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During the first years of America's reckoning with the tragedy of September 11, 2001, an insidious, homegrown neo-fascism is detectable in the governing political regime. American politics has always included some corruption and manipulation of ideas, force, and numbers, but the current situation is extremely troubling. This new fascism needs attention during its ascension to prevent its complete supremacy.
The signs of a practiced totalitarianism and an active neo-fascism are evident in the land of liberty. An unholy combination of economic and political power is directing the faux democracy of our nation. There is a blind patriotism whose corruption of language and ability to perpetrate the 'big lie' is beyond parody. This cheap, cynical 'Americanism' is blended seamlessly with a decadent entitlement culture, replete with an excess of sanctified hedonism. Delusional diversions-'Bread and Circuses'-are everywhere within the nation's life. The opiates are legion and the addictions are peddled by multinational corporations through their ownership of instant communication.
A powerful, informing principle for the media is catering to America's unresolved sexual dysfunction. It is devilishly ingenious and remarkably effective. That twistedness is combined with relentless messages of terrible insufficiency in appearance and sex appeal, in possessions, and thus happiness. Feelings of doubtful worth influence most of us. And Jesus named that personalized, internalized hate 'evil.' He challenged each of us to self healing through the powers of recognition, love, and mercy. Wonder what the outlaw Nazarene rabbi would say to Donald Trump or Martha Stewart.
The idea of a 'Devil' is a copout-escapist, magic thinking. Yet the reality of evil contending with goodness is resolutely manifest. There is not an 'Evil One' rather an 'Evil All'. The distractions presented and managed by the corrupters, the agents of evil, emphasize a sick, shallow persona-ism over depth of character for our cultural icons. Celebrity alone passes for human nobility. A toxic and disgraceful set of selfish values trumps a just, respectful, and interdependent morality. This is profoundly sad yet persistent.
Dominant religion serves a distorted legalism meshed in a positive-thinking, feel-good gospel. It does not offer a spiritual remedy for our toxic civilization. It peddles life-denying rules, escapism, denial, elitism, and hypocrisy. Marketed in mega-churches, the 'religious lounge' is popular and growing. A prophetic faith that calls a person or a society to consider its values and morals and preaches principles of affirmation, mercy, and community as a means of transformation to nobler existence, is a quaint anachronism. Its ghost haunts sad, nearly empty shells of once vital congregations. In religious views that 'sell,' the implications of interdependence are not even considered, much less seen as ethically imperative.
The labeling of 'terrorism' by the government as America's great enemy harkens back to the scapegoating of Jews, gays, and gypsies-the undesirables of seven decades ago in Nazi Germany. That rant obscures the structuring of an economic oligarchy by the few and a dismantling of human rights (our sacred Bill of Rights). There is no serious consideration of why we are justifiably hated by so much of the world...colonialism, arrogance, prejudice, exploitation, and self-righteousness.