Fascist America II: The Last Turnoff

[marmar]

from OurFuture.org:



Fascist America II: The Last Turnoff
By Sara Robinson

August 11, 2009 - 3:15pm ET


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Writing about fascism for an American audience is always a fraught business. Invariably, a third of the readers will dismiss the topic (and your faithful blogger's basic sanity) out of hand. Either they've got their own definition of fascism and whatever's going on doesn't seem to fit it; or else they're firm believers in a variant of Godwin's Law, which says (with some justification) that anyone who invokes the F-word is a de facto alarmist of questionable credibility. I get letters, most of which say something to the effect of, "Calm down. You're overreacting. We're nowhere near there yet."

Another third will pepper me with missives that are every bit as dismissive -- for exactly the opposite reason. To them, anyone who's been paying the barest amount of attention should realize that America has been a fascist state since (choose one: 1) 9/11; 2) Reagan; 3) McCarthy; 4) The Civil War; 5) July 4, 1776. For them, my careful analysis and worried warnings are dangerously naive -- clear evidence that I'm simply not seeing the full horror of America as it truly is, and always has been, at least since (insert date here).

Given this general crankiness, I probably wouldn't bother with the subject at all -- except for that final third who keep me going. From them, I've gotten a blizzard of anecdotes, questions, meditations, ideas, suggestions, manifestos, and love letters (including lots of link love). The piece sparked a lot of conversation all across Left Blogistan about what fascism is and what it ain't and what we need to be watching for. And that kind of thoughtful discussion is exactly what I hoped for. I wanted people to start paying attention.

In the previous post, I pointed out that the most insidious part of fascism is that by the time it's finally obvious to absolutely everyone that these people are dangerously out of control, it's too late to do anything about it. Early warnings are even more valuable here than they are in most domains. And since futurists are -- more than anything -- in the business of early warnings, it falls to me to step up there and point out that according to at least a few of the more reputable atlases in the glove box, this looks a lot like the last turn into the parking lot of downtown Fascist Hell. ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.ourfuture.org/blog-entry/2009083311/fascist-america-ii-last-turnoff

[dixiegrrrrl]

1. The worst part is the majority of people kill the messenger

and hang onto their denial for dear life.
Which is why, when danger is finally apparent, it is too late for the ones who refused to see.

[SpiralHawk]

2. Excellent analysis - the k and the r

from the end of the article:

"Finally: Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. Even if we succeed this time, let's not kid ourselves that this is over. The conservatives are investing a lot of money and effort to build a mass movement that's explicitly aimed at destroying a Democratic government -- and if we learned anything from the Clinton years, it's that they're not going to let up for a second as long as the Democrats are in control."

[Gabi Hayes]

3. William Shirer in 30s Germany:

Berlin, August 25, 1934—Tomorrow begins a new chapter for me...

So began William Shirer’s journal entry upon his arrival in the capital of Hitler’s Third Reich. Shirer had left a rather mediocre post with the New York Herald in Paris to become the Universal News Service’s Berlin correspondent. Returning to Berlin for the first time since its decadent Weimarer Republik days, he was struck by what seemed a complete transformation of the place. While he previously had sat up long nights with German friends in bars, cafes and their studios discussing politics, art and literature, sex, music, the meaning of existence and other provocative topics, he found many of the same people—most of whom had been liberals, artists, students, socialists or communists—now infected with Nazism.

Shirer’s former friends mostly praised the rebirth of the German Vaterland under National Socialism and the firm guidance of the Fuehrer. As good Germans they valued the return of respect for authority and the honoring of basic Teutonic traditions. Glad to see a recovery from the nation’s shameful humiliation at Versailles, they seemed for the most part to tolerate shortages of some consumer goods, censorship and the enforced lack of general freedom in exchange for a reinvigorated German spirit. Shirer found these people exceptionally depressing. Those who disapproved of the “New Germany,” however, distrustfully watched what they said out of fear of being silenced—like so many others already had been—and subsequently remained invisible.

After Shirer returned to Germany his first assignment took him to Nuernberg to cover the annual Nazi Party rally, which he found to be “the best possible introduction to the nightmarish world Adolf Hitler was beginning to create in his adopted land.” For a full week in September the amazed reporter watched as by day tens of thousands of uniformed party leaders and SA and SS troopers euphorically cheered Hitler while he screamed of a resurgent Germany which would assume its rightful place as the leader among nations. By night Shirer listened to the roar of jackboots marching through the narrow, medieval streets in torch lit processions. For the rally the Nazis scripted arousing speeches and staged impressive military displays and powerful rituals of an almost spiritual nature; they exploited fully the Gothic, archetypal-Germanic environment of Nuernberg to create an effective atmosphere of national might steeped in German history. They then sold this spectacle to the rest of the nation through Joseph Goebbels’ propaganda machine as proof of restored German strength and superiority.

Shirer saw Hitler for the first time on 4 September—only ten days after his arrival in Nazi Germany—as the Fuehrer arrived after dark at the Deutscher Hof, his favorite hotel in Nuernberg. Apparently saving his energy for what would be a long, tiring week of tantrums, tirades and endless processions, the expressionless Hitler offered the waiting hordes a weak Nazi salute and disappeared inside the hotel. The people—who had been chanting “We want our Fuehrer!”—became ecstatic when Hitler made a brief appearance on the balcony and waved. Women swooned and many people surged forward to get a closer glimpse of Hitler, trampling others in their way. The complete devotion of the crowds, the blind adoration of “this vulgar, uneducated, fanatically bigoted Austrian” dumbfounded Shirer—reminding him of Holy Rollers he had once seen in rural Arkansas and Louisiana with the same “crazed expression on their faces.”

http://www.traces.org/williamshirer.html

[marmar]

4. Great piece.

nt

[Gabi Hayes]

5. Rise and Fall is a great book. He loved Germany, and it decimated him

to see what it had become, and how it happened so quickly

the paragraphs above have some eerie parallels to what's happening today, with the benighted throngs, filled with people who just shout out stuff that makes no sense at all, especially given their own circumstances

did you see the link about the woman at the NH townhall (thread here somewhere), most of whose family is on some sort of medicare/SSI, calling the coming healthcare reforms nazism, or something?

[BlancheSplanchnik]

7. Here's another important point from that article -- appropos for the present:

"Confronting Censorship

Psychological manipulation became the centerpiece of Hitler’s grip over German society. A key to complete thought control , censorship of the press determined what the German people normally thought and talked about regarding the country’s political and cultural life." (emphasis mine)


Like what most of M$M, in particular FarceSpews, is doing now.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

6. Never knew of this blog before...thanks

looks good.

[imdjh]

8. Fascism is not on the horizon in the US.