FASCISM FLASHBACK

 

Editor,

During World War II, there was a publication called “Army Talk” sent out to soldiers in the field to inform them of different subjects. The one from March 24, 1945, was titled “Fascism.”

It starts with: “You are away from home, separated from your families, no longer at a civilian job or at school and many of you are risking your very lives because of a thing called fascism.”

Also from the first page: “Fascism is the precise opposite of democracy. People run democratic governments, but fascist governments run the people.”

On the fourth page, under “How can we spot native American fascists at work?”

“1. Pitting religious, racial, and economic groups against one another in order to break national unity … In the United States, native fascists have often been Anti-Catholic, Anti-Jew, Anti-Negro, Anti-Labor, anti-foreign-born.”

“2. …Fascists deny the need for international cooperation.”

I’d say this describes our current resident of the White House and Stephen Miller, among others, quite well.

Where are we?

From “The Diary of Anne Frank”:

“Terrible things are happening outside. At any time of night and day, poor helpless people are being dragged out of their homes. They’re allowed to take only a knapsack and a little cash with them, and even then, they’re robbed of these possessions on the way. Families are torn apart; men, women and children are separated. Children come home from school to find that their parents have disappeared. Women return from shopping to find their houses sealed, their families gone.”

Terry Garrett
Bellingham

PROGRAMMED EXCESS

Consumerism--a social system of programmed excess--is what drives the unceasing demand for MORE. As Amazon and Microsoft nuclear-fueled data centers ramp up electric consumption for consumers to do more online shopping for entertainment and recreation, the question of sustainability raises its unwelcome head.

DYSTOPIAN AMERICA

Will the new fascist version of the EPA change it's name to the Environmental Destruction Agency?

DOJ to the Department of Injustice?

A Ray Bradbury moment, author of Fahrenheit 451, a dystopian novel where fire departments burn books.

CHRISTIAN TERRORISTS

Christian terrorists have a long history of violence in the United States, beginning with the Salem 'witch' lynching by the Puritans, followed by the lynching of Black men by the Ku Klux Klan, the American Indian boarding schools run by churches, the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing by Christian Patriots, the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol by President Trump's Proud Boys, the White House-sponsored demonizing and incarceration of queers, and the recent murders of Democratic lawmakers in Minnesota.

Religious terrorists--be they Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist, or Hindu--are not reasonable people; they are religious fanatics. And if history teaches us anything, it is that religious fanatics can't be reasoned with. They have to be jailed or killed. Something nobody apparently wants to admit. And when law enforcement gets involved on the side of Christian Patriots--as many did during the January 6 insurrection--we have enormous problems.

Freedom Socialist Party

Anti-Queer Christian Bigotry got a fierce reception from Anti-Fascist protesters in Seattle. The Freedom Socialist Party evidently has more backbone than the Democratic Party.

Coming Chaos

The future is dark--literally. The Iberian peninsula power blackout from Lisbon to Barcelona on April 28, 2025 demonstrates the vulnerability of modern technology-reliant systems. As noted by former New York City deputy commissioner in the Office for Emergency Management Kelly McKinney, "In complex systems, disaster is not the exception; it’s the destination."

Unreasonable Choices

To Dye For, the documentary film about the effect of synthetic food dyes on the behavior and mental health of children, helps to explain why there is such a vast mistrust of the U.S. government. In Europe, these dyes are banned because they can cause cancer, but in the United States, they are allowed in school lunch foods and prescription medicine. They have no nutritional value, but they look pretty.

One thing noted in the film that focuses on children who--due to higher sensitivity to dyes--have experienced severe behavioral and mental health problems is that they are literally unable to think. Even if your child is not particularly sensitive, this should prompt others to avoid dyes, which are on food labels.

The fact that the federal government allows carcinogenic additives to our food contributes to the general mistrust of federal agencies charged with protecting public health, and combined with the many other betrayals of trust by our public institutions helps to explain the unreasonable social movement against vaccines. When citizens have to go to other sources to learn the truth, they don't always use reason.