Bentley Little

Unfortunately (even though I am in agreement with ArTV), how can we strike any sort of balance with millions upon millions of people with differing opinions?

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That is my 2 cents.

roachboy

i simply do not see how a more authoritarian form of government would serve anyone's interests--particularly not a variant of fascism, which is i think what you would get in the states---given the virulent nationalism that is so easily mobilized here. the best you could hope for is yet another instance of a period that everyone who lives through it chooses to pretend never happened. that is the *best* you could hope for.

last time around, there were lots of people who thought fascism just swell--it correlated with "common sense," valorized martial "values," talked about a spiritual renewal of the Youth, gave these folk a sense that they were gettingmore "authentic"...and it had nice flags and lovely uniforms......it appealed in particular to lower middle-class folk, who saw in this nationalist ideology a way to avoid a sense of economic precariousness.

what probably disturbs is the word fascism--it would sell better if it was called something else.
but it would not be something else.
not here.

maybe if the time comes, there will be an emphasis on the christian fundamentalist elements, and this will enable you to call it something else. (looking around, this is the most likely combination that i can see at the moment---this could obviously change, and i have no committment to it beyond what seems most likely now....)

such a total mobilization can always get around matters of differing opinion--mobilize the Nation with an adequately dire set of arguments about threats from without being mirrored by real or imagined threats from within, put it on saturation "news" outlets, and presto macho, you would have miliions of very military americans wrapping themselves in a wide range of fascist regalia. good for small business, that would be.
good for the economy.
good for everyone, no?

fascism last time round was dependant on radio.
radio is nothing compared to television.

of course any such attempt would probably engender civil war.
because you might get around questions of opinion, but you will not get around fundamental political rejection of the turn toward this kind of rule.
and i can tell you that i would be amongst those fighting against right-authoritarian forces.
because if they were to gain anything like popular power, they would create neither a country nor a world i would want to live in.

but i see this as a possibility in the states.
it would be a dismal and ridiculous end to a historical project gone terribly terribly wrong.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

ARTelevision

No I wouldn't change our form of government. I would simply affirm it's strong authoritarian principles - that exist no matter which party is in power. I see a tendency toward increased authoritarian power and I am in favor of that, especially since I consider the major force opposed to our government (besides Radical Muslim murder/suicide-ism) to be media power, which I've referred to elsewhere as "mediarchy".

Either our government increases its authority to govern or it will be simply replaced - almost invisibly - by mediarchy.

I see this year's election as pivotal in this conflict.

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create evolution

Charlatan

We are doing it now.

__________________
"My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars."
- Old Man Luedecke

roachboy

on this, i do not understand art: on what basis do you oppose dominant media and the state? it seems to me that they march pretty much to the same drummer. both are interested in passive consumers----both prefer nationalism because it sells things---- both are interested in the continued financial well-being of large congomlerates----both only respond to the people when they have to.

for example.

the press is usually the ardent supporter of whichever regime is in power. gradually, factions within become a kind of loyal opposition--the exception of late has been right media, which has opted for a much more corrosive kind of option, one that they still play.


so i am not convinced about the choice you posit above between the authoritarian power and the "mediarchy" either as an opposition or in the assumption that the latter represents a coherent political interest on its own terms.


i also do not see what difference there would be between a fascist regime that retains the existing institutional infrastructure and one that does not? the former would simply have a figleaf of formal legitimacy the latter did not afford itself.....but it would come to the same thing, both ideologically and in practice.

and again, what you are mean practically when you talk about authoritarian politics in the states, given the horizons for thinking about this available to us as we sit here in august 2004, is fascism. unless you have another conception of what this authortarian system would look like. so far, most post have been about an argument that would lead you to argue for such a regime, but you have stayed away from defining that regime in any positive sense.....

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Charlatan

I think the key to all of this is the illusions that Art has spoken of... The illusions of freedom and the illusions of authoritatianism...

If I understand Art, he is NOT seeking a facist state rather he is seeking an acknowledgement of the existing structures of authoritarianism that are already in place.

I would argue that the illusion of freedom is what allows the western world to stomach the existing authoritarian trends that are in place... in fact I would go as far to suggest that the mediarchy that Art posits is a tool that governments and corporations use to create this acceptance.

It is the difference between the modernist facist state (like those that rose in the 30s) and the post-modern "facist" states we have today (as seen in most western nations). The difference is that the levers of control in the former are usually military in nature while in the latter they are a product of manufactured consent via the media and other tools in the authoritarian tool box.

I am not sure that acknowleding the authoritatiranism inherent in our systems will do much than to rile those who believe they still have large amounts of free will.

__________________
"My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars."
- Old Man Luedecke

ARTelevision

Yes, absolutely. If I could have put most of this as well and as coherently as you just have, Charlatan, I certainly would have done so at the start. (I have a fundamental disagreement, however, which I will get to in a moment.) I suppose part of the reason you were able to arrive at these cogent insights is due to the preceeding discussion - which I think has been illuminative. I also think you've probably made connections between some other well-known positions I've taken around here - especially as regards mind manipulation by media technology.

I do not subscribe to "Wag the Dog" scenarios. I see the requirement that the government wage media information and disinformation campaigns as part of how government must operate in the post-modern world. I also see it as a requirement to increase such campaigns to attempt to reduce the signal-to-noise ratio produced by the wholly separate and anti-governmental, amoral, socio-pathological, and anarchic power wielded by the media as held by private corporations, organizations, and individuals. The conflict between governmental authority and media-induced anarchy is exactly the conflict I address.

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roachboy

charlatan:
acknowledging that freedom is almost purely formal in the states --that there are profound authoritarian tendencies in contemporary political and cultural life--particularly in america--all of this is one thing, a kind of critical analysis.
but it is quite another when you shift from critique to a set of almost normative arguments rooted in an endorsement of these trends.
in other words, it is for me not ok that you would argue on the basis of these trends--which are obvious enough---that things at any level have to or should be this way.

another way: i am comfortable with the critical analysis--i agree with much of it---but not at all, at any level, with the other.

not conceptually.
not politically.
not ethically.
there is not a single register on which i accept this switch in kind of argument.

as for naming the regime that i see as being implicitly endorsed here: if you are going to argue for it, why not name it?
but please note that i included a caveat--this is the logical conclusion from how i see things--maybe there is another conception of what an authoritarian politics would look like--in which case i would be interested to hear it--i probably would not endorse it either, but at least there would be a positive version of what is so far a kind of empty category (authoritarian) that is on the table.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

roachboy

huh--i just stumbled across the mass media thread and am reading through it...may have to retract more things...geez....

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

denim

You sound like I would expect a Federalist to sound. A Libertarian would have to disagree with you, no?

Locobot

"illusion of freedom" huh? Freedom is not an all-or-nothing-black-and-white issue as we all know you like to see things ARTele. Freedom is relative, Americans are more free than Chinese, less free than the Dutch. Many of the objections to ARTele's arguement have been elucidated above and I largely agree with these. How do you propose to assert the Authoritarianism of the American government that wouldn't result in a scenario of immediate civil war? How do you intend to choose and maintain leaders who would be free from corruption, the basic and severe flaw of Authoritarianism?

ARTelevision

Completely.
I consider Libertarianism to be simply me-ism at worst and don't-tread-on-me-ism at best.

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denim

Then I don't feel bad about disagreeing. Not that I did anyway.

hammer4all

Yes, I think most anarchists recognize the problem of security, but at the same time we realize that an anarchist society won't happen over night. It will take many long years of hard fought struggle to make our current system more democratic and free. We can deal with the problem of security as it arises.

denim

Which explains the problem. True security requires people trained in it. When you're being attacked, on-the-job-training is too harsh.

Bill O'Rights

oh, most assuredly.

__________________
"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony

"Hedonism with rules isn't hedonism at all, it's the Republican party." - JumpinJesus

It is indisputable that true beauty lies within...but a nice rack sure doesn't hurt.

ARTelevision

Libertarianism vs a strong postmodern hierarchical authority paradigm would be an enlightening discussion for this thread, I think. Anarchy has been covered some, so I'd be interested in a Libertarian view here.

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Bill O'Rights

Ok...I kinda like the "don't-tread-on-me-ism" euphemism. It seems accurate, to me. In fact, I may use it myself, in the future.

It's the "me-ism" that causes me to scratch my head in ponderment. I've seen you make this reference before. How do you come to view Libertarianism as self-centered, or narcissistic? At least, that's what I'm inferring from it. The most basic tenet of Libertarianism is personal responsibility. I don't see anything egocentric about that. How are you analyzing this?

__________________
"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony

"Hedonism with rules isn't hedonism at all, it's the Republican party." - JumpinJesus

It is indisputable that true beauty lies within...but a nice rack sure doesn't hurt.

sailor

I agree, BOR. I too am curious as to where this idea of self-centered Libertarianism came from.

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"Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws."
--Plato

denim

I can see libertarianism as self-centered if it's taken as "I only care about that which affects me directly", which is possible. It's fair to allow Art to take this in a negative fashion since I and others took his authoritarianism that way.

And I don't necessarily disagree that libertarianism isn't the best possible way to go. The biggest problem is that just about any governing method can be good, with the right people. The "problem" part comes in when the "right people" are succeeded, as they always are, eventually, with the wrong people. Then, no matter what kind of government you've got, it'll suck hard. As I understand it, representative democracy has, historically, always been followed by tyranny. We're certainly headed that way, too.

Coming up with a form of government which doesn't have this weakness could be a good answer, if we had one.

ARTelevision

I have many Libertarian friends. I see folks move toward Libertarian positions based on their desire to do some illegal or sometimes regulated things - drugs, for example or porn or any number of things promoted by mass culture. From this position, their cries of "freedom" appear as simply "I want what I want". They seem most attracted to a get-the-government-off-my-back attitude and they are easily converted to Libertarianism as a result.

There's the whole group of people who oppose taxation. As we know, all nations have taxed their citizens since pre-Biblical times. It is a requisite for nationhood. I'm suspicious of anti-tax sentiments that are simply another way of saying "I want all my money".

The idea of personal responsibility sounds good. I see it as a concept most typically applied to others - in the sense they are accused of lacking it. I almost never see anyone using it in any other way than to blame other people for not taking responsibility for their lives, etc. Such defensiveness borders on denial. Personal responsibility is something that is either enforced or it doesn't happen in most people's lives.

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Charlatan

Don't get me wrong... I am not endorsing the system I've described. I am simply trying to understand Art's position.

I tend to agree with Art's take on Libertarianism above... Then again I am a Federalist at heart.

That said, while I agree that a certain level of "authoritarianism" is inherent in all systems I stand by my first statement that it is all in the balance between government controls and personal liberties (real or imagined).

__________________
"My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars."
- Old Man Luedecke

Bill O'Rights

Ok...I see where you're coming from, but from my point of view, you're bending the branch a bit. Which, I suppose, is ok...I tend to do the same thing. Let me counter a few points though:

Yes. It is true. I will concede that there are those within the Libertarian Party, whose sole motive is the parties stance on the legalization of marijuana. I would counter, however, that these are not "true" Libertarians. I would also counter that every party has its share of fringe undesirables. These few do not make the parties platform less sound.

Of course some taxation is necessary in order to live in a quality society. I know of very few that would question that. Our (the Libertarian) stance is that there is simply too much unchecked taxation. With better accountability, and less government interference, where it should not be, the tax burden can be reduced exponentially. By all means, we need to pay our fair share. Key there is fair share. What's wrong keeping more of what you have labored to earn in your pocket, to spend as you please?

No doubt. No one likes to have their shortcomings pointed out. However, it's not an issue with Libertarianism. With less government involvement to hold your hand, you are going to be forced to take on personal responsibility...no matter what level you have grown accustomed to taking on in the past. If your entire existence revolves around government assistance...you're going to have trouble. At least until you grow accustomed to doing for yourself. If you are already self reliant...you should have no problem in a Libertarian society.

__________________
"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony

"Hedonism with rules isn't hedonism at all, it's the Republican party." - JumpinJesus

It is indisputable that true beauty lies within...but a nice rack sure doesn't hurt.

denim

You want self-centered, I'll give you self-centered. I'm a "me-ist" at heart, but with the understanding that others matter too. My problem is, which others, and how do I keep the rest from getting to me and mine. I dare say that trumps Art's "fear" concept w/o totally invalidating it.

There are things bigger than me which are worth fighting for. I think most people will agree with this relative to their individual "me"s. The disagreements start when you try to determine how much bigger you're willing to get, and how much compimise you can stomach.

I've seen a list of this kind of grouping in, I think, RAH's Starship Troopers. It goes something like

• self
• family
• tribe
• country
• species

where the bigger person manages to care about the larger grouping. I find this too clear-cut for everyday use.

I can care about our species, but less than I care about our country, but less than, etcetera. I doubt this is unusual. OTOH, the thing which horrified me the most in Orwell's 1984 was the idea of trying to breed out orgasm. To lots of people, that may be the only real joy they ever have, and removing it takes out the net keeping the human race alive. Any such breed would tend to die out.

In fact, RAH tended to go on about this quite a bit in the 1960s. Starship Troopers was originally intended to be a Juvenile, in fact. Later that decade, he published The Moon is a Harsh Mistress which is essentially about exploring different forms of government, starting with essential anarchy. Anyone else here read them? And don't bring up that horrible movie.

ARTelevision

Yes, of course, guys. But it's just so much dreaming. It takes a lot to convince me that anyone ever takes personal responsibility for anything. To assume so can't just be naivete because you guys are not naive. But I think what you're doing is substituting idealism for practical possibility.

IMO, personal responsibility is either enforced or it doesn't exist in any statistically significant way. The same goes for social responsibility - except it's even more rare than personal responsibility. And you know I don't accept people proclaiming their personal and social responsibilities from the rooftop. Self-serving rhetoric isn't the same as the way things actually are.

The problem is one of proper perspective on idealism and its place in the scheme of things. Wishful thinking doesn't make things so. What makes things so is negogtiating from positions of power in the real world. As far as humans are concerned, power and fear trump everything else - especially idealistic hopes and dreams. We either enforce things that are desirable for optimal societal performance or they do not occur - except among a tiny minority of personally and socially responsible individuals. You can't forge a nation or a government from that group.

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denim

But you can start with that group. It's been done.

roachboy

the extent to which presonal responsibility is an abstraction is directly correlated to the degree of political disempowerment experienced by individuals.

the dominant discourse in the states for 20 years has attempted to reduce politics to a kind of shopping. in the u.s., people are politically constituted as active subjects one day every 4 years. otherwise, they are expected to submit while pretending they are not, consume, be isolated, be powerless.

there are few (and increasingly fewer) meaningful feedback loops that connect the public to the states, fewer and fewer spaces of anything like a democratic practice.

you want to deal with personal responsibility matters? then increase the level of democratic practice---authoritarian regimes substitute repression for responsibility, they engender a kind of total indifference, a kind of wholesale withdrawal on the part the population. a more authoritarian style government will make every element of contemporary society that bothers you, art, expontentially worse.

this does not fall into the curious, constricting binaries that have emerged on the thread: authoritarian vs. "anarchist" (what anarchism? the black block?) or "libertarian" (a repellent pseudo-politics)--the alternatives are not total authority or total atomization. jamming the conversation into this space seems to me a way of trying to structure the outcome in advance.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Locobot

Postmodern hierarchical authority? How is that possible if postmodernism is *defined* as resistance to hierarchical structures? The authoritarianism championed in this thread is anything but postmodern. In fact it's positively Stalinist.

ARTelevision

Actually no one here has even remotely championed anything having to do with Stalinism. Your comments are duly noted however. Thanks.

Postmodernism is a currently existing time and space. As we are no longer living in the modern era, it functions as a delineator of the present.

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roachboy

there have been problems from the 1970s in mapping postmodernism from a (primarily) literary style onto a broader social formation.
the driving assumptions are good old zeitgeist history.
what has been at stake in the debates is the social power that would accrue to academics who found themselves in a position to generate a descriptive category that would bind other analysts to a particular frame of reference.
many folk want to be marx.
generating names is a way to audition for the gig.

it is not at all a foregone conclusion that the term "postmodern" refers to anything particular in the social world----even if you focus on the famous category of "fragmentation"--which turns out to be extraordinarily loose, and that functions (among other things) to posit the previous (modern) period as one of unity--which is empirically not true--and to reduce the astonishing complexity of modes of fragmentation to a single term/feature.

i suspect that the term is revealing in this particular conversation, however, in that authoritarian forms of government involve intimately a dream of a return to some prior, lost unity.
here it seems that it is assumed this would have to be forced onto people.

the most atomized societies have in general been authoritarian.
the kinds of regime that have least fostered individual responsibility have been authoritarian.
look at the history of stalinism, for example: it is a central feature of almost any description of life under that regime.
same applied under fascism.
same obtained under monarchies (which in general were more coherent ideologically than they were politically).
the same unfolded under oligarchy.
if you find these problems in contemporary american society, i would argue it is a direct function of the degree to which the states are already authoritarian in significant aspects--and i still maintain that the way out--if there is one--- is less not more of this.

why bother to cultivate responsibility, say--or more generally an adult relation to the world--if you live under a regime that infantilizes you at every turn? infantilization follows from the reliance on a external authority, which is assumed to be omniscient, a kind of spectral parent who chastizes the wayward child, who enforces "discipline" in the name of abstract higher norms? how on earth can you expect an increase in reponsibility from a population that you would reduce to the status of a child?

i am understanding less and less of this thread as i participate in it.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Locobot

Sorry to burst your bubble ARTele but Stalin is a textbook example of authoritarianism. Or are you arguing for another form authoritarianism? Nazi Germany? Khmer Rouge Cambodia? Castro's Cuba? Orwell's Oceania? If you're advocating a new yet-unseen form of authoritarianism you haven't given us any details. You complain that this thread is straying off topic and devolving into semantic arguements, yet you don't provide a solid topic and misuse words.

On Libertarian v. Authoritarian: Authoritarians would argue for centralized state control and concentrated power while Libertarians would disperse power among smaller states, provinces, counties etc. Compeletely decentralized Libertarian government runs the risk of dissolving any semblance of a unified nation. Authoritarianism is clearly better for forming a national army capable of defense and especially attack. Strong defense is possible in a Libertarian government through autonomous militia and guerilla warfare but raising an army for attack would be difficult. Authoritarian governments are not as economically strong as democratic ones due to endemic corruption that accompanies that form of leadership. Libertarian governments would almost certainly have to exist as democracies. A flaw of Authoritarianism lies in how new leaders are chosen, typically when a authoritarian leader dies so does his or her government.

ARTelevision

Perhaps. But this thread involves political theory to an extent that is not often attained here - or elsewhere.

Your post directly above, roachboy, is insightful - especially in terms of your description of a postmodern authoritarianism. I'll elucidate my thoughts on it if interest continues in the discussion.
Thanks.

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ARTelevision

Locobot, it seems to me you are discussing perhaps only the first page of the thread. It has since then gotten well on track and your issues have indeed been addressed here.

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Locobot

I don't agree with that, at least not on any substantive societal level. I agree that authoritarianism enforces unity through state control and this may have the infantilization-to-fragmentation/indivdualism/rebellion effect that you're describing on a small scale, but not for the masses. Sure Stalin created Solzhenitsyn (author of "the Gulag Archipelago"--probably the most damning critique of Stalinism) but he also enjoyed the support of the vast majority of his population. For every Solzhenitsyn there were 10 million ardent Communists. If you go to Russia today you will find most older people still support Stalinist Russia even though it no longer exists. I defy you to compare positively the individualism and diversity of any authoritarian government with that of an equally sized non-authoritarian nation. You may argue for the scientific achievements of Nazi Germany, but I would remind you that German science superiority predated the Nazis (e.g. Werner von Braun's Rocket Club). Hitler may have cracked the whip for his war machine, but he was also burning books lets remember.

ARTelevision

Well now we're back on historically described "Authoritarian regimes".

We had an extended discussion in the middle of this thread in which I was willing to retract the word and replace it with a concept of authority-oriented governing principles because people were getting stuck on old irrelevant examples.

roachboy added some good points regarding the inadmissability of historical definitions to the contemporary situation of the USA. I stated I appreciated his assistance in getting the discussion away from such "Authoritarian" examples as Soviet Russia, China, Iraq, etc etc.

As I've completely disavowed any interest in old Authoritarian paradigms and as my entire discussion revolves around the observation and description of new authority paradigms, I won't be continuing to comment on this regression of the discussion.

If it is possible to assimilate what has transpired earlier here and if it is possible to get on with the discussion before historical Authoritarian examples were brought up again, I may continue. Otherwise, I'm not going to restate what has already been discussed.

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Bill O'Rights

You don't have kids...do ya?

__________________
"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony

"Hedonism with rules isn't hedonism at all, it's the Republican party." - JumpinJesus

It is indisputable that true beauty lies within...but a nice rack sure doesn't hurt.

roachboy

on stalinism:
you can look at a long tradition of texts about stalinism, from anton ciliga, through the (problematic in many respects) memoirs of kravchenko, through czeslaw milosz (even) and find abundant evidence for the argument i am advancing about stalinism as a regime (there are many many more elements to this, but my memory is not functioning at 100% this afternoon--i blame the heat). there is also a long tradition of left critiques of the soviet system, tends to confirm the same views of what the system worked like in vivo. this says nothing about the enormous amount of historical literature that floats around out there on the same system.

at nearly every point, you find descriptions of a wholly atomized social reality juxtaposed with the socialist realist vision of that reality, in which the latter is treated as a long, bizarre profoundly not funny joke.

as for the "ardent communists" you speak of---- the "old guard" of social revolutionaries, anarchists, politically committed bolsheviks who opposed stalin----in other words those who actually dreamed of working to establish a kind of socialism that would not result in the corruption of the very idea of socialism----most of them ended up helping to build the gulag itself in their capacities as zek.
as for "right deviationists" like bukharin, his fate is well known.
as is that of trotsky.

as for the other supporters: stalin was all about the systematic elimination of political opponents, real or imagined.
read the short course of the history of the soviet communist party for the justifications of paranoia as doctrine--look at the idea of the hitlero-trotskyite figure, the floating explanation for everything that went wrong in stalinist industry or anywhere else for that matter. think about the view of the polity built into that notion, and what the practical correlates of such a view would mean for any sense of social solidarity. [this is where milosz is particularly good]

further, solzhenitsyn is not the only bit of information you have recourse to--his is a highly problematic political position, which seems to be oriented around a nostalgia for a pre-soviet system in which religion played a central role--this complicates his writing in many ways--and if his work was the only source for information about the gulag, that information would itself be a problem. fact is that you can crosscheck most of the things he says.....

that there would be ex post facto nostalgia for stalin says much more about the situation in the post-soviet states than it does about how stalinism was experienced.

as for your challenge, which i assume is directed at me, i confess that i do not know what you are asking. maybe rephrase it and i'll see if i can respond?

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

roachboy

kinda wish i had seen art's post just above before i wrote my thing on stalinism--ah well.....

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

ARTelevision

That's OK roachboy. you're involved in a historical discussion which should play itself out.

I suppose I should have named this thread: "New Authority Paradigms" and been more direct about it. If this one reaches an entropic state then I'll start a new thread. But folks interested in reading all of the preceeding posts, may express an interest in where it was going before the digression of justly failed historical antecedents. In that case, I'll pick it up at the point just before it veered off.

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Stompy

Whether authoritarianism has good points or not and whether people truly are ready for personal responsibility or not, no one will ever willingly want that type of govt control in place, so it seems kinda moot.

Because people these days don't like to be told how to live their lives, I have a hard time believing things will will deteriorate into a backward state of being instead of evolving and changing into a society where people have more responsibility and freedoms.

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