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They Warned Us in 1945: Fascism in America Would Look Like Patriotism - The Rational League (therationalleague.substack.com)

submitted 5 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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"MAGA was never about policy.

It was never about taxes or trade or immigration, at least not in the ways its supporters claim. It was about fear. About losing status. About the aching dread that the world no longer bends to you. And when power begins to slip, the mind scrambles to make sense of its new fragility. That’s when people reach not for reason, but for revenge (Kelly, 2020; Golec de Zavala & Keenan, 2021)."

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Trump’s followers are not irrational. They are reacting, often viscerally, to a perceived collapse of the world they knew. Crime is down, but they feel unsafe. Immigration enriches the economy, but they feel invaded. Diversity increases opportunity, but they feel erased. Trump doesn’t need to solve these problems. He just needs to affirm that they exist, and promise to punish whoever caused them.

This essay is excellent.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Absolutely. Saved a copy for when it inevitably gets censored. This summation stuck out to me:

We often talk about MAGA as if it were a political disagreement. As if it were about taxes, jobs, or policy platforms. But what the research shows, across neurology, psychology, and political science, is that MAGA is something deeper: an identity reaction to perceived loss. It is fear rebranded as freedom. It is status anxiety rebranded as tradition. It is authoritarian psychology wearing the skin of patriotism.

This isn’t just a movement of bad ideas. It’s a movement of deeply felt insecurity, fused to a political figure who offers vengeance, not vision. And in that fusion, the need for power replaces the desire for truth. The need to dominate replaces the value of liberty. The need to feel morally superior replaces the capacity for self-reflection.