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Disinformation and Democracy

Roger Berkowitz
Hannah Arendt argues that the distinction between truth and lie can be eroded, over time, by "continual lying." When political leaders, institutions, the press, and respected figures habitually and continually state alternative facts, their lies—even if they are neither intended to be believed nor are believed—attack the very foundations of what Arendt calls the common world.  

Fascist Tactics

Roger Berkowitz
The United States is not currently a fascist country. It is unlikely that it will become one. But Jason Stanley rightly points out that we should not ignore the rise of fascist tactics increasingly being used by the President and his administration while they are also excused by members of the President’s Republican Party.

On Not Being Silent

Roger Berkowitz
George Orwell was one of the greatest anti-fascists of the 20th century. Not only did he satirize and expose fascism and totalitarianism in his novels 1984 and Animal Farm, but also he enlisted and fought fascists in Spain with the Spanish Republicans. Orwell risked his life to oppose and counter fascism wherever he found it. And yet, in 1941, Orwell wrote one of his classic essays defending the English writer P.G. Wodehouse against charges of fascism. 

Solitude and Hope

Roger Berkowitz
Jennifer Stitt  finds herself turning to Hannah Arendt amidst the pandemic, protests, and democratic danger. In such “dark times,” Stitt writes, Arendt’s meditations on the relations between isolation, loneliness, and solitude are meaningful. Above all, Stitt is attracted to Arendt’s idea of solitude, “the thinking activity” that “made moral judgments...

Power Politics

Roger Berkowitz

In an essay “Power Politics Triumphs” from 1945, Hannah Arendt argues that the “obsoleteness of this book” is a  “consequences of the author’s pathetic faith in the validity of economic arguments.” Over and again, in modern politics, it has been shown that “nobody cares” about economic arguments and that politics is not driven by economics.

“I’m With the Young On This”

Roger Berkowitz
In a passionate, honest, and brilliant interview with Bill Moyers, Bill T. Jones is asked if he is more politically inclined now than previously in his life.  Jones invokes Hannah Arendt to affirm the necessary confluence of politics, intellectual honesty, and spiritualism. 

Justice and Vigorous Debate

Roger Berkowitz
The weakness of a group letter—and I have never signed one before and hope not to have to sign one again—is that it never fully captures one’s own views. It is by necessity a compromise. And I feel strongly that in a group letter, no person should be attacked. That is one reason why the letter took a positive and quite abstract approach. 

Scaling Moderation

Roger Berkowitz

In an Interview with Kevin Roose, Steve Huffman explains his decision as CEO and co-founder of Reddit to ban a series of groups on the platform including “The Donald,” a group populated by many supporters of President Trump that has become “a source of countless memes, slogans and conspiracy theories that made their way into the broader online conversation.

Loneliness and Solidarity

Barbara Taylor writes about the epidemic of loneliness that preceded the pandemic that has forced so many of us to isolate ourselves. And yet Taylor argues that within the pandemic we have begun to find practices of care and kindness that are actually working to make us less lonely and building a global solidarity.