By Dennis Prager | Townhall.com
Source: AP Photo/Jae C. Hong
As my listeners and readers can hopefully attest, I have
been on a lifelong quest to understand human nature and human behavior. I am
sad to report that I have learned more in the last few years, particularly in
2020, than in any equivalent period of time.
One of the biggest revelations concerns a question that
has always plagued me: How does one explain the "good German," the
term used to describe the average, presumably decent German, who did nothing to
hurt Jews but also did nothing to help them and did nothing to undermine the
Nazi regime? The same question could be asked about the average Frenchman
during the Vichy era, the average Russian under Lenin, Joseph Stalin, Leonid
Brezhnev and their successors, and the millions of others who did nothing to
help their fellow citizens under oppressive dictatorships.
These past few years have taught me not to so quickly
judge the quiet German, Russian, etc. Of course, I still judge Germans who
helped the Nazis and Germans who in any way hurt Jews. But the Germans who did
nothing? Not so fast.
What has changed my thinking has been watching what is
happening in America (and Canada and Australia and elsewhere, for that matter).
The ease with which tens of millions of Americans have
accepted irrational, unconstitutional and unprecedented police state-type
restrictions on their freedoms, including even the freedom to make a living,
has been, to understate the case, sobering.
The same holds true for the acceptance by most Americans
of the rampant censorship on Twitter and all other major social media
platforms. Even physicians and other scientists are deprived of freedom of
speech if, for example, they offer scientific support for hydroxychloroquine
along with zinc to treat COVID-19 in the early stages. Board-certified
physician Dr. Vladimir Zelenko, who has saved hundreds of COVID-19 patients
from suffering and/or death, has been banned from Twitter for publicizing his
lifesaving hydroxychloroquine and zinc protocol.
Half of America, the non-left half, is afraid to speak
their minds at virtually every university, movie studio and large corporation
-- indeed, at virtually every place of work. Professors who say anything that
offends the left fear being ostracized if they have tenure and being fired if
they do not. People are socially ostracized, publicly shamed and/or fired for
differing with Black Lives Matter, as America-hating and white-hating a group
as has ever existed. And few Americans speak up. On the contrary, when BLM
protestors demand that diners outside of restaurants raise their fists to show
their support of BLM, nearly every diner does.
So, then, who are we to condemn the average German who
faced the Gestapo if he didn't salute Hitler or the average Russian who faced
the NKVD (the secret police and intelligence agency that preceded the KGB) if
he didn't demonstrate sufficient enthusiasm for Stalin? Americans face the
left's cancel culture, but not left-wing secret police or reeducation camps.
(At least not yet -- I have little doubt the left would send outspoken
conservatives to reeducation camps if they could.)
I have come to understand the average German living under
Nazism and the average Russian living under communism for another reason: the
power of the media to brainwash.
As a student of totalitarianism since my graduate studies
at the Russian Institute of Columbia University's School of International
Affairs (as it was then known), I have always believed that only in a
dictatorship could a society be brainwashed. I was wrong. I now understand that
mass brainwashing can take place in a nominally free society. The incessant
left-wing drumbeat of The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles
Times and almost every other major newspaper, plus The Atlantic, The New Yorker,
CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, NPR, all of Hollywood and almost every school from
kindergarten through graduate school, has brainwashed at least half of America
every bit as effectively as the German, Soviet and Chinese communist press did
(and in the latter case, still does). That thousands of schools will teach the
lie that is the New York Times' "1619 Project" is one of countless
examples.
Prior to the lockdowns, I flew almost every week of the
year, so I was approached by people who recognized me on a regular basis.
Increasingly, I noticed that people would look around to see if anyone was
within earshot and then tell me in almost a whisper: "I support
Trump" or, "I'm a conservative." The last time people looked
around and whispered things to me was when I used to visit the Soviet Union.
In Quebec this past weekend, as one can see on a viral
video, a family was fined and members arrested because six -- yes, six --
people gathered to celebrate the new year. A neighbor snitched on them, and the
celebrants were duly arrested. The Quebec government lauded the snitches and
asked for more public "collaboration."
Snitches are likewise lauded and encouraged in some
Democrat-run states and cities in America (Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti in
March: "Snitches get rewards") and by left-wing governments in
Australia. Plenty of Americans, Canadians and Australians are only too happy to
snitch on people who refuse to lock down their lives.
All this is taking place without concentration camps,
without a Gestapo, without a KGB and without Maoist reeducation camps.
That's why I no longer judge the average German as easily
as I used to. Apathy in the face of tyranny turns out not to be a German or
Russian characteristic. I just never thought it could happen in America.
Dennis Prager is a nationally syndicated radio talk-show host and columnist. His latest book, published by Regnery in May 2019, is "The Rational Bible," a commentary on the book of Genesis. His film, "No Safe Spaces," was released to home entertainment nationwide on September 15, 2020. He is the founder of Prager University and may be contacted at dennisprager.com.
