A common thread ties the rise of American authoritarianism with the Nazis marching on Melbourne streets, writes DrAlex Vickery-Howe.
I ONCE PENNED an article entitledPresident Donald J. Trump is a convicted felon. That was true when Iwrote it and its still true. It will always be true.
As we watch the ruthless crackdown on immigration in the U.S., where Marines havenow been deployedto quell a non-existent uprising, one wonders how innocent migrants feel when they are handcuffed, humiliated, detained and deported by a man who has actually broken the law. Its a hideous irony.
One wonders, as well, at how all the self-described patriots who claim to oppose tyranny react when they see rights abandoned, courts ignored and a small fortune spent on an autocratsbirthday parade. For the span of my entire life, conservatives have been telling me they need their guns in case a dictator threatens America. Well, the dictator is here now, guys this is your moment. Its weird that youre cheering him on.
The more Trump tightens his hold, the more America begins to resemble the authoritarian regimes we were once taught to fear.
In his review ofMein Kampf, George Orwellcapturedthe victim politics of fascism and how history manages to repeat itself:
This image ofAdolf Hitlers portrait goes against the American conservative image of what a tyrant looks like and how they behave. Hitlers great trick was to play-act in this way. He was the one who was suffering, who was wounded, who was standing up for his country and his people in the face of oppression and enemies both from withoutand within.
Similarly, theimage of Donald Trumpharried, wounded, engulfed by suited agents, pumping his fist in the air and urging his followers to fight! was the point at which he won the presidential campaign.
Trump became the martyr, the victim and the victor. It didnt matter that hed been the aggressor up to that very second. It didnt matter that hed been shot by a mentally ill young man who hadno coherent ideological agendabut did have, thanks to years of Republican policy, easy accessto a firearm. It didnt even matter whether it wasBidenorHarriswho opposed Trump moving forward.
Personally, I will always argue that Biden wasmistreated and devaluedby his own party, and that Hollywood elites intervening in op-eds played right intoTrump and JD Vances anti-elitist rhetoricbut history doesnt care.
History works from big pictures. Not detail. Not nuance. That photograph of Trump clutching his bleeding ear changed everything.
It was over when that shot rang out. Violence doesnt vanquish political adversaries; it lionises them.
The messaging for the viral rally is slippery and vague, but the organisers are just another restructure of the far-right.
Trumpspower grabover the months since has been built on the glory of that moment. Hats off to him for being cunning enough to exploit the publicity opportunity, telling the secret service team to wait, wait so that he could mug for the camera. It was the split decision that solidifiedhis hold over the American peopleand marketed his grift at the expense of democratic norms and values.
EvenCenk Uygur, ofThe Young Turksfame, expressedsome begrudging admirationfor how Trump handled the attack. Many once staunch critics had to concede that Trump had weathered an attempt on his life and done so defiantly. It became difficult to position oneself knowing that a mans life had been threatened, which is never acceptable, while also knowing that the consequence of that day would be the legitimising of a true dictator-in-waiting.
In a superlative piece of writing that we should all retweet obsessively,Umair Haquedetailed howthis style of politicsplays out:
Haque is being bone dry, of course, but his ironic take on authoritarian mentality is textbook Trumpkin. I often return to this article because I think, in years to come, Haques style of writing will prove prophetic.
It is also why America was so unprepared. The imagined authoritarian the phantom menace that kept theNRAin business was someone cast in permanent shadow, someone who favoured big government. Someone opaque and interventionist. The idea that he would be the guy who spruiks tacky hotels, who tells broad jokes, who eats cheeseburgers and sleeps withStormy, didnt occur to the conservative American psyche. Trump is as American as apple pie. Trump is old school. Hes a mans man: thats why the Village People play when hespasms on stage.
To right-wing America, Trump is the local hero and its Hollywood, the elites, the Dems, the libtards, the queers, the illegalsand all the scary educated people, who are threatening the USA. Arming those neoconservative citizens against an imaginary takeover was pointless because the real takeover willalways be invisibleto them.
Donald Trump leads the most overtly fascist political movement the world has seen since 1945 and a second term as president would sound the death knell for American democracy.
We shouldnt consider the Left blameless. Democrats had four years to challenge Trumps narrative. Heplayed class politicsand he exposed theirblind spots. Now SenatorBernie Sandersand RepresentativeAlexandria Ocasio-Cortezare leading thecounter-narrative. Hopefully, there is still an opportunity forstrong, sane voicesto prevail.
Meanwhile, the people who warned thatthese dark dayswere coming and tried to bring fascism intopublic discoursewere dismissed as alarmists because comparing Trump to Hitler, despite themany glaringparallels, was seen as too… mean?
Perhaps were nasty people, as Trump himself would say, as he signs orders to separate families and muses about arresting California GovernorGavin Newsomfor holding the wrong philosophy.
Perhaps well be painted as (irony of ironies) anti-American for believing in democracy and the rule of law.
Perhaps well haveour phones searchedand our passports held if westep on U.S. soil. This is what happened to Australian writerAlistair Kitchen, who was held for 12 hours for having the wrong views on Gaza. The thought police are out in force.
But this is how fascism works. How it has always worked. Cast yourself as a victim and rise against the odds to become a hero. Cast those who oppose you as the enemy, the thugs, the radicals…
In Australia this past week, we have seen the same technique play out.Thomas Sewell, the local Nazi and former leader of the homoerotically named Lads Society, tried to frame himself as victim when he claimed his right to protest was being denied by Victorian PremierJacinta Allanpatently ridiculous when Sewell had been holding court in Melbournes CBD just the day before.
There are a lot of ironies built into Sewells angry and nonsensical worldview: an anti-immigration poster boy whoimmigrated to Australiafrom New Zealand (Go back to where you came from, ya Kiwi!); an anti-immigration poster boy whoattacks the peoplewhove actually been here the longest; an anti-immigration poster boy who… looks pretty bad on a poster. Did anyone else think of all theBert is Evilmemes? Theres aresemblance.
Calls grow for neo-Nazi Thomas Sewells deportation, but strict citizenship laws make removal unlikely.
Even so, we cannot ignore the grim fact that there isa class elementto these recent Australia first protests. This explosion of misplaced anger has been underpinned by the strident anti-immigration rhetoric of former Leader of the OppositionPeter Duttonand his absurd claim that it was recent settlers and notwealth inequality between generationscompounded by successive governments shying away fromchanges to negative gearingand other tax reforms that led to the present housing crisis.
Its hard to build a rallying cry around economic theory, but very easy to stir up hatred with easy (fake) solutions. To combat this trend, it would be wise to look to Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez in the United States. There is no viable New Left in politics withoutempathy across the class divide. Studies suggestthe wealth gap is widening. It is precisely these economic and social conditions that give rise to the Alternative Right.
Or to put it all another way…
Closing the wealth gap kills the victim narrative.
In the meantime, we can expect Trump and Sewell to keep playing classic hits from an old German staple. Its a broken record of self-pity.
But Trump will always be a convicted felon and thats the most Sewell will ever manage to aspire to.
DrAlex Vickery-Howeis an award-winning playwright and social commentator. He teaches creative writing, screen and drama atFlinders University.
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