Antisemitism and the Origins of Totalitarianism
Benjamin S. Case
If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle. —Sun Tzu, The Art of War Many still consider it an accident that Nazi ideology centered around antisemitism and that Nazi policy, consistently and uncompromisingly, aimed at the persecution and finally the extermination of the Jews. —Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism
During the 2016 election cycle, the political weathervanes turned toward fascism. During Donald Trump’s presidency, we witnessed the disintegration of the body politic and learned just how vulnerable our society is to an authoritarian executive fueled by far-right propaganda. As the Joe Biden administration inevitably fails to deliver on most of its promises and a radicalized right regroups, it is worth now thinking back to 2016. The morning after the November election was surreal; the hatred that Trump’s campaign kicked up had been frightening enough, but few of us really believed Trump could be president. On the eve of the election, just about every poll had Hillary Clinton comfortably ahead. That next morning, my then-partner and I left our Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania apartment and stepped out onto the street just as a city bus was passing by. The digital panel on the side of the bus ominously read: “CHANGES COMING.” After a moment’s discussion, we realized it was a Port Authority message about changing service lines, but the sight had still stopped us wide-eyed in our tracks. Changes were coming. Following Trump’s election, hate crimes skyrocketed, reality seemed to unravel in the mass media, and white identity politics congealed into a potent mainstream force. As civil society watched in horror and disbelief, pundits, public figures, and talking heads turned to political philosopher Hannah Arendt’s 1951 book, The Origins of Totalitarianism, to understand and interpret what was happening.
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