Reddit Reddit reviews The Origins of Totalitarianism

We found 17 Reddit comments about The Origins of Totalitarianism. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.

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The Origins of Totalitarianism
The Origins of Totalitarianism
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17 Reddit comments about The Origins of Totalitarianism:

u/inthequiveringforest · 29 pointsr/simpleliving

Sometimes, and I don't know if this applies to your understanding specifically, there is confusion around these two concepts. I have found that this excerpt from Hannah Arendt's The Origins of Totalitarianism, dense as it is, helps to clear it up:

> Loneliness is not solitude. Solitude requires being alone whereas loneliness shows itself most sharply in company with others. Apart from a few stray remarks--usually framed in a paradoxical mood like Cato's statement (reported by Cicero, De Re Publica, I, 17): numquam minus solum esse quam cum solus esset, "never was he less alone than when he was alone," or, rather, "never was he less lonely than when he was in solitude"--it seems that Epictetus, the emancipated slave philosopher of Greek origin, was the first to distinguish between loneliness and solitude. His discovery, in a way, was accidental, his chief interest being neither solitude nor loneliness, but being alone (monos) in the sense of absolute independence. As Epictetus sees it (Dissertationes, Book 3, ch. 13) the lonely man (eremos) finds himself surrounded by others with whom he cannot establish contact or to whose hostility he is exposed. The solitary man, on the contrary, is alone and therefore "can be together with himself" since men have the capacity of "talking with themselves." In solitude, in other words, I am "by myself," together with my self, and therefore two-in-one, whereas in loneliness I am actually one, deserted by all others. All thinking, strictly speaking, is done in solitude and is a dialogue between me and myself; but this dialogue of the two-in-one does not lose contact with the world of my fellow-men because they are represented in the self with whom I lead the dialogue of thought. The problem of solitude is that this two-in-one needs the others in order to become one again: one unchangeable individual whose identity can never be mistaken for that of any other. For the confirmation of my identity I depend entirely upon other people; and it is the great saving grace of companionship for solitary men that it makes them "whole" again, saves them from the dialogue of thought in which one remains always equivocal, restores the identity which makes them speak with the single voice of one unexchangeable person.

u/ryanknapper · 21 pointsr/politics

OK, that's it. A few weeks ago I bought a few books about how it was that German seems so cool these days but gave rise to power the de-facto Hitler of all Hitlers.

They're next in my reading queue. This is insane.

u/RunningNumbers · 7 pointsr/politics

If you indeed voted for him, you should read Hannah Arednt and maybe Plato's Gorgias/Republic.

u/archamedeznutz · 6 pointsr/worldnews

Here is a book about actual fascism It doesn't achieve everything it sets out to theoretically, but it's a good try.

Although Arendt focused on totalitarianism it's a classic for a reason and it would be unwise to omit.

I generally recommend ignoring the Eco essay on Ur Fascism it's popular on the internet because it's brief and a list, but it's sort of a glib pig's breakfast and not very well thought out.

If you think the United States is drifting toward fascism, you might want to understand why that's just internet nonsense.





u/ell20 · 6 pointsr/GamerGhazi

A little off topic but the framework that the article sited bears a striking resemblance to the model that Hannah Arendt described in her book "The Origins of Totalitarianism". The concepts are all very similar, even if the vocabulary is different.

the rise of the leader, the sense of urgency from an external source, the consolidation of ideology through brotherhood, the dehumanization of the foe, and so on.

It's a little dense, but once you get into it, it's a fascinating book on the history of these movements.

edit: fixed the link

u/Volsunga · 3 pointsr/neoliberal
u/TrapWolf · 3 pointsr/entj

Ain't No Makin' It: Aspirations and Attainment in a Low-Income Neighborhood

u/NuclearTurtle · 2 pointsr/pics

> So we should wage war against everyone who has bad ideas?

If that bad idea involves the systematic murder of 6 million Jews, then yes, I'd say we should try and stop them, forcefully if necessary

> And how would one tell the difference between nazis and non-nazis?

You just need to know the signs to look for. If you want to learn more about them, I'd suggest reading Anatomy of Fascism or The Origins of Totalitarianism, both of which give you a good understanding of how to identify actual fascism. Also, while I'm linking to Amazon, I'd also like to recommend It Can't Happen Here, which is a novel written in the 1930s about how the rise in Fascism would look in America

u/this_is_poorly_done · 1 pointr/politics

Shameless plug for Hannah Arendt's The Origins of Totalitarianism... it's just this work was an exact description of the power networks described in her book.

u/VelvetElvis · 1 pointr/explainlikeimfive

This isn't explaining it to you like you're five, but here's one of the most important books ever on the subject. It's about totalitarianism which is often closely related to fascism and talks about both in fairly easy to understand language. I read it in high school.

http://www.amazon.com/Origins-Totalitarianism-Hannah-Arendt/dp/0156701537/

u/CyberneticPanda · 1 pointr/news

Repeating over and over a slogan or talking point until it becomes part of daily discourse and people accept it without further proof is an informal logical fallacy/propaganda technique known as "The Big Lie." Hannah Arendt wrote in her influential work "The Origins of Totalitarianism" that "The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists."

u/NewMaxx · 1 pointr/worldnews

Another good author on the subject is Hannah Arendt including The Origins of Totalitarianism, specifically section three. She's not as popularly known and is now a bit outdated but her books are astoundingly profound.

u/alontree · -3 pointsr/environment

I reply, asking you have you read, “The origin of totalitarianism” by Hannah Arendt?

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0156701537/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_gxByDb433BW5H

Hannah Arendt's definitive work on totalitarianism and an essential component of any study of twentieth-century political history

The Origins of Totalitarianism begins with the rise of anti-Semitism in central and western Europe in the 1800s and continues with an examination of European colonial imperialism from 1884 to the outbreak of World War I. Arendt explores the institutions and operations of totalitarian movements, focusing on the two genuine forms of totalitarian government in our time—Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia—which she adroitly recognizes were two sides of the same coin, rather than opposing philosophies of Right and Left. From this vantage point, she discusses the evolution of classes into masses, the role of propaganda in dealing with the nontotalitarian world, the use of terror, and the nature of isolation and loneliness as preconditions for total domination.

u/a_can_of_tea · -26 pointsr/Shitstatistssay

God forbid we read books to understand history better and not make caricatures out of people.

https://www.amazon.com/Stalin-I-Paradoxes-Power-1878-1928/dp/0143127861

https://www.amazon.com/Origins-Totalitarianism-Hannah-Arendt/dp/0156701537

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/166566.The_Opium_of_the_Intellectuals

Let me pose it this way, why do you think Stalin did what he did? Because he's an evil statist? Grow up.