we are all neo-fascists now

When we dutifully troop off to the polling stations on election day we know in our hearts that we’re wasting our time. We’re going to get screwed and having the choice of being screwed by the Tweedledee Party or the Tweedledum Party isn’t much of a choice.

How did this happen? Was it simply some weird historical accident that all the major political parties ended up being pretty much the same? Some political theorists think thee’s an inevitable drift to the centre and that the major parties eventually all become centrist. But that hadn’t happened. There is nothing moderate or centrist about the major parties today. What we’ve seen is a drift towards extremism and totalitarianism.

Do political parties actually matter at all? Do political leaders like Biden and Boris Johnson and Scott Morrison have any real influence? Are they just puppets, with the same people always pulling the strings?

Right-wing conspiracy theorists explain all this by positing the existence of the Deep State, a sinister cabal of insiders and power-brokers who actually run the government. I’m always wary of disappearing down the conspiracy theory rabbit hole. I don’t think there’s a Deep State in the sense of an organised conspiracy or cabal. What I think has happened is that a lot of powerful interest groups have decided that they have major interest in common – they all want a docile rigidly controlled population. They have all, for very different reasons, come to the conclusion that totalitarianism is essential for the achievement of their very different goals.

Big business now has the economic system it wants. It’s a kind of neo-fascism with big business and big government working in partnership to advance the interests of big business and big government. They do not want any political debate at all on economic issues. That could lead to ordinary people asking some very awkward questions. Big business likes totalitarianism because they like the idea of being able to shut down debate on economic issues. They want political debate to be entirely focused on social and cultural issues, issues they don’t care about.

Economists and right-wing think tanks have ideological reasons for not wanting debate on economic issues so they’re cool with totalitarianism as well.

Journalists, academics and professional political activists are True Believers in various social causes and they want to be able to exercise rigid control over any debate on those issues. They don’t want debate. They just want to tell us what to do and how to think. Totalitarianism sounds very attractive to such people.

The military wants more money, to buy cool sexy new toys and to provide more career opportunities. They do not want any debate on whether military spending is a complete waste of money. They’re very happy with the idea of keeping people distracted by social/cultural issues so naturally they favour rigid social control.

Media magnates (including social media magnates) like the new totalitarianism because they are the ones who will get to do most of the enforcing. Under the new totalitarianism they get to be the Thought Police. And they love power.

The police like totalitarianism because they’re natural bullies.

The bureaucracy likes the new totalitarianism because it means more power for them.

Politicians like the new totalitarianism because (like the bureaucracy) they believe that people should be taught to do whatever the government tells them to do.

You don’t need an organised conspiracy. You just need a lot of powerful interest groups who all find that totalitarianism will be very much in their interests.

What can ordinary people do? The first thing they have to do is to understand that voting is entirely futile. It just gives the system a legitimacy it doesn’t deserve.