>While implying that the US is a totalitaian state will get you lots of up votes from insecure europeans, the word has no meaning if it encompasses the current state of affairs in America.
It would be convenient to keep the word "totalitarianism" forever connected with the very specific practices of Nazi Germany or, say, Stalin's USSR, and only those. Unfortunately the word and the practice existed way before and will continue to exist in the future. And there's not just a single form of it.
One can spend all his life between home, office, some cosy restaurant or cafe, friends house, and never understand anything that's going on in society at large, if he's so inclined. Especialy if he's on the upper echelon, e.g not a black, latino, native american, or "white trash", so he doesn't get to transparently see the structures of totalitarianism in a day by day basis.
Add mass surveillance, three-strike laws that resemble 19th century ethics, the concentrated control of mass media, constant external war, etc etc and you have quite a potent mix.
It would be convenient to keep the word "totalitarianism" forever connected with the very specific practices of Nazi Germany or, say, Stalin's USSR, and only those. Unfortunately the word and the practice existed way before and will continue to exist in the future. And there's not just a single form of it.
One can spend all his life between home, office, some cosy restaurant or cafe, friends house, and never understand anything that's going on in society at large, if he's so inclined. Especialy if he's on the upper echelon, e.g not a black, latino, native american, or "white trash", so he doesn't get to transparently see the structures of totalitarianism in a day by day basis.
From the militarization of police: http://www.amazon.com/Rise-Warrior-Cop-Militarization-Americ...
to cities built for exclusion and closing down of public space: http://www.amazon.com/City-Quartz-Excavating-Future-Angeles/...
to the privitazation of prisons (and the highest incarceration rate of the world by far, surpassing even Stalin's era Gulag percentages when it comes to blacks): http://www.amazon.com/Punishment-Sale-Private-Business-Incar...
to the dwindling middle-class (which is, when it exists, the real pillar of democracy): http://www.amazon.com/Servant-Economy-Americas-Sending-Middl...
Add mass surveillance, three-strike laws that resemble 19th century ethics, the concentrated control of mass media, constant external war, etc etc and you have quite a potent mix.