HOBBES AS A WISHFUL THINKER

In his time, Hobbes was accused of atheism, and later, of materialism. But I attribute such accusations to a prejudice against him on the part of his critics. Hobbes is a no-nonsense philosopher, rejecting superstition in all forms, which often leads him to oversimplification, which is not, however, an altogether destructive defect. For instance, Stalin saw simplification (which, in his mind, was a scientific reduction to the basics) as a higher philosophical virtue, and the word oversimplification would of course be to him merely a word of opprobrium, reflecting the opponents’ negative attitude toward the perceived simplification. Hobbes’s all-encompassing materialism is deduced from his treatment of life as a motion of the limbs, from which he arrives at the notion of the commonwealth, which he calls Leviathan, as an “artificial man,” who is thus accessible to scientific study, just like that other creation of art: man himself. This is much more than an analogy. To me, this is Hobbes’s choice of method. Ridiculing the non-scientific gibberish of University professors, “the schoolmen,” he does not wish to be accused of being one of them, should his political philosophicality happen to be just as unscientific as theirs. Profoundly impressed by the works of Galileo and Kepler, he finds for himself an ingenious scientific method to study social organization, like physicians would study the human body.

Hobbes’ political philosophy rests virtually entirely on his understanding of the state of nature as “a war of all against all,” where there is no property, no justice, and no injustice, where force and fraud are the highest of all virtues. (What for Machiavelli is a product of deep idealistic disappointment in reality, for Hobbes is a simple statement of fact.)
Hobbes is horrified by all forms of anarchy, and naturally his desiderata are law and order, which can only be provided by strong established power. He is not opposed to “tyranny,” as to him this word is nothing but an expression of opprobrium toward the monarchy, on the part of its critics. Social organization, in his scheme of things, starts with pure “democracy,” as people, unhappy with living in the “state of nature,” which is the state of permanent war, come together to form a commonwealth, in which they must all agree to be ruled by an absolute sovereign of their choice, for as long as their sovereign provides them with peace and protection from harm in exchange for their liberty. Once the sovereign is thus democratically chosen, all the power is invested in him (or in it, if that is an assembly). The sovereign then makes laws, using his power to enforce them. Justice is now his exclusive domain, because in Hobbes’s definition justice is obeying the sovereign’s law. There is no way to impeach the sovereign, or to object to his choice of successor, unless he (or it) shows incompetence in performing the covenanted sovereign duties, or puts his subjects’ right of self-preservation in jeopardy. In such cases, all bets are off.

There are two important points to take notice of here. One is that Hobbes’ position is antithetical to the idea of checks and balances, actively promoted by the majority of other political philosophers, notably including Machiavelli before him and Locke after him. If ever the expression “people deserve their government” was embodied in a specific political doctrine, our Hobbes is its epitome. Once you yourselves have chosen your Sovereign, do not dare to complain! The other point is that Hobbes comes so close to the idea of “national interest” that his political theory appears to become glued to it, to the full exclusion of any internal struggle whatsoever (such as class struggle for instance) within his commonwealth, while external forces (practically all other commonwealths) are hostile to it, hence their peaceful coexistence becomes a virtual impossibility, which, in turn, makes the role of the sovereign ever more important, and provides further legitimacy for his (its) absolutist excesses.
In this line of thought, I can easily call Hobbes yet another early harbinger of the actual Totalitarian State, which prides itself on the original democratic support of its citizens, and sees this support as its license of absolute power. It also thrives on the concept of one whole and indivisible national interest, and regards all opposition to the State as a willful subversion of this national interest, and further draws its absolute power from the strong fear of an outside threat, and sometimes even hostile encirclement.
Comrade Stalin was, of course, the consummate Hobbesian Sovereign. And so is Mr. Putin today, which is undoubtedly the biggest part of his huge mass appeal.

A BOOK FOR ALL SEASONS

Thomas More is a classic Utopian, that is, a wishful thinker. Describing the capital of his imaginary island Amaurote, he unabashedly lays down the plan of London, but what a difference these two make! Amaurote is not just some non-existent place in the Southern Hemisphere. It is what More wishes his London to be. More is also a very forceful wishful thinker, and he makes sure that his Utopia would not be dismissed as an idiosyncratic product of Sir Thomas’s personal fancy, by directly appealing to the unimpeachable authority of Jesus Christ! Having introduced Utopia to the reader, More’s alter ego Raphael (perhaps, as in Archangel Raphael, the healer of the blind?) Hythloday says this, near the conclusion of his story:
“…And I doubt not that either respect for every man’s private comfort, or else the authority of our saviour Christ (which for his great wisdom could not but know what was best, and for his inestimable goodness could not but counsel that which he knew to be the best) would have brought all the world long ago unto the laws of this commonwealth, if it were not that one single beast, the princess and mother of all mischief Pride resists and hinders it…”
So, what exactly is Thomas More’s Utopia, which dares to employ such heavy artillery, and apparently gets away with the arrogance of secular fiction turning to God for its validation?

In Utopia, private property does not exist, and there is complete religious tolerance, except for the atheists, who are not, however persecuted, but deprived of the full rights of citizenship. More sees a social need for order and discipline, prizing them much greater than freedom and liberty. Everybody is obligated to work, but the work is limited to six hours a day, and it is not exhausting. While the island stores reserves of gold and silver, money is used to contract mercenaries (mostly to fight just wars for the Utopians), whereas the citizens have no need for money for themselves, as luxuries are non-existent. And so on, and so forth…

...Law and order rigidly enforced. The kind of enforcement More has in mind requires a powerful State. This amounts to More’s advocacy of State-imposed communism, or extreme socialism, if you like, which, at least to me, becomes indistinguishable from a totalitarian State built along religious lines. Although some freedom of religion is sort of allowed in his Utopia, which makes it different from a monoreligious theocracy, it is still based on the practice of Christian communism, which in turn is based on the Biblical communism of the Acts of the Apostles (see, for instance Acts 4:31-35).

…My original idea of the present book, then titled Capitalism and Christianity, was to represent the clash of these two as a “contradiction in terms,” and to show their moral incompatibility, while upholding what is known as Christian communism in protest against the very fashionable trend of moralization of capitalism. While I abhor the efforts of capitalist apologists to represent capitalism as the ethical apotheosis of all social systems imaginable, I am far from advocating the Christian commune as the way of an idealistic future either. The world is too imperfect for it, to begin with. Besides, I am a fierce opponent of uniformity in all of its aspects and, I am afraid, such communes even in a dream world have drab homogeny as one of their least rewarding side effects. Yet, although rejecting the idea of such communes, both in principle and in general practicality, I am convinced that there are certain advantages to be gained from borrowing some of their socialist ways. It is therefore most profitable to read Thomas More’s Utopia with a perfectly open mind: without becoming a captive audience for its Christian homiletics but neither rejecting it wholesale as merely a very naïve piece of Christian propaganda.

In the meantime, let us marvel at the effort of yet another wishful thinking totalitarian. Apparently, Christian communism, once we take a long hard look at it, becomes indistinguishable from the totalitarian ideal. The commune looks more and more like a totalitarian State, and the State looks more and more like a Christian commune.

RUSSIA'S PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS 2011

December 4, 2011, was the day of Russia’s national elections to the State Duma (Parliament), and although the final results will take some more time to be tallied, the general picture is by now very clear… At least to those of us who can see the whole picture.
The dominant Putin-Medvedev party United Russia is currently balancing on the tightrope of 50%, which is a very significant drop indeed, since the last Duma elections, in 2007, when the party received 64.3% of the total vote. Thus, in purely numerical measures the “Putin Party” did lose some ground.
But what does this drop really signify? As I am writing this, there’s plenty of gloating in the West about Mr. Putin’s alleged debacle, and Russia’s pro-American oppositionists are ecstatic about it, although very angry about the reported incidents of rigged elections in different localities of the country. Judging from the news reports spread throughout the Western world, Russia is again on the unstoppable march toward an America-friendly pro-capitalist democracy, defying a clique of some Soviet-era leftovers and KGB apparatchiks who are desperately trying to put a wrench in the progressive clockwork of history.
I pity those Western news audiences who may have received this news with a straight face and believed it. It is therefore important to put certain basic facts in proper perspective, which is the purpose of this posting.

…Although there is an eerie similarity here with certain recent events clustered together under the caption “Arab Spring,” where the democratic genie let out of the bottle, with the full complicity of the West, brings forth with him a full-blown anti-Israel and anti-American Islamic revolution, I would refrain from pushing this similarity on the reader, except to point out the quaint similarity of unintended consequences and false expectations of the West in both these cases. In fact, United Russia’s unquestionable loss of a large handful of votes by no means spells out the Russian hardliners’ loss and West’s gain. Taking a closer look at these figures, we see that Russia’s Communists, leftwing socialists and extreme nationalists have nearly doubled their clout in the country, while those pro-Western personalities who have virtually monopolized the ear of a sympathetic Western public have all but disappeared from the Russian radar screen. Had Sunday election not been “fiddled with” at all, as alleged, the end result for the West might have been truly frightening…

In other words, here is the real result of Russia’s parliamentary elections 2011. The Putin-Medvedev party garnering about fifty per cent of the popular vote will from now on have to accommodate a good forty-five per cent of hard-line socialists and Russian nationalists, thus moving Russia’s political center even further from policies accommodating the West toward an unflinching take-it-or-leave-it stance, with an emphasis on Russia’s increased military might and a further strengthening of her anti-American alliances.

Come to think of it, effective 2012 Mr. Putin will be just about the last American friend in the new Russian government. I am sure that he will enjoy his role tremendously, and for this reason he must like last night’s election results very much.

MACHIAVELLI'S DISAPPOINTED UTOPIA

(For much more on Machiavelli the political philosopher, see my big entry Il Principe Fiorentine, in the Significant Others section, to be posted later.)

In transforming exceptional individuals into legends, history is sometimes flattering and sometimes unkind. In such cases we are wont to say: “Move out of the way, individual, for your legend is riding an unstoppable train.” But in some cases our legend is clothed in nothing worse than a faulty conventional wisdom, which can easily be corrected without inflicting any significant damage to the legend itself. Such is the case of the great political thinker Niccolò Machiavelli.
Now, what is he doing in the fairly idealistic Wishful Thinking section? It is almost obvious that he must fail the entrance test. His forte, as most people know, is utterly amoral Realpolitik, and his most famous advice to the Princes (Il Principe: Chapter XVIII, In What Way Princes Must Keep Faith) is not to keep faith:

“But it is necessary to be able to disguise this character well and to be a great feigner and dissembler; and men are so simple and so ready to obey the present necessities, that the one who deceives will always find those who allow themselves to be deceived… Alexander VI did nothing else but deceive men… but no man was ever more able to give assurances, or affirmed things with stronger oaths, and no man observed them less; but he always succeeded in his deceptions as he knew well this aspect of things. It is not necessary to have all these [virtues], but it is very necessary for a prince to seem to have them.”

There is ostensibly no place for such unabashed political cynicism anywhere in the vicinity of the search for the ideal, and yet I am satisfied with including Machiavelli among my distinguished wishful thinkers as I see his political cynicism as nothing short of a bitterly disappointed political idealism. Come to think of it, only a bitterly disappointed idealist can rise to such heights of cynicism as Machiavelli does.

It is true that we are judging Machiavelli primarily by Il Principe. But in his Discorsi Sopra La Prima Deca Di Tito Livio, written a few years later, he shows us his different, utopian side, as if asking the posterity not to judge him by Il Principe alone.
Discorsi offers us incontrovertible proof that there is a large moral dimension to Machiavelli, the assumed amoralist. There are certain political-moral values which he holds dear: national independence and liberty above all, security, and constitutional guarantees of law over whim. The best constitutions must distribute rights not only among the rich and powerful, but also give a substantial share to the poor and powerless, or else, political instability will necessarily ensue. Surprisingly to those who do not know it, Machiavelli must be given the credit for being the first political thinker ever to formulate the doctrine of checks and balances. Princes, nobles, and people must all have their part in the Constitution: “Then these three powers will keep each other reciprocally in check.”
But to achieve the noblest ends even a saint has to have the means to be successful and success cannot come without power. It is at this point that Machiavelli’s idealism becomes frustrated, as he realizes the corrupting effect of power on even the best of people (memento Aristoteli!). This is where he becomes amoral, advises the Princes to dissimulate, to be unscrupulous regarding their means, for the best means are those that help you achieve your ends, provided of course that the ends are moral and serving public interest, which is what he advocates in the first place. But is it possible for an honest man, desirous of the public good, to engage in immoral means in order to achieve the moral ends? Or will the ends be inevitably corrupted by the means?!
Here is the beginning of that famous disconnect between moral ends and immoral means. Here is the source of Machiavelli’s idealistic frustration…

“…And the devil, taking him up into an high mountain, shewed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. And the devil said unto him, All this power will I give thee and the glory of them, for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will give it. If thou therefore wilt worship me (the means), all shall be thine (the ends).” [Luke 4:5-7.]
…Well, at least, we know what Jesus said to that…

THE POLITICAL ANIMAL AND THE LAW OF THE STATE

Those who are only perfunctorily acquainted with Plato and have not read his Dialogues with attention and sufficient comprehension may have developed an impression that the main focus of his political philosophy is the Philosopher-King, that is, the enlightened make-believe ruler of the make-believe realm of his wishful thinking. In fact, Plato’s political ideas are by no means naïve and childish. The centerpiece of his political philosophy is not the Philosopher-King, but the all-powerful State, drawing its strength from its enthusiastic majority supporters (all for one and one for all!) and “democratically” suppressed opposition. Whereas the Philosopher-King is a distinctly authoritarian concept, the State is the consummate totalitarian concept, and those who do not understand, or do not want to acknowledge this basic distinction between authoritarianism and totalitarianism (and the combined number of the confused and their confusers is shockingly great!) must not be allowed as legitimate debaters in any serious discussion of the concept of totalitarianism.
It is exactly because of his insistence on the supremacy of the State that I see Plato as the first great theorist of totalitarianism. Remarkably, his successor as king of philosophy Aristotle follows in his footsteps, but he goes even further.
Plato was the first to suggest that, in the absence of the philosopher-king, the rule of law is preferable to the rule of the monarch’s whim. Aristotle developed this idea in his precise scientific manner, highlighting the fact that even the best of men is still an animal (be that the best of animals!), and therefore, the rule of law is better than the rule of any man. Let us now try to put these things in some order, starting with his probably best-known quotation, from Politics:
“Man, when perfected, is the best of animals, but when separated from law and justice he is the worst of all since armed injustice is the most dangerous, and he is equipped at birth with the arms of intelligence and wit, moral qualities which he may use for the worst ends…”
Here is Aristotle’s argument in favor of the rule of law over the rule of man:
“The rule of law is preferable to that of a single citizen for he who bids law rule may be deemed to bid God and reason alone rule, but he who bids men rule adds the element of the beast; for desire is a wild beast, and passion perverts the minds of rulers, even if they are the best of men.”
Thus dismissing even “the best of men” as just “the best of animals,” Aristotle, like Plato, elevates the role of the State, but goes an extra mile rationalizing its supremacy. Although the State is historically posterior to the family, it is philosophically anterior to it, as the whole is anterior to its parts. The imagery here is of a living organism (the hand is no longer a hand, Aristotle argues, if the body is destroyed), foreshadowing Hobbes, whose opprobrium of “Aristotelity” does not prevent him from borrowing the same “Aristotelian” imagery in the opening cannonade of his Leviathan.

No man can fulfill his destiny, to Aristotle, unless he is part of the State, which is properly moralized: “The end of the State is a good life.” Because the State embodies the Law, the rule of Law, Aristotle’s imperative desideratum, can be identified with the rule of the State, and now we have our second totalitarian in a row!
...Plato and Aristotle… Kakïye Imená!!! Why doesn’t everyone wish to join them in becoming totalitarians?
But, joking aside, how about answering the last question on philosophical, rather than emotional grounds? It will be not enough to dismiss the great Greeks’ totalitarian predilection just on the grounds of two millennia plus between us. Unlike, say, slavery, which was a dated “resident evil” of epochs gone by, the phenomenon of the State is very much with us and will apparently stay with us till the end of time, and so will the debate about the parameters of the State’s role in human society. Therefore everything said on this perennial matter by the greatest minds of antiquity is still relevant today, and, paradoxically, comes across far more elaborate and sophisticated than any such discussion in modern times, overshadowed and shackled by the ever-vigilant watchdogs of political correctness.

PLATO'S TOTALITARIAN POLITEIA

(Plato’s Politeia is a complex, multidimensional work, covering metaphysics and the philosophy of science, ethics, with its focus on the concept of justice, and, generally speaking, the whole spectrum of philosophical contemplation, political philosophy and the Platonic idea of a perfect Politeia, being only one part of it.
The present entry makes no effort to make an exhaustive study of this work as no such critical endeavor has ever been the purpose, even in part only, of my undertaking. What I am discussing here, are just a few glimpses of my reading of Plato, with a relevance, in this case, to my exposition of the “totalitarian ideal.”)

Plato does not seem to like any of the existing political systems of the world. The authoritarian monarchy is, according to him, probably the best of them all, but, alas, the potentates do not quite measure up to the task of governing. The oligarchy pitches the wealthy few against the poor many, creating a disharmony that ruins any chances of good government. Democracy yields the power to the opportunistic demagogues, whose bid to governing depends on their cynical skill to manipulate the crowds.
The best bet for him is to vest the political power in the idealized figure of the philosopher-king (or, as I am calling him, philosopher-statesman). The next best thing, should their kind be predictably in short supply, is to vest all power in the State. Let us be reminded, however, that our philosopher-statesman, (should one be either luckily found, or propitiously bred), never pursues his “personal” interest in governing, that would be different from the interest of the State. (With this in mind, we may aptly joke that a true statesman is indeed a dedicated “State’s man,” and Plato would surely agree with this.)
Philosopher-statesman is thus a dedicated servant of the State and personal enrichment registers zero on his list of priorities, as money and luxuries mean nothing to him. Such is the essence of the “totalitarian ideal.”

…How many times do I have to repeat in different sections that Plato was a consummate totalitarian, and probably a fascist, that is, he had become one having been disappointed in the practicality of finding his ideal “philosopher-statesman.” That the latter is a sine qua non of perfect government follows directly from the following passage in his Politeia: “Unless philosophers bear kingly rule in cities, or those who are now called kings and princes become genuine and adequate philosophers, and political power and philosophy are brought together… there will be no respite from evil for cities.” In the absence of a perfect totalitarian leader, the fascist State becomes an imperfect substitute. Instead of being perfectly governed from above, it creates and controls the government, the imperfect leader, as a necessary state symbol, included.
...There I go again, as always, refusing to comply with the standard usage of the word “totalitarian,” handily relegated to the safe and secure area of indignant condemnation, reserved for the usual-suspect regimes of Stalin, Mussolini, and Hitler, plus, in a limited sense, of Mao, although the mysterious idiosyncrasies of the Chinese national psychology make the subject rather difficult to fathom. Instead, I am employing the word totalitarian in a more philosophical, meaningful sense, just as Giovanni Gentile used it, and to him, Gentile, should go the credit for the first use, and therefore, his ought to be the definitive interpretation with which I am now choosing to stay, and operate.

Plato’s Politeia is an open and shut case of social engineering, a mental, rather than a test-tube creation of a controlled society. “Totalitarian,” in my understanding, means not only the act, or product, of such social engineering, but an enthusiastic public acceptance of this product, that is, of the socially engineered state. Whereas the word State evokes negative emotions, sarcasm, and cynicism, or, at best, neutral indifference from the non-totalitarian individual, the totalitarian mindset embraces “my State,” habitually referring to it as “our State.” Incidentally, I have counted thirty-four occurrences of “our State” in the English translation of Politeia. I do admit though that the enthusiasm exhibited by the creator of Plato’s State should not count for much without a parallel enthusiasm of the public, but these two are psychologically linked: as we know, political enthusiasm is an exceedingly contagious public affliction!
In other words, in the absence of an appreciative public, inhabiting Plato’s new-born, and still uninhabited, Politeia, its happy creator (I am deliberately withholding the name of Socrates, as Plato’s Politeia is Plato’s own creation, rather than of Socrates, to whom he attributes it), and his acquiescent listening public are the totality of the public, by default.

An interesting conversation about “citizen happiness” takes place at the start of Book IV. Adeimantus asks “Socrates” how the public can possibly not be miserable, with no money to buy things they might like, and all those pleasures and luxuries which are supposed to constitute a person’s happiness. Politeia’s creator has a ready answer: citizen happiness comes from contributing to the happiness of the State(!) The totalitarian ideal has never been better expressed!

Plato’s Politeia has an overwhelming body of supporting evidence to confirm it as Plato’s definitive vision of an ideal totalitarian society: All for one (meaning the State) and one (meaning the State) for all. There is no need to write a comprehensive essay here, especially, since this book will be under further discussion in other sections. Only a few other important points therefore will be made here, ostensibly omitting from any further consideration the temptingly inviting image of the philosopher-king, which incidentally was an ironic soubriquet of Giovanni Gentile, but may be already too self-evident and even superfluous for the purposes of this discussion.

The most intriguing subject that remains, and already invites a serious controversy, is about censorship.
As we are reading Plato’s Politeia, we realize that the author’s ideal is by no means in the creation of a free society, built on purely utilitarian principles, and, as we have been so used to in modern Western societies, morally non-judgmental. On the contrary, the objective of Plato’s social engineering is a virtuous State. It shall not allow the bad to coexist with the good, and this “unnatural selection” becomes the function of the censors. Few people would disagree with me that censorship is a bulwark of totalitarianism (again, the difference between authoritarian censorship, which serves the narrow political interests of the ruling clique, and totalitarian censorship, which is alleged, and, in fact, philosophically designed, to serve the best interests of the society as a whole, is in the quantity and the quality of public acceptance), and so, here is Plato the Censor:
“Then the first thing will be to establish a censorship of the writers of fiction, and let the censors receive any tale of fiction which is good and reject the bad and we will desire mothers and nurses to tell their children the authorized ones only. Let them fashion the mind with such tales even more fondly than they mould the body with their hands; but most of those that are now in use must be discarded." (Book II.)”
Ironically, among those banned mischief-makers, in Plato’s Politeia, are the great giants Homer and Hesiod, followed into the darkness of the Verboten Zone by practically all other foremost partakers of the greatness of the Greek creative genius:
“But shall our superintendence go no further, and are the poets only to be required to express the image of the good in their works, on pain if they do anything else of expulsion from our State? Or is the same to be extended to other artists, and are they also to be prohibited from exhibiting the opposite forms of vice and intemperance and meanness and indecency in sculpture and the other creative arts; and is he who cannot conform to this rule to be prevented from practicing his art in our State, lest our citizens be corrupted by him? Let our artists be those who are gifted to discern the true nature of the beautiful and graceful; then will our youth dwell in a land of health, amid fair sights and sounds, and receive the good in everything; and beauty, the effluence of fair works, shall flow into the eye and ear, like a health-giving breeze from a purer region, and insensibly draw the soul from earliest years into likeness and sympathy with the beauty of reason.”
This “well-meaning” rationale for censorship is, incidentally, deceptively close to my own rationale for the “life-saving diet.” (See that eponymous entry in the Sensus Communis cluster, posted on this blog on January 16, 2011.) I guess, the standards of distinguishing arts from pornography, or morality from immorality, have by now long changed toward much greater tolerance, and it may well seem that Plato’s prejudice against immorality is just as strong as mine, provided the stipulation of the two-plus millennia of changing attitudes between us. Should my predisposition for censorship brand me as a totalitarian-leaning socialist, so be it. But there is an important difference between mine and Plato’s prudishness with regard to the obscene. Homer, Hesiod, and even Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides (all banned in Plato’s Politeia, but for different reasons) have all indulged in varying degrees of obscenity (considering what Kronos did to his father Uranus, or Odysseus to the traitor Melanthios, for instance, just imagine what Plato would have said about the excesses of indecency in our Bible!!!), but their historical, aesthetic, and overall cultural value, as well as the distinct philosophical content of their masterpieces, elevates their alleged “obscenity” far above the muddy waters of offensive, in-your-face immorality, which in the past hundred years or so has become synonymous with “social freedom.” After all there is a world of difference between the refined frivolity of the elite and the lewd profanity of the mass culture. The Russian genius Pushkin, in Gavriiliada, or the artist Konstantin Somov, in Le Livre de la Marquise, provide examples of the former, whereas the pornographic orgy of the modern-day Western pop culture (and the post-Soviet Russian “culture” is by no means free from its hideous excesses) represents the latter. It is one thing to indulge in some measure of... well, cultured elitist frivolity, à la Petronius, Apuleius, Rabelais, et alii, but quite another to bring the culture down to the level of cheap circus, with no redeeming artistic value.

But there is yet an additional profound difference between my fairly modest form of indecency censorship, and Plato’s wholesale embargo on independent thinking. Whereas my life-saving diet is a protest against the intentional and wicked corruption of society for corruption’s sake, Plato’s restrictions, as judged by his prohibitions of the great Greek tragedians, are in pursuit of thought control, lest the minds of the youth be swayed by some unauthorized ideas of free-thinking geniuses.
So, here is a powerful repudiation of Plato’s totalitarian ideal, namely, its outright rejection in principle of any kind of creative, or independent thinking, particularly in the broad field of the humanities, which does not explicitly submit its body and soul ad majorem civitatis gloriam. And, inasmuch as I realize the necessity, in a totalitarian state, to resist not only the insidious inroads of aggressive immorality, but all independent political thinking as such, to that extent I remain a firm opponent of the totalitarian paradise, even if some of its features look exceedingly appealing to me, considering the alternative.
Apparently, the power of persuasion, on which Giovanni Gentile had idealistically counted, in his apologia of the fascist state, and which I would have much preferred to be practiced in the Soviet State of my young years, instead of its crude, and eventually self-destructive, ideological public pressure and its pathetic, silly propaganda is not considered sufficient in keeping the public under the State’s kindly rule, just as the case is with all experiments with European Christian-communist polities in America, which so far have all failed.

Perhaps, Plato is wise enough to recognize the impracticality of anything less restrictive and coercive than his State, which only serves to demonstrate again how the social engineer’s prejudice, lying at the heart of his creation, against all independent thinking sours his social broth, not even at the actual birth of the ideal State, but at its very conception.

ME AND TOTALITARIANISM: AN INTERLUDE

The Mirror section, to which this short entry belongs, comes relatively late in the sequence of the thematic sections of this book, which means that by this time some important conclusions regarding my Grundthemen have been made in a very determined fashion. Which is not to say that these conclusions may always have hit the bull’s eye. I’d rather venture to aver that most of these conclusions may have been… well, imprecise…
A good case in point is my defense of totalitarianism. Contrary to what most readers will assume, I am not a diehard, dyed-in-the-wool totalitarian. I am rather a defender of the "unjustly oppressed and persecuted." The critics of totalitarianism are… all! Some (and these are surprisingly few) out of conviction, but others ( and these are unsurprisingly many) out of complacency with what is perceived as conventional wisdom. Somebody, however, ought to speak out on behalf of the prejudicially maligned. A lawyer defending a criminal is not an implicit criminal, but, rather, a defender of judicial fairness. So am I, on behalf of totalitarianism.
For, as far as I am concerned, totalitarianism is not a life sentence, nor a caricature, but a legitimate political concept, and the more it is analyzed without historical prejudice, the more humanity can benefit from such an analysis.
Detractors of totalitarianism today are many. I am perhaps the only one who is not afraid of counting myself among its defense attorneys. Which makes me proud.