Bookshelf

🎨 Impressions

First published in 2017, this book couldn’t be more timely. The earlier signs were there back then and most people in the Western countries probably thought that the collective drift towards the political right and far-right would be kept in check soon and swing back at some point. And while that happened here and there, it now seems like it’s swinging back even stronger towards the right. What felt like testing the waters just a decade ago is in full swing right now. In the US, where this writer is based, certainly, but also in my home country of Germany, a situation that many people from around the world have noticed due to our horrifically destructive history with right-wing extremism that cost around 60 million people their lives of which around 6 million were systematically murdered by my grandparents’ generation.

We must not forget what a strong emotion hate can be when it’s strategically used by people who are craving unchecked power for power’s sake. No matter what the motivations behind each of the main actors are on the political world stage, they have to be pulled down from their positions as soon as these despicable agendas come to light. Pulled down by us all.

This book is written as a practical guide for every citizen. We need to be able to see the signs and then take meaningful action. It’s easy to feel powerless, but that’s an excuse. We all have to step up and protect the vulnerable people in our society. Democracy only works when everyone is involved.

What I like about the book is the conciseness of it and the variety of the suggestions. Not everyone has to follow all twenty ideas to the fullest, but that’s not necessary. We can all play to our individual strengths and work out in what area we each can make difference. That’s the beauty of a diverse society.

For me personally the chapters with which I resonate and where I will try to make a conscious effort are 1, 2, 4, 5, 9, 10, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 20.

I strongly suggest that everyone read this book. And if you’re in Germany, better do it before the next election on February 23rd, 2025. There’s always a next election, until there suddenly isn’t.

📔 Highlights

Prologue: History and Tyranny

Both fascism and communism were responses to globalization: to the real and perceived inequalities it created, and the apparent helplessness of the democracies in addressing them. Fascists rejected reason in the name of will, denying objective truth in favor of a glorious myth articulated by leaders who claimed to give voice to the people.

1. Do not obey in advance.

In 1941, when Germany invaded the Soviet Union, the SS took the initiative to devise the methods of mass killing without orders to do so. They guessed what their superiors wanted and demonstrated what was possible. It was far more than Hitler had thought. At the very beginning, anticipatory obedience means adapting instinctively, without reflecting, to a new situation.

Milgram grasped that people are remarkably receptive to new rules in a new setting. They are surprisingly willing to harm and kill others in the service of some new purpose if they are so instructed by a new authority. “I found so much obedience,” Milgram remembered, “that I hardly saw the need for taking the experiment to Germany.”

3. Beware the one-party state.

at the federal level, as well as the majority of statehouses. The party that exercises such control proposes few policies that are popular with the society at large, and several that are generally unpopular—and thus must either fear democracy or weaken it.

4. Take responsibility for the face of the world.

What might seem like a gesture of pride can be a source of exclusion.

5. Remember professional ethics.

If members of the professions confuse their specific ethics with the emotions of the moment, however, they can find themselves saying and doing things that they might previously have thought unimaginable.

8. Stand out.

It is those who were considered exceptional, eccentric, or even insane in their own time—those who did not change when the world around them did—whom we remember and admire today.

9. Be kind to our language.

Watching televised news is sometimes little more than looking at someone who is also looking at a picture. We take this collective trance to be normal. We have slowly fallen into it.

11. Investigate.

It is your ability to discern facts that makes you an individual, and our collective trust in common knowledge that makes us a society. The individual who investigates is also the citizen who builds. The leader who dislikes the investigators is a potential tyrant.

Like Hitler, the president used the word lies to mean statements of fact not to his liking, and presented journalism as a campaign against himself.

We find it natural that we pay for a plumber or a mechanic, but demand our news for free. If we did not pay for plumbing or auto repair, we would not expect to drink water or drive cars. Why then should we form our political judgment on the basis of zero investment? We get what we pay for.

although we may not see the other person in front of his or her computer, we have our share of responsibility for what is on the screen. If we can avoid doing violence to the minds of unseen others on the internet, others will learn to do the same.

12. Make eye contact and small talk.

people who were living in fear of repression remembered how their neighbors treated them. A smile, a handshake, or a word of greeting—banal gestures in a normal situation—took on great significance.

Having old friends is the politics of last resort. And making new ones is the first step toward change.

13. Practice corporeal politics.

Protest can be organized through social media, but nothing is real that does not end on the streets. If tyrants feel no consequences for their actions in the three-dimensional world, nothing will change.

17. Listen for dangerous words.

People who assure you that you can only gain security at the price of liberty usually want to deny you both.

Epilogue: History and Liberty

When exactly was the “again” in the president’s slogan “Make America great again”? Hint: It is the same “again” that we find in “Never again.”