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The Cowardly Face of Authoritarianism

Rogue Valley

Lead or get out of the way
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The Cowardly Face of Authoritarianism

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By Professor Timothy Snyder
The New York Times
12/3/18

First we see the face. The face of America’s Donald Trump, or Hungary’s Viktor Orban, or Russia’s Vladimir Putin, or Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the face of men who wish to transform democracies into personality cults. The face is the oldest mark of leadership, the mark that works for clan or tribe. If we see only the face, we are not thinking about policies or politics; instead, we are accepting the new regime and its rules. However, a democracy is about the people, not a single mythicized person. People need truth, which a cult of personality destroys. The transition from democracy to personality cult begins with a leader who is willing to lie all the time, in order to discredit the truth as such. The transition is complete when people can no longer distinguish between truth and feeling. The cult of personality functions the same everywhere; it rests on the inaccurate notion that the face somehow represents the nation. The authoritarians of today tell medium-size lies. These refer only superficially to experiences; they draw us deep into a cave of emotion. If we believe that Barack Obama is a Muslim born in Africa (an American lie with Russian support), or that Hillary Clinton is a pedophile pimp (a Russian lie with American support), we are not actually thinking; we are giving way to sexual and physical fear. These medium-size lies are not quite the big lies of the totalitarians, although Mr. Orban’s attacks on George Soros as the leader of a Jewish conspiracy come rather close. They are, however, big enough that they help to disable the factual world.

A cult of personality used to require monuments; now it requires memes. Social media consumes the public imagination like the giant statues of tyrants from former times consumed public space. But as those monuments remind us, tyrants always die. The empty heterosexual posturing, the shirtless photo ops, the misogyny and indifference to the female experience, the anti-gay campaigns, are designed to hide one basic fact: A cult of personality is sterile. It cannot reproduce itself. The cult of personality is the worship of something temporary. It is thus confusion and, at bottom, cowardice: The leader cannot contemplate the fact that he will die and be replaced, and citizens abet the illusion by forgetting that they share responsibility for the future. As we move away from democracy, we forget its purpose: to give us all a future. A cult of personality says that one person is always right; so after his death comes chaos. Democracy says that we all make mistakes, but that we get a chance, every so often, to correct ourselves. Democracy is the courageous way to have a country. A cult of personality is a cowardly way of destroying one.

I have little doubt that our current era of Trump will someday be viewed as America's brush with cultist authoritarianism, where a significant portion of American society was willing to support this cult at the expense of America's reputation and leadership in the world.
 
The Cowardly Face of Authoritarianism

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I have little doubt that our current era of Trump will someday be viewed as America's brush with cultist authoritarianism, where a significant portion of American society was willing to support this cult at the expense of America's reputation and leadership in the world.

It never ceases to amaze me that Trump is seen as authoritarian while Democrats under Obama were lauded for forcing the ACÁ, a law that forced people to purchase a certain product under the threat of penalty. The ACÁ was the definition of “authoritarian”.
 
The French are currently RIOTING AGAINST the "FACE OF AUTHORITARIANISM as you read this, and Trump, and ONLY TRUMP, was WISE ENOUGH TO STAND UP TO IT, lucky for us.
 
The Cowardly Face of Authoritarianism

<snip>



I have little doubt that our current era of Trump will someday be viewed as America's brush with cultist authoritarianism, where a significant portion of American society was willing to support this cult at the expense of America's reputation and leadership in the world.

First let’s hope that this is in fact, “a brush with!”

Remember, whenever Donald Trump has tried to join an elite group, Wall Street “old money,” NFL, for example, he has always been looked down on. As displayed in Argentina, he will be looked down on in the “strong authoritarian leader’s club” as well.
 
These claims are an absurdity and without evidence or support. They are the yammerings of people who eat, sleep and breathe Trump hate. They are the cultists.
 
These claims are an absurdity and without evidence or support. They are the yammerings of people who eat, sleep and breathe Trump hate. They are the cultists.
Only Trump cultists deny his attempts at turning America into an autocracy. That’s okay though, because more Americans are waking up and acting with their votes. Trump is losing power and influence. Credibility left long ago. By the time ‘20 rolls around Trump will be lucky to catch an Uber ride out of DC.
 
Only Trump cultists deny his attempts at turning America into an autocracy. That’s okay though, because more Americans are waking up and acting with their votes. Trump is losing power and influence. Credibility left long ago. By the time ‘20 rolls around Trump will be lucky to catch an Uber ride out of DC.

Provide your evidence. Do you have any?
 
It never ceases to amaze me that Trump is seen as authoritarian while Democrats under Obama were lauded for forcing the ACÁ, a law that forced people to purchase a certain product under the threat of penalty. The ACÁ was the definition of “authoritarian”.

Yet wholly legal. Change our government if you don't like it.
 
Yet wholly legal. Change our government if you don't like it.

See, I kind of LIKE the way our government was set up. I'm trying to prevent the lefties from changing it.
 
See, I kind of LIKE the way our government was set up. I'm trying to prevent the lefties from changing it.

I thought you were objecting to the ACA as being "authoritarian?!" If it was perfectly legal it was not authoritarian.
 
The Cowardly Face of Authoritarianism

23serners-leeHRjpg-INYT-articleLarge.jpg




I have little doubt that our current era of Trump will someday be viewed as America's brush with cultist authoritarianism, where a significant portion of American society was willing to support this cult at the expense of America's reputation and leadership in the world.

Cult?

Liberals had little children singing Obama songs in class.
 
I thought you were objecting to the ACA as being "authoritarian?!" If it was perfectly legal it was not authoritarian.

See, here's the problem with what you'e saying; "legal" doesn't imply that something isn't "authoritarian". In fact, the ACA was so authoritarian that Roberts had to twist himself into a knot to decide it was legal.
 
See, here's the problem with what you'e saying; "legal" doesn't imply that something isn't "authoritarian". In fact, the ACA was so authoritarian that Roberts had to twist himself into a knot to decide it was legal.


What definition of "authoritarian" are you using?


Definition of authoritarian
1 : of, relating to, or favoring blind submission to authority
had authoritarian parents
2 : of, relating to, or favoring a concentration of power in a leader or an elite not constitutionally responsible to the people
an authoritarian regime

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/authoritarian
 
The French are currently RIOTING AGAINST the "FACE OF AUTHORITARIANISM as you read this, and Trump, and ONLY TRUMP, was WISE ENOUGH TO STAND UP TO IT, lucky for us.

Trump actually fellates authoritarians. That's not exactly 'standing up to them'.
 
What definition of "authoritarian" are you using?


Definition of authoritarian
1 : of, relating to, or favoring blind submission to authority
had authoritarian parents
2 : of, relating to, or favoring a concentration of power in a leader or an elite not constitutionally responsible to the people
an authoritarian regime

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/authoritarian

I'm referring to #1 in the hope that we can avoid #2.

Actually, I'm referring to the propensity of those on the left to seek out ways to get everyone else to accept #1 as the norm in an effort to make #2 a reality.
 
I'm referring to #1 in the hope that we can avoid #2.

Actually, I'm referring to the propensity of those on the left to seek out ways to get everyone else to accept #1 as the norm in an effort to make #2 a reality.


So...the left bad. Got it.
 
So...the left bad. Got it.

Not really. It's just that those who tend to want to run everyone's life (act as an authoritarian or prefer and authoritarian form of government) tend to be on the political left.
 
Not really. It's just that those who tend to want to run everyone's life (act as an authoritarian or prefer and authoritarian form of government) tend to be on the political left.


left bad
 
It never ceases to amaze me that Trump is seen as authoritarian while Democrats under Obama were lauded for forcing the ACÁ, a law that forced people to purchase a certain product under the threat of penalty. The ACÁ was the definition of “authoritarian”.

Allowing someone not to purchase a certain product and then guaranteeing them access to it anyway while others have to cover the costs seems worse.
 
Provide your evidence. Do you have any?
If you need me to provide evidence you either aren’t paying attention or you a Trumpster.
For the first, read. For the second, there’s no hope.
 
Allowing someone not to purchase a certain product and then guaranteeing them access to it anyway while others have to cover the costs seems worse.

So let me make sure I have that straight. I thought the whole impetus for the ACA is that people were being denied certain medical services. I may be mistaken there but I seem to remember that being the rallying call. Now, however, you're saying that people without insurance were covered anyway. Is that what you're saying? Do I have that right?
 
See, I kind of LIKE the way our government was set up. I'm trying to prevent the lefties from changing it.

Yet the GOP in Wisconsin is trying to kneecap the duly elected people in that state because they are............democrats. Please note DULY ELECTED.
But hey no authoritarianism under Trump. Just say Nyet.
 
So let me make sure I have that straight. I thought the whole impetus for the ACA is that people were being denied certain medical services. I may be mistaken there but I seem to remember that being the rallying call. Now, however, you're saying that people without insurance were covered anyway. Is that what you're saying? Do I have that right?

They weren't covered. And they were denied preventative medical services. But they were treated anyway if their condition was dire enough. And if they didn't pay for said treatment, the hospitals that treated them were reimbursed by medicaid which you and I pay into. So the ACA was an effort to get the poor to pay what they could afford and get them access to preventative medical treatment and in the process stem the drain on medicaid to some degree.
 
Only Trump cultists deny his attempts at turning America into an autocracy. That’s okay though, because more Americans are waking up and acting with their votes. Trump is losing power and influence. Credibility left long ago. By the time ‘20 rolls around Trump will be lucky to catch an Uber ride out of DC.

possibly. however, his cult is Tiger Beat in love with him, so i wouldn't be so sure. those of us who didn't fall for his hucksterism are still the majority, but we must get out and vote against in crushing numbers.
 
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