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In reply to the discussion: You do realize he has gone full fascist in his speeches. [View all]Grasswire2
(13,568 posts)39. Transcript and video of Yale Holocaust historian Timothy Snyder on the coming authoritarianism.
[link:https://www.democracynow.org/2017/5/30/on_tyranny_yale_historian_timothy_snyder|
Please take the time to watch the video or read the transcript, everyone.
This guy is the expert. They go through the points in his book "On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons From The Twentieth Century"
Here's the part about the first lesson: Don't Obey In Advance.
.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I wanted to ask you about the first lesson you talk about in your book, especially in light of the realities that, in our day and age, clearly, authoritarianism has enormous more power of surveillance and social control of populations. You write in your first lesson, Do not obey in advance. Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more repressive government will want, and then offer themselves without being asked. A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do. I think about that in terms of the enormous gravitation of the population toward social media and then the ability of states and corporations to actually monitor and control what people say and do and shop and everything theyre thinking about.
TIMOTHY SNYDER: Yeah, so, I agree with that completely. The historical basis of that first lesson, Dont obey in advance, is what historians think we understand about authoritarian regime changes, and in particular the Nazi regime change of 1933. Historians of Nazi Germany disagree about a lot of things, but one of the few things we agree about is the significance of adaptation from below in 1933. When we look at Hitler in retrospect, we sometimes have a tendency to think of him as a kind of supervillain who can do anything. But in fact, the lesson of 1933 is that consent from below matters a lot, not consent necessarily in the sense of voting or marching or anything active, but consent in the sense of bystanding, going along, making mental adjustments.
So the point of Dont obey in advance is not to give your consent in that way, which is very important, because if you do just drift at the beginning, then psychologically youre lost, or, to put it a different way, if you dont follow lesson one, Dont obey in advance, then you cant follow lessons two to 20, either. Politically, its also really important, because the time which matters the most is the beginning, where we are now. Right now we actually have much more power than we think we do. Our actions are magnified outwards now. When protest becomes illegal or dangerous, this is going to change. But right now Americans actually have more power than they think they do.
And your point actually magnifies all of this, because the reasonone of the reasons you shouldnt obey in advance is that when you do, youre actually giving power ideas. They dont necessarily have plans. They dont necessarily know what they can do. But when we lean towards what they think they wantand social media is a very good example of thisthen we give them ideas. We teach them what they can do. So, in our real lives and in social media, its very important not to obey in advance, because, youre absolutely right, that information is being collected and collated and considered
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. We are further down the road towards fascism than many realize or want to admit
Va Lefty
Oct 2018
#3
I have seen this coming for a long time, but I never actually thought we would get this
smirkymonkey
Oct 2018
#6
Transcript and video of Yale Holocaust historian Timothy Snyder on the coming authoritarianism.
Grasswire2
Oct 2018
#39
I agree but would add it's not just Trump, it's also the moneyed interests that put him into power.
jalan48
Oct 2018
#8
Yes. These are the folks pulling the strings. If it's not Trump it will be someone else like him.
jalan48
Oct 2018
#13
Exactly. One of the other pundits said to him, you don't call yourself a nationalist!
BeckyDem
Oct 2018
#36
Both the R & D parties were opposed to these regimes. They actually came together.
madinmaryland
Oct 2018
#48
South Africans defeated apartheid, Poles defeated communists with solidarity, Chileans defeated Pino
mahina
Oct 2018
#88