[motohagiography]

That aspect of her thesis was called political "atomization," which was the creation of this lonely state by isolating people from each other, and ultimately from truth, so that they become neutralized to the totalitarian agenda. The destruction of communities, families, and social connections is a totalitarian process and agenda.

It was the result of a campaign of arbitrariness and farcical lying because the real target and conquest of totalitarianism is truth itself. When nothing can be believed, all opposition is neutralized. This neutralization and eventual liquidation is the totalitarian process. Activists project this as "stochastic terror," these days, but the technique goes back over a couple hundred years. What was exceptionally notable about that book, and is a bullet point in the article, is that the very idea of history as progress itself is the initial condition of ideology.

The final chapter "ideology and terror," is the distillation I think people should read today, but the whole book, particularly the initial chapters that are an unblinking view of antisemitism, colonial thinking, and the nation state are sound foundations for thinking about the 20th century.

[hirundo]

It would be nice if public health agencies formally considered the public cost of such atomization from covid lockdowns. They may find in the end that the cost is worth paying, but it should be part of the analysis.

But what kind of study could yield valid, reproducible data about how much atomization is caused by how much lockdown, and how much authoritarianism is caused by how much atomization?

[medium_burrito]

Useful data points I think would include: - Suicides, attempted and successful - Calls to suicide hotlines - Overdoses - Phone call data, assuming a sufficient database of people's relationships -> anecdotally, people are calling each other way less - Following what people are watching online- I bet youtube and facebook have an extremely good measure of how many general segments of viewing population there are, and I bet these have increased. Amazon book sales might do the same. - Alcohol sales, obviously. Friends in the industry say volume has quadrupled while unit price has dropped by a similar magnitude.

[Ygg2]

> When nothing can be believed, all opposition is neutralized.

I'm gonna recommend watching Hypernormalization by Adam Curtis. In it he talks about Vladislav Surkov basically turning the Russian political scene into a bizarre post modernist theater, where he would publicly proclaim to fund left wing, right wing or other, centrist parties and NGOs, to give the impression that everyone is working for Putin.

[aphextron]

>That aspect of her thesis was called political "atomization," which was the creation of this lonely state by isolating people from each other, and ultimately from truth, so that they become neutralized to the totalitarian agenda. The destruction of communities, families, and social connections is a totalitarian process and agenda.

You can see this so clearly in any video of Trump rallies, or their protests. There is no conversation, conviviality, or sense of community happening between the attendees. It's a collection of completely disconnected individuals taking selfies and angrily screaming platitudes to the general crowd. It's quite disturbing to see.

A prime example: https://youtu.be/L5hksM_R59M

[Matticus_Rex]

That is not what I've seen from the crowd except during speeches. I, too, naturally tend to believe the worst about these people but there's definitely a sense of Trump supporter community there.

[pavlov]

There is a community there, but for many the process of joining this new community has involved the destruction of their existing links to family and local society. QAnon is the most extreme example of this kind of cultish separation among Trumpists.

[s1artibartfast]

I think there is a push and a pull going on. Many people feel like outsiders or are otherwise unfulfilled with their communities, making new associations more attractive

[gabereiser]

This. A slow toxic rot of self that erodes the family and community links until their thoughts and actions seem alien to the outside.

Sounds like my ex-wife (fell victim to QAnon). :/

[s1artibartfast]

Since you brought it up, what factors do you think made you ex-wife susceptible to qanon ideas?

[gabereiser]

She was always susceptible to misinformation. When we moved to Central Florida a decade ago, they have what’s called “Love Bugs”. An invasive flying beetle from Central America. While on the job as a barista, someone told her they were genetically engineered at UCF. She believed him. Arguing with me that was the truth until I pointed her to science articles and Wikipedia.

Fast forward a few years and the thought of sex-trafficking rings took root. She was convinced that girls were being abducted for sex slavery and that people in government were supporting them.

This twisted even further when I confronted her about it, told her that what she thinks is real isn’t, and she immediately jumped on me for gaslighting her.

Needless to say, it was she that filed for divorce. I’m way happier now.

Those that downvoted my comment above because my ex-wife, you should meet her, she’s completely crazy now.

[platz]

It should be recognized that the left, especially neoliberals, has played just as much a role in atomization of the public as the right.

Indeed, it is usually conservatives that actually, in practice, attempt to promote community and family values.

Although portions of the right have contributed to atomization via the 'free market', the left's project of scientism and eschewing of tradition arguably has also contributed significantly to this.

[rusk]

> the left, especially neoliberals

It seems kind of funny to see these two lumped together ... I don’t think neoliberalism would be considered left by left people ...

I think the confusion arises from the different interpretation of liberalism on either side of the Atlantic.

Neoliberalism is an economic movement rather than a social one (unlike neoconservatism, the political ideology that funnily enough advocates neoliberalism) and it’s an iteration of classical economics aka “economic liberalism”.

Liberal economics is actually more like libertarianism which is paradoxically more closely aligned with the “right wing” mindset.

Neoliberalism does incorporate some notes about redistribution of wealth for reasons of economic expedience but this is rarely seen in practice.

This all goes to show that words are slippery and labels are bullshit and you’re far better off trying to understand where the people you’re disagreeing with are coming from than be lazily painting them as this or that.

[platz]

I'm not sure what the point you're driving at is; it seems you did understand the gist of my point.

It seems like you want a semantics debate about how neocons and neolibs are are equivalent terms? Sorry, not the conversation for me, nor the main point I was making.

[flagrant]

I think what he's driving at is that your point relies on the assumption that neoliberalism is left wing, when this is not true.

[rusk]

To be honest all I think I was really driving at is that he sets the tone in the first sentence that he’s uninformed about what he’s talking about. I kind of get the impression also that he’s trying to be divisive rather than understand the issues at hand. I kind of feel he goes against the hacker ethic on both points ...

[platz]

> your point relies on the assumption that neoliberalism is left wing, when this is not true

I didn't say that all neoliberals were left wing.

I said that there were some people on the the left that were neoliberals.

Please understand this difference.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism#United_States

> Early roots of neoliberalism were laid in the 1970s during the Carter administration, with deregulation of the trucking, banking and airline industries,[144][145][146] as well as the appointment of Paul Volcker to chairman of the Federal Reserve.[21]:5

> During the 1990s, the Clinton administration also embraced neoliberalism[130] by supporting the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), continuing the deregulation of the financial sector through passage of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act and the repeal of the Glass–Steagall Act and implementing cuts to the welfare state through passage of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act.[147][149][150]

You seem to presuppose your claims are de-facto correct; I don't think that is true.

[rusk]

You didn’t make it very well it seems.

[yrimaxi]

d

[platz]

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25850671

[dragonwriter]

> It should be recognized that the left, especially neoliberals, has played just as much a role in atomization of the public as the right.

Neoliberalism is a center-right, corporate capitalist economic ideology. It has nothing to do with the Left, which it sees (and is seen by as) an enemy. (Americans are particularly likely to get confused by this because the dominant, more centrist faction of the Democratic Party is neoliberal, and the Democratic Party is the left-most of the US’s major parties.)

But, yes, it has played a central role in atomization of society.

[platz]

> It has nothing to do with the Left

Well, nothing to do with the left may be a bit of an overstatement, imho.

If the "Left" is such a problematic term, then let's just agree to avoid using the term, since you seem to be of the position that the "more centrist faction of the Democratic Party" is not Left.

I would assume the term "Left" includes both the "more centrist faction of the Democratic Party" and the more left-leaning social-democratic ideologies.

The left is a big tent composed of many factions.

also, linking this for citations: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25850671

[dragonwriter]

> since you seem to be of the position that the "more centrist faction of the Democratic Party" is not Left.

It's not.

Also, neoliberalism was the economic ideology of the dominant faction of the Republican Party prior to Trump, too, and few would call them “the Left". (There were differences in social ideology, of course, between Republicans and Democrats.) Hence the “neoliberal consensus” of the 1990s and beyond.

[platz]

I don't think anyone is confusing the Republican party with the left.

However it seems who gets to be in "the left" and who doesn't seems to be very up for debate these days.

I'm fairly certain if you asked anyone in the 90's if the clinton administration was on the left they'd answer in the affirmative.

I understand the social democratic part of the left has evolved and differentiated itself since then. This is great, but I think it problematic to retcon the history exclusively this view.

Just because the social democratic faction would like complete ownership on the term "the left" I think does not make it so, or at least can be agreed to be a subjective claim.