I don’t mean only the US but in much of the world: in many European countries the populist far right is unseating Christian-Democratic parties (conservative parties), like in Hungary, Slovakia or Czechia. In others like Germany or France the far right is at the gates of power, in the UK, Reform UK is running high in the polls. In Turkey autocratic Erdogan is copying the Putin playbook to systematically dismantle the social-democratic opposition. In Japan, a neo Thatcherite that doesn’t hide she honors Japanese war criminals is about to become the new PM.
Something common I see in all these parties is strong disaffection with the current state of their countries and a longing to an idealized past they promise to bring back, to make countries great again…
Except that societies have changed beyond recognition in the last 40 years, emerging China, India, Mexico and a myriad of south east Asian countries can produce cheaper than us in the developed countries, so called first world democracies are now much older and indebted than 40 years ago (no wonder societies have shifted so hard to the right), buying a house is now waaaay more expensive than 40 years ago, you cannot earn a livable wage just assembling toasters like 40 years ago, you just cannot roll automation and digitization back, no matter how much you complain…
The past cannot come back, neither will it come back just because some people want it to. It’s completely futile, but people are not rational about this, they’re completely emotional and tribal.
It’s like a huge, collective effort in denial: denying that we in the developed world are older, not the first ones in the world anymore, that other countries we always considered inferior to us are even surpassing us technologically while we complain and hope for a savior that brings us 40 years back when we, the white guys, ruled all over.
I don’t see it happening: being angry and voting the far right may make some people feel good, it may make them feel they’re somehow taking their country back, but it’s not going to stop China, India and other countries from developing, investing in new technologies and even creating trade alliances that bypass the US or the EU.
My question: was there a moment in history where societies were so shifted to the right like today? How long did it last?
I think last time this happened a bunch of anti media consolidation laws were passed to prevent rich people from owning everything (unfortunately they were repealed in the 90s in the US) Also taxes, wars. Basically rich people will fund wars to ensure people don’t take their money but in doing so they destroy their money because wars kill workers, destroy products and produce nothing of value.
Its easier just to tax rich people and break up the large conglomorates they’re using to rig everything. Tech companies would need to be included here. Idk why there isn’t a massive tax on all kinds of bad corporate behaviors that lead here: buying companies, mergers, stock buybacks and corporate real estate shenanigans should all have serious taxes associated with them.
We don’t tax those things because we don’t have true representation. Our “representatives” do not work for the people, they work for the rich. Senators, Congressman, SC, and the president should all be put in jail if they are convicted of taking bribes. Unfortunately, we have two separate sets of laws in this country, one for the rich, and one for the poor.
You gotta stop thinking of it as a left/right thing. It doesn’t exist. It’s clouding your perspective. Populists vs establishment might be a better way to categorize if you needed just two groups, but that’s still too simplistic.
The world is a messy place with lots of different groups trying to get power, enrich themselves, and push their ideology. Whatever ideology a group is pushing has little to do with having the moral high ground and will typically result in their own benefit.
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treat it as a spectrum
a spectrum is typically 1-dimensional as well, though; at least the spectrums i think of
Whatever ideology a group is pushing has little to do with having the moral high ground and will typically result in their own benefit.
what little you can do to improve the quality of politics is to educate the people so they can analyze and decide whether the policies are meaningful for common good or not.
It lasted most of history. It seems like every time society shifts to the left, it only lasts for a few generations before it dies under autocratic control.
The problem is they’ll always be shitty fascists who think they should be in charge of everything.
And the majority of people only realize how bad that is when they lived thru it.
For an enduring free society, it needs to be a foundational belief that everyone is equal and has basic inalienable rights…
And before anyone says we tried that, their “everyone” was just “white landowning men”.
The problem is that the left, progressives, whatever… are usually more open minded and liberal so they bicker and find nuance in EVERYTHING. Which is nice… But also a massive weakness when it comes to building strong coalitions.
The left is endlessly sub dividing… each group gate keeping harder than the previous… each one more white knighting than the previous with endless, useless infighting.
Meanwhile the right is like “brown people are to blame for everything!”
“Sounds, good here’s my vote…”
😐
yep pretty much. left/progressives have no coherent narrative. just a bunch of sub-groups all trying to co-opt the narrative and bickering over whose group is the most important. and the right just picks the most absurd group an blasts the rest of the left as being part of that group.
A big part of the left was just anti government, when the left got to be government that part broke away. The right got back with the obsession of staying in power. I believe that’s how the left lost so many votes. Not that they do wrong, they just lost numbers.
You’re probably speaking about a specific country, not the world in general
Look for the grift in every single country you mentioned, because ultimately, that’s the goal. They want the power and control of money. A narcissist is probably behind every one too. They think they can do it.
The fascist times throughout Europe. It was at a different time in each country.
Before, there weren’t what we would call democracies, but some were democracies at an early stage. Later, people learned to get along with people who voted for other parties.
Then they collectively forgot about that last part.
I’d say all of history until 1968?
Evil always gets ahead because it’s willing to do anything to “win.” Good? Not so much. (Well actual good, anyway - not that fake shit that does things claiming their “Good Book” backs them up on it, for example.)
The only reason Good gets control every so often is because Evil is too focused on “winning” & ultimately inadvertently destroys its own foundations in order to do so. Once it figures out how to avoid that, we’re really screwed.
The closest example of that I can think of is China’s current leader. I’ll grant many will somewhat rightly claim he’s done a lot of good over there, but he’s definitely accomplished a fair bit of it through some significant evils.
The difference this time is that the underlying debate is around the definitions of good and evil.
A lot of people over the last ten years have heard about the evil things some people have done and plan to do and gone “yup, sounds good to me.”
I tend to doubt it’s as different as you think. IMHO, the majority of people want good, but are clueless as to what exactly that looks like when it comes to more complex topics like managing the wide variety of people that make up a society. Understanding that usually requires a LOT more time and effort into reasoning things out than they’re willing/able to put in, anyway.
They therefore pick someone to trust who seems (read: cons them into believing) like they know “the truth” to do all their thinking for them. Those arrogant enough to portray themselves as such are almost always malignant personality types interested primarily in manipulating others to do their bidding in order to benefit themselves. They “know” everything, and either are exceedingly unlikely to admit to human failings such as not knowing something, or always have a ready excuse that puts blame upon their enemies for their failings.
They divide people up & pit them against one another to distract, ensure loyalty, and keep control.
Any of this sound familiar? It’s a pattern repeated among humans throughout history.
I dunno about that. You can blame it on right wing media brainwashing or whatever else, but I don’t believe that anyone didn’t know that electing trump was going to bring harm to several groups of people. They knew it, and they decided they were ok with it because they thought trump would be good for them personally.
and they decided they were ok with it because they thought trump would be good for them personally.
nah that’s not what it is, i think. many trump voters knew that trump would hurt them personally but they still voted for him because ideological consistency (or “the long-term good”) is more important to them than not getting hurt within the next four years.
you can see ample proof of this in the !leopardsatemyface@lemmy.world community, where people actually did and continue to get harmed by trump and would still vote for him again.
You think republicans have principles??? You lost me there.
republicans have principles???
sure they do. like:
- who doesn’t work, doesn’t deserve to eat
- hard work is more important than human life itself
Change those to:
*Who isn’t rich, doesn’t deserve to eat
Being rich is more important than human life itself *
And you might be closer to some actual republican principles. But of course they’ll toss them and start believing the opposite if they’re told to.
Yeah, I suppose that’s fair to an extent. The slow burn of Faux Snuz brainwashing and anger buildup definitely contributed as you mentioned, but it is possibly unusual in that the buildup period was so long (Republicans have been working from a basic plan since the mid 70s when some strategist of theirs came to the realization that abortion would be an extremely effective wedge issue) before it reached its peak without anything happening to break that spell.
I’m not really a history buff, so I don’t have a lot to compare to off the top of my head. My argument was based more upon what I know of human psychology - a subject of much more interest to me personally, but which doesn’t have nearly the same amount of documented historical details with which to compare.
Honestly, though, the only thing I think is different today is our level of knowledge and understanding. Data warehousing, statistical analysis, psychological profiling, etc., etc. are all new additions to the dynamic that I strongly suspect have made successful manipulations possible at such as massive scale.
People themselves are still the same as they’ve basically always been - some good, some not, some smart, etc. It’s just now we have the ability to give those in power much more certainly with regards to methods of achieving their goals. Since those who actually desire to be in positions of power are almost invariably the types who shouldn’t have it, the end result is sadly predictably ugly.
So at most we are talking a bit over 200 years that might be relevant to this. Just fyi if this is unique its not been a possibility for very long history wise.
In ww2 Europe 65-75 people had to die before the pendulum swung back. The far right always is responsible for millions of deaths when in control. I think the best prevention would be identifying people with narcissistic and psychopathic personalities and not let them become leaders. We currently reward them in our system
In ww2 Europe 65-75 people had to die before the pendulum swung back.
🧐
They probably meant “65-75 million,” but hey, even the typo is correct as long as you’re talking about a very specific 65-75 people.
Oh, I was thinking they meant 65-75 people before the pendulum (the second counter on the grandfather clock?) swung back, so 65-75 people per second. I didn’t think so deeply about the maths behind it, just accepted it as a possible meaning. But I’ll do it now.
UPDATE: Checks out for 2-3 years, but something is telling me there was enough time for even more years to fit between 1939 and 1945.
UPDATE: Unless you consider “swung back” as 2 seconds, because then it’s even possible.
Colloquially, “the pendulum” here is probably public political sentiment. It’s commonly understood, whether true or not, that a population swings back and forth between progressive and conservative values; illustrated by a pendulum swinging from left (progressive) to right (conservative). In the US, this is further inflamed by the two-party system, which unintentionally encourages such polarization and swings in political will.
So, in the US for instance, the Gilded Age (far right) gave way to the Progressive Era (far left), which led to the Roaring Twenties and the Great Depression (right), which led to the New Deal (left), which eventually led to Reaganomics (right), which led to Obama (slight left), which led to Trump (super far right).
The original question was asking, how long until this pendulum swings back to the left again. The “65-75” answer, it seems, was talking about WW2 in Europe, when the pendulum swung to the right as Hitler took power, and didn’t swing back to the left until after 65-75 (million) people died.
Oh, yes you’re right - I’m not a native speaker and I think we phrase it slightly differently, and I took that literally. Thanks for the explanation!
Happy to help!
Berlin 1939
I think the best thing to do is just find our own alternative communities. Make our own hangouts. Our own clubs. We can still live life and be happy even if the rest of society is shit. Depending on how this upcoming elections goes. I might go underground. Just disconnect from society. Stop talking to normies outside of business. I will have put in my 35 years of fighting. I don’t want to be miserable my entire life. I don’t want to argue with people my entire life. Maybe it’s just impossible to connect with people who arent like us. That doesn’t mean we have to be sad. It doesn’t mean we have to be alone. We can make our own spaces. Stay off the grid and under the radar. Have fun and have our own culture with people who like us.
Not exactly. I am old enough to remember wondering why gay couples couldn’t get legal marriage, and when interracial couples were stared at, and the ozone layer had a hole, and the Satanic Panic, but it felt like we were in a shitty spot but moving in the right direction just painfully slowly. Lots more violence than now.
Yeah, my working theory is violent narcissists have a much harder time beeing casually violent, so they go ever more totalitarian, because then they can be violent without repercussions again…
It constantly goes in cycles, three steps forwards, two steps backward.
In my opinion, it’s always been a cycle of pretending to take a step forward while simultaneously slowly walking backwards unbeknownst to everyone, and then taking 2 steps backwards for good measure.
That’s just untrue. People live in better conditions today, even just considering social acceptance, and not technology or medicine. Most societies are at least in theory democratic, where people get some input towards the ruler. There are legal protections against slavery, misogyny, homophobia, racism, transphobia, and anti monopolistic agencies that try to temper the worst parts of capitalism. Trade unions have successfully campaigned so that now people work less than they have since the start of the industrial revolution, in unprecedentedly better conditions.
Don’t get me wrong, there’s a long way to go, and many of these things exist a lot more in theory than practice. Child rights, in particularly, are woefully lacking.
However, claiming that the past, at any point, was better for the vast majority of people is the same nostalgic, rose tinted, incorrect thinking that MAGA (when was America ‘great’ the first time?) Republicans fall prey to.
People live in better conditions today
I see way too many poor, chronically ill, and visibly distressed people. This isn’t normal, not even a little bit.
even just considering social acceptance
Social acceptance has been nonexistent for me as a gay, autistic male - people frequently tell me about their similarly horrible experiences.
and not technology
Technology has advanced, sure, but it just serves to enslave, manipulate, and spy on us in increasingly dystopian ways as the years go by. Mass surveillance, centralized databases, and unregulated AI have been normalized. What’s next?
or medicine
As a chronically ill person, medicine has caused me significantly more harm than good because doctors are too overworked to identify side effects and complications - and I have nearly died several times due to medical negligence/iatrogenic illness. No, I’m not exaggerating. There have been many key advancements in medicine, but our healthcare industry is very sick - even in countries with socialized healthcare. There are people experiencing relief that previously wasn’t possible - I’m not denying that.
Most societies are at least in theory democratic, where people get some input towards the ruler.
Democracy is largely illusory, especially here in the states. Consent of the governed is not present in many “democratic” societies if you’ve been paying attention.
There are legal protections against slavery
Slavery and third-world exploitation have exploded overseas to support first-world needs (even child slavery), prison/slave labor is incredibly pervasive in the states, and before Trump became Führer an estimated 40%~ of US agricultural workers were undocumented immigrants - modern slaves.
misogyny, homophobia, racism, transphobia
The legal protections are effectively nonexistent to prevent or remediate discrimination in practice. Two-party consent laws for recording are really terrible for those subject to abuse.
Trade unions have successfully campaigned so that now people work less than they have since the start of the industrial revolution
Here in the states, unions are largely nonexistent, people still work significantly more than they need to, productivity has risen but wages have largely stagnated, people are largely in significant debt and they cannot afford a house or a car, they cannot afford to reliably access healthcare (and even if they can “afford” it, it isn’t timely), higher education is inaccessible and college debt is unreal, etc.
in unprecedentedly better conditions.
Yes, and no. There are many careers that harm you in ways that only modern society can. Like plastics workers being exposed to a greater risk of cancer. I have known many people that have been denied access to necessary PPE in multiple fields and have suffered workplace injuries that have been covered up. We can do so much better, but our society still revolves around exploiting people while pinching pennies.
Have we taken some steps? Sure. But we’ve taken many, many, many more backwards while people are oblivious in their bubbles. Pop your bubble, please. More people than ever before in history are suffering silently in ways that only can happen in modern times. Denying or whitewashing the extreme levels of suffering people are experiencing because some aspects are better than the past isn’t helping anybody.
You are pointing out how the world is a terrible place with lots of suffering. I completely agree with you. But in each of these areas, the way things are now is still better than they’ve ever been. They’ve always been bad and horrible, and in most places and times, worse.
the way things are now is still better than they’ve ever been.
Untrue, and again, it’s whitewashing. You make a lot of big claims, but they don’t hold true in reality. The advancements you tout are as weighty as a corporate slogan for real people.
Two steps back somehow in 2025 involves tripping and falling behind by nearly a century
Something common I see in all these parties is strong disaffection with the current state of their countries and a longing to an idealized past they promise to bring back, to make countries great again…
The past cannot come back, neither will it come back just because some people want it to. It’s completely futile, but people are not rational about this, they’re completely emotional and tribal.
Yes, societies are going through the five stages of grief:
- denial (there are no problems, and if there are, they’re the <insert minority group>'s fault)
- anger (vote for a strongman) <-- you are here
- bargaining (maybe we can partially go back to the better past)
- depression (this sucks, nothing can be done about it)
- acceptance (well, let’s look forward and make the best out of it)
There’s nothing quite like today. There’s things that are similar, but social media has really made things worse.
Populism is rising because things haven’t been great for a lot of people for a long time, and it’s too hard to ignore anymore. Globalism and free trade were massively oversold to the masses, it hurt wide swaths of people that have been ignored for decades. People that feel disenfranchised will vote for change regardless of the change proposed.
Social media has escalated everything as well. The echo chambers are enormous and essentially impossible to avoid. Many traditional institutions are also extremely weak now that would have forced more interaction between people with differing views and limited extremism. Social media also does a great job in conflating the size of various groups and beliefs, a few dozen people can make a community seem as large and impactful as a few thousand .
People that feel disenfranchised will vote for change regardless of the change proposed.
hahah yeah unfortunately that’s accurate :D
