The Religion of Totalitarianism

Is Government the New God? – The Religion of Totalitarianism

Since the birth of totalitarianism in the 20th century much has been written about this form of rule and millions have read George Orwell’s depiction of it in the classic novel 1984. But what is often overlooked is that totalitarianism is more than just a political system, it is a fanatical religion, and this religion is spreading across the globe with a ferocity not seen since the mid-20th century. In this video we are going to investigate the religious nature of totalitarianism in the recognition that we must know our enemy if we are to defeat it. Shortly after fleeing Nazi Germany, the political scientist Waldemar Gurian wrote the following:

“The totalitarian movements that have arisen after the First World War are basically religious movements. Their aim is not only to change political and social institutions, but also to remodel the nature of man and society.” 

Waldemar Gurian, The Totalitarian State

Totalitarianism shares many characteristics with organized religions. For example, Christianity and Islam are built on the belief of a future golden age that will be ushered in with the second coming of Christ. Totalitarianism movements share a similar idea – but instead of a god or prophet that transforms the world, totalitarian movements are built on the belief that mankind can recreate the world and a new golden age can be constructed under the direction of the all-powerful and all-controlling State.

“. . .in consequence [of the decline of Christianity],” writes Carl Jung” the [religious] projections have largely fallen away from the divine figures and have necessarily settled in the human sphere…the [modern] “enlightened” intellect cannot imagine anything greater than . . . those tin gods with totalitarian pretensions who call themselves State . . .” 

Carl Jung, Practice of Psychotherapy

This belief that it is possible for a centralized, all-powerful State to radically change society for the better is why Hannah Arendt wrote that:

“…[totalitarianism] is not a government in any traditional sense, but a movement. . .” 

Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism

In the totalitarian movements of the past, this golden age was envisioned to be one of racial purity, or a Communist utopia of equality, efficiency, and prosperity for all. Today this totalitarian “golden age” is one in which mankind exists in harmony with mother earth, or in its more extreme form, an age where man merges with machine and transcends biological limitations of disease and death. Needless to say, totalitarian utopias never come to fruition, for as Karl Popper warned:

“The attempt to make heaven on earth invariably produces hell.” 

Karl Popper, The Open Society and its Enemies

These utopian visions do, however, succeed in stimulating the religious enthusiasm of the masses and totalitarians use these visions to convince the population that the utopian end justifies any, and all, means – be it mass-surveillance, censorship, widespread oppression, mass-imprisonment, or even the extermination of groups of people. Or as Barry Goldwater explains:

“Those who seek absolute power, even though they seek it to do what they regard as good, are simply demanding the right to enforce their own version of heaven on earth. And let me remind you, they are the very ones who always create the most hellish tyrannies. Absolute power does corrupt, and those who seek it must be suspect and must be opposed.”

In the totalitarian religion, there are the chosen people and there are the sinners. The chosen ones naïvely believe in the possibility of a paradisal future and the ability of the state to be the vehicle to effectuate this transformation. They are the pious who follow the State’s commands with unquestioning obedience. 

The sinners are the non-believers. They are the heretics who stand in the way of the so-called “greater good” and prevent the forward march of history. To use an analogy offered by the Polish philosopher Zygmunt Bauman, the totalitarians see the earth as a garden to which they are anointed to cultivate, and the sinners as the weeds that must be exterminated to bring about the full flowering of the totalitarian utopia:

“All [totalitarian] visions of society-as-garden define parts of the social habitat as human weeds. Like all other weeds, they must be segregated, contained, prevented from spreading, removed and kept outside the society boundaries; if all these means prove insufficient, they must be killed.”

Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust

But removing the weeds is only one part of the totalitarian religious movement; the remaining citizens must be turned into totalitarian true believers who inwardly assent to a life of strict conformity and obedience to authority. For in totalitarianism, the mere outward display of compliance is not enough. Like all fanatical religions, totalitarian movements seek to control the innermost thoughts of its followers. Referring to Mussolini’s fascist dictatorship in Italy, Giovanni Amendola explained:

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