Many people forget that pre-Hitler Germany was a democracy with parallels to the modern day USA. Hitler was elected to office in virtually the same manner we elect our leaders. What went wrong then? How did the citizens of Germany fall into this trap? Why didn't they overthrow the evil lord once his madness was apparent to all? He was a master of human psychology that's why! Germany had fallen on terrible times. The destruction, debt, and humiliation left over from World War I was creating inflation and unemployment. The Germans were afraid for the future, feeling abused, and longed to remake their greatness. Adolf used all of this to his advantage to seize power and to hold it. Today, many Americans also believe in the greatness that America has to offer. They refuse to look at the warts of America's past, and see themselves as the reigning glory of the planet. America can do no wrong and wil continue to export American culture and know-how to the unfortunate people who don't live in this powerful country, they think. In fact similar to what occured in Germany, if someone suggests that we have erred people will say, "sssshh! Keep your mouth shut, you don't want to really piss anyone off do you!" I imagine this was repeated constantly in Germany when Jews started vanishing off of street corners.
The master manipulator Hitler used fear to his advantage just as our freedom limiting leaders do now. "Look another school shooting!" they say. Of course the remedy is to limit your rights to home defense (which I think is the ONLY thing guns should be used for, as long as their safely out of reach of children). "Look the environment is becoming unlivable!" they repeat endlessly. The cure limits what we can do with private property, and what kind of music and movies we can listen to and watch. "Look terrorists make the world unsafe!" The antidote they wish to use would violate your right to privacy. Yes, fear does motivate humans. Our leaders are hoping that it motivates you to look to them for protection and stability so they can gather more and more power. In my eyes one ingredient is missing from this stewing problem and that is economic calamity. If the US were to enter into a huge economic downturn would the result be a move to a new Fascism?
I think it would.
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