No matter the chaos in the world, the perils of its geopolitical landscape, or the stumbling march of new technology, it’s important to remember one thing: we’re already living out someone’s future; an event landscape and social tumult imagined or prophesized by others.
That’s not to say all prophets have been correct. Indeed, most—including anything to do with religion—have been dead wrong. Some hit a few targets (Orwell’s doublespeak, Eisenhower’s warnings about the military-industrial complex). Others have their projections adjusted (hello Nostradamus!) to make them relevant, usually by those who would benefit from an “I told you so” trope. And, of course, there have been many so-called false prophets.
False prophets claim the gift of divine inspiration—in some cases to actually speak for a god—or make such claims for evil ends. Religious texts, predictably and comically, are riddled with references and warnings about such grifters (Deuteronomy, a cross-platform tract, touts a particularly scary one: “But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name that I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die”) while claiming to channel the real word of one of the world’s several-thousand gods and themselves prophesizing a whole shit-ton of now-provable ridiculousness.
Because any disciple, acolyte or cult member will, by design, warn against listening to anyone but their leader, false prophets aren’t easily separated from the real deal, and can thus go on to greatness or not-so-greatness depending on their marketing savvy. The result is can’t-make-this-stuff-up vignettes that play like Saturday Night Live sketches. Say, a convicted felon hawking bibles to raise money for his presidential campaign (“It’s a terrific bible—the best bible”). Thus entreated, devout Christians across the United States are again poised to vote for the demonstrably most un-Christ-like person ever to occupy America’s highest office, a man who, under false pretenses, incited an insurrection that cost lives and livelihoods. Outsiders looking on wonder How is such mass hypocrisy even possible?
It’s possible because that’s how fascism works.
When chaos reigns, fascism—an authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization—thrives. Creating disorder and inciting violence, fascists up their chances of seizing control by promising to restore order. And if they can leverage a human-organizing principle like elections or religion along the way, all the better.
Of course, no politician or movement pronounces themselves fascist. It happens when the rest of us don’t pay close-enough attention, building slowly on well-recognized tenets: supremacy of the military, protection of corporate power, suppression of labour, obsession with crime and punishment, disdain for intellectuals, science and the arts (you know—the things that actually give a country its identity), manipulation of elections, and the intertwining of religion with government—often covertly to create what amounts to a functional theocracy.
The latter has boiled under the surface of U.S. Republicanism since evangelical Christians used talk radio to elect Ronald Reagan in 1980, and has only increased since. George Bush Jr. claimed to be on a mission from God and held prayer meetings in his situation room while bombing away the lives of almost a million innocent civilians in the Middle East. Yet this is nothing compared to recent events.
With Trump seemingly having the coming U.S. election in the bag, it was revealed that a playbook for a Christo-fascist America known as Project 2025 had already been drawn up. Its chief architect, Kevin Roberts of the Heritage Foundation, went on record saying that having a child shouldn’t be an “optional individual decision.” Translation: women shouldn’t have a choice in the matter. Lest anyone think There’s no way, hidden-camera video shows a Project 2025 co-author discussing how he’d already drafted “hundreds of executive orders” for Trump’s second term. With such a post-election bomb to detonate, it’s no wonder proponents embedded in various state governments were already busy softening up the ground by enshrining prayer in public schools while banning books and various educational topics.
This is boilerplate fascism once power is gained, but getting there still requires the creation of chaos and scapegoats. Blaming immigrants for a country’s problems instead of the banksters and capital class is an orthodoxy that has run unaltered from Franco, Mussolini and Hitler through today’s cadre of neo-fascists (i.e., fascism light—without the public hangings) of Trump, Bolsanaro, Orban and Canada’s own wannabe badboy Pierre Poilievre: slogans like “Make America Great Again” and “Bring it Home” are clear semaphores for “We’re gonna take our country back from these people.” (A recent Trump quote, also once uttered word-for-word by David Duke, the Louisiana Republican who failed to gain a nomination to run for president in 1988 due to his rabid antisemitism, racism and former post of grand wizard of the KKK). Just this week, Trump said he’d use the military to expel immigrants and maintain civilian order. (Again, you can’t make this stuff up.)
Of course, this was predicted back in 1919, when Eugene Debs said, “In every age it has been the tyrant who wraps himself in the cloak of patriotism, religion, or both.” Debs’ insight describes fascism’s most dangerous quality and ultimate incarnation—disguising itself in the ideologies of the society in which it arises by morphing them into deceptive mythologies with familiar, slogan-driven rhetoric. These promulgate the notion that none of the injustices and challenges in society are endemic to the system, but the product of corruption and conspiracy by ethnic minorities, establishment elites, and the left. The aim is to convince folks that rooting this out requires a “strongman” (or woman)—which often leads to dictatorship.
“By this logic President Donald Trump is a fascist,” wrote Jacob Ostfeld in the Harvard Political Review in 2021. “This much, if not already apparent, was made clear on Jan. 6. The Capitol break-in merged tyrannical ideals with the incitement of violence, two telltale qualities of an aspiring fascist demagogue. But no fascist leader can be effective without a cadre of zealous supporters.”
In this case supporters who bought into the myth of systemic voter fraud despite a complete lack of evidence. How to prevent such things from happening again? The answer lies in understanding that fascism transcends politics, and that at its core is always mythology—the mythology of false prophets.
Leslie Anthony is a science/environment writer and author who holds a doctorate in reversing political spin. n
