Totalitarian Regimes
The totalitarian systems of the 20th century represent a kind of collective psychosis, whether gradually or suddenly, reason and common human decency are no longer possible in such a system. There is only a pervasive atmosphere of terror and a projection of the enemy imagined to be in our midst. Thus society turns on itself, urged by the ruling authorities.
Joost Meerloo
According to Oxford, a totalitarian regime is one in which “government is centralized and dictatorial and requires complete subservience to the state.” But as we have discussed, one man’s king is another man’s tyrant and often it is only in retrospect that we label another’s government as totalitarian. I mean, how can a country called the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea be totalitarian with words like democratic and people in its name? And would we even be able to tell if we were in a totalitarian state? Does it have to be fascist or communist to be an authoritarian or totalitarian government? Does it need to be a state government at all?
The markers we would generally be looking for would be a state with a single ruling party, run by a dictator-like figure, with control of state sponsored media, monopoly of weapons, use of force and fear to control the population (usually with something like secret police and civilian informants), a highly centralized government and a guiding ideology. Every state government has at least some of these features to some extent so we will need to look at each factor independently.
Let’s start with ideology. Fascism at its core is about being bound together. It’s about favouring the national identity over that of the individual and enforcing this ideology through oppression of opposition and strict economic rules. Communism is when an autocratic government controls and owns the means of production, putting the collective good over the individual and is enforced through oppression of opposition and strict economic rules. No wonder they were mortal enemies, they were fighting over the same ideological territory. The main difference I guess was that Marx believed that through a communist government eventually the state would disappear and everything would be equally distributed in a post-capitalist utopia. Due to the examples of history however, we can easily see how either of these ideologies turn into authoritarian nightmares but are we certain that a liberal-democracy couldn’t as well? Is there such a thing as a capitalist totalitarian state?
Hannah Arendt pointed out that the
“ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction (ie., the reality of experience) and the distinction between true and false (ie., the standards of thought) no longer exist.”
By this definition we could see totalitarian regime in all sorts of scenarios outside of extreme left or right ideologies. It is not hard for me to imagine a corporation or a conglomerate that is run by a singular ruling capitalistic ideology, that controls the media, and uses a version of force to control the population. Take for example Amazon who has monopolized web services and to some extent retail so they can control what is hosted on their platforms and what isn’t. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns the second most subscribed to newspaper in the world and he has state and municipal governments grovelling at his feet with tax incentives to build his warehouses in their jurisdiction. The great leftist intellectual Noam Chomsky argues that, “it’s ridiculous to talk about freedom in a society dominated by huge corporations. What kind of freedom is there inside a corporation? They’re totalitarian institutions - you take orders from above and maybe give them to people below you. There’s about as much freedom as under Stalinism.” That being said, I got in trouble when I worked at Wal-Mart and they did not send me to the Gulag, although they did make me stay late for a few minutes to finish cleaning my department, time for which I was paid. Still, they held all the power over me, until I quit and worked retail somewhere else. Fascists. In all seriousness though, for those of us who have experienced near financial ruin, the power that an employing corporation can have over us is significant, not to mention the power it may have over its consumers.
Or how about a liberal-democracy example like Canada? There are multiple federal parties in the great white north but Trudeau’s Liberals have managed to win three elections despite only amassing ⅓ of the popular vote, actually coming second in the last two elections. Despite the mounting scandals, it is hard to imagine the Liberals losing an election any time soon. He has made comments and actions that clearly communicate his desire for more centralized government power, a greater monopoly on weapons, and a willingness to use physical and financial force to suppress opposition. Canada has a state sponsored media that is propped up with government subsidies despite having abysmal viewership or readership and since the main opposition proposes reducing funding to the CBC there is a clear bias in their political reporting, creating a national level conflict of interest. And ideologically Justin Trudeau makes no secrets that he supports a more globalist agenda. It might not be enough to fully indict him as a totalitarian but maybe we can call him, totalitarian-adjacent? Is this what President Biden meant when he used the term semi-fascist?
Thank you for reading so far. Here is the outline of the manuscript for the book so you can keep track of where you are.
Introduction
Defence against Psyops
What are PsyOps?
What makes us marks?
The power of narratives
Who is behind it?
Kayfabe
Psychological Operations
Propaganda
Diversion of hatred
Character assassination
Re-education
Cults
False flags/agent provocateur
Totalitarian regimes (you are here)
Menticide
Defence
Principled insubordination
The Culture Wars
Ideological possession
Cancel Culture
Postmodernism
Profanity
MAGAstan vs. WOKEistan
Religious Zealotry
Heroes and villains
The Defence
The 21st Century Hero
The Responsibility of Freedom of Speech
Ridicule and Humour
Parallel Polis
Art and doubt
The Information Wars
Political Polarization
Corporate Media
Big Tech and the Post-Truth World
Noise vs Signal
“Woke”Journalism
Hate Hoaxes and victimhood
Collective ADHD
Advertisers
Defence
News/Media Diet
Critical Consuming
Rhetoric
The Slow burn
The Psychological Wars
Bullying
Gaslighting
Shame and isolation
Social contagion/Moral Panic
Safetyism
Social Media and human downgrading
The Meaning Crisis
Defence
Know Thyself
Be Wise
Stoicism
Psychological Immunity
Antifragility
Be Kind
Live Well
Conclusion