ILLUSIONS, HALF-TRUTHS AND MASKS: Keywords: Antifa, mobs, riots, radicalization, Le Bon, Ortega y Gasset, Arendt, Desmet, dictatorships, totalitarianism, useful idiots.

 

French mob storms the assembly of the Etats Generaux 1789
The elected congress lasted two months. The Jacobins ruled by mob

ILLUSIONS, HALF-TRUTHS AND MASKS

A meditation about the new rise of communism in America

By Xuan Quen Santos

PART  VIII

“Is there a greater tragedy imaginable than that in

our endeavor consciously to shape our future in

accordance with high ideals we should in fact

unwittingly produce the very opposite of

what we have been striving for.”

Friedrich A. von Hayek (1899-1992)

“The Road to Serfdom” (1944)

  

During the last 150 years, a new sociological phenomenon began to be recognized. I believe it is part of the emergence of the middle class, still misunderstood and misdirected. It has been highjacked and turned into a powerful tool of ideological terrorism. I am referring to “the mob”.

You have seen it lately in the violent college take-overs in defense of the terrorist group Hamas, carefully disguised as a defense of the Palestinian people in Gaza. They proved to be more anti-Israel. You have witnessed them in action many times, with different masks. They quickly disappeared, only to re-appear as the current anti-ICE riots in defense of illegal immigrants.

Recent anti-ICE riots in Los Angeles.
The Mayor called it a peaceful demonstration

Consider these recent events in the USA. All had echoes throughout the world. Occupy Wall Street riots (2011), LGBTQ riots under many names since 1969 (2011, 14, 20, 21, 23), The Women´s Marches riots (2017), Defund the Police riots (2014-21), Antifa riots (2017-23 reoccurring), Black Lives Matter riots (2020), Trans riots (2019-22), Keep Roe vs Wade riots and Pro-Abortion riots (Numerous since 2009 to 2020), and pro-Hamas against Israel riots going on. They have been transformed into the current anti-ICE riots in Los Angeles that are spreading into other crime-riddled cities. What do they have in common?

New York's Wall Street Occupy riots

 They are remarkably similar. They are well organized and supported. The presence of young people predominates with a surprising high proportion of women. Universities seem to be the main stages with a not-all student and teacher cast. Professional agitators have been identified. The rioters are well equipped, from banners and posters to quasi-uniforms and anti-riot gear. Their jingles and catchwords are well rehearsed. They promote selected agendas of the political platform of the same party. They appear at the right moment to obliterate any civil discussion of the issue at stake. They claim to be peaceful expressions of the right to free speech but quickly turn violent, which they are prepared for from the start. They seem to receive abundant financial, media and political support. Their real identities and connections are elusive. Is all this a spontaneous coincidence?

PRO-abortion riots, part of the defeated agenda of the ERA

I make the distinction between “the mob” and a movement. The first one is a well-orchestrated, organized, funded and shielded instrument that has non-disclosed ulterior motives. The second one is an authentic expression of a group originating in a specific circumstance or grievance they want to bring the public’s attention to. What I see now are “mobs” using as masks what appears to be on the surface an apparently legitimate cause.

The "mostly peaceful" BLM riots turned into "defund the police"
Lasted for more than two months, 60 people died, and it cost over $ 2 billion 

The word “mob” may have been used for the first time during Queen Elizabeth I reign. A Jesuit ambassador of Spain paid a crowd from the pubs and brothels of London’s East End to stage a riot on the streets with the intent of disrupting the negotiations that were going on at the court to find a non-Spanish suitor for her to marry. It created a temporary disruption, and the Jesuit was found out. The same mob was paid by the court to run him out of town. By the time of the Civil War of England (1642-1651), the word was already in use to describe the rioters in London.

Chicago May Day parade workers celebration dissolved.
May Day 1 was declared by the First International Communist
to commemorate the original Chicago massacre of 60 policemen 
by a bomber during the riot

Urban riots involving large crowds have occurred frequently.  Roman historians described them with the phrase “mobile vulgus” (moving or excitable crowd). It refers to a mass of people excitedly moving on public spaces, such as streets or plazas. They are not a procession, or a parade; the first one is characterized by somber emotional displays, including music, and the second one has a joyful celebratory spirit. Food riots during famines, or for public hangings of criminals protected by the authorities in spite of public furor, or for resistance to the confiscation of food and supplies by armies, are described by many historians. I will not consider those as “mobs”, but as an authentic collective expression of grievance, even if illegal.

Anti-Vietnam War Kent State U riot

In an article published in “The Journal of British Studies” (2014) by Robert B. Shoemaker, he describes the difference between what I call “the mob” and a popular riot: “In this respect, the early eighteenth century appears as a crucial period in the long process in which the political elite lost control of  popular disturbances in London. Whereas the London riots that helped precipitate the Civil War involved a strong element of political direction and discipline, in 1780 the Gordon riots, the most violent and destructive riots in London history, had the quality of an assault on  symbols of authority. Concurrently, the early eighteenth century  witnessed not only an apparent increase in the frequency of small-scale rioting in the metropolis but also a weakening of the role of traditional rituals in disorder and an expansion of the range of grievances expressed. Although rioting was not yet seen as a significant problem in London in the early eighteenth century, these changes suggest that the growing fears of social upheaval encapsulated in the new name for rioters, the mob, would eventually be justified.” His article is titled “The London “Mob” in the Early Eighteenth Century”; he provides useful information about the grievances that generated the riots. His interpretation, as manifested in the conclusion I have underlined near the end of the paragraph I have quoted, reflects a Marxist methodology, if not an outright looking for the oppressed and the oppressors. Unless the people of the XVIII century had a looking glass into the future, how could they have “growing fears of social upheaval”.

The 1968 Paris Student riots

For the purpose of this entry, the event that Showmaker describes as having “a strong element of political direction and discipline” qualifies as a “mob”. It is a planned riot that masks the identity of the promoter and is used for an ulterior purpose. The Gordon riots were demonstrations called to protest the liberalization of anti-Catholic policies that reflected the public sentiment since the Civil War; they turned into violent riots led by religious zealots. To this day, anti-Catholic provisions are still in the British constitutional tradition. These riots would not qualify as the “mob”.

The majority of causes Shoemaker cites are presented by him as objections and resistance to the demands of the capitalist owners of the new textile mills. They were in fact, violent actions of the medieval guilds of (hand-loomed) weavers that were opposing the threats of competition. They were small capitalists, not laborers paid with wages. Cotton cloth produced at the new mills, particularly Calico prints, became popular for the consumers as the prices began to tumble and they had new and colorful prints. Since Marx had not appeared at the time, I would still classify them as movements, even if the rioters did not grasp how economics would explain the temporary transition to the full industrial age they were witnessing. Shortly after this period, labor unions began to appear formed by real laborers paid in wages by the new factories. For the first time, what we now call “consumer products” appeared, which consumers loved for their lower prices and innovations. Everyone loves lower prices, particularly low-income consumers. Obviously, the weavers were affected.

The Soviet Revolution began by using the mobs after the failures of WW I
against the installation of an elected government led by Kerensky

This same type of obtuse and self-centered resistance to change by workers affected by progress was illustrated by two recent events that were on the news. Just as the recent national elections were winding down, a port strike on the East coast was announced. What did they want? They demanded that port owners DO NOT MODERNIZE. The US ports are the worst among the industrial nations. Consumers pay for their high costs and inefficient operations. The ports have been crippled with similar obstacles for nearly sixty years. The other example is the general opposition coming from the labor unions and the socialist sectors to the innovations that MAY come from Artificial Intelligence. They will come in the form of increased productivity of labor as a result of the capital invested in the new technologies. Workers will be displaced from many jobs, but many more new jobs will be created. Again, the consumers, which are all of us, will appreciate the changes brought to their quality of life by new technology. This authentic anxiety and struggle suffered by the affected workers became the vehicle to create the “mob” and mask the goal of destroying capitalism.

What happened during Marx’s early life? socialist ideas began to spread with furor through different sects after the chaos of the first French Revolution. By the time of the third, in 1848, widespread revolts had exploded across Europe. Marx and Engels, the young German university agitators, had practiced rioting in Paris and finally were recruited by the English labor unions to write their Manifesto. It is nothing less than a plan to destroy what they called capitalism, which should properly be called the free market economy. As we have demonstrated in previous entries, they had no explanation for what would happen after. It took several decades for Engels to complete a proposal that was debunked almost immediately.

Unfortunately, by then the term “praxis” had been accepted by the practicing Marxists. It can be summarized with this description. Praxis means putting in practice the revolution. If we know the revolution against capitalism is inevitable, we can accelerate its arrival by creating the conditions for it. What could those conditions be?  Ten of the specifics were outlined in the manifesto: 1) Abolition of property in land, all belongs to the state. 2) A progressive income tax, 3) Abolition of inheritance rights, 4) Confiscation of the property of opponents and of those that leave, 5) Nationalization of financial institutions, 6) Nationalization of all media and transportation, 7) Nationalization of industries and machines, 8) Obligation to join a workers army, 9) Redistribution of the people from the cities to the rural areas, and promote agro-industrial centers, and 10) Mandatory public education.

You would be surprised to look at an audit of how far into these 10 policies for the self-destruction of the United States are already in place. It is only a matter of degree, but they are all ready to be fully weaponized should socialists take more control of the political apparatus of the state. All 10 policies are in place. Many were installed during the 1930s and 1940s. These “conditions for the revolution” can only be promoted if the structures of government are taken over first. I like to be reminded of this path with the words of Ayn Rand: “There is no difference between communism and socialism, except in the means of achieving the same ultimate end: communism proposes to enslave men by force, socialism - by vote. It is merely the difference between murder and suicide”. To take your property, the state does not have to take the property. It can just take away your rights to decide about your property by way of regulations, prohibition, limitations or taxation. Think of EPA arbitrary rules, or the powers of zoning boards.

We are mostly there in the area of public education. We have just realized how far we are into this weapon for self-destruction.  Every time you hear the executives of the AFT and the NEA speak on behalf of the 3.2 million unionized teachers, ask yourself; are they advocating to create the conditions for revolution, or for the interests of children, as they claim? Only 27 states have right-to-work laws where the workers are free to join a union or not, if their place of employment has unions. In the other states, they are mandated to join the armies of workers and to pay their dues. The largest labor unions are of government employees, the ideal army of workers already under state control, or maybe the other way around. We have just seen how much they control. We already have “death-taxes” to gradually destroy inheritances. You are probably familiar with the progressive income-tax that has created the imbalance that 2% of the taxpayers pay more than 50% of the revenue, 50% of the people on the tax rolls pay only 2%, and 30 million taxpayers do not even file as they are probably receiving benefits.

The next time there is an election, ask yourself if the policies proposed by the candidates advance Marx’s proposals, or if they intend to roll them back. Look for the masks used by democratic socialists or social democrats.

But “praxis” is the duty of any supporter of Marxism. That is what a comrade teacher can do in stealth in the classroom. That is what a comrade preacher can induce into his flock. That is what a news talking-head can transmit with his bias. That is what a simple prank caller can do to terrorize a school or a place of work. That is what a comedian or an entertainer can do with the choice of his material. That is what a Tik-Toker influencer can do with his followers. That is what a singer can do with the lyrics of his songs. That is what a college professor can do when he offers grades to his students for participating in a sit-in. That is what a librarian can do when she chooses the books to display. That is what a community organizer can do to mislead his neighbors. That is what a college student can do to display the sign he is given for the riot. That is what a person of means can do to buy the riot gear…Anything to advance the “conditions for revolution”, anything to promote social unrest, anything to create public chaos. If you have not read any of the handbooks for rioters, you should find out who Saul Alinsky was. Obama and Hillary admired him as their mentor.

Ready to provoke the police reaction ANTIFA IN GEAR

You can advance the revolution by being a discreet activist. You can make signs, you can be a courier, you can write the lyrics to a song, or the verses for a chant. You can memorize the chant. You can wear the T-shirt you are given. You can skip school or work and participate in “what is mostly a peaceful demonstration” and confront the police. You can learn to make Molotov cocktails…

The role of the agitators, locally known as community organizers or sponsors, is key for a simple reason. There is no such thing as “group-think”. Only individual persons think. The oxymoron phrase was coined by social-psychologist Irving Janis in 1952, which he popularized in 1972 in a book analyzing the fiascos in foreign policy of the United States. Other psychologists empirically proved that there is such phenomenon as subconscious social pressure which leads to conformity to the group as emotional responses and not reason. Agreeing to what someone else has proposed is not thinking. Without the agitators there is no mob.

ANTIFA present at many riots leading the violence

           

The Federalist, a conservative website magazine, reported about Woody Kaine’s arrest for counter-protesting at a pro-Donald Trump rally held in the state Capitol in Minnesota on March 4, 2017. Woody is son of Senator Tim Kaine (D VA), who was Hilary Clinton's running mate as Vice-presidential candidate. Kaine was one of six ANTIFA counter-protesters of a group of approximately 100 counter-protestors, who set off smoke bombs and fireworks inside the building. Witnesses reported seeing Antifa flags in the crowd of counter-protestors. Kaine tried to run when approached by an officer and he had to be restrained. A judge sentenced him to a year of probation. The basic facts have not been denied. He was offered a plea.

 The “mob” exists. Antifa is not an idea.

The first serious study about the “mob” was done in 1885 by Gustave Le Bon. “Psychologie des foules”  (The Crowd: A study of the Popular Mind, in English) by the French ground breaking social psychologist, “is devoted to an account of the characteristics of crowds”,  in his words. A newer synonym of crowds is “masses”. His analysis of the riots that accompanied the French Revolution is very revealing of how the Reign of Terror ruled. One of his conclusions reads: The general characteristics of criminal crowds are: “openness to influence, credulity, mobility, the exaggeration of sentiments -good or bad, the manifestation of some form of moral justification…”.             

Prepared to go violent during "peaceful demonstrations" in Oakland CA

               

A second analysis was given in “The Rebellion of the Masses” (1890) by the Spanish philosopher Jose Ortega y Gasset. His point of view is that of the disappearing elite that held to the classical liberal beliefs while in the middle of a political environment in flux. Spain was facing violent riots in favor or against the monarchy, in favor or against republicanism, in favor or against communism. The chaos brought about the Spanish Civil War that resulted in an authoritarian tyranny. Ortega y Gasset’s reflections point to the key role the media has played in creating a new mass-culture of barely educated multitudes that feel empowered to use their recently acquired power. The mass-man feels qualified to have strong opinions about everything and act, regardless of his qualifications. A similar process had just happened in Italy and Germany. The old Prussian-German Empire became constitutional to no avail; its defeat during WW I led to a republic; it was quickly overtaken by socialism which brought about Adolph Hitler by popular election. Italy went through a more chaotic process from monarchy to republic to socialist anarchy, resulting in the rise of Benito Mussolini.

                A third study of the masses was provided by Hannah Arendt in “The Origins of Totalitarianism” (1951). Chapter 10’s title is a summary of our topic, “The Temporary Alliance between The Mob and the Elite”. There is no such thing as “group think”. Socrates warned the mob that voted to condemn him to death by pointing this out. Somebody always does the thinking that moves the mob. Arendt’s warnings are clear: “The mob always will shout for the strong man, the great leader, for the mob hates society from which it feels excluded”.

                In my opinion, Arendt’s preference for the use of “mob” to substitute crowds, proletariat and masses is revealing of the recognition that the original Marxist view was no longer respected. Arendt was a German Jewish philosopher, lover of Heidegger who became pro-Nazi. She managed to escape on time and wandered around Europe until moving to New York. She took refuge as a teacher at the New School for Social Research, the socialist rival enclave of the Frankfurt School operating in Columbia. Arendt was also a teacher at Yale, Chicago, and Wesleyan. Although she is considered a powerful critic of totalitarianism, she never stopped being a socialist. As most socialist, she was critical of the regimes of Stalin, Hitler, and Mussolini, but never accepted the fact that such regimes are the inevitable end of any socialist scheme. Her position was ambivalent, ambiguous, and discreet. She was writing during the era of McCarthyism. Although more serious, her work puts her on the shelf by other contrite-Marxists, such as George Orwell.

                The last one is a refreshing new analysis. It takes us away from a particular political vision and back to a more clinical analysis of the behavior of people who conform what has been called the proletariat, the crowds, the masses, and the mob. “De Psychologie van Totalitarisme” (2022) by Belgian clinical psychologist Mattias Desmet, a professor at Ghent University, aims at understanding what could be the longest lasting effect of the policies to combat the Covid 19 pandemic. In his words: “The grip of governments on private life was growing tremendously fast. We were experiencing an erosion of the right to privacy, alternative voices were increasingly censored and suppressed, the number of intrusive actions by security forces was rising dramatically, and more”.  In Europe, as well as in Asia, there were violent Covid related riots in 2020 and 2021. In the United States, they were anti-lockdown protests promoted by conservative groups that ended up exposing the failed policies of public education promoted by the teachers’ labor unions. These were authentic movements and not mobs.

                Facing the possibility of the emergence of new totalitarian regimes around the world, Desmet, like Le Bon, follows his quest only to find the same “mob” playing a key role. Desmet gives us an updated diagnosis. “Dictatorships are based on a primitive psychological mechanism, namely on the creation of a climate of fear amongst the population... Totalitarianism, on the other hand, has its roots in the insidious psychological process of mass formation”.

                Desmet’s chapter six, “The Rise of the Masses” has diagnosed four symptoms that lead to the emergence of the “mob”. “The first condition is generalized loneliness, social isolation, and lack of social bonds among the population... The deterioration of social connectedness leads to the second condition: lack of meaning in life... The third condition is the widespread presence of free-floating anxiety and psychological unease within a population... The fourth condition, in turn, also follows from the first three: a lot of free-floating frustration and aggression. The link between social isolation and irritability is logical and has also been established empirically.”

                There is one important fact omitted in all the analysis about the appearance of the “mob” is its potential size. I have been impressed by the presence in the "mob" of many angry women, of all ages, and by young men, many that still don’t shave. Why?

                The global population grew from 1 billion in 1800 to 1.6 billion a century later. By 2000, it had reached 6.1 billion. In 2024 it is estimated that we will exceed 8.1 billion. It had taken 1,000 years to reach one billion just two centuries ago. The population growth, our survival as a species, is a measure of success, not of failure. We have grown, not just in number, but in longevity and quality of life since the world has increasingly opened to a market economy. During the XX century, 200 million people perished by violence or starvation under the communist regimes. The current population of the United States is estimated at 340 million; 51.5% are women. The population between 10 and 25 years old is 24 million. The adult population between 26 and 64 years old is 172 million. With these statistics in mind, it is evident that the topics to lure women -a single category as birthing people (non-men)- into the mob are explained. It also explains the importance of taking over the education of uninformed, immature minds that are ready to do something relevant. Has it worked?

                Why do you think that socialists want to lower the voting age to 16 years of age? Or to offer abortion on demand?

The tragic truth is that the new education that creates the “mob” is really indoctrination in what must be considered the gravest intellectual mistake. It began as another moral idea in search of a community organization that would be like paradise on Earth. Supported by the new scientific enthusiasm, it turned into an apparent theory that would be not only the explanation of history, but also be able to predict the future. Half a century after the young agitators Marx and Engels had called for the workers of the world to rise in revolution, they finally produced a belated construct of economic ideas that almost immediately were found to be in insoluble error. After a hundred years of overwhelming evidence of the record of all socialist-communist experiments, any real scientist would have concluded it was time to close the chapter. It is time to bury their works in the shelves of literary creations. The truth behind the “mob” is not the product of any worker’s exploitation. The “mob” is a tool to undermine and destroy legitimate authority, attain power, and keep it at any cost.

                It was not a famous educator who said, “Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I will have sown will never be uprooted.” It is easy to check out his name, which happens to be false. He used 146 other names. He eventually oversaw the Institute of Pedagogics in the country he ruled. And he ruled over all the teachers. Among his many works, he also created a manual for terrorists. He clearly states the purpose of terrorism is at first to provoke the over-reaction of the authorities which will de-legitimize them and become unpopular. Once in power, terrorism is used by controlling the satisfaction of necessities and raising an army of citizens committed to the revolution. The “mob” does not exist without agitators and organizers that collect the “useful idiots”, as they have been called by many totalitarian leaders, into the corrals at the campus to practice their jingles and slogans. About the resources for the revolution, he is credited with the phrase “Don’t worry, when we need the ropes, the capitalists will be the first to sell us the ones we will use to hang them”. The name of the agitator was Vladimir Ilych Ulyanov. Most people have heard of him as Lenin.

“The first condition is generalized loneliness, social isolation, and lack of social bonds among the population... The deterioration of social connectedness leads to the second condition: lack of meaning in life... The third condition is the widespread presence of free-floating anxiety and psychological unease within a population... The fourth condition, in turn, also follows from the first three: a lot of free-floating frustration and aggression. The link between social isolation and irritability is logical and has also been established empirically.”