This article was posted shortly before the election but everything in there is still true and seeing his appointees perhaps worse than predicted.

  • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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    14 hours ago

    We live in an era where democracies once considered “consolidated” — meaning so secure that they couldn’t collapse into authoritarianism — have started to buckle and even collapse.

    Literally everytime a society acts like authoritarianism isn’t a threat…

    You’ll never guess what shows up.

    It’s a constant fight, it will literally never be over. But over and over, all it takes is 2 or 3 generations for people to think it was really over last time.

    A huge part of the issue is writing them all off as evil monsters. The leaders always are. But their supporters are almost always desperate people who think they’re doing the right thing.

    To truly keep it at bay, we need a society where everyone has enough to live comfortably so they’re not desperate and looking for scapegoats to blame. It would solve the vast amount of local crime as well. We focus on making prison worse than poverty, but no one would choose prison over a comfortable life.

    • Seleni@lemmy.world
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      1 hour ago

      It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone’s fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I’m one of Us. I must be. I’ve certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We’re always one of Us. It’s Them that do the bad things.

      -Terry Pratchett

    • jrs100000@lemmy.world
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      12 hours ago

      It would be easier to believe they think they are doing the right thing if they weren’t so excited about all the people they want to hurt.

      • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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        12 hours ago

        Because they believe the people they’re going to hurt are hurting others worse…

        There is nothing new about what is happening.

        • jrs100000@lemmy.world
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          11 hours ago

          I didn’t say there was anything new about it. People are, and always have been, capable of monstrous evil. It is normal human behavior, but that doesn’t make it any less vile.