FLAIT

In the 1940 movie The Great Dictator, Charlie Chaplin plays a duel role: a WWI veteran/Jewish barber, and "Adenoid Hynke" the dictator of "Tomainia." It's a spoof of Adolph Hitler and Nazi Germany.

At the end of the movie, the barber is mistaken for the dictator, and Chaplin, as the barber, gives a speech, not as "Hynke," but the barber:

I’m sorry but I don’t want to be an Emperor, that’s not my business. I don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone if possible, Jew, gentile, black man, white. We all want to help one another, human beings are like that. We all want to live by each others happiness, not by each others misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone and the earth is rich and can provide for everyone.

The way of life can be free and beautiful. But we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men's souls, has barricaded the world with hate; has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed.

We have developed speed but we have shut ourselves in: machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical, our cleverness hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little: More than machinery we need humanity; More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness.

Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost.

The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men, cries out for universal brotherhood for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of despairing men, women and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people.

I'm not posting this because that could have been said today in terms of what terrorists and terrorism have done to us and the world. I'm posting it because of what our megalomania, our greed, our arrogance, our hate, our "torturing and imprisonment" (without charges) of "innocent people" (also here), including an American teenager - in many cases knowing they're innocent - and killing them, or letting them die while their cases (conveniently) languish in court, that has done to the world.

Once you're through chanting U-S-A...U-S-A...U-S-A...U-S-A... watch the clip with some self-reflection to what Chaplin is talking about. Because he could very well be talking about the United States today.

Chaplin sees what lies ahead and wants to live in a world that's not built around greed, selfishness, hate, ignorance, intolerance, division and intimidation. But as this blog has proven, that's exactly what the Republican "Party" is built on.

Then Chaplin gives a shout-out, presumably to German soldiers:

...don’t give yourselves to brutes, men who despise you and enslave you, who regiment your lives, tell you what to do, what to think and what to feel, who drill you, diet you, treat you as cattle, use you as cannon fodder.

Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men, machine men, with machine minds and machine hearts. You are not machines. You are not cattle. You are men. You have the love of humanity in your hearts. You don’t hate, only the unloved hate. Only the unloved and the unnatural. Soldiers: don’t fight for slavery, fight for liberty...

Chaplin saw that German soldiers believed everything their leaders told them, as if they were part of a cult. (Hmm...) He's telling them that they have hearts and minds of their own and is begging them to use them to make the world a better place.

Instead of German soldiers, Chaplin could very well be addressing conservatives here in the United States today. Its leaders have "enslaved" a conservative "regiment" that "tells (their voters) what to do," "what to think" and "what to feel;" that gets them to care more about winning a political argument (by making stuff up) then dealing with the country's problems maturely and responsibly, and in fact, would rather see them worsen just so they can attack and blame Democrats, liberals, taxes and "big government."

If I can extrapolate, Chaplin would be asking conservatives to open their minds, use their intellect, and participate in a war of ideas, not a sanctimonious and self-righteous war against, well, everyone not conservative (especially liberals, all three of 'em). "Don't fight for partisanship, division and broken government," Chaplin would say, "fight for intelligence and good, honest government!"

Good luck with that, though.

"Let us fight for a world of reason," Chaplin concluded, "a world where science and progress will lead to all mens happiness."

The next time you can reason with a Republican, and the next time they're interested in or at least believe in science, it'll be the first time.

While Chaplin is referring to the horrible possibility of a world ruled by Nazis, in 1940, you can see that he could very well be referring to today's Republican "Party." I illustrate their scary similarities here and here.

Watch the clip (or read the text). Listen to what Chaplin is saying. Not as an arrogant American who justifies our illegal, immoral and deadly actions; our secret wars and torturing; and calls for military action against other countries, without a thought to its consequences, flippantly, as if you were singing a song. But as a fair and open-minded American who knows hypocrisy when he sees it.

Chaplin was smart enough to use this movie as a warning to the world. Perhaps his words should give America a similar warning to what's coming already come to our political world (also here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).