The Language of Fascism

Since the advent of Trump 2.0 in January of this year, it has become increasingly clear that this time around, we face a more virulent and all-encompassing attempt to impose fascism than the first try.

I’ve searched for ways to explain what was occurring and what I might contribute to opposing it, including through writing. I was surprised by the speed and extremity of what was happening. What I expected to be a more slow-moving Orban or Putinesque version of fascism/authoritarianism, seemed more akin to the Nazi experience.

I’ve been somewhat a student of the history of Nazism in Germany and was struck by how the language and methods of Trump et al resembled much of that of the Nazis, albeit in a greatly altered situation including the peculiar history and reality of the United States. No, I’m not arguing that this is a replica with the same predictable outcome. Far from it, and the outcome is unwritten.

What I am arguing though is the parallels and dangers shouldn’t be ignored.

One thing that presented itself to me was the need and potential importance of recording observations of events under the “new” Trump regime, as well as the growing resistance to it. I was drawn to read Victor Klemperer’s two volume Diary, I Will Bear Witness of daily life as a Jewish academic in Nazi Germany from 1933-1945.

Klemperer details from a very personal perspective the encirclement and escalating suppression of Jewish life, and especially that of he and his “Aryan” wife Eva, as well as their circle of friends and associates. Victor miraculously survived the holocaust, largely due to Eva’s background. When the firebombing of Dresden by the U.S destroyed the city in 1945, Victor and Eva managed to escape. Ripping off the yellow star the Nazis required Jews to wear upon penalty of death, Victor left with Eva and made their way to allied lines

I’m just finishing volume I, which ends in 1941. Through this volume, Klemperer, who was a professor/author on French and world literature, documents the language of the Third Reich. He has an idea, which he despairs of even being able to execute due to the increasing threat of death, of someday writing a book on it. In fact, he survived and did publish that book, which I plan to read.

Reading Klemperer’s diary rings a frightening warning from history as fascism unfolds now in the U.S. I can’t shake the feeling that reading this is prologue, albeit as I say in a different situation and time with different parameters or potential results, and being deeply shaken and disturbed by that.

Klemperer, a military veteran who has always considered himself German and Protestant rather than Jewish, is finding himself increasingly estranged from that feeling of “Germaness”.

In 1938, he writes of this being “knocked out of him”, and says, “too much of what, in the past, I took lightly, viewed as an embarrassing minor phenomenon, I now consider to be German and typical. The superlativism, which is a special hallmark of the language of the Third Reich…. the Nazis do it in a way that is half megalomania, half frantic autosuggestion. One of their favorite words is ‘eternal’.”

Trumpist language oozes superlativism. In typical manner, Trump lauded his “accomplishments” in 43 days during his State of the Union address- “The American dream is unstoppable, and our country is on the verge of a comeback, the likes of which the world has never witnessed and perhaps will never witness again.  There’s never been anything like it.”

In 1936, Klemperer writes, “The Fuhrer must be followed blindly, blindly! They do not need to explain anything at all, since they are accountable to no one. Today it occurred to me: Never has the tension between human power and powerlessness, human knowledge and human stupidity been so overwhelmingly great as now.” I am reminded here of the destruction of scientific research by the Trump regime, but also the lock-step sycophancy of the GOP in extolling Trump’s first 100 days.

With the mad celebration of the German annexation of Austria in 1938 and its increased vitriol against Jews, Klemperer recounts “a broad yellow handbill with the Star of David has been stuck to every post of our fence. ‘Jew’. Warning against the unflagged plague barracks. Der Sturmer has dug up its usual ritual murder; I would truly not be surprised if next I were to find the body of a child in the garden.”

He speaks of Hitler presenting Goering with his “marshal’s baton in a great ceremony. They have no sense of the comic impression they make. Their conscious humor is spite against the defenseless”. And further, “For some days now divine right has been given ever more prominence. Again and again in the newspaper. He is the instrument of Providence- the hands that write ‘no’ (in the April 1938 vote to endorse the regime) will wither- the sacred election. .. We think he will have himself crowned Emperor.”

This all sounds quite familiar. Trump speaking of himself as “the King”, tweeting memes of himself wearing a crown. He mused about seizing a third term despite Constitutional limits. How many of his supporters imagine him as “picked by God” after surviving an assassination attempt last summer. Now, Trump has gone so far as to tweet a meme of himself as the new pope!

In a recent interview on “Trump’s first 100 days” with The Atlantic, Trump claims he “runs the country and runs the world”.

So many other examples of Americanized but Naziesque type language or imagery from regime officials stand out, including their glee in crushing the powerless. Musk with a chain saw on stage, bragging of putting USAID into the “woodchipper” despite the deaths it will cause, declaring social security which millions have paid into and rely on for survival a “Ponzi scheme”. The thinly veiled but obvious Nazi salutes of Bannon and Musk. The constant bragging by Trump and his toadies about their “right” to annex Greenland and deport whoever they want without regard to the law, The constant, “biggest ever” crowds at his election rallies and his first inauguration, the plan for a June military parade in D.C. honoring him. The constant demands of other Trump officials demanding world leaders “thank” and bow down to him.

The approach is so comic, so seemingly bizarre, so brazen, and transparent. So lunatic and out to lunch yet at the same moment so dangerous. They view reality as whatever those in power can bludgeon people into accepting and they intend to do so no matter how extreme.

Many other examples spring to mind of the fascist Trumpian language and propaganda. The constant use by the curent regime of the Nazi playbook of “accusing the other side of what you yourself are doing” –(from Goebbels reportedly)-characterizing press exposure of Trump’s misdeeds or crimes as “fake news” and the press as “enemy of the people”, targeting political opponents for investigation or jail as corrective justice against those who conducted a “witch hunt” after Trump (for obvious crimes he committed), targeting and threatening to impeach the “radical activist judges”, who would dare to cross him on due process.

Calling the scrubbing of the racist history of America from museums, institutions, government agencies and websites, or ridding them of programs or language that just slightly took account of historic discrimination against people of color as “reversing racial discrimination” (toward white people!-just replace Aryan with this for the U.S.) Promoting the spread of misinformation, lies, and fascist narratives as “promoting freedom” that has been suppressed by “the woke culture”. The analogies are too numerous to recount, the speed of attack too fast to ignore.

A Case Study of Trumpian Fascist Propaganda

April 29th, Trump interviewed with Terry Moran from ABC News on his first 100 Days. In this, he admitted he could bring Kilmar Obrego Garcia home from the Salvadoran CECOT prison, but his lawyers don’t want him to and so he doesn’t have plans to. Trump’s statement proves false the previous blather from Trump officials like Pam Bondi and Steven Miller that the U.S. couldn’t return Kilmar despite court rulings including the Supreme Court, because it was solely up to El Salvador.

Of course originally, a DOJ lawyer in court said Kilmar had been deported “by administrative error”, (for which he was then fired by Bondi apparently). Later, refusing to be seen as misstepping, regime officials claimed this wasn’t the case. They fastened on the lie Kilmar was a MS-13 gang member, which they have since stuck with despite the almost complete lack of evidence.

Trump argued with Moran that Obrego Garcia literally had “MS-13” tattooed on his fingers. Trump had earlier tweeted out a photograph of Obrego Garcia’s hand which is apparently a photo-shop produced photo. Some source had taken a photo of Garcia’s hand, which has tattoos on it, and “interpreted” the symbols on it- (a marijuana leaf, a smiley face, a crucifix, and a skull)- as indicating “M S 1 3”. These enumerations were then digitally added above the actual symbols to create this impression. Experts aware of MS13 tatoos say the actual symbols that are on Kilmar’s hand aren’t indicative of MS13 gang tattoos. One, a Salvadoran journalist who has written a book on MS13 said, “Never, ever, did any of the hundreds of sources I spoke to say anything that would allow us to believe Trump’s strange interpretation of tattoos”.

Undeterred by the truth, Trump argued those letters and numbers were actually and literally on Kilmar’s hand in the photo. He argued Moran should just agree with him and say yes, they were on his hands!

Now, it’s being reported in NYT that the State Department in response to the Federal court that ordered his return and after the Supreme Court ordered the regime to “facilitate” his return, had inquired with El Salvador about returning Garcia but that Salvadoran dictator Bukele had refused to release him because he was Salvadoran. Thus it seemed regime officials may have been planning to use this to claim to appear to be in correspondence with the Supreme Court order to “facilitate” Kilmar’s return-saying they tried, but failed. But now Trump has let out this is all bullshit, just that his lawyers don’t want to.

But this is common Trumpism, one might say, Trumpism 101. Completely opposing statements are given from one day to the next from Trump or top Trump officials. There is a pretense, sometimes unchallenged by the press, that these statements aren’t in complete opposition to each other and at the same time a refusal to offer any coherence or clarity. And then again, resetting a path to bully their way forward when exposed. This is part of the use of language to eliminate truth and logic.

A big part of the fascist “language and method” is to send up a cloud of conflicting bullshit from various officials, often involving the dictator in chief himself-to create a fog of confusion and obfuscation that becomes difficult to walk back through, separate out and document who said what when and make it hard to even pin down either the argument or “bottom line” of what the regime says when it gets in trouble.

In an interview, journalist and author Masha Gessen speaks of Trump’s “bully lie”. Lying with a wink that you know what you’re saying is transparently and provably false, but that you have power over others, so you determine what to believe. The choice provided by power is, accept it and maybe you will be allowed to live and prosper in the world we own and rule, refuse to, and you’ll pay the price. In Trump’s world and the one he seeks to create, there is no truth, really, no evidence, no logic, no reason, no “thinking things through”-just power in charge to follow and be obedient to, or suffer.

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