What does this mean? : "The Religion of h**l is Patriotism, and its Government is an Enlightened Democracy"...

Question

By James Branch Cabell (1879 - 1958)

U.S. novelist and journalist.

*My uncle told me this quote and said that it was a slap on the face of Martial Law....

What does this mean?

Answer 1

It means that the guy has a political opinion and regards 'patriotism' as evil.

Yawn.

Answer 2

I have no clue what that means, lol.

Answer 3

It means to beware of governments that use "patriotism" as cover for their activities; a way to get citizens to go along with their actions; a way to shame those citizens who disagree with them into supporting their policies.

Democracy in general is a very dangerous form of government - public passions of the moment can be justification for government actions or policies whenever the idea that "the majority rules" is used as a guideline. An "enlightened democracy" is a government that 1)knows better than others, including its own citizens 2) has the "moral high ground" in whatever actions it takes, based on this claim to superior knowledge. Such a government can justify any action, no matter how cruel or blatantly oppressive, based on the "fact" that it possesses a superior understanding of how the world should be - and after all, it is only making things "right", or "fair", or "just", etc... So, an "enlightened democracy" is really a government that will not acknowledge any limitations on its own power. Implementing martial law as one possible tactic such a government might take - to ensure that all citizens follow "proper", "fair" or "just" actions.

That last point was actually one of the Communist governments used for their oppression. They claimed that it was necessary to burden the people so they would be forced to change their society toward a more pure format. They were actually socialist - the old Soviet Union was officially known as "USSR" - United Socialist Socialist Republic; the n***s were "Nationalist Socialist German Workers' Party". Nikita Kruschev (spelling?) former Russian leader, said that USSR included Republic in the name because a republic had the best reputation as a stable form of government, and the Soviets wanted to bolster their image.

By contrast, in a republic the government can only make rules or take actions based on established law. We all know that governments don't always act according to an "ideal" standard of behavior. However, ideally a republic *should* prevent governments from doing things that are outside the law and/or boundaries placed on government power.