Gilad Atzmon – gilad.co.uk Dec 29, 2020
Revisiting Theodore W. Adorno’s work on the ‘authoritarian personality’ and the ‘F Scale’ reveals that in 2020, it is actually liberals, progressives and the so called ‘Left’ that manifest 8 out of the 9 most problematic, antidemocratic and authoritarian attitudes.
The theory of an authoritarian personality was introduced in the 1930s in an attempt to explain the mass appeal of fascism and right-wing ideologies. It came to life in the wake of a sharp rise in the popularity of fascist movements in many European societies in the inter-war period.
At the time, many European ideologists and intellectuals were deeply inspired by Marx and Freud. Marxism predicted that the great depression would translate into a vast shift in working class conciousness, materialising into a global socialist revolution. Of course, this didn’t happen. The economic crisis resulted instead in mass support for nationalist and fascist movements that were often deeply anti-Semitic.
The rational behind the above deviation from the Marxist prophecy borrowed some Freudian theoretical mechanisms. ‘People are authoritarians’ was the given ‘explanation’: under certain threatening conditions ‘authoritarian characters’ are emotionally and cognitively vulnerable to the appeal of fascist and nationalist ideologies.
During the 1930s a score of Jewish Germanic intellectuals mainly (but not at all) associated with the Frankfurt School (e.g., Wilhelm Reich) were committed to point at the psychological and socio-economic conditions responsible for the making of the Authoritarian personality.
In his 1933 work The Mass Psychology of Fascism, Wilhelm Reich attempted to explain the striking victory of ‘reactionary’ fascism over ‘progressive’ communism. Reich was desperate to rescue the relevance of revolutionary Marxism. To do so, he formed a new ‘post-Marxist’ theoretical outlook to explain why the Germans of his time favoured ‘authoritarianism’ over a ‘preferable’ communist revolution.
Reich reckoned that the attraction of ‘reactionary’ and ‘conservative’ politics and the inclination towards fascism is driven by a long history of rigid, authoritarian patriarchy which affects family, parenting, primal education and eventually, society as a whole. In an attempt to save society from fascism, Reich synthesized Marx and Freud into a ‘sexual revolution.’
In 1950, the Frankfurt School’s prominent intellectual Theodor W. Adorno, along with others, published The Authoritarian Personality, a collection of studies that became a prime academic text in the domain of social science. In this volume Adorno and others delved into the theory of the authoritarian personality and reported the results of a decade-long research in testing the theory.
Bearing in mind the origins of many of its members and the prime intellectual objective of the Frankfurt School, it is far from surprising that the investigation had begun with an attempt to explain the psychological roots of anti-Semitism: the assumption was that authoritarian personalities manifest some ethnocentric patterns that come to life with xenophobic inclinations and a dislike of out-groups and minorities.
Adorno & co. reduced the authoritarian personality into a set of nine ‘implicitly antidemocratic,’ attitudes and beliefs. Adorno believed that it was possible to identify authoritarian personalities by the degree to which people would agree with these nine attitudes. The nine fascist attitudes; are briefly summarised here:
- Conventionalism: Adherence to conventional values.
- Authoritarian Submission: Towards ingroup authority figures.
- Authoritarian Aggression: Against people who violate conventional values.
- Anti-Intraception: Opposition to subjectivity and imagination.
- Superstition and Stereotypy: Belief in individual fate; thinking in rigid categories.
- Power and Toughness: Concerned with submission and domination; assertion of strength.
- Destructiveness and Cynicism: hostility against human nature.
- Projectivity: Perception of the world as dangerous; tendency to project unconscious impulses.
- Sex: Overly concerned with modern sexual practices.
Reviewing the relevance of Adorno’s take on authoritarianism in the light of the current global pandemic hysteria or the battle over the integrity of the American presidential election may reveal that in accordance with the F Scale, it is actually progressives, liberals and the so called ‘Left’ who are manifesting the most problematic antidemocratic authoritarian patterns:
- According to Adorno, Fascists ‘adhere to conventional values.’
In 2020 ‘conventional values’ are practically dictated by so-called ‘liberal’ and ‘progressive’ ‘community standards’ as defined by Twitter, FB and Google. These conventional values are often validated by ‘factcheckers,’ occasionally substantiated by conventions rather than anything that resembles factual research, academic or theoretical study.
- Adorno insists that Authoritarians submit to ingroup authority figures.
But in 2020 it is actually progressives and liberals who adhere to the ‘epidemiological ingroup authority’ of Bill Gates. Similarly, Anthony Fauci is for progressives a supreme judge on public health matters. How many colossal blunders should we take from Imperial College London before this institution is dismantled? Similarly, you may want to ask yourself who in America tends to believe its ‘ingroup’ pollsters despite the fact that they prove to be colossally wrong time after time?
- Adorno tells us that fascists manifest authoritarian aggression against people who violate conventional values.
As things stand ‘cancel culture’ is actually a progressive/liberal operational mode. People see their culture being cancelled for exploring critical views of conventional thoughts that are precious to progressives. It is hardly a secret that there is a growing fear amongst the wider public of expressing criticism, let alone doubts on a number of progressive issues, as such conduct could lead to vile aggression.
- Adorno insists that Fascists oppose to subjectivity and imagination.
In reality it is progressive algorithms that are set by ‘liberals’ at Twitter and FB to trace and punish those who dare to explore subjective ideas about COVID-19, Trump, gender, Palestine or Soros. The progressive notion of political correctness is in itself a tyrannical call designed to suppress any form of subjectivity or imagination.
- According to Adorno Fascists are superstitious and think in a stereotypical manner, they believe in individual fate and think in rigid categories.
Sadly, it is actually progressives and liberals who succumb to rigid categories such as ‘white,’ ‘privileged,’ ‘conspiracy theorists,’ ‘anti-Semites,’ ‘supremacists,’ ‘racists.’ ‘deplorables’ and so on. In the world in which we live, a significant number of American voters express doubts about the last election’s integrity but their voice is institutionally ignored because they are ‘white,’ ‘conspiratorial,’ and generally ‘deplorable.’ Similarly, many Westerners express scepticism about COVID-19 vaccines, yet the so called ‘liberal’ mainstream media wouldn’t let their voices be heard let alone explored. The COVID-sceptics are presented as ‘delusional’ and ‘conspiracy theorists.’ Whether this is indeed the case or not, it is rather evident that it is progressives and liberals who actually operate within a rigid intellectual realm made of strict categories.
- Adorno insists that Fascists are obsessed with domination.
In 2020 it is actually the liberal and progressive internet giants from Google to Amazon that celebrate their domineering powers eliminating those whom they do not agree with, deleting their pages, fiddling with their rankings and practically eliminate their thoughts. This is what book burning means in 2020. You may also ask yourself who often exercises violence against statues, adhering to the foolish belief that defacing a statue equals ‘rewriting history.’
- Authoritarians can’t handle cynicism. They are hostile towards the human nature, Adorno says
I ask myself who is chasing comedians, artists, authors, scientists who dare to mock contemporary hegemonic discourses. How many books were burned by Amazon? How many lectures and videos were removed by Google/YouTube? In the world in which we live, liberals and progressives censor elected politicians and mark their comments.
- Adorno believed that Fascists perceive the world as a dangerous place and they tend to attribute their own unconscious impulses to others
In the upside-down world in which we live, it is actually the so-called right wing and nationalists who constantly refuse to be tormented by global threats: whether it is global warming or pandemics. It is the ‘Left’, liberals and progressives who succumb to every possible global warning whether factual or imaginary. As we will read shortly, in the world in which we live it is not the right-wing or the nationalist who ‘projects’ his or her symptoms. It is actually right-wing Americans who are otherized and suppressed to the point that they struggle to see their vision being heard let alone discussed by mainstream media.
- Adorno believed that fascists and authoritarians are overly concerned with modern sexual practices.
This is the only criterion that genuinely relates to contemporary conservatives. It is fair to argue that conservatives are still succumbing to the idea that gender is a binary matter. They also adhere to family and church values. However, this doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with ‘fascism ‘or ‘authoritarianism.’ People who believe that gender is a binary matter can often argue their case and also discuss any other topic in the frankest manner.
A current examination of Adorno’s F-Scale and the Authoritarian Personality reveals that it is actually progressives and liberals who manifest the quintessential fascist tendencies. While contemporary conservative and nationalist correlation with the F Scale may not grow beyond 0.12 (1 trait out of 9) liberal and progressive correlation with Adorno’s F scale can rise up to 0.88 (8 out of 9).
Was Adorno totally wrong then? Not necessarily. Adorno’s F Scale describes the authoritarian condition that is characteristic of hegemony, domination and a particularly exceptionalist world view. In the 1930s some European right-wing nationalist ideologists evolved into radical exceptionalism. The F scale describes their attitude accurately. Nowadays, that sense of exceptionalism and chosenism is progressive territory, as progressives happen to be people who believe that others are reactionary. Progressives, as such, are people who believe themselves to be chosen.
The fight against anti-Semitism and the attempt to understand its roots was at the heart of Adorno and the Frankfurt School’s work. Bizarrely, Adorno’s F Scale is an adequate description of the Jewish condition. Each of Adorno’s F scale authoritarian traits can be traced at the core of Judaic beliefs and thought; Judaism is a rigid authoritarian adherence to Mitzvoth (conventional values). It demands the total rule of Rabbis (Authoritarian Submission). It doesn’t tolerate any form of deviation (Authoritarian Aggression). It is superstitious and lumps the ‘goyim’ in a stereotypical manner (Superstition and Stereotypy) and so on. It is therefore plausible that those ‘attitudes’ which Adorno attributed to fascists by means of projection are those which Adorno actually found in himself. Such an observation of Adorno’s project would validate the work of the great philosopher Otto Weininger, who proclaimed that that which we hate in others is that which we hate in ourselves.
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Good article by Gilad. In fact I’d say it’s one of his best.
The Frankfurt school’s main job was to promote communism in the west. And they did this by taking indoctrinating the youngest generations through an agenda of heavy indoctrination into hating their nation, through the promotion of feminism, LGBTQ+, anti Christianity, nihilism, atheism and of course sex.
It was overwhelmingly obvious that seeing as fascism, national socialism, in fact any form of nationalism, was detrimental to communism, the Frankfurt School critical theorists had to do their best to demonize these ideologies as much as they could, to the point that today, people are revulsed by the sheer mention of either ideologies. This shows their success in making the nation hate itself, which was one of the primary goals of the school, along with the promotion of Marxism.
And Gilad, correctly shows that everything Adorno, linked (wrongly) with Fascism, actually describes to the ‘T’ the indoctrinated and brainwashed pupil of the Marxist school, in the west. As Gilad calls them – liberals and progressives (‘today’s’ socialists and communists).
Gilad also points out that the work of the Frankfurt School Marxist (mostly Jews) was to indoctrinate and brainwash people into loving Jews and to attack anyone didn’t and criticized Jews. Frankfurt school Marxism was, therefore, a heavy indoctrination into ‘Semitism’, which is of course BS, because the JEW is not, nor ever has been of the line of Shem. The Israelites, on the other hand, are Shemites, who just so happen to be the European peoples. The Jews ARE Cainites and Canaanites.
And this was the very reason they fled Germany, when Hitler got into power, because they knew, without any shadow of a doubt, that Hitler would put them up against a wall and shoot them, seeing how destructive their agenda was. And what did the west do? Yup, they embraced them, put them all into top positions of power in academia and the msm, gave them 100% freedom to teach and promote their ideology and voila, here we are in the mess we are today because of it. McCarthy OF COURSE, tried to warn all of us about it, but academia and the msm (controlled by the very people’s he tried to warn us about) laughed at him and told society he was talking rubbish. Roll on 70 years and we’re right back at the time of McCarthy, yet again, where whistleblowers and being demonized (and worse arrested) who should try to awaken the public to the agenda that’s going on, again the work of the Jew.
The Frankfurt school has been instrumental in utterly indoctrinating people into being unable to think for themselves, so much so that the minute the truth is presented to them, they immediately go into cognitive dissonance mode and break down, resorting to subjective attacks. ‘Ideological subversion’ is another name for the work of the Frankfurt school Marxists and there’s really nothing that can be done to change the minds, the heavily indoctrinated and brainwashed minds of the overwhelming majority. So, in essence, the vaccination SHOULD be taken by as many people as possible, to cull a a large majority of the population, because they are ALWAYS going to be opposition to those who know the truth and are trying to stop the creation of the Jewish, new world order.
Thank you…..hit nail on head
“The Jews will sell you any dream you please for small change.” –Juvenal
Jesus, Marx, Lenin, Einstein, Freud, Adorno, Musk, Gates, Spielberg etc…all Jews, selling their dreams/scams…which the dumb goyim believe & buy..
I read the first bit. I keep saying it, there is no real left. Why does The Zionist Party of England support immigration? First, they don’t support this policy to make working sheeple better off. The main reason for the Red Tories to support immigration is in the hope that most immigrants will vote Zionist. It is a well-known fact that many Zionist Party MPs support the privatisation of the NHS. Sir Kier Establishment Starmer supports his mates in the Tory party over lockdowns. Ignore the face value of this support. The Tories want to gut the UK economy so they can turn it into Malaysia 2 & the Red Tories support lockdowns because they figure that the more economic damage, the more likely the sheeple will vote for them.
You think there is a left-wing in Amerika? Well, just take a look at Biden’s voting record over his very long political career. There is nothing left-wing about Biden.
It suits the elites to believe that there is a right-wing, which does exist, and a left-wing which is total fakery perpetuated by the right-wing fake news. Extinction Rebellion and Greta Thunberg are not socialists, they are not left-wing. They do not want to improve the lives of sheeple. In fact, ER is a death cult and many so-called greens want massive sheeple death.
I’ve no idea why Gilad uses this outdated terminology? Maybe he does it because it is very hard to debate and educate the sheeple without resorting to the establishment labeling systems.
The 1930s was a very different period from what we know today.. Most of today’s working classes believe they are middle class… crazy. My grandmother was real upper-middle class. She and my grandfather never needed to work. She had her own stockbroker. She never had a mortgage. She paid cash for everything. She was an old fashioned liberal. Talking about money just wasn’t done. As a child, I asked how much money she had? She said “Not a lot’ which was just being polite. But she did say, that if she wanted to make a lot of money, she could do it. I only had an interest because I heard a few conversations about selling shares & just off the top of my head, she wanted to sell 800 BP shares. What I am trying to say is that language and conditions have changed since the1930s, and it is rather foolish to use it to contextualise today’s problems. This is where people fall down when they quote Karl Marx. Many statements attributed to Marx have been twisted by academia & fake news presstitues.
Adorno is what the bully starts saying when he is getting an overdue kicking. “The Fascist not like subjectivity like when me say 2 plus 2 equals 97”. And all of Infowars have been saying all along that “the Left are the real Fascists”
Spot on.
Gilad is a brilliant mind.
He quite rightly keeps matters of the Spirit out of this essay, because that is not in its remit.
The irony is that the ultimate motivation behind this is NOT a Socialist Utopia but the Satanic elimination of Christianity and the imposition on the entire World of the Rule of Evil.
Only God can sort this out, but only if enough men and women Pray like it depends on God and Act -in unison – as if it depends on them.
Ephesians 6:12
Power is its own ideology.
“Left” and “Right” are just a Punch & Judy show. In reality, the overlords sponsor both of them, and always have.
Do we ever know what is true or false we have been lied to for so long, manipulated and deceived that we now do not know which way to turn. Here we are again being lied to and deceived bullied and threatened Lockdowns stifled controlled and made to look like fools. Pummeled and bashed every bloody second on the media in the papers everywhere you turn signs that tell us their is a deadly virus on the loose when their is nothing of the sort. A PM who stands on tv in front of millions with his henchmen beside him lies spilling from his mouth with a smile on his face knowing all the time the intention is to get us to take a dangerous toxic cosh in a syringe full of deadly diseases that will kill us and that generations yet to be born will stand no chance of being healthy instead born twisted mangled from the genes that have been changed and passed on. We should storm in our thousands the vipers nest and drag them out of office. I cannot think of anything more hellish then what we are all being put through at this time. All this is bad enough what is it going to be like when it really gets going.
Carl Jones —
Excellent comments.
As to your question, “I’ve no idea why Gilad uses this outdated terminology?”
I think I know: An awful lot of political thinkers and writers and activists are locked in the 1930s.
I mean that literally. They think in terms of Red and Black and are even digging up the old COMINTERN phrase, “Objective;y pro-Fascist.”
What’s objectively pro-fascist? Anyone NOT supporting Progressive (sic) causes such as open migration, black lives matter, all of it.
It’s total cult reasoning: Totally agree with them or you are the enemy. It’s so bad that the old antiwar Left is ashamed they helped all this happen.
So What?
We all knew already judaism and zionism was fascism, of the bad sort.
It has been that since 2000 years.
Nothing new.
And by the way.
Atzmon was early out, talking about a criminal investigation on covid1984.
Why isn’t he doin dat?
We know Frankfurt School was a iewes gig.
Its like part of the protocol.
And like clever accusers, they embody what they criticize.
Please mr get a new subject!
Fascist State ?? I don’t see here any Mussolini ideas , but I see mostly Trotsky & Pol Pot’s ideas …
there is right fascism + left fascism + islam fascism + zionistfascism.
in old Rome the taxmen carried their bundle of fasci sticks + an axe
(lictor bundle)to punish the germanic tribes which didnt pay tax . so,
it does not matter which ideology is behind . punishment its in every
case.
Classical liberalism is not the liberalism of today which is essentially a liberation from rules and conventions which stand in the way of what you want. Clearly, in the West the way to power by the communists has been mainly through deception.
Atsmon unfortunately does not give us a clear picture of what has gone on with the communist takeover in the form of a very fascist-looking globalist movement. That was not his intention, but that is the elephant in the room right now, and in no way are we going to see much light on the problem by seeing how modern liberals have become the source of the new totalitarian world order taking shape.
Also, if anyone wants to get caught up on how the communists have subverted the West they have to go a little deeper than citing the Frankfurt school and various New York and London Jewish financial tycoons advancing the tyranny wherever they could. The Marxist-Leninist-Stalinist goal of establishing a materialistic “workers paradise” and their so-called “classless society” through violent revolution and oppression, only worked in nations where there was already a deep divide between the two camps of the “oppressed” people and the oppressive superstructure of capitalism. In Western civilization there was a complex homogeneity among all classes, which required other tactics to tear down and overthrow. The major obstacle of communism in the West has been its 2,000 years of a culture built on the Christian faith, politics, art, literature, wars, peace, commerce, and a higher standard of living for the alleged “oppressed” masses than in most other cultures in history.
Without getting into the differences between Christian universalism and Jewish exclusivity and what it means to be “chosen”, which has something to do with a history of Jewish and Masonic establishment leaders wanting to sweep away the traditional roots of Christianity, the Marxist-Leninists particularly from the time the Soviets under Brezhnev realized that to overthrow the West, their means had to be two-pronged – overt on one hand where a revolution could be engineered, and on the other hand, covert or subversive, like what they knew was effective from the tactics of the Frankfurt school in America and in other Western nations. It was mainly the influence Antonio Gramsci, a communist thinker who died in an Italian prison in 1937, that the USSR later did an about face from their tactics of overtly opposing cultural oppositions in the West to communism.
In 1985 the Soviets trotted out Mikhail Gorbachev to put a human face on communism. Coincidentally this in precisely the same decade in which the two great international banking dynasties of the West (the banking cartel), largely responsible for the spawning of communism everywhere, had expanded global trade to include a very broke communist China which at the same time was rich in low-cost labor. At this same time after opening up trade and developing China they were planning their control of 21st century, in what they revealed as Agenda 21 at the Earth Summit in Rio in 1992.
Gorbachevism is Gramscism to its core, and “globalism” is just one more name for communism – tis final stage.
“Gramsci is best known for his theory of cultural hegemony, which describes how the state and ruling capitalist class – the bourgeoisie – use cultural institutions to maintain power in capitalist societies.” Wiki
In this respect the Catholic Church, which was the principal foe to communism in the West, was systematically subverted by Gramscism ever since the pontificate of John XXIII in 1958. That was where the roots of Glasnost really began. Both followers of the Frankfurt school and disciples of Gramsci have infiltrated secular and religious institutions, including the entire democratic process everywhere, stripping away our cultural and constitutional roots making way for their globalist “paradise” enforced by their totalitarian controls.
As for fascism, Hitler who also was a socialist admired the brutal methods of Stalin. Today we see instruments such as Kill Gatea and Darth Schwab working to impose more of a fascist world order through a corporatocracy and a technocracy enforced by government oppression, but at the heart of everything Agenda 21/2030 “sustainable development” is just more communist subversion using tactics such as fabrication, provocation, penetration, diversion, deception, disinformation and wet work. What we see emerging with the planned leveling and likely privation of the globalist movement, is both totalitarianism and communism.
The Jew will only be satisfied when every white Gentile is exterminated from the face of the earth.
And if you speak out about this you are labled as Anti semtic.
The Jew has No idea of what he is creating. The day will come when Jews will not be liked or loved. They may have a fake country but besides that all they have is a rotten past of perpetually VICTIMHOOD.
Have you noticed that the Jew never tells you why they are loathed.
Why did 109 countries throughout History removed THESE parasites for doing exactly what they are doing now which is Terrorism.
Thats right Adolf Hitler had a brillant plan.
No offical document has ever been shown that states a FINAL SOLUTION FOR THE JEW. Yes Adolf wanted them gone from Europe.
The Jew is a leech of epic proportions. The Jew will drive a stake through youre heart and smile at you whilst you take your final breathe.
I hold the Jew responsible for every Evil in this world.
Its the Jew that pushes Degeneration and debauchery on the masses.
Take a look at the So called Holy land of Israel where a Massive PRIDE FEST of FAGS AND QUEERS. And they say the Jews are Gods chosen.
What God choses a certain people to genocide another in the Palestinians. What gives them the right to subjugate these Arabs.
Yes Ive tried to tolerate the Jew yet i cant or wont.
Thanks to some jewish people whom have enlightened me about Judaism and Zionsim..
They are the same.
Hans,
That is utter jew bullshit!
There is only one Fascism, formed to fight against marxism/communism/bolshevism. It is not right nor left, again, jewish dialectic bullshit, IT IS FASCISM.
Why am I constantly on “truth sites” putting people right on the real meaning of Fascism and not the hollywood caricature that they propagate. These people are supposed to be awake to the jew question, or, do they know exactly what they do and are infiltrators (shills).
Read this excellent book on real Fascism and learn:
https://archive.org/details/100QuestionsAboutFascism
Ross: YOU need to be very careful on here. You are not allowed to say: “It is not right nor left” (fascism). I can think of a very long list of commentators who will abuse you no end for holding this valid opinion.
There are climate change fascists, there are LGBT fascists, there are fat fascists, there are all kinds of political fascists, there are cyclist fascists, vegan fascists, animal fascists… in fact, the list is endless. We have two fairly recent additions to the fascist clan & they are technocrats and the medical world. I can’t say medical elite, because once you put economic consideration directly on the shoulders of doctors, they soon develop extreme prejudices. Doctors do this so they can come to terms with the awful decisions that they are forced to make. Doctors make decisions all the time and they are very well taught how to do this & it is very normal, but doctors now make decisions that are not based on medical practice, but on hospital management diktat and in the UK, what the regime is will to spend. This is fascism. Here in the UK, the MHRA is a fascist organisation that prices human life based on what money they wish to give to big pharma. An excellent example of this is chemo, which actually kills the patient. Over 90% of US oncologists would not have chemo for themselves and would not recommend chemo for their families.