The Hardening of Society and the Rise
of Cultures of Cruelty in Neo-Fascist
USA
By Henry Giroux
Dark Times are truly upon us.
There will be an acceleration of
acts of violence under the Trump
administration and the
conditions for eliminating this
new stage of state violence will
mean not only understanding the
roots of neo-fascism in the
United States, but also
eliminating the economic,
political, and cultural forces
that produced it.
March 17, 2017 "Information
Clearing House"
- There is more at work here than
getting rid of Trump, there is a need to
eliminate a system in which democracy is
equated with capitalism, a system driven
almost exclusively by financial
interests, and beholden to two political
parties that are hard wired into
neoliberal savagery.
What does the culture of cruelty look
like under a neo-fascist regime?
First, language is emptied of any sense
of ethics and compassion.
Second, a survival of the fittest
discourse provides a breeding ground for
racial and social sorting.
Third, references to justice are viewed
as treasonous or, as at the present
moment, labelled dismissively as “fake
news.”
Fourth, the discourse of disposability
extends to an increasing number of
groups.
Fifth, ignorance becomes militarized,
enforced not through an appeal to reason
but through the use of the language of
humiliation and eventually through the
machinery of force.
Sixth, any form of dependency is viewed
as a form of weakness, and becomes a
referent and eventually a basis for
social cleansing. That is, any form of
solidarity not based on market-driven
values is subject to derision and
potential punishment.
Seventh, the language of borders and
walls replaces the discourse of bridges
and compassion.
Eighth, violence becomes the most
important method for addressing social
problems and mediating all
relationships, hence, the increasing
criminalization of a wide range of
behaviours in the United States.
Ninth, the word democracy disappears
from officially mandated state language.
Tenth, the critical media is gradually
defamed and eventually outlawed.
Eleventh, all forms of critical
education present in theory, method, and
institutionally are destroyed.
Twelfth, shared fears replace shared
responsibilities and everyone is reduced
to the status of a potential terrorist,
watched constantly and humiliated
through body searches at border
crossings.
Thirteenth, all vestiges of the welfare
state disappear and millions are subject
to fending for themselves.
Fourteenth, massive inequalities in
power, wealth, and income will generate
a host of Reality TV shows celebrating
the financial elite.
Underlying this project is one of the
most powerfully oppressive ideologies of
neoliberal neo-fascism. That is, the
only unit of agency and analysis that
matters is the isolated individual.
Shared trust and visions of economic
equality and political justice give way
to individual terrors and self-blame
reinforced by the neoliberal notion that
people are solely responsible for their
political, economic, and social
misfortunes. Consequently, a hardening
of the culture is buttressed by the
force of state sanctioned cultural
apparatuses that enshrine privatization
in the discourse of self-reliance,
unchecked self-interest, untrammeled
individualism, and deep distrust of
anything remotely called the common
good. Freedom of choice becomes code for
defining responsibility solely as an
individual task, reinforced by a
shameful appeal to character.
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Liberal critics argue that choice absent
the notion of constraints feeds Ayn
Rand’s culture of rabid individualism
and unchecked greed. What they miss in
this neo-fascist moment is that the
systemic evil, cruelty, and moral
irresponsibility at the heart of
neoliberalism makes Ayn Rand’s lunacy
look tame. Rand’s world has been
surpassed by a ruling class of financial
elites that embody not the old style
greed of Gordon Gekko in the film Wall
Street, but the psychopathic personality
of Patrick Bateman in American Psycho.
The notion that saving money by reducing
the taxes of the rich justifies
eliminating health care for 24 million
people is just one example of how this
culture of cruelty and hardening of the
culture will play out.
Dark Times are truly upon us. There will
be an acceleration of acts of violence
under the Trump administration and the
conditions for eliminating this new
stage of state violence will mean not
only understanding the roots of
neo-fascism in the United States, but
also eliminating the economic,
political, and cultural forces that
produced it.
There is more at work here than getting
rid of Trump, there is a need to
eliminate a system in which democracy is
equated with capitalism, a system driven
almost exclusively by financial
interests, and beholden to two political
parties that are hard wired into
neoliberal savagery.
Henry A. Giroux currently
holds the McMaster University Chair for
Scholarship in the Public Interest in
the English and Cultural Studies
Department and a Distinguished Visiting
Professorship at Ryerson University. His
most recent books are America’s
Education Deficit and the War on Youth (Monthly
Review Press, 2013) and Neoliberalism’s
War on Higher Education (Haymarket
Press, 2014). His web site is www.henryagiroux.com.
This article was first published at
Greanville Post
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