Tag: fascism

A Vocabulary of Fascism

Photo Protesting Minister Chadwick

Extremely anti-social views and behavior, coupled with a lack of conscience, are evidence that a person is suffering from sociopathy.  It’s hard to tell if someone actually lacks a conscience, but anti-social behavior is easy to spot.  People who habitually flout the laws and mores of their society, and who are, in fact, against those laws and mores, are behaving anti-socially. This may even be accompanied by misanthropy, which is the hatred of other people.

But just because you hate other people doesn’t mean you can’t love yourself. Narcissism is just that — excessive vanity and admiration of self.  And of course, egotism follows, for surely such a fabulous person as oneself will be completely selfish and self-absorbed. It’s the mindset of the spoiled rich kid — I want it, give it to me now!

Egotism leads to autocracy — the expectation of absolute power over other people, because after all — you’re great!  Not only do you deserve absolute power, you are the best and only person for the job.  And look how the people love you.  It’s proof that you deserve to run the world.

Every now and then, an autocrat emerges who takes it a step further — to the right, that is.  Suddenly, it’s all about the autocrat and his great nation which is his.  Everyone and everything must be put to the service of the great nation and its aims, which are the autocrat’s aims, which are never wrong and always right.

And now you have fascism, a totalitarian, rabidly nationalistic, far right system of government and society run by what we usually refer to as a “fascist dictator.”  Looking back into the not-so-distant past, we see that you don’t even have to be fully sane to do it.

If this is a problem for society, it will be solved. It’s only a matter of time.

 

Photo credit: Vrb7, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Let’s Try To Save Democracy

Elon Musk-March 28 2024

Every day of the Trump dictatorship is a new revelation. Today, we learned that Trump’s people are intimidating citizens using law enforcement, the justice system, and local civil servants as their storm troopers.  They are planning to criminalize all forms of dissent.  So they say.  No doubt some people will be made examples of.  It’s terrifying, when you get right down to it.  But is it true?  Can Trump and Musk really shut down all dissent, just like that? Doubtful, but all the same, the pro-democracy, anti-fascist side seems shockingly inactive.  Social media tells us that there are a lot of people who want to fight back and stop the illegal, unconstitutional actions of Trump and his power-mad regime. So why aren’t we out there proving it?  Why this tepid, ho-hum response.   I’m going to attribute it to a lack of imagination about possible actions we can take.

To begin with, let’s talk short term goals — things we have to do right away to save ourselves from fascism.  At the top of that list is getting get rid of Elon Musk who is South African by birth and fascist by nature.  We’ll never get our democracy back as long as he’s around.  Next, we have to challenge the constitutionality of Trump’s massive barrage of presidential decrees.  This is an abuse of privilege if ever there was one.  We don’t govern the way in America — Trump’s executive orders need to be rolled back. 

What to do?  Here are some potential actions to add to the legal challenges currently underway.  

Since the White House is the seat of operations, a huge permanent rally needs to be there every day until Musk and Trump are gone.  If the police push back, the citizens push forward.  It may seem a bit like the myth of Sisyphus, but it’s vitally important that Musk and Trump feel physical pressure every day.  And that pressure has to be loud too.  The size of the rallies must grow and evolve until finally the Trump regime falls.  That’s one thing.  

Furthermore, these loud protests have to be localized in a thousand uncooperative ways, from saying no to some things to demanding others.  We and our elected representatives can do that.

For instance, states rights — demand them. That’ll give us a layer of protection from insane executive decrees.  Insist on state prerogative in every place it applies.  Treat federal money like the tainted apple it is and refuse to take any that has right-wing strings attached.  Don’t comply with Trumpian federal programs just to get money. 

While we’re being loud, we could also be contacting our Congresspeople and anyone else who’s got the power to help, just to keep them thinking and working on this problem, which is massive, an emergency if ever there was one. It’s not an “oh well, I guess we’re doing fascism now” kind of thing. This is all-hands-on-deck.    Seriously.  

So that’s where are are — the time of mourning is over, and we have got to get up off the sofa and do something.  Complete loss of freedom isn’t fun.  Having fascist overlords who use armed thugs to enforce their will is a new level of terrible.  If we don’t act now, we’re going to lose everything we care about, starting with the right to a decent life. Even though doing the right thing is hard, it’s better than suffering the eternal regret that comes with doing nothing.

Let’s try.  I will if you will…

 

Wcamp9, CC BY 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

There’s A New Doge In Town — And His Name Is Elon Musk

Berlin, Lustgarten, Kundgebung der HJ

I’ve been reading a detective novel set in Venice, which, without mentioning the word itself, reminded me of the the Italian noun ‘doge.’ Why is it, I wondered, that it has such a fascist ring to it? For some reason, I get an Il Duce vibe every time I hear it, and I’ve been hearing it a lot lately. This is because Elon Musk, the South African multibillionaire who bought Trump the presidency, has declared himself Doge of the federal government.  I know, he’s not the actual Doge and that DOGE is just his cute name for his new fiefdom, but bear with me.  

For those out of the loop on Medieval titles, a doge is the absolute ruler of an Italian city-state such as Venice or Genoa.  In the day, the Doge was an elected office, but the term was life; the Doge’s job was to represent the local oligarchy.  Definitely a supreme leader type, to which Italy is prone. So this is what Musk is modeling himself after, and don’t think he doesn’t know it.  He even pronounces it the same.

It always seemed like such a typically European thing, these fascist leaders.  Not something we Americans would ever have to worry about.  After all, wasn’t it Sinclair Lewis who wrote It Can’t Happen Here?  And yet, here we are battling fascism in America — America, a beacon of democracy the world over.  I confess, I was surprised.  Lewis, however, would probably NOT be surprised to see America “go fascist.”  Unlike the rest of us, he knew it could happen here, and now, let’s face it, it has.

As for this Doge nonsense, Musk is all over it. Not only is it the name of this uber department which he’s created for himself, it’s also the name of his favorite cryptocurrency.  Using the government as the means to your own private jokes at the expense of the governed is sociopathic.  Using it to advertise a pet investment product, well, what can we say?  Dignity is not a virtue that Musk and Trump possess, if in fact they have any virtues at all. 

Elon Musk in his new role as Terminator of the American way of life now gets to put his patchy efficiency skills to the test in a complete, multi-billion dollar slash and burn on the federal government.  In the process, he will fire tens of thousands of federal employees and eliminate whole swathes of congressionally approved programs, without an iota of oversight or constitutional authority.  You know how tech bros love to disrupt.  Musk is here to disrupt the federal government, so that he and Trump can install a new bureaucracy with which to crush the American people into submission.  They’re thinking long term, you see.

It’s worth remembering that in every case of tech bro disruption, real people have suffered and lost their jobs, whole industries world-wide have been destroyed, whole communities as well, as the oligarchs gobble up our housing stock in the ongoing corporatization of real estate.  Future You will own nothing once they’re through.  The oligarchs will own it all and if we’re lucky, they’ll rent it back to us for a nominal fee, right down to the air we breathe.  

I don’t think it can be stressed enough that quality of life for all but the very wealthy is being destroyed, and the rich, especially the rich young disrupters of the tech industry, truly don’t care.  Why should they?  They’re getting what they want, which is everything and then some.

 But compared to other American oligarchs, Musk is in a league of his own.  Sure, he’s the richest guy in the galaxy but it goes way beyond that.  For starters, he makes no effort to hide his fascist views or his basic hatefulness.  Moreover, it’s hard not to think that he’s been having a laugh at the public’s expense, made all the more rich because so many of us still aren’t in on the joke.  The punch line, of course, is that he’s a fascist and he’s totally open about it, and people still think he’s great.  He can call new agency DOGE, he can sig heil at a Trump rally — twice! — and make Nazi jokes on X, and still people don’t call him on it.  If you’re him, it must be pretty hilarious.  

There’s an old flick called A Face In The Crowd which stars, of all people, Andy Griffith as a somewhat sociopathic populist hero who gets caught on a live mic making fun of his audience.  In the film, the duped American audience was not amused and they dropped him like a hot potato.  This was 1957, when people apparently still had values and some pride.  But today, Trump and his freak show cabinet are wide open about all their mean-spirited, undemocratic views, and still Trump’s supporters support them.  Congress approves or fails to condemn.  The media maintains Trump-friendly neutrality.  

In the end, you have to ask yourself, what would it take for Musk to fail?  Or Trump for that matter?  As The Last Poets said, in a song worth remembering in these dark and dangerous times, “Better get busy before we all are through….”

Photo Credit: Bundesarchiv, Bild 147-0510 / CC-BY-SA 3.0