Heed the words of one American who had to flee dictatorship. He does not like what he is seeing. It is all too familiar to him:
“We survivors of authoritarianism have a terrible, terrible foreboding, because we are experiencing something we should never do: deja vu. Our parents fled from collapsing societies to America. And here, now, in a grim and eerie repeat of history, we see the scenes of our childhoods played out all over again. Only now, in the land that we came to. We see the stories our parents recounted to us happening before our eyes, only this time, in the place they brought us to, to escape from all those horrors, abuses, and depredations.”…
“…when radicalized young men are killing people they have been taught to hate by demagogues right in the open, on the streets — a society has reached the beginnings of sectarian violence, the kind familiar in the Islamic world, and is at the end of democracy’s road.
How did the state’s law enforcement respond? In America, they’re simply called “the police.” They let him do it, and then they protected him. The killer was only brought to justice because there was a national outcry after the act was caught on video. If none of that had happened, he probably would never have been. The police were forced to act, in other words.
What do we survivors see in that tiny parable? Crucial institutions have already been captured by the extremist factions who stand against democracy.”…
“That’s another thing we survivors see very clearly right now, but “real” Americans might not. The capture of a police force is not just the capture of a police force. It threatens the whole fabric of a democracy. The monopoly on violence that the people’s agents should have is being transferred to the authoritarian. Why else would police forces beat people on the streets? Give hateful young men a free pass to kill people?
It all points to the beginnings of true violence, not just at the hands of the radicals — but aided and abetted by the state. That is the point at which a democracy finishes collapsing — and never comes back. Because once the state is free to do real violence — who is going to protest? Speak out? Even criticize?…”
Oh ye of little faith! The Chicken Littles of democracy fail to appreciate how much stronger the US is than any other example. Yes, things are bleak at the moment, but we can always point to the Civil War as evidence that we can ultimately survive pretty much anything.
Not the best example. I fear we are due for another if 40% of the country is committed to rule by Trump no matter if said rule is affirmed by voters. An educated Republican said on my Facebook “all mail in votes are fraud”. Everyone across the spectrum condemned Dylan Root after Charleston. The president and his Fox News minion have justified and praised the Kenosha shooter for “protecting property” from protesters. Trump already had our troops (who he thinks are his) fire on protesters in American cities. This is a guy who we know will do anything and everything to stay in power, accumulate wealth and power for his family, and pass it on to his kids. This is someone who convinced Americans to drink bleach and whom the Republican Party would do nothing to stop if he did start shooting people on 5th Avenue.
“Look at the Donald owning the libs” they’d say as he mows down scores of his own citizens on live tv. If you don’t thick we live in a country where that is possible and where many of our fellow citizens wished we lived already you’ve been under a rock for four and a half years. When he says 2+2=5 the media, his party, and his supporters say it is too.
You’ve joined the paranoia side too?:(
I honestly fear you’ll be saying “look at the Civil War” while DHS brownshirts are hauling you away to who knows where.
Those brownshirts released the innocents they swept off the streets a few weeks ago — that was a REHEARSAL. You don’t seem to appreciate that each such kidnapping was grossly illegal — and absolutely nothing has been done about it.
You are a historian. Are you familiar with how quickly East Berlin was sealed off? It happened in ONE NIGHT, without warning.
As I have repeatedly said, we are not Germany. What has happened most recently reminds me most of the violence encountered by civil rights protesters in the 60s, which did not represent the best of America of course, but we as a country lived to tell about it.
I lived through and remember the civil rights protests of the 1960s. I grew up in a MD suburb of Washington DC, MLK’s Great March on Washington happened in my neighborhood and was covered as a local news story.
What was happening then is not remotely like what is happening now.