#totalitarian

It’s ridiculous to talk about freedom in a society dominated by huge corporations. What kind of freedom is there inside a corporation? They’re totalitarian institutions - you take orders from above and maybe give them to people below you. There’s about as much freedom as under Stalinism. ↗

— Noam Chomsky

#fascism #freedom #society #stalinism #totalitarianism

One of the greatest advantages of the totalitarian elites of the twenties and thirties was to turn any statement of fact into a question of motive. ↗

— Hannah Arendt

#politics #politics-language #totalitarianism #motivational

On the 'Celestial Seasonings' green tea packet there is a short explanation of its benefits: 'Green tea is a natural source of antioxidants, which neutralize harmful molecules in the body known as free radicals. By taming free radicals, antioxidants help the body maintain its natural health.' Mutatis mutandis, is not the notion of totalitarianism one of the main ideological antioxidants, whose function throughout its career was to tame free radicals, and thus to help the social body to maintain its politico-ideological good health? ↗

— Slavoj Žižek

#politics #radical #totalitarianism #nature

Totalitarianism is patriotism institutionalized. ↗

— Steve Allen

#patriotism #totalitarianism

Journalism is the protection between people and any sort of totalitarian rule. That's why my hero, admittedly a flawed one, is a journalist. ↗

— Andrew Vachss

#any #between #flawed #hero #journalism

There must be no worse punishment to a totalitarian nation than the withdrawal of capital. ↗

— Jerzy Kosinski

#must #nation #punishment #than #totalitarian

Because if you lived, as I did, several years under Nazi totalitarianism, and then 20 years in communist totalitarianism, you would certainly realize how precious freedom is, and how easy it is to lose your freedom. ↗

— Milos Forman

#certainly #communist #did #easy #freedom

Disorder is inherent in stability. Civilized man doesn't understand stability. He's confused it with rigidity. Our political and economic and social leaders drool about stability constantly. It's their favorite word, next to 'power.' 'Gotta stabilize the political situation in Southeast Asia, gotta stabilize oil production and consumption, gotta stabilize student opposition to the government' and so forth. Stabilization to them means order, uniformity, control. And that's a half-witted and potentially genocidal misconception. No matter how thoroughly they control a system, disorder invariably leaks into it. Then the managers panic, rush to plug the leak and endeavor to tighten the controls. Therefore, totalitarianism grows in viciousness and scope. And the blind pity is, rigidity isn't the same as stability at all. True stability results when presumed order and presumed disorder are balanced. A truly stable system expects the unexpected, is prepared to be disrupted, waits to be transformed. ↗

— Tom Robbins

#order #rigidity #stability #totalitarianism #totalitarianism

A tax-supported, compulsory educational system is the complete model of the totalitarian state. ↗

— Isabel Paterson

#compulsory #educational #model #state #system

Perfection spawns doctrines, dictators and totalitarian ideas. ↗

— Antonio Tabucchi

#doctrines #ideas #perfection #totalitarian