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the picture below is the site of a mass grave. captive partisans were brought here by nazis, forced to dig, and then executed on the spot.

our tour guide, who was delighted by our group because tourists never ask about fascism, walked us forty minutes to this vineyard in the middle of nowhere. there were no signs on the road. us americans were worried about trespassing, since no one on the property was around.

he took us to this grove and explained that the partisans were young communists from the nearby town of arezzo. local land & business owners, even their parents and friends, had eagerly ratted them out because they saw nazi occupation as bringing order back to the region.

we learned that many in central italy still to this day see nazis as heroes and americans as villains, because the nazis got rid of those troublesome punks while the americans brought bombs and tanks.

then our tour guide informed us that his own grandfather was one of the partisans executed here.

he told us that the nazis lined them up one by one and shot each in the head, and more times in the chest. but human beings are hard to kill, and it was known that even this kind of brutality was survivable.

so they threw grenades into the grave, just to be sure.

this was standard practice.

nestled in the bushes nearby with zero fanfare stands a single solitary monument. there are monuments just like it all across italy.

what stuck with me was not just the cruelty of the nazis. it was the callousness of the turncoats, who never stopped believing that they had done the right thing.

whether by nature or nurture, there is a class of people who will always prefer death and destruction over a reduction in profits. they cannot be reasoned with. they cannot be taught empathy. they will watch young people shot, dismembered, and buried alive, and they will say that god is good.

there is no reform. there is no compromise.

believe what your eyes see. listen to what your heart tells you. we are surrounded by systems that exist to launder guilt and naturalize structures of oppression, so that we side against our senses.

but you know exactly what is happening. you do.

we are waking up from a dream of peace in the interregnum of a war that never went away. the fruits of our nation's conduct, a largely bipartisan project from the start, have arrived by the truck-full. it did not come out of nowhere. it's not new, or unprecedented, or even particularly surprising.

what it IS, however, is the present. it's not a history book. it's not a mass grave. it is happening right now.

and right now, this moment and each moment after, is the *only* moment you will ever own.

stories will be told about this era for years to come. but only we are its authors.

only you.

Fascism : a populist political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual, that is associated with a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, and that is characterized by severe economic and social regimentation and by forcible suppression of opposition

AND

The 10 pillars of fascism, from the book How Fascim Works, copy and pasted from the book's Wikipedia page for no particular reason:

The mythic past: Fascists draw on a mythical past to justify a glorious future.

Propaganda: Propaganda in fascist politics often operates through inflammatory speech, stirring hostility and manipulating emotions, and displacing reasoned public debate with fear and division.

Anti-intellectual: Fascist politics attacks education, expertise, and language, weakening the tools necessary for informed public debate and leaving power and group identity as the only basis for judgment.

Unreality: By flooding the public space with falsehoods and attacking trusted institutions, fascist politics destabilizes reality and shifts truth from a shared understanding of reality to the authority of a leader.

Hierarchy: Unlike liberal thought, which expands dignity and rights to all, fascist ideology sees hierarchy as rooted in nature, using myths to legitimize dominance by the powerful. Equality is portrayed as a denial of this natural order.

Victimhood: Fascist politics blurs the line between equality and discrimination, portraying the dominant group as victims of a hidden conspiracy

Law and order: A healthy democracy ensures equal justice and mutual respect among citizens and authorities. Fascist law-and-order rhetoric, by contrast, divides society into the naturally lawful and the inherently criminal, portraying those who defy traditional norms, such as women outside gender roles, nonwhites, immigrants, or religious minorities, as threats to order simply by existing.

Sexual anxiety: Fascist politics ties national strength to patriarchal manhood and the traditional family, treating any deviation as a threat. It exploits sexual anxiety and economic insecurity, fueling panic over race mixing, gender nonconformity, and nontraditional sexuality to reinforce ideals of purity and order.

Sodom and Gomorrah: Fascist politics idealizes rural life as morally pure and central to national strength, while depicting cities as corrupt and influenced by outsiders. Policies are framed to protect rural communities from urban and foreign “contamination.”

Fascism : a populist political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual, that is associated with a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, and that is characterized by severe economic and social regimentation and by forcible suppression of opposition

AND

The 10 pillars of fascism, from the book How Fascim Works, copy and pasted from the book's Wikipedia page for no particular reason:

The mythic past: Fascists draw on a mythical past to justify a glorious future.

Propaganda: Propaganda in fascist politics often operates through inflammatory speech, stirring hostility and manipulating emotions, and displacing reasoned public debate with fear and division.

Anti-intellectual: Fascist politics attacks education, expertise, and language, weakening the tools necessary for informed public debate and leaving power and group identity as the only basis for judgment.

Unreality: By flooding the public space with falsehoods and attacking trusted institutions, fascist politics destabilizes reality and shifts truth from a shared understanding of reality to the authority of a leader.

Hierarchy: Unlike liberal thought, which expands dignity and rights to all, fascist ideology sees hierarchy as rooted in nature, using myths to legitimize dominance by the powerful. Equality is portrayed as a denial of this natural order.

Victimhood: Fascist politics blurs the line between equality and discrimination, portraying the dominant group as victims of a hidden conspiracy

Law and order: A healthy democracy ensures equal justice and mutual respect among citizens and authorities. Fascist law-and-order rhetoric, by contrast, divides society into the naturally lawful and the inherently criminal, portraying those who defy traditional norms, such as women outside gender roles, nonwhites, immigrants, or religious minorities, as threats to order simply by existing.

Sexual anxiety: Fascist politics ties national strength to patriarchal manhood and the traditional family, treating any deviation as a threat. It exploits sexual anxiety and economic insecurity, fueling panic over race mixing, gender nonconformity, and nontraditional sexuality to reinforce ideals of purity and order.

Sodom and Gomorrah: Fascist politics idealizes rural life as morally pure and central to national strength, while depicting cities as corrupt and influenced by outsiders. Policies are framed to protect rural communities from urban and foreign “contamination.”

…an update, on my previous post.

The West Wing - Bible Lesson.

"The death of human empathy is one of the earliest and most telling signs of a culture about to fall into barbarism."

Hey did you know there's a tell all book about the behind the scenes of Meta and the author is forbidden from promoting it?

Well then, I guess we'll have to do it for her.