Newsletter #246 — June 20, 2024
This is the second newsletter in a two-part series focused on Ayaan Hirsi Ali's June 4 Free Press article "We Have Been Subverted," and Andy Atwood's Medium article entitled "Is this Russia's 4-Step Long-Game to Destabilize the U.S.A.? which drew heavily from a third article by Gil Duran and George Lakoff which appeared February 29 in Framelab, entitled Putin failed to conquer Navalny or Ukraine. He's had better luck with Trump’s GOP. The last newsletter described Yuri Bezmenov's four steps of democratic subversion (which was the focus of all three of these other articles. The steps are: demoralization, destabilization, crisis, and normalization. In the first newsletter we laid out the problem and discussed who is responsible for the problem. Here we discuss how this happened, and more importantly, what can be done about it.
As we noted earlier, this subversion is not just something of concern to people with interests in international relations. i It is also a process that is being used within America and other Western liberal democracies by unscrupulous actors seeking seeking to expand their power base and move the societies towards authoritarianism.
How Did This Happen?
How did this subversion happen, Hirsi Ali asks? Like Atwood, Duran and Lakoff, she uses Bezmenov to explain: Demoralization targets three areas of society: its ideas, its structures, and its social institutions, including religion, education, media, and culture. The "old ways of thinking," she says, become discredited, and anyone who continues to believe in them is discredited as well.
Think of the cynicism and selective truth-telling young Americans encounter in most classrooms. "You know Jefferson owned slaves, right? You know Columbus killed millions?" Again, never mind that Jefferson set us on the path to emancipation, or that Columbus knew nothing about epidemiology. A little learning, as the saying goes, is a dangerous thing. ... The ultimate intended outcome is that the afflicted willingly embrace self-destructive behaviors and ideas. Thus, all moral constraints can be eschewed in the pursuit of “just” and “virtuous” causes.
The next step of demoralization is destroying the fundamental structure of a society, such as the rule of law and social relations. This is done by emphasizing the corrupt nature of the justice system (attacks on the U.S. Supreme Court anyone?), the police ("Defund the Police!) and our political system. (Here she objects to Trump's New York conviction on 34 counts of "obviously political charges." I'd add, as a counterpoint, the continuous insistence by most Republican leaders that the 2020 election was "stolen" and our electoral system is corrupt. It is not just the left or just the right who are playing these games.
The third area of demoralization is what Bezmenov called "life." It includes core social institutions such as family, health, race, population, and labor. Families are being demoralized, she says, by promoting ideas that weaken bonds between family members, promoting "narcissistic individualism over family unity", driving division between the sexes and gender identities (and suggesting that there is no such thing as "women", but only "people with uteruses," and the "replacement of parental authority with the state." Hirsi Ali goes on to note:
Subversion abuses the tolerance of an open culture, forcing the host society to accomplish its aims like a virus attaches to a host. ... Over time, as the subverters come to dominate an institution, they apply institutional pressure. Curbs on academic freedom, the curriculum, and alterations to the hiring process inevitably follow. Think of the novel instruments to enforce uniformity of thought among academics: DEI statements, now a requirement at universities across America.
Even in the cases where subversive activity is clearly illegal, such as with destruction and violence during the 2020 riots and at many anti-Israel protests today, crimes committed in service of some larger goal — like “decolonization” — are presented as righteous. ... When young people say “resistance is justified,” many—if not most—of them believe they are simply standing up for the downtrodden. But the deeper implications of that statement are about justifying the morally reprehensible. How else to explain that at our most prestigious college campuses, students can be found glorifying Hamas terrorists and openly praising North Korea?
Hersi Ali concludes this section by saying that we are well on our way to being "considerably demoralized." She suggests that elementary school teachers don't really want to racially stratify fourth graders, but they go along with the idea, given that the experts told then that will help "fix" racism. Likewise, most high school history teachers, she says, don't want to bring about an American version of the Bolshevik revolution, but many have been told to replace the focus on 1776 with something from the 1619 Project that defines America as fundamentally evil because of its original sin of slavery. Again quoting Hersi Ali:
We have also come to a place where it is difficult for anyone to dissent for fear of incurring the wrath of the adherents—witting or not—of subversion. So people go along, keep their heads down, and try not to make a fuss.
The second stage of subversion is destabilization. This happens after a society is badly demoralized, suffering from domestic turmoil across all sectors. Democratic politics take on the character of a vicious struggle for power. Factionalism takes hold. Economic relations degrade and collapse, obliterating the basis for bargaining. The social fabric frays, leading to mob rule. Society turns inward, leading to fear, isolationism, and the decline of the nation-state itself, leading to crisis.
It is important to understand that, at this stage, the process of subversion is largely self-propelled. What once required active involvement on the part of a subverter has now taken root and grows organically. Then, society ruptures all at once in a rolling series of crises as the full extent of the cancer manifests.
Finally, says Bezmenov, a subverted society enters the normalization stage, which is when the subversive regime takes over, installing its ideology as the law of the land. By then, the enemy has totally conquered the target society—without ever firing a shot.
We, in the United States, are certainly beginning to see the results of such destabilization. Disinformation (and the flood of conflicting information) has made it practically impossible to know who to believe, and extreme views on both the left and the right are being promulgated in the educational system, media, politics, and culture. Politics has certainly become a vicious struggle for power, allowing both sides to advocate and justify all sorts of formerly abhorrent and sometimes illegal, sometimes violent, means to make sure their side prevails.
The left is banning "improper" speech; while teaching that America and Americans (particularly whites, and particularly within that group white men) should be ashamed of themselves. Both the left and the right are banning "improper" books (the right banning books about slavery and LGBTQ people; the left is banning books, such as To Kill a Mockingbird and Dr. Suess, that they see as racist. The left is campaigning for ultra-far right candidates in the hopes of making it easier to beat them. The right is trying to limit access to voting and is intimidating election workers. Both sides are doing all that they can to tip the electoral playing field in favorable ways.
Polls show between 20 and 25% of respondents agree that "violence might be necessary to get America back on track," though it should be noted that more Republicans agreed with that statement than do Democrats (who also happen to be in power at the moment). In the same NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll taken in April,.2024, over 30% of Democrats and 50% of Republicans said that they "desired a leader who 'breaks some of the rules to get the nation back on track." So factionalism has certainly taken hold.
Economic relations, has not yet been downgraded to the point where the basis for bargaining is destroyed, although there are plenty of people speaking out against capitalism, and campaigning for a different (though often unspecified) economic model. Corporate profits are seen as unethical, even though, in their absence, there is no incentive to produce all the miraculous goods and services we have become so addicted to. (Some corporate profits and CEO salaries are obscene, we agree, but that doesn't mean all profit or the capitalistic system itself is bad.)
Our social fabric is certainly fraying, though we haven't yet gotten to the point of mob rule or the decline of the nation-state itself. But many fear that could happen after the 2024 Presidential election — no matter who wins.
Unlike Dunam and Lakoff who blame Russia and the Republican party for this subversion, Hirsi Ali points her finger at three other actors: American Marxists, radical Islamists, and the Chinese Community Party. Vladimir Putin, she says, is also waging his own subversion campaign, though he isn't cooperating with the other three who are, she says, actually working together.
What unites these enemies? On the surface, they have little in common. We all know what happens to “Queers for Palestine” in the Palestinian territories. Or Muslims in China. We all know what CCP mandarins think of Black Lives Matter activists. Or rather, what they would think, if they deigned to do so.
But they have wisely chosen the same common enemy: the West. [As has Russia as well, of course.]
Ali concludes her essay by observing
Orwell said that “To see what is in front of one’s nose needs a constant struggle.” Everyone with eyes to see is now scrambling to do just that.
What is at stake in our ability to see plainly? Everything. What is at stake is nothing less than the preservation of our way of life.
Now is the time for all of us blind seekers to come together. To restore what we have lost will be the work of our lifetimes. Can there be a more important project?
We think not.
What Can We Do to Reverse the Damage and Prevent More?
Unfortunately, Hirsi Ali doesn't say anything about what we can do to restore what we have lost. Atwood, however, does. He suggests six things we can do.
First, enlarge your perspective by paying attention to the water you are swimming in. [This phrase comes from his opening explanation about who he is: "I have been a systems thinker for 50 years — a big picture guy. Think of me as a fish that has a deep interest in the water we are swimming in."]
Second, share this info and your wonderments with friends and family. Engage in deep dialogue around their perspectives, and yours.
Third, your response will depend upon the water in which you swim. What is your worldview? Pre-modern, Modern, Post-Modern, or Integral? [Atwood promised to write more about this distinction in future articles, but as that is beyond the scope of this post, suffice it to say that one should try to recognize ones own values and beliefs and then stand up for them, while also being willing to modify those beliefs in response to persuasive criticism.]
Fourth, wonder, or do some research, about what WE have done, and are doing to destabilize other nations. Remember Newton’s Third Law of Motion: that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. [We would add "wonder or do some research about what WE have done, and are doing to destabilize the other political party, and hence our own nation, right at home in the U.S.A.]
Fifth, will the post-election period be our time of destabilization as predicted, no matter who wins in November of 2024? [As we said earlier, we expect that the post-election period could, in addition to being a period of further destabilization, give rise to the kind of crises that would lead to the normalization of authoritarianism (in either its right-wing or left-wing form.) We all should do all we can to make sure that doesn't happen. That would start with accepting the results of the election, no matter what they seem to be, and, if we are unhappy with the outcome, working through existing channels to not only defend our values, but at the same time, keep democracy alive.]
Sixth, remember the price that has been paid by patriots here in the U.S.A. to protect democracy. Read some history. Watch Band of Brothers on Netflix. Do not ever forget the revolutionary principles advanced in the Declaration of Independence:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
And remember Benjamin Franklin’s response to this question upon the signing of the United States Constitution:
“Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?”
“A republic, if you can keep it.”
Please Contribute Your Ideas To This Discussion!
In order to prevent bots, spammers, and other malicious content, we are asking contributors to send their contributions to us directly. If your idea is short, with simple formatting, you can put it directly in the contact box. However, the contact form does not allow attachments. So if you are contributing a longer article, with formatting beyond simple paragraphs, just send us a note using the contact box, and we'll respond via an email to which you can reply with your attachment. This is a bit of a hassle, we know, but it has kept our site (and our inbox) clean. And if you are wondering, we do publish essays that disagree with or are critical of us. We want a robust exchange of views.
About the MBI Newsletters
Once a week or so, we, the BI Directors, share some thoughts, along with new posts from the Hyper-polarization Blog and and useful links from other sources. We used to put this all together in one newsletter which went out once or twice a week. We are now experimenting with breaking the Newsletter up into several shorter newsletters. Each Newsletter will be posted on BI, and sent out by email through Substack to subscribers. You can sign up to receive your copy here and find the latest newsletter here or on our BI Newsletter page, which also provides access to all the past newsletters, going back to 2017.
NOTE! If you signed up for this Newsletter and don't see it in your inbox, it might be going to one of your other emails folder (such as promotions, social, or spam). Check there or search for beyondintractability@substack.com and if you still can't find it, first go to our Substack help page, and if that doesn't help, please contact us.
If you like what you read here, please ....
Please Contribute Your Ideas To This Discussion!
In order to prevent bots, spammers, and other malicious content, we are asking contributors to send their contributions to us directly. If your idea is short, with simple formatting, you can put it directly in the contact box. However, the contact form does not allow attachments. So if you are contributing a longer article, with formatting beyond simple paragraphs, just send us a note using the contact box, and we'll respond via an email to which you can reply with your attachment. This is a bit of a hassle, we know, but it has kept our site (and our inbox) clean. And if you are wondering, we do publish essays that disagree with or are critical of us. We want a robust exchange of views.
About the MBI Newsletters
Once a week or so, we, the BI Directors, share some thoughts, along with new posts from the Hyper-polarization Blog and and useful links from other sources. We used to put this all together in one newsletter which went out once or twice a week. We are now experimenting with breaking the Newsletter up into several shorter newsletters. Each Newsletter will be posted on BI, and sent out by email through Substack to subscribers. You can sign up to receive your copy here and find the latest newsletter here or on our BI Newsletter page, which also provides access to all the past newsletters, going back to 2017.
NOTE! If you signed up for this Newsletter and don't see it in your inbox, it might be going to one of your other emails folder (such as promotions, social, or spam). Check there or search for beyondintractability@substack.com and if you still can't find it, first go to our Substack help page, and if that doesn't help, please contact us.
If you like what you read here, please ....
