End of Hope
The World War II was a unique event. Knowing the humans, normally hardline tribal and territorial bastards, it takes a lot to make long time rivals who were just recently busy trying to genocide each other, freak out and simultaneously arrive at the same conclusion: whatever that was, we've had enough of it.
Some fellas did some serious brainstorming back then, and identified the root cause to the best of their ability. The Fascism henceforth, was set for complete Overton Defenestration, expectedly, marking the beginning of "dancing around definitions" era. The whole task of defining and isolating the evil was thought to be a task of political discourse. Which was a grave mistake, retrospectively. See, turns out words don't have meaning outside of practical application. As long as you are able to evade reality checks, nothing stops you from arriving anywhere, mentally speaking. And by "anywhere" I mean, yah. Anywhere.
Fortunately today, we have more bleeding edge info on how fascist emotional responses work, strictly biologically speaking. Turns out (shock!) the fascism does not come from somewhere outside. Some humans more, some less, but most certainly will exhibit fascist emotional responses under certain conditions. I am talking about fear. Long story short, there is cute little organ in our brain called amygdala. That is known to take over when it feels threatened.
The more threatened the person feels, the more likely he is to act defensive (anoher shock!). And acting defensive usually, due to some enolutionary conditioning, in human goes as follows:
Be hostile to anything unfamiliar, as it may pose a threat; Be quick to respond to any real or perceived threat and respond at full force with the goal of eliminating the threat; Do not have empathy towards threat as it hinders your ability to defend yourself; Act first, think later;
But there is more. Humans tend to form real or imaginary communities, and act as one during emergencies. Yet another survival mechanism refined by billions of years of evolution, especially seen in monkeys and other fluffy animals. The society that consists of people who feel threatened, will naturally bring the internal emotional responses of the majority at the whole new level. Any such society will exhibit traits of fascism, as long as the people within are running in defensive mode.
The 14 characteristics are:
1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism; Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.
2. Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights; Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.
3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause; The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial, ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.
4. Supremacy of the Military; Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.
5. Rampant Sexism; The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and anti-gay legislation and national policy.
6. Controlled Mass Media; Sometimes to media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common.
7. Obsession with National Security; Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
8. Religion and Government are Intertwined; Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government's policies or actions.
9. Corporate Power is Protected; The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.
10. Labor Power is Suppressed; Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.
11. Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts; Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts is openly attacked, and governments often refuse to fund the arts.
12. Obsession with Crime and Punishment; Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.
13. Rampant Cronyism and Corruption; Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.
14. Fraudulent Elections; Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.
If you recognize your country, fully or partially, then congratulations, you are right, this shit is universal. Part of being human is behaving like that when trying to survive real or perceived outside threat.
We can not isolate the issue and defeat it by purely political, diplomatic or educational means, as you can't cure flu with counselling. The hope is lost, because this is what is happened, what is happening, and what is going to happen again, regardless of what we try.
The senseless wars will go on regardless of whether the reasons for them are real or imaginary, and the responsibility to mitigate the impact sounds like medical domain. However, do you know many volunteers who will allow to block their amygdala for the sake of world peace? Me neither.