America’s Crossing the Last Lines of Social Collapse

Two Fascist Massacres in 24 Hours? This Is How It Happens — And What It Means

Image Credit: CNN

There were not one but two massacres in America yesterday. In Allen, Texas, a man opened fire at a shopping mall. In Brownsville, Texas, meanwhile, a man drove an SUV into a crowd. Both appear to be intentional, not random acts of violence. In Allen, the gunman was an open supremacist, a fascist.

Does that mean anything to anyone anymore? You see, all figures like me can do is warn you. And today is one of those days where I have to do just that, in uncompromising terms.

America’s now crossing a line. A red one. A final one. The rise of right wing violence is becoming an everyday part of life. Now, massacres are just…regular occurrences. By fascists, fanatics, lunatics. They are beginning to just kill people they think of as subhumans, who don’t belong, aren’t “real” enough. With guns. With cars. With their bare hands.

Two massacres in one day.

Americans, inured to violence, write this kind of thing off. If I open the New York Times or Washington Post, there isn’t even an article connecting the very obvious dots here, or even remarking on the fact that there were two massacres in 24 hours. Sharing motivations. Sharing politics. Sharing an intent to kill the dehumanized. Driven by hate. Occurring in the context of a right wing that’s gone insane with power, on a quest to snatch and steal existence away from anyone it regards as inferior.

Think about what it means when there are two massacres in such a short span of time, by fanatics, and yet it’s not commented on as a shared event, a trend, the crossing of a line.

But it is.

You see, all figures like me can do is warn you. Do you want to know how many societies I’ve seen collapse? The turning points are always — always — the same. By now, we write about them in textbooks, so similar are they. They form a pattern. That pattern goes like this.

An economy stagnates. Demagogues arise. They blame it on powerless and innocent outgroups. The circle of hate extends, soon enough, to include the in-group, too. Now, people of the “right” skin color, faith, what have you, are fair game — just because they’re gay, or women, or read the wrong books. Demagogues target them. They take their rights away. Their basic freedoms — expression, association, privacy, intimacy, movement — go up in smoke, just like that.

And the killing begins. Because the demagogues are telling their flock that the existence of these hated subhumans is not tolerable. It isn’t to be allowed. Hey, we’re taking their existence away politically, eviscerating their basic freedoms. Wouldn’t it be a shame if someone finished the job? Wink-wink, nudge-nudge. It’d sure be a shame if someone did the job of annihilation so we didn’t have to. For example, foot soldiers, in a crusade of purification. Sure would be a shame — wink wink, nudge nudge — if something ultraviolent happened to those people.

Hey, they’re not even people at all! After all, we’re taking their rights away because they don’t deserve to exist. We’re taking their personhood away for a reason. They’re not people. They’re just breeders. Workers. Slaves. They’re a stain, an infection, nothing. Sure would be a shame if someone eliminated these subhumans for us.

Wink wink. Nudge nudge.

A line is crossed. A final one. Violence erupts, at a grass-roots level. The true believers take matters into their own hands. The pattern’s always the same. Let me continue detailing it for you.

These true believers now become terrorists, foot soldiers in a crusade of purification. They begin to attack public spaces and public places. Because that is where the hated subhumans are expressing their basic freedoms, enacting them — and so of course, that is where you attack to send a message, written in blood. They begin to attack shopping malls. Bars and clubs. Schools. Shelters.