How do we make sure totalitarianism doesn’t rear its head again?

There is a reason for the saying that history repeats itself.  This is simply because events are based on age-old human desires of certain kinds of people who want power over everyone else.  And let’s be blunt about it: this isn’t the case with everyone.  Most people have a live-and-let-live attitude, and they just want to have the ruling class leave them alone.

The question is, how do we recognize this potential ruling class before they attain too much power and cannot be stopped?  What are the warning signs along the way that indicate who cannot be trusted with the keys to the gun cabinet and the ability to silence and then punish those who would rise against them?

Let’s start with a little parable to see if anything is starting to look disturbingly familiar.

One day, a minority party shows up with “new” ideas for a new system that has never been tried before (trust them on this one — they have no reason to lie about this, no sir).  These new ideas will “solve” inequality and every other social ill ever known to mankind, because it’s a “new” system that has never been tried before.

This isn’t seen as a threat to the rest of society because people would rather just live their lives and just have the government leave them alone.  

They would rather go about their business instead of caring about politics, which is exactly in line with the desires of the minority party with the new ideas.  They are perfectly happy being ignored as they infiltrate all the institutions of culture. 

The minority party (did we mention they have brand new ideas that have never been tried before?) want people to be controlled for the common good (Gemeinnutz geht vor Eigennutz in the original German).  Thus, they feel they must get everyone else in line and work for these brand-spanking-new ideas that have never — repeat: never — been tried before.

Unfortunately, because they have these brand new ideas and claim to be saving humanity, the planet, or some other distraction, they are able to ensconce themselves in power, controlling free speech, freedom of the press, and the right of self-defense.  Thus, they are difficult to dislodge.  But soon enough, resistance builds up to them because of the lies, authoritarian nature, and force needed to keep them in power.  

It also becomes manifestly evident that they are insane.  

Seeing this, good people rise and defeat the folks with the new ideas and vow never to let this happen ever again.  

But as time wears on, memories fade, and the same human desires of certain types of people to attain power over everyone else rear their ugly head once again.  History is quietly rewritten to where up is down, red is blue, and left is right.  This isn’t seen as a threat to the rest of society because people would rather just live their lives and have the government leave them alone.

Then a minority party shows up with “new ideas” for a new system that has never been tried before.  Despite having learned the hard lessons of history, most people are taken in, and the process repeats.

You can see what happened within the span of a few sentences.  People should be able to see that this has taken place in the past, but for some reason, they are taken in by slick marketing.  How many times have you heard of certain ideologies being “new” and having never been tried before as a blanket form of denial of their abject failure?

The question is, what do we identify as the warning signs and dangerous traits of those who always show up to do the same thing all over again? 

The parable and current events give us some important clues.

The first is that personalities of this type have a decided lack of moral clarity coupled with an overwhelming desire to control others.  It follows that personalities of this type are perfectly willing to lie, cheat, and steal to get what they want: control.  

Since their malevolence has no bounds, they innately know that projection, or accusing their opponents of what they are doing, is a perfect way to confuse the situation and get most people to ignore the argument.

They also know that supposedly having a new system of government and a faux noble cause is a great way to engender false plaudits from most people, as Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn once said: “To do evil, a human being must first of all believe that what he’s doing is good.”

Supposedly saving the planet gives them the cachet to do whatever they want, all for the cause of fighting global cooling, warming, climate change, or whatever climate cause they conjure up.

People of this personality type also see government in a different way from how normal people do.  Most people see government as a necessary evil, like fire.  Everything is fine if both are kept under control.  It’s when fire and government grow out of control that whole civilizations can be consumed.

Unfortunately, power-hungry personalities don’t see it this way.  

They see themselves as the “priests of power,” as expressed by O’Brien in George Orwell’s 1984.  They can wield government as a weapon to “punish our enemies and reward our friends.” 

It’s not just giving them power that is dangerous; it’s doubly so, because they exploit that power to suppress other people’s freedom and set theirs in stone.  They don’t just lie; they lie to distort reality, to the point where you don’t know which side is evil and which side is good.  They pretend to be good to confuse the issue until it’s too late. 

We need to quantify all these qualities to evaluate future leaders.  Now that they’ve been manifested so many times, there is no excuse for humanity to fall for them ever again.

D Parker is an engineer, inventor, wordsmith, and student of history, the director of communications for a civil rights organization, and a long-time contributor to conservative websites.  Find him on Substack.

Image via Pixabay.