Unserious and More than a Little Authoritarian

Forget issues of offense for the moment, or even questions of whether things like the following are distractions meant to divert us from paying attention to more serious matters. The bottom line is that stuff like Trump-as-Pope tweets from the official White House Twitter feed is a combination of juvenile and bush-league authoritarianism.

And, stuff like this is likewise so very Kim Jung Un-esque. (Not to mention that Sith are the ones with red light sabers–but a guy with a geeky podcast can’t help but point that out).

The whole make-Trump-a-muscleman thing is also just so profoundly strange.

But, of course, these are the same folks who brought us the following.

Ultimately, this is just propaganda to prop up the Strong Man (because he is actually weak).

I am reminded of the role of the leader in fascist regimes. I am also reminded of Stanley stating, in the introduction of his book, How Fascism Works, the following: “The most telling symptom of fascist politics is its division. It aims to separate a population into an ‘us’ and a ‘them’” (xxx).

I usually think about such divisions as the kind of thing we see with Trump and his view of immigrants. But the whole point of these tweets is to signal which team one is on. If you “get the joke,” then you are on Team Trump, but if you react negatively, you are one of the others. It is intended to divide. It is an official White House communication source actively trolling the population.

I would also note that we see here unreality via propaganda. For more on this, see my post Defining and Discussing Fascism (Part I).