A night with Rachel
I went with my parents, sister, and brother in law to watch Rachel Maddow speak last night. It was essentially a speaking tour for her book Prequel. The book essentially chronicles different anti-semitic and fascist waves in the United States and the ordinary people that stood up to fight them. As you might imagine, most of these stories are stories we never taught in history class and it is shameful for two history teachers (my father was also one) to sit and be dumbfounded with stories we had never heard before.
She called us a blue dot in a sea of red. We know all too well what the stakes are what life could look like if we fail. Obviously, many of the questions turned to the worry over what is happening and what might happen if we don’t succeed. Her advice was to stay in lieu of fleeing for a safe haven.
Two separate conversations I had prior to the evening made this point a lot more clear. The first one is that I obviously make myself known by doing this. I comfort myself in that I am but small potatoes in the vast internet. However, they could track me and know where I stand.
On the heels of that conversation, my brother in law told us that someone he knew had a conversation with him and knows he is more liberal. The guy flat out told him when the civil war comes he won’t hesitate to put him down since he now knows my brother in law is on the other side.
What we know is that the rhetoric is all designed to dehumanize us. If you can successfully make us less than human then you can successfully shut down the part of the conscience that doesn’t allow people to harm others. Maddow made the point that the best thing we could do and is reach out and make connections now. Go beyond what we normally would do. If we normally text then make a point to call. If we normally call then make a point to see them in person. If we see them in person then see them in person more often.
I think she was exclusively talking about loved ones and friends that are likeminded individuals. She didn’t say that specifically, but that is how I interpreted her plea. I think the idea is there would be someone looking for you (and us for them) if that time ever comes. I certainly can’t argue the point, but another thought entered my mind as she discussed this.
If the goal of the right is to dehumanize us then our goal should be to rehumanize everyone. Yes, I just made up a new word, but these times demand some invention. They say in hostage situations that it is harder for the aggressor to eliminate the hostages if they see them as people. If they know their name and see that they have feelings.
The overall takeaway is that average and ordinary people throughout history have thwarted the onslaught of fascism. Fascism always has an allure to some people. The allure of an all-powerful leader that can push back against the complex forces that “keep us down” can be alluring. Of course, that’s true until we become one of those that stand in the dear leader’s way. I don’t have all of the answers as to how to defeat fascism. However, the idea of doing it together seems much more palatable than doing it separately.
Yeah, I heard her say that average people thwart fascism. Average people resist fascism. Thwart, not so much.
On Aug. 31, 1939, most of Europe was fascist, and the nazis had not yet fired a shot.
If you believe Ernst Nolte (Three Faces of Fascism), it was invented in France. If you continue to follow his argument, you are forced to a conclusion, although Nolte himself never comes out and states it (at least in that book):
The seedbed of fascism is Roman Catholicism.
Maybe that’s why the US has never gone whole hog for fascism.
1OH, wow! OK. I spent 12 years in a local parochial school where rulers and pointers could be and were used on students, usually all boys. This was at a time when there was a population surge after WWII. All of her classrooms were overcrowded. Those kids who were always the Ground Zero for the nuns temper did withdraw quickly or never returned the next semester. Whacking kids with something hard did not seem to bother my parents. They were doing the same thing at home. Either you obeyed or nobody loved you. Oddly enough, so many of those boys who were whacked around actually did sign up with the military. Some of them were able to be admitted to any one of the military post-secondary schools. For that matter, recruiting officers were very glad to see these boys.
As for seedbeds, check out some of the ancient “religions” of the pre-Christian times. You will see enough of early fascism in them as well.
This all goes back to what I found out some years ago. There are three “controllers” in life: religion, government, and families. All of them have “governors”.
2I spent 14 years in parochial schools, all non-violent.
To be a Catholic in the Deep South was a very different proposition from elsewhere. Being the persecuted rather than the persecutors gave the Church a different outlook, perhaps.
I am not aware of any premodern movements that fit closely to Nolte’s definition of Fascism: leader, nationalism, targeted enemy and so forth.
In any case, the progress of fascism in Europe followed a particular path: France, Italy, Bavaria, Portugal, Spain, Poland. All very Catholic.
It was nearly always weaker in Protestant areas, possibly because the Lutheran-style hierarchies were so much weaker.
3Ain’t many advantages to being old and creaky, but one is that I’ve seen this shit before.
Today we’re hearing noise from the lunatic right-wing fringe, talking about revolution including the violent overthrow of the government. They have actually attempted this.
Yep, seen it before.
In about 1968 it was noise from the lunatic left-wing fringe. The code words were “come the revolution.” Come the revolution, things are gonna be different. Things gonna get real.
A good proportion of those talking that way were true believers. They really expected a upheaval, any day now. Remember little Charlie Manson? He tried to trigger it. People died. Of course, other people talking that way were just in the movement to get laid.
I’m just speculating, but my guess is that a lot of those revolutionaries from the late sixties today have fat 401Ks and comfortable retirements. The are what they abhorred.
I expect a similar outcome this time around.
4Mostly barbershop talk, in my opinion. A few dangerous lunatics and a whole lot of cosplay.
Real fascists, historically, have not been outlaw rebels but respectable citizens who come in by the front door. as Sinclair Lewis observed, with flags.
5Clearly none of y’all actually live in an area crawling with RWNJs. Where they make up 85+per cent, and totally dominate the scene; to the degree of imposing an actual danger to any nearby ‘libruls’.
And Harry completely glosses over the only fascist state that actually had a massive worldwide impact, the Nazi regime of Adolph Hitler and Co., in largely Protestant Germany. In close alliance with the Shintoist Japanese Imperial empire.
6Nick, my son is an ardent liberal. He had a conversation very like your brother in law’s with someone he barely knows. His response was *what if we shoot back*? He was told lib’ruls don’t have guns. I don’t know why they seem to believe this, but it might come as a truly nasty surprise to some of these gun slinger wannabes. Food for thought for some of them, at least.
7Well, I live in Carroll County, Maryland, a place so Republican that 1 — count ’em, one — Democrat even filed for local office in the last election. And I am old enough, and well-traveled enough, to have been represented by both Lester Maddox and Jesse Helms.
Hitler got his start in Munich, a wholly Catholic state. Only after being released from Landsberg Fortress in 1926 did the Nazi movement make a fundamental shift to seek broader support in Lutheran regions, led by economic radicals like Goebbels, Rohm and the Strasser brothers. In its origin, German Nazism was entirely Catholic (with the support of Pacelli, the papal nuncio).
The alliance with Japan was never close. There were no examples of Germany and Japan pursuing a united, or even a coordinated policy.
8Thanks Nick, I would love to see Rachel Maddow live! The term Fascism is unfortunately evolving. I call our present day cancerous strain Corporate Fascism – A poisonous blend of Corporate power and greed, White Supremacy and Christian Nationalism.
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