The Nazification of American society and the challenge for educators

Abstract

The United States is at a turning point in its history. As civic culture collapses, neoliberalism wages war on the public imagination, and politics is emptied of democratic values, violence and staggering inequality in wealth and power occupy the center of power and everyday life. This articles explores how the different mobilizing passions of fascism overlap and shape language, policies and a range of educational practices that extend from banning books and whitewashing history to forcing teachers to take loyalty while enacting punishing policies aimed at Black, Brown, and trans-gender youth. As fascism is normalized, it is crucial for the crisis of education to be matched by a crisis of ideas. In addition, there is an urgent need for educators to merge a mass movement for economic and social justice with a formative culture and educational project that places matters of morality, justice, compassion, care, and civic courage above a predatory neoliberal capitalism that is destroying the planet and ushering in a new age of fascist barbarism. The article calls upon teachers and educators along with artists, youth and others committed to a democratic socialist society to unite and fight for a future defined by social justice democratic values, equality, social responsibility, inclusiveness, and freedom.