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Is anyone else starting to wonder whether Orwell was a time traveler trying to warn us?
It couldn't possibly be that Trump and his handlers are using it (edit: 1984) as a road map and his followers are stupid enough not to notice.
It's more that Trump read a book:
Ivana Trump told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that from time to time her husband reads a book of Hitler's collected speeches, My New Order, which he keeps in a cabinet by his bed. Kennedy now guards a copy of My New Order in a closet at his office, as if it were a grenade. Hitler's speeches, from his earliest days up through the Phony War of 1939, reveal his extraordinary ability as a master propagandist.
"Did your cousin John give you the Hitler speeches?" I asked Trump.
Trump hesitated. "Who told you that?"
"I don't remember," I said.
"Actually, it was my friend Marty Davis from Paramount who gave me a copy of Mein Kampf, and he's a Jew." ("I did give him a book about Hitler," Marty Davis said. "But it was My New Order, Hitler's speeches, not Mein Kampf. I thought he would find it interesting. I am his friend, but I'm not Jewish.")
Edit: I'll note that this appears to the only time Trump has been observed reading a book.
No time travel, it is just that Orwell and the Repubs are both basing their content partially on observations about Nazi Germany.
Orwell's writings were inspired by what he had experienced in Burma and Spain. The issue isn't that he was particularly prescient, it's that nothing has changed.
Besides, of the two dystopian novels, we're much closer to Brave New World.
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I believe the framework Warzel is looking for is something like:
'Mass Delusional Narcissistic Sustained Psychosis at a Societal Level'
With many of the characteristics of Nazism.
Well you see, according to the DSM whatever the latest edition is, a mental condition is ultimately only real and serious and diagnosable if it seriously impacts your or others ability to function in the economy.
Strong religious beliefs? Literally magical thinking and delusional, but nope, generally not a disorder in and of itself.
Brainwashed by a fascist cult leader into conspiratorial delusion generation upon being presented with facts you do not like?
Eh, as long as you don't directly, obviously, repeatedly threaten to harm others, you can probably still go to work, no problem.
Driven to nervous breakdowns by the stress of work, trauma of poverty, knowledge that capitalism is going to kill billions of people in the coming decades and you as a moral being feel helpless, yet somehow responsible?
Oh sure, you probably qualify for something, here's some pills that may help you get back to work.
There is no ethical Psychology or Psychiatry under Capitalism either.
Funny thing about humans is that they only really have their own life’s frame of reference for evaluating their experiences. I wouldn’t necessarily say that the decline of the American empire is unique, I am sure when other empires were experiencing similar levels of decline they had just as much douchebags to contend with. But the threat posed by increasing natural deterioration is a unique factor of our current era. Well that, and the specter of large scale nuclear war. Other than that, the culture wars have always been raging. Honestly, there’s no war but class war. I sound like a broken record now
Climate change was also probably behind the Bronze Age collapse (widespread drought,)- though it probably had nothing to do with humans changing things.
Gotta have the ol double-think.
this post was submitted on 11 Oct 2024
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