American Fascism possible in the United States?

By César Omar Sánchez

Hooray! Yes, America is back again! We voted agent orange out of the office finally! The transition of power will need to begin, and America will be back on track again! These are the words I kept hearing from my colleagues, liberal friends, and my neighbors from all over my neighborhood after the results of the November 2020 Presidential elections. Unfortunately, I did not share the same enthusiasm and excitement as they did on the streets throughout this nation. Studying and trying to understand the current political and economic system in the US for over twenty years, I came to realize that Joe Biden’s election triumph over Donald Trump will not bring any sort of change whatsoever. When we have a system in which corporations and the free-market ideology dictate and control the government and all other public institutions from education to housing to our limited community healthcare system, that is not a democratic system where we can all try to make a difference for change. But now, we might be facing a new problem, an extreme right-wing Christian fundamentalist movement that is influencing many politicians in the US Congress and numerous corporations across this nation. A dangerous ideologue, that if we are not careful, we can all be facing fascism in America.

America and Its Distorted Values

            

    

    In the United States, many still believe that this nation was founded under Christian values and that True America Patriotism is the backbone of this country. Since the 2016 Presidential Election where Trump was the winner, we have seen a huge surge of right-wing fascist organizations and religious extremists in the US. According to the Southern Poverty of Law, there numerous hate groups under the following categories: Ku Klux Klan, Neo-Nazi, White Christian Identity, Nationalist, Racist Skinhead, Neo-Confederate, Black Separatist, Anti-Immigrant, Anti-LGBTQ, and Anti-Muslim. Western-style chauvinistic fascist group like the Proud Boys is one clear example of how they conflate Patriotism and Christian values as the only way to bring America back.

            The beliefs of Christians are as flawed and imperfect as all religious beliefs around the world. Unfortunately, it seems that true genuine or non-violent traditional Christian values are being co-opted and radicalized by a new Christian movement known as Dominionism. This religious movement seeks to mask itself in the mantle of the Christian Faith and American Patriotism. The word Dominionism comes from Genesis 1:26 - 31 in which God gives human beings “dominion” over all creation. Even though their members are not as high in numbers, but the members within this group are highly influential. Today, their numbers are three-time as higher than before since Donald Trump was elected to office in 2016. Author and a former chief editor war correspondent for the New York Times wrote a book called American Fascist where he writes about the rise of Dominionism,

    "Dominionism now controls at least six national television networks, each reaching tens of millions of homes, and virtually all of the nation’s more than 2,000 religious radio stations, as well as denominations such as the Southern Baptist Convention."  (Chris Hedges 10)

            I believe that Capitalism is antithetical and in the eyes of Jesus Christ, I also believe he will not condone it. Capitalism, money, and greed for power are against all Jesus’s beliefs that he preached before he was crucified. This current system that we are in does not give room for people to learn all the enlightenments of many critical thinkers and philosophers like for example Immanuel Kant, Aristotle, Plate, Voltaire, and St. Augustine, which I believe we need to go back study, and perhaps learn something from these individuals to build a better society. Critical thinking and the rise of illiteracy in the United States are one of the many reasons why education is falling apart. When a country is being run as a corporation that only a few percentages of people benefit from it, that gives little room for freedom and a democratic country, instead, we have become a failed state. Corporations’ biggest donors are groups like the Dominionism and other extreme right-wing Christian religious group in the United States. Chris Hedges also goes on to say that,   

    “Corporations such as Tyson Foods, - which has placed 128 part-time chaplains, nearly all         evangelicals or fundamentalists, in 78 plants across the country – along with Purdue, Wal-Mart, and Sam’s Wholesale, to name a few, are huge financial backers of the movement.” (Chris Hedges 22)

Classic Totalitarianism vs Inverted Totalitarianism

German-born American political theorist Hannah Arendt wrote about the scientific tactics on total domination and the steps on how to control the mass people in a totalitarian system such as the Third Reich in Germany during the rise of Nazism. The three steps to total domination are described as Hades, Purgatory, and Hell, however, these are just analogies described as evil tactics to crush humanity's spirit. The first essential step is to eliminate the juridical individual or the political opposition by way of disenfranchisement. The second step is to demoralize them to the point of rendering their consciousness impotent. And finally, the third step of maintaining Total Domination is the destruction of ones’ individuality, one's identity through thought and action.

In a classical totalitarian system, power is controlled by a political demagogue, however, the late political philosopher Sheldon Wolin who wrote in his underrated book “Democracy Incorporated” mentions that a totalitarian state, it can also be controlled by a corporate state as opposed to a political leader. This form of control from the state is called “Inverted Totalitarianism” in which money buys politicians, tv airwaves, radio commentators, and almost every news media outlets in this country; all these methods are implemented to serve corporate needs. Corporate state can impose draconian laws to oppress the mass majority of people that oppose it.

Biden vs Trump, two clowns, same circus

            In today’s US politics, it is now clear that there is no more party left that represents the poor, the working class, blacks, and people of color from all ethnic and religious groups. Biden’s history of passing domestic and foreign policies has been a total disaster when he was Delaware’s senator and Vice-President under the Obama Administration. From the crime bill that accelerated the incarceration of Blacks and Latinos to the vote on the Iraq war, Joe Biden has done more damage to this country than the current president Donald Trump. Of course, that is not to say Donald Trump has not hurt this country either, but if you look at Biden’s past and current policies, we are still are paying the price due to his past policies.

            The democratic party has become the new centrist or perhaps a new version of the republican party with distorted political views. The current republican party has become more of a cult with Nazi sympathizers and conspiracist theorists that rely on “alternative facts” from their so-called reliable sources.

During the rise of fascism in Germany before Hitler came to power, Russian Revolutionary and Political Theorist Leon Trotsky wrote about how SDP (Social Democratic Party) in Germany at the time failed the people in which it gave the open path to fascism.  Trotsky writes about how many political leaders were more opportunistic and did little to help the German people. Reformists, under Leon Trotsky’s view, were a waste of time 

“We are, apart from all other considerations, interested in dragging the reformists from their asylums and placing them alongside ourselves before the eyes of the struggling masses. With a correct tactic, we stand only to gain from this.” (Trotsky 234)

    If Joe Biden does not make any radical changes that will address people’s grievances within the next two years, I fear the mass people in this county will revert to voting into office a right-wing Christian demagogue. This time, the next president will not be a buffoonish or idiotic person like Trump, but a charismatic, savvy, and manipulative person with an extreme Christian conservative view backed by religious movements like the Dominions or any other extreme fundamentalist organization.

Fascism in history and in today’s world.

    Fascism was created during the era of mass politics and appealed to the emotions of people in despair by using extreme rhetoric, rituals, and carefully stage-managed ceremonies. Robert Paxton, author of The Anatomy of Fascism writes that, 

    “Fascism does not rest explicitly upon an elaborated philosophical system, but rather upon popular feelings about master races, their unjust lot, and their rightful predominance over inferior peoples.” (Paxton 16)

            There have been many debates and discussions between scholars about fascism in both the past during WII and the modern era today. Some argued that fascism died after the fall of Adolf Hitler and that right-wing politics has been decimated and does not have the same political strength and backing as before. However, I would argue that fascism is coming back but in a different form, perhaps in a form of a corporate-fascist system backed financially by extreme religious groups. Fascistic organizations still exist and are scattered in certain countries in Europe. During the ’90s, fascist “skinheads” were attacking immigrants in Britain, Germany, Scandinavia, and Italy. In that same time frame, certain fascist and neo-nazi political parties were back on the rise and as Paxton wrote,

    "The first participation of a neofascist party in a European government in 1994, when the Italian Alleanza Nazionale, a direct descendant of the Italian neo-fascist party." (Paxton 173)

Conclusion

            Fast forward till today, we have numerous fascist elements within the Trump administration along with Nazi sympathizers in the White House. Since Trump’s remark after the Charlottesville, Virginia killing of activist Heather Heyer where he said, “there many good people on both sides” and that there was “blame on both side”, we are living in an era where some believe they are the superior race (White Supremacy) while certain other types of people or inferior.  

            The killing of George Floyd that sparked another widespread nation protest was pretty much the final draw and exposed the systemic racism and segregationally economic problem Blacks, Latino and other people of color are experiencing in the United States. These issues have been going on for decades and Joe Biden was part of it during the signing of the 1994 Crime Bill. Both Democrats and Republicans have failed us all for many years now and continue to do so during this Global Pandemic we are facing. As for the current president, Trump is not the problem, he is a symptom of a bigger problem…a systemic problem. Joe Biden’s winning of the election is not the solution and will not solve our problem. If we do not do anything and just become apathetic to the current state we are in, say farewell to America, and hello to Fascism in an Inverted Totalitarian system that is slowly creeping upon us.

We must continue to pressure our political leaders for radical change, sooner or later the streets will speak again, and I predict mass civil unrest throughout this nation will spread if nothing is done. Some people will view it as anarchy or a people’s front revolution, for many, it could be a sign of hope. As a current student majoring in philosophy and religion, I came upon a 2010 article from the Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, author Pablo Gilabert argues when it comes to Immanuel Kant's theory of duty,

“Some duties of this category can be specified so that they extend demands of justice and that some of them have a global scope.” (Gilabert 5)

In other words, duties can be a part of a theory of justice for the people witnessing massive injustice in this country and worldwide. It is time for a Revolution. The Revolution is now! It is time to rebuild a better world.

by César Omar Sánchez. Community organizer, New York/New Jersey Cuba Si Coalition, Advisory Board Member of ProLibertad: Free All Political Prisoners Campaign.

 

Reference

Arendt, Hannah. “Totalitarianism in Power.” The Origins of Totalitarianism. Penguin Classics.     2017.

Hedges, Chris. “Faith.” American Fascists: The Christian Right and The War on America. Free     Press, p. 10-22

Trotsky, Leon. “What next?” The Struggle Against Fascism in Germany. Pathfinder Press. p. 234.

Paxton, Robert O. The Anatomy of Fascism. Vintage Books, 2005. pp. 16-173

Wolin, Sheldon S. Democracy Incorporated: Managed Democracy and the Specter of Inverted Totalitarianism. Princeton University Press, 2017.

SPL Center, Team. “Frequently Asked Questions about Hate Groups.” Southern Poverty Law Center, 18 Mar. 2020, www.splcenter.org/20200318/frequently-asked-questions-about-hate-groups.

Gilabert, Pablo. “Kant and the Claims of the Poor.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, vol. 81, no. 2, 2010, pp. 382–418. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/20779568. Accessed 7 Dec. 2020.