This is off topic somewhat, I read "Human Smoke" several years ago, and what jumped out at me was Baker's controversial assertion that is was Churchill who initiated the bombing of civilian targets. I mention this only as another possible motivator to read the book. The book is disturbing for the reason Hamilton Nolan points out, but it also documents how tribalism brings out the worst in us.
After decades now (yes, long before Little Big Orange) of having people I care about admonish me for being alarmist, being proven justified over and over is such cold fucking comfort.
History is fascinating, if not horrifying. The chain of events in retrospect seem so obvious. Of COURSE that was going to happen! It was inevitable! Yet events happening in real time can seem random - chaotic, as is currently the case, (intentionally or not.) That said, even the casual observer can't miss the catastrophic death spiral we're experiencing. I'm confounded by the maniacal support for our collapse, and can only conclude it is, in fact, what some (tho not all) have been awaiting. (Insert DJT voice here: Sad!)
Hey, I’m a terminal-masters guy: history of science. Trained up to the diss level (abandoned) as a historian.
You’re not off at all. It’s fascism. Like species (was gonna be a historian of biology), it’s a semi-fuzzy term that bleeds into equally fuzzy neighbors like “authoritarianism.” Semi-fuzzy because of the expected variation under the umbrella-term caused by different times, places; but as real as “cats,” the actual set of organisms.
I was worried about this stuff ages ago—not because I’m Nostradamus but because I think I lack the normal “things’ll be fine” mode. Bad at denial…unless of course I’m just in denial about it.
The United States is so much younger than the rest of the world. Everyone else has already gone through this fascist crap or is currently mired in it. For a minute there it looked like we might be smart enough to learn from others' mistakes. Evidently not.
if MAGA actually had a scientific racial theory and a plan for eugenics on the ground, I would take this post more seriously. But they don't and won't and illegal immigration is not a net good. Legal immigration is definitely a net good. Lock up the employers of illegal immigrants and treat the exploited people in the most humane way possible. Stop foreign policy that forces people to leave their homes and families. Now that would be great.
Are you sure they don't have a pseudo-scientific race premise on the back burner? Our country's eugenic past created some dark things for hundreds of thousands of disabled Americans between approximately 1900 and 1946. Some would like to bring that past back.
Good article. I am writing a short story telling a similar tale of the euthanasia of the developmentally disabled and mentally ill people in the years leading up to WWII. Although contemporary examples don't yet exist, I feel terrible things are headed our way. It may start with Trans people and immigrants, but it will not end there. Once the rule of law is lost, it may take decades to get it back.
That article about people paying for subscriptions and not realizing how much they were paying made me laugh. Dummies. I have to pay here because they suck so terribly.
You know the Chomsky story? His dentist told him he was grinding his teeth. He couldn’t figure out when: his (first) wife watched him while he slept. Nuthin.’ He was not conscious of ever doing it.
I forget how but one of them, in the midst of the hypervigilant search, noticed that he was grinding every morning reading the New York Times.
I had an idea in 2014 that The Times (London) and other UK and Australian newspapers should have had a subscription tier that let you get the newspaper from 100 years ago to that day delivered each day to your inbox so you could follow WW1 in real time, I’m still surprised that none of them tried it, maybe we should do the same thing now, from the beer hall putsch through to January 33 Der Spiegel or others should let us see day by day what their news actually covered as Hitler rose to power and compare it to how they cover the AFD at home and Mussolini (trump) overseas today
No. It does highlight the militarism of the UK and US (and Germany, and Japan, and China...) but does not have anything approaching a thesis as clear as that.
That was a great article…horrifying…but very eye opening. If my eyes could get any wider… 👁️👁️ lol
This is off topic somewhat, I read "Human Smoke" several years ago, and what jumped out at me was Baker's controversial assertion that is was Churchill who initiated the bombing of civilian targets. I mention this only as another possible motivator to read the book. The book is disturbing for the reason Hamilton Nolan points out, but it also documents how tribalism brings out the worst in us.
"History repeats itself, but in such cunning disguise that we never detect the resemblance until the damage is done." Sydney J. Harris
After decades now (yes, long before Little Big Orange) of having people I care about admonish me for being alarmist, being proven justified over and over is such cold fucking comfort.
Ditto...I would SO have preferred being proven wrong...I don't have a huge ego, being 'right' doesn't win me any self esteem
History is fascinating, if not horrifying. The chain of events in retrospect seem so obvious. Of COURSE that was going to happen! It was inevitable! Yet events happening in real time can seem random - chaotic, as is currently the case, (intentionally or not.) That said, even the casual observer can't miss the catastrophic death spiral we're experiencing. I'm confounded by the maniacal support for our collapse, and can only conclude it is, in fact, what some (tho not all) have been awaiting. (Insert DJT voice here: Sad!)
Hey, I’m a terminal-masters guy: history of science. Trained up to the diss level (abandoned) as a historian.
You’re not off at all. It’s fascism. Like species (was gonna be a historian of biology), it’s a semi-fuzzy term that bleeds into equally fuzzy neighbors like “authoritarianism.” Semi-fuzzy because of the expected variation under the umbrella-term caused by different times, places; but as real as “cats,” the actual set of organisms.
I was worried about this stuff ages ago—not because I’m Nostradamus but because I think I lack the normal “things’ll be fine” mode. Bad at denial…unless of course I’m just in denial about it.
From 2008: https://free--expression.blogspot.com/2008/06/this-lands-homeland-by-doug-tarnopol.html
I think I'm gonna skip this one. I'd like to sleep at some point within the next year.
The United States is so much younger than the rest of the world. Everyone else has already gone through this fascist crap or is currently mired in it. For a minute there it looked like we might be smart enough to learn from others' mistakes. Evidently not.
if MAGA actually had a scientific racial theory and a plan for eugenics on the ground, I would take this post more seriously. But they don't and won't and illegal immigration is not a net good. Legal immigration is definitely a net good. Lock up the employers of illegal immigrants and treat the exploited people in the most humane way possible. Stop foreign policy that forces people to leave their homes and families. Now that would be great.
Immigration laws are random and made up and have changed all the time so to say that what's good is based on what's legal is pretty nuts
Are you sure they don't have a pseudo-scientific race premise on the back burner? Our country's eugenic past created some dark things for hundreds of thousands of disabled Americans between approximately 1900 and 1946. Some would like to bring that past back.
Good article. I am writing a short story telling a similar tale of the euthanasia of the developmentally disabled and mentally ill people in the years leading up to WWII. Although contemporary examples don't yet exist, I feel terrible things are headed our way. It may start with Trans people and immigrants, but it will not end there. Once the rule of law is lost, it may take decades to get it back.
There are definitely shades of the sort of eugenics you're referring to in the way RFKjr speaks about autistic kids...
That article about people paying for subscriptions and not realizing how much they were paying made me laugh. Dummies. I have to pay here because they suck so terribly.
You know the Chomsky story? His dentist told him he was grinding his teeth. He couldn’t figure out when: his (first) wife watched him while he slept. Nuthin.’ He was not conscious of ever doing it.
I forget how but one of them, in the midst of the hypervigilant search, noticed that he was grinding every morning reading the New York Times.
I had an idea in 2014 that The Times (London) and other UK and Australian newspapers should have had a subscription tier that let you get the newspaper from 100 years ago to that day delivered each day to your inbox so you could follow WW1 in real time, I’m still surprised that none of them tried it, maybe we should do the same thing now, from the beer hall putsch through to January 33 Der Spiegel or others should let us see day by day what their news actually covered as Hitler rose to power and compare it to how they cover the AFD at home and Mussolini (trump) overseas today
Isn’t the thesis of that book that America and the UK forced Germany into war?
No. It does highlight the militarism of the UK and US (and Germany, and Japan, and China...) but does not have anything approaching a thesis as clear as that.
"If we fail to study and learn from history, it is bound to repeat itself", and here we are!