I sometimes fear that people think that fascism arrives in fancy dress worn by grotesques and monsters as played out in endless re-runs of the Nazis. Fascism arrives as your friend. It will restore your honour, make you feel proud, protect your house, give you a job, clean up the neighbourhood, remind you of how great you once were, clear out the venal and the corrupt, remove anything you feel is unlike you…It doesn’t walk in saying, “Our programme means militias, mass imprisonments, transportations, war and persecution.”
a post my mum shared on fb earlier (via mnrva)
Written by the poet Michael Rosen
(via coldalbion)
YES YES YES
Facism almost always walks in and offers two things:
1) identification of a legitimate problem (often poverty/a failing economy/a lack of jobs)
2) identification of an Other who can be blamed and removed so that the problem is solved and the future is prosperous and safe. (The Other almost never caused the problem, but that’s not the point; the point is how you can tell the story to link them together.) The idea of the Other being to blame is often softened, at first: “Well, we’re not talking about ALL [group], just the bad ones!” Just punishments for the “bad” people, and you and your friends and family get your future back.
It’s a deal an awful lot of people will take, if they are brought to believe in it.
(via decepticonsensual)