in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles–stereotypical bastions of liberal elites–cycle through the video as NRA spokeswoman Dana Loesch snarls: “And then they use their ex-president to endorse the resistance. All to make them march, make them protest, make them scream ‘racism, and sexism and xenophobia and homophobia.'” It is an “open call to violence to protect white supremacy,” as Deray Mckesson put it; some NRA members have condemned the ad according to The Washington Post.

But what’s less clear is why these modern buildings are featured. Architecture has a long history of functioning as a symbol of power–but how, historically, did modernism became a political target? It’s complicated.

Already knowing that the NRA is a crypto-fascist arm of white supremacy, only thing that confuses me is their issue w/modern architecture. pic.twitter.com/jNIPdf0wa8 — Soulless Golem (@ZacharyLipez) June 29, 2017

apparently the nra think's gehry's la phil is a threat to freedom. maybe they should play the 1812 overture–it has canons. https://t.co/k6WF87WMn3 — mark lamster (@marklamster) June 29, 2017

Clinched fist of truth! The NRA's propoganda video is really something. Frank Gehry & Anish Kapoor make appearances. https://t.co/x9bC2CPvXD pic.twitter.com/csh4fCC8h0 — Kriston Capps (@kristoncapps) June 29, 2017

Unsurprisingly, authoritarian regimes have typically looked to emulate the architecture of monarchs. Commissioned by men who held absolute power, these buildings and their lavish ornamentation were symbols of their wealth and strength of their empires. Stalin, Mussolini, and Hitler all used overt classical references in the buildings they commissioned.