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Tag Archives: totalitarianism
Muslims in England Burn the U.S. Constitution
The below video represents Herderian politics in action: underground men, as if stepping out of the shadows of a Dostoevsky or Conrad novel, possessed of a collectivist ideology that has made them mad, eat bitterness together. It is a protest in Britain initiated by … Continue reading
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Tagged atheism, herderianism, Islam, Muslims, quran, the bill of rights, the constitution, the Enlightenment, Thomas Jefferson, totalitarianism
1 Comment
Nietzsche’s checkmate: does atheism lead to totalitarianism?
A.C. Grayling, an atheist author that I tend to otherwise love, calls the idea that atheism gave birth to communism and fascism a theist “canard.” But, as an agnostic who has been doing a good deal of Nietzsche reading lately, I’m not … Continue reading
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Tagged a.c. grayling, apologetics, atheism, atheist, Charles Darwin, Communism, contingency, fascism, Friedrich Nietzsche, Nietzsche, postmodernism, totalitarianism
15 Comments
Apocalypse Now?: North Korea, a nuclear power, threatens full-scale war with South Korea
And this chilling sentence appeared in the New York Times story on the crisis: The motivations, health and even state of mind of North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-il, remained cloaked in mystery. Got it? We don’t know whether, exactly, Kim … Continue reading
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Tagged apocalypse, Communism, cults, foreign policy, Jim Jones, kim jong-il, korea, north korea, oh shit, Politics, south korea, totalitarianism
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Are Alain Badiou and Slavoj Žižek Authoritarian Leftists?
At Dissent, Alan Johnson worries that two revered intellectual theorists, Alain Badiou and Slavoj Žižek, are increasingly sounding—it’s hard to be polite about this—old school authoritarian: I propose to write a series of posts on what I will call the “new authoritarian … Continue reading
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Tagged Ayn Rand, Communism, illiberalism, intellectuals, left, marxist, philosophy, postmodernism, Slavoj Zizek, Socialism, totalitarianism
1 Comment
Dear Leader Megalomania
I like these two: . And this one: . More from MightyGodKing (MGK) here. And still more Dear Leader totalitarianism and megalomania (but of the Christian fundamentalist variety) here.
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Tagged chick tracts, Christian fundamentalism, comedy, Communism, cult of personality, cults, fundamentalism, humor, korea, north korea, south korea, totalitarianism
1 Comment
A great quote on fundamentalism from Lionel Tiger and Michael McGuire’s new book, “God’s Brain” (2010)
On page 8: People are killed for what is in their heads and for the amulets worn around their necks. A mighty university press, Yale, refuses to publish images of a religious figure—the book is precisely about them [images of … Continue reading
21st Century Russia: Early 1930s Germany Redux?
A sobering documentary on 21st century Russia. Worth watching in full. We live in dangerous times. Here’s part 1 of 6:
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Tagged capitalism, cossacks, death, economics, fascism, global economy, life, Putin, Russia, totalitarianism
7 Comments
Beck Zedong!
Glenn Beck’s got a one hundred year plan (oh, shit): “We need to start thinking like the Chinese.” In other words, Glenn Beck thinks that focused, insurgent, belligerent, fanatically committed mass movement Maoism—with its disciplined cell groups, ideological purity, and relentless propaganda—is the right … Continue reading
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Tagged Andrew Sullivan, Communism, conservatism, fascism, glenn beck, mao zedong, National Review, rush limbaugh, Sean Hannity, tea parties, teabaggers, totalitarianism
1 Comment
Nanny State Watch: Fire-Safe Cigarettes Are Intrusive Upon Human Liberty
I don’t smoke, and I didn’t know there was such a thing as fire-safe cigarettes, but apparently there are states legislating their sale, and Andrew Sullivan today got a life-affirming rant from one of his readers about them. Money quote: We … Continue reading
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Tagged America, cigarettes, freedom, john stewart mill, liberty, smoking, totalitarianism, United States
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Jeff Bezos’s Orwellian Treatment of George Orwell’s 1984
The potentially Orwellian implications of the Kindle here.
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged 1984, Amazon, George Orwell, jeff bezos, kindle, Orwell, totalitarianism
2 Comments
Quote of the Day: Robert Lifton on the “thought terminating cliche”
Thought terminating cliches? You know, like the ones that Americans hear weekly from Rush Limbaugh and Fox News. Here’s the psychologist Robert Lifton, from his book, Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism : “The language of the totalist environment is characterized by … Continue reading
Bearing Witness to the Holocaust: Studio Portrait of Kurt Klein, Age Two
Studio portrait, from 1922, of two-year-old Kurt Klein. In 1937, Kurt Klein’s parents sent him to live with relatives in Buffalo, New York. His parents, unable to immigrate, died at Auschwitz in 1942. According to the U.S. Holocaust Museum archives: Kurt was … Continue reading
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Tagged adolf hitler, Auschwitz, buffalo, death, fascism, Germany, Holocaust, Judaism, life, new york, the problem of evil, totalitarianism
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Soviet Hammer & Sickle Shirts Being Sold at Amazon
Below is a disturbing shirt being sold at Amazon. I don’t oppose the shirt being sold, only disturbed that people are so ignorant of the history of the 20th century that they would think it “cool” to wear it. Or worse: they … Continue reading
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Tagged aleksandr solzhenitsyn, andrei sakvarov, Communism, fascism, gulag, ignorance, lenin, Soviet Union, stalin, stupidity, totalitarianism, vaclav havel
4 Comments
Bearing Witness to the Holocaust: Jews Forced by Nazis to Scrub a Street in Vienna
Nazis in Vienna force Jews to scrub a street as non-Jewish spectators look on: Source: U.S. Holocaust Museum. Photograph is in the public domain.
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Tagged austria, Bishop Richard Williamson, demonization, Holocaust, Judaism, Politics, pope benedict, religion, the Holocaust, the shoah, totalitarianism, vienna
12 Comments
BIG JESUS is Watching You? Is Christianity a Form of Authoritarianism/Totalitarianism?
Christopher Hitchens thinks that Christianity, in the way it surrounds and encloses the psyche of the believer, and threatens the unbeliever with torture, is a form of totalitarianism: It is an odd thing, isn’t it, to tell somebody, IF YOU … Continue reading
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Tagged apologetics, authoritarianism, Christianity, Christopher Hitchens, George Orwell, Jesus, religion, scapegoat, scapegoating, the Bible, totalitarianism
28 Comments
Bearing Witness to the Holocaust: Image from Auschwitz, 1944
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Tagged 1944, Auschwitz, christian antisemitism, genocide, Politics, religion, the Holocaust, totalitarianism, war
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Quote of the Day
Fyodor Dostoevsky wrote this arresting passage in his short story, “The Dream of a Ridiculous Man”: [P]eople appeared who began devising ways of bringing men together again, so that each individual, without ceasing to prize himself above all others, might not … Continue reading
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Tagged Communism, Dostoevsky, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Hegel, life, literature, psychology, Socialism, totalitarianism, utopia, utopianism, war
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Liberal Secularism v. Illiberal Secularism: Why Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett are Wrong to Hint That Perhaps the State Should Set Restrictions on Religious Child-Rearing
Late in 2007 Damon Linker, in the New Republic, had a great essay on the contemporary atheist movement, and it can still be read online here. The title of the essay is “Atheism’s Wrong Turn.” For me, there are two “money quotes” in the essay. Here’s the … Continue reading
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Tagged agnosticism, America, apologetics, atheism, Daniel Dennett, family, homeschooling, illiberalism, liberalism, religion, Richard Dawkins, totalitarianism
3 Comments
EVERY Knee Shall Bow and Every Tongue Confess—Christmas?: Santa Abolishes “Happy Holidays” Once and For ALL
Bill O’Reilly wins the War on Christmas:
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Tagged 1984, authoritarianism, Bill O'Reilly, Christmas, comedy, George Orwell, holiday cheer, humor, santa clause, Stalinism, the war on christmas, totalitarianism
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Thinking About the First Monotheist: Not Moses, but Akhenaten
In the 14th century BCE, the Egyptian pharoah Akhenaten, father of “King Tut” (Tutankamen), and husband of Nefertiti, seems to have had some profound revelation that there was only one God, and that God’s name was Aten—who manifested himself in the … Continue reading
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Tagged Akhenaten, Bible, Egypt, history, literature, monotheism, Moses, poetry, Santi Tafarella, totalitarianism
6 Comments
Prometheus Unbound 