People usually have the wrong idea about totalitarianism, because they assume it is politically-motivated - whereas it is in essence a form of spiritual warfare.
The wrong assumption is that totalitarianism is ultimately trying to control human behaviour, and that thought-control is merely an effective method of inducing the desired behaviours (by getting people to want to do, exactly what The System wants them to do...).
But in fact the opposite is the case: 'total' behavioural-control is just a mechanism for controlling thinking.
Therefore, for totalitarianism thought-control is the aim and its 'end' - and the various social mechanisms - such as omni-surveillance, micro-management, propaganda, terror and pervasive bureaucracy - are merely means to that end.
The sexual revolution provides an illustration. The significance of the perpetual revolution in sexuality and sexual identity is that it is an effective means of spiritual corruption. By monitoring and controlling sexual behaviour, the totalitarian system is able to control thought.
When people are encouraged and compelled to engage in sexual behaviours (spoken, written, social, and physical) that conflict-with and contradict biological functionality and Christian morality, the effect is to control thought in the desired direction - to corrupt by subversion and eventually explicit inversion of The Good.
And that is the purpose. If The System can get people to do wrong, by a system of near-total behaviour control, then evil thinking strongly tends to follow. When actual sexual behaviour is implicitly underpinned by a denial of the objectivity of morality, by materialist assumptions, and by an hedonic ethic - there will usually follow erosion of the ideals of God and eternal life, marriage and family.
By using totalitarian influence and power to effect a revolution in mass human sexual behaviour, the net effect will be self-chosen damnation, a deliberate and explicit embrace of evil and rejection of The Good.
And that is the ultimate objective. Which is why totalitarianism is intrinsically anti-Christian.
This is very rhetorically effective -- not to argue that the sexual revolution is totalitarian, but to use it by-the-way as an example to make a point about totalitarianism in general -- taking it for granted that of course the sexual revolution is totalitarian in nature and that the reader knows that.
ReplyDelete@William - I'm not sure for whom, reading this blog, this might count as rhetoric! Here, I do take it for granted, or else I could never get around to building on the assumption...
ReplyDeleteAs you know, I usually suggest avoiding arguments, and providing 'evidence' when the problem is actually a matter of metaphysical assumptions.
The best - perhaps only - strategy (including rhetorical strategy) is probably to state briefly and clearly the alternative perspective that derives from different metaphysical assumptions; and/or to focus on these metaphysical assumptions from the start - if someone has the ability to concentrate for more than a couple of minutes, and sufficient motivation to allow this.
The death by a thousand small cuts is something I can personally identify with.
ReplyDeleteIt's everywhere too. Even in ambient noises in the city. In someone's expression. Practically in every form of communication imaginable--especially the small unconscious ones--the really important ones I think.