What I find interesting about the film is that it's a rare example of World War II speculation. It's like what we do now with World War 3 but it's like one of maybe two other pieces of media from the time that I even know about that does that.
As a film, maybe it was rare. But the written literature of the 1920s & 1930s was full of examples of what a new World War could look like. Largely, these novels and short stories were specifically written out of the experience of the Western Front, where long years of attritional warfare destroyed a generation and laid waste to massive swaths of the countryside. They projected forward what might happen if airplanes began to drop chemical weapons on civilian targets en masse. They expanded on the experience of the Russian Civil War, which quickly devolved into a chaotic stew of ideologies and petty warlords. Stephen Vincent Benet's "By The Waters Of Babylon" has a man of the future wandering the ruins of New York City, laid waste by carpet bombing. Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" recounts how a "Nine Years War" in the 1940s & 1950s wreaked the world and paved the way for the totalizing ways of "Fordism," an ideology marked by planned economics, eugenics, sex positivism, and recreational drugs.
Let's also have a moment of respect for Things to Come's set-makers, stage-hands, costumers, and model-makers. They did some hella good-looking futuristic tech with what I assume was mostly wood, cloth, and plaster!
Indeed; practical, hand made effects/sets really hold up. I was watching Excalibur the other day and it felt far more real than most modern digital movies.
Insightful as always. One of the biggest takeaways is the caution to try to understand how a group sees itself, and the reminder that that's entirely possible to do without adopting that group's views yourself.
That’s actually a satisfying answer to the question of why the competing ideologies of that era used the same tactics to achieve the same ends while remaining violently opposed to one another, without seeming to notice how essentially identical they were.
I once saw a comment regarding a political test mentioning that the Authoritarian Left and the Authoritarian Right would actually have a lot in common that they could sit down and talk about.
I was about to say exactly the same thing- especially with That Hideous Strength, and Lewis’ brief mention of BUF. Also, perhaps you know this, but Orwell wrote a critique of That Hideous Strength, and then went on to write 1984, which in some ways has elements that critique Lewis’ dystopia (mostly, Lewis’ idea of divine salvation from it).
Look to GK Chesterton. His writings inspired Lewis, as they did Gandhi. "The world is what the saints and the prophets saw it was; it is not merely getting better or merely getting worse; there is one thing that the world does; it wobbles. Left to itself, it does not get anywhere; though if helped by real reformers of the right religion and philosophy, it may get better in many respects, and sometimes for considerable periods. But in itself it is not a progress; it is not even a process; it is the fashion of this world that passeth away. Life in itself is not a ladder; it is a see-saw."“
I have loved the word grok since the day I came across it in "Stranger in a Strange Land", which, incidentally , is still one of my favorite books of all time. Love your show.
Fiction and slang always give us words to articulate more precisely things that formal and 'proper' language doesn't quite capture. 'Grok', 'Sass', 'Belly-feel', whatever... the closest that real English comes to any of that is the archaic 'Ken', and that's still more intellectual than visceral (not to mention being a dialect word unless you count it as a loan; the status of Scots as either a dialect or a language is still pretty up-in-the-air).
It was almost two books that happened to be sharing the same covers. One of those was absolutely magnificent and the other kind of went in a really weird direction and which I look kind of like one might at a weird uncle whose refrigerator is constantly filled with bizarre types of cheese that he never seems to actually eat. But the weird doesn't detract from the magnificent.
I would argue the problem with acting “for the people” is that the moment you make that invocation you have forsaken the individual, reduced everything and everyone down to a series of abstract principles. Then you try to force flesh and blood people through that abstract mold and get frustrated when not everyone fits through it and the only response you can think of is doubling down on your philosophy because the only alternative then is to forsake your beliefs and thus risk killing a part of who you are. Self reflection is painful, blaming everything else is easy.
Except usually those people ARE going with what the people want, you however are implying that a small minority should dictate the will of the people simply because they too are citizens. The rest of the world is not America, the idea of rights is a myth to all of them and to apply the idea of protecting the minority from the majority in any other nation is a joke
"you have forsaken the individual, reduced everything and everyone down to a series of abstract principles." Well, yeah. It's eugenics taken to the logical next step. Life is a highway. Everyone must drive between the lines. Anyone who can't shouldn't be allowed to drive; the alternative is a road to ruin. The only question is how wide to make the lanes.
@@lwilton And off-ramps. "Well, you guys are pretty weird, but as long as you're weird way over there, it's not my problem". Of course, this is too much like NOT ruling the world, for some people.
A debating opponent of H.G. Wells's critique was G.K. Chesterton - sadly only remembered for writing detective stories & the breadth of his insights largely forgotten today. Essentially he was an journalist. I think his words resonate with a perennial truth especially in the late line: "The world is what the saints and the prophets saw it was; it is not merely getting better or merely getting worse; there is one thing that the world does; it wobbles. Left to itself, it does not get anywhere; though if helped by real reformers of the right religion and philosophy, it may get better in many respects, and sometimes for considerable periods. But in itself it is not a progress; it is not even a process; it is the fashion of this world that passeth away. Life in itself is not a ladder; it is a see-saw."
@@richardhall5489 thanks for that! I need to stand on my head more often. I honestly think GKC is seriously overlooked for our time. The apostle of common sense, a title of great book btw.
Very nice going there with the Mosley connection. History seems to gloss over the fact that fascism was a movement which ran through most of Europe back in the 30's and not just in one particularly country. It's a very blatant movie, in that respect, but all great Sci-fi reflects it's time. It is very different watching it with 90 years hindsight, though. However, the sheer ambition of the movie cannot be undenied. Those sets and costumes are absolutely beautiful. "Whings ovar the whorld" old chap, thanks for another great video.
This is a man who understands the internet. After 18 minutes of insightful commentary on a truly arcane subject, ends it by throwing a bomb at a dead Italian philosopher. Always was fascinated by Things to Come, from how it predicted the Battle of Britain to its portrayal of a post-apocalyptic setting (a first I think). The most difficult part of the film is the third act. He does a fantastic job putting into the context of its time. I (stupidly perhaps) never considered how this tied into Mosley and the Black Shirts.
Without being in the time or place of the original audience, subtle cultural signals are always missed. It's why movies that can stand the test of time are actually pretty rare. For all of Eco's writing skills, he couldn't abstract from his own experiences or impulses. Frankly, you can see Stephen King for a more modern example.
What strikes me is how the third act seems to foretell our current rise of stupidity in a revolt against the "elites" by the common people who think progress has gone to far in a way they can't quite describe without targeting ancient minorities.
Would love to see your take on Yul Brynner's "The Ultimate Warrior." The 70s were a smorgasbord of post-apocalyptic, urban decay, gangs/cults out of control movies (e.g. "The Warriors" and "The Omega Man") that, when taken as a whole, reveal the societal fears and anxieties of that era.
Oh my gosh, another person remembering The Ultimate Warrior! 🫡 Yes, that late ‘60s to 1977 period is practically nothing but dystopian hell sci-fi. One might make the case that The Ultimate Warrior is taking place in the Mad Max universe.
@@steveharrison9901We're kind of doing that again, aren't we? Even the traditionally-optimistic Star Trek has gotten very dark lately, to the point of making a show about a black-ops agency now. And it seems like an awful lot of written sci-fi is set in one dystopia or another. Not to mention the zombie-apocalypse fad that ran vigorously from 2004's Dawn of the Dead until the cancelation of The Walking Dead.
The film inspired me as a kid to dig deeper on politics and philosophy, which I did. Your take on the film is spot on. Love this channel more and more. Brilliant.
Excellent essay. Wells is truly a man who 'thought about things'. One of my favorite Wells vook is 'The War in the Air". Written around 1908, it's basically 'The Shape of Things to Come' without the hope.
Another author I've discovered that is quite thought provoking is H. Beam Piper. I'd go with "Space Viking", "The Cosmic Computer", Oomphal in the Sky", "A Slave is a Slave", and maybe just for fun "Lone Star Planet"
On the contrary, one that had that goal, and could retain it thru several generations, well could. However the final group in power would then ossify the society in the current shape, so that they could remain themselves an ossified and useless extension at the very top, never in fact giving up the power they no longer need to keep the privilege they still desire. And in ossifying the society to retain their power and privilege, at a stroke they would destroy all that they had worked for generations to create.
What always amuses and annoys me is that American Leftists can easily recognize this truth when it comes to corporate leaders and Republican politicians, but are utterly blind to it where Democrat politicians are concerned. Rightist people aren't perfect either, but seem to at least generally accept the notion that anyone can become corrupted.
When I first watched this movie, I couldn’t help notice that the "Wings over the world" and the use of the "Gas of Peace'' had similar parallels with the Royal Air Force practices at the time with Imperial Policing. This included bombing and strafing "unruly" tribes and their villages with follow-up ground support provided by Rolls Royce Armour Cars.
There was always a thick undercurrent of historical inspiration in GW's fiction/lore, often straying into outright copying and plagiarism. I honestly think that Warhammer/40k is a gold mine well worth digging into for the purposes of comparative analysis even if a person has no interest in the games themselves... a weird distillation of late-20th-century perspectives on everything thus far through the lens of 'there must always be conflict'.
@@victorkreig6089 Infinite and the Divine, the Darktide campaign, Mechanicus, the Priests of Mars Trilogy, Warhammer Crime, Titanicus, Assasinorium: Kingmaker, the Big Dakka, etc.
I recently started listening to Dies The Fire by S.M. Sterling because of your video and I just have to thank you. I haven't had so much fun with a series in a long time.
Absolutely fantastically insightful video, it touches brilliantly on matters I've long thought of. Particularly the bold revolutionary and energetic quality of the futurist movements of the 20th century are things that in most scholarship since ww2 have been brushed off as having been nothing but purely aesthetical propaganda. Something I felt really misunderstands such a pivotal component to why these movements captured the interests of so many.
That's on purpose, not coating it in propaganda lies would make people see that even communism as garbage as it is thought peasant brainless farmers deserved more basic intellectual respect than post-war people did. The NSDAP and Italo fascists were very much of the opinion that if you treat people with respect and that they are competent instead of just borderline room temperature IQ they generally don't hate you as much. Of course that's how all governments treat people now so they all are regarded poorly across the board, and have become stupider in the process for it sadly
I did like the movie, and I enjoy your commentary on it. It is a window into Wells and that time in the world. The film also has a scene depicting the horrors of trench warfare and gas warfare. Good review, you said what I was thinking about the subject.
Great, thoughtful video. Ideologies aside, while watching the segments I noticed A) How vastly influential the sets, costumes, and miniature designs were on the science fiction pulp magazine cover art of the 1930s & 1940s; B) The miniature cities seem to be very influential on the 1976 Logan's Run. The design is still pretty amazing.
Even striping away all the political and social commentary, this film is still fascinating to watch from a purely visual standpoint. The sets, costumes, and visual effect all had a profound influence on many other productions, well into the modern era. Probably the best example would be: SKY CAPTAIN AND THE WORLD OF TOMORROW. On a side note: Many people will know H.G. Wells as an author of Speculative Fiction/Science Fiction. But many don't realize that he, like his fellow Englishman, George Orwell was an essayist and wrote many no-fiction books on
It's interesting to see that "togas and vaguely Greek clothing is how we will dress in the future" trope goes back so far. Gene Roddenberry loved that one.
The same switch in how his books are perceived happened really badly in The Time Machine too. When he’s only interacted with the Eloi and sees the future as a utopia he thinks it’s because of communism. Later he discovers the morlocks and how grim things really are when Wells wrote it he probably intended it to be how the working and capital class would evolve without communism. However when I read it in the 2010s I thought it was about the evolution of the communist party rulers vs the people they ruled, because I knew how the USSR ended up working.
It always reminds me of how, in the modern US, everyone wants their children to become college-educated office drones, even if a trade-school plumber is making better money and probably contributing more to society. Even the utterly-useless "gender studies" sort of degrees are seen as being worth tens of thousands of dollars, while a kid who wants to be an electrician or auto-mechanic is seen as an embarrassment to his family.
You were at 1000 subs not too long ago, glad to see this channel is getting the recognition it deserves. 500k by Jan 2026 guaranteed! I just love this content, going out into the woods and talking about the philosophy of science fiction settings with my friends was one of my prime leisure activities in my teens and twenties. Good memories brought to life.
Fellow Fabian, George Bernard Shaw, pacifist and vegetarian that he was, actually managed to be quite honest about how authoritarian the Fabian system would be after a certain point. Using the hypothetical example of some bohemian man, he said such individuals could never be allowed to work the minimum effort, for just for their own needs, but they must be compelled to work for the greater society, at some determined-from-above minimum surplus output. In both Shaw's and Wells' visits to the Soviet Union, I think both at the height of the planed Ukrainian Famine-Genocide, the Holodomor, they both managed to "overlook" what was going on--well it wouldn't have played very well to the then narrative that the Russians had the future and it "worked". In regards to Wells' "Imperial Progressivism" which the 4th part of _Things to Come_ unironically champions, a good antidote is the first two books of CS Lewis' Space/Ransom Trilogy, where the character of Weston is largely a stand-in for Wells himself.
All ideologies are violent, the only real difference between most is how honest they are about it Because words only get you so far then eventually you have to take action if you want to see any further advancement that's just how "persuasion" works
@@victorkreig6089 You have a broader definition of 'violent' than I do. For example, a willingness to use violence in defence of oneself, others and their property, is not what I would call violent, while an ideology that promotes physically assaulting people who disagree with it would qualify. And, of course, there are some ideologies that are explicitly pacifist. Mind, that sort of ideology doesn't tend to stick around for very long when the people who believe in violent conversion are free to practice.
"To be GOVERNED is to be watched, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, regulated, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, checked, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures who have neither the right nor the wisdom nor the virtue to do so. To be GOVERNED is to be at every operation, at every transaction noted, registered, counted, taxed, stamped, measured, numbered, assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, prevented, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished. It is, under pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general interest, to be place under contribution, drilled, fleeced, exploited, monopolized, extorted from, squeezed, hoaxed, robbed; then, at the slightest resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, vilified, harassed, hunted down, abused, clubbed, disarmed, bound, choked, imprisoned, judged, condemned, shot, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and to crown all, mocked, ridiculed, derided, outraged, dishonored. That is government; that is its justice; that is its morality." -Pierre-Joseph Proudhon
I was thinking that on my first FO4 playthrough, taking the elevator down. I was a little disappointed that Father didn't have huge shoulderpads and a little cape.
I found the film on UA-cam before your essay. It does feel like the essence of Fallout video game storyline are in here, especially in Act 2 of the story.
Wells did touch on something prescient, humans, as a people and culture, need something to push against. If it is not outward, then that energy will be directed inward. Seems we are genetically predisposed to conquest.
We are. The DNA that spreads itself more aggressively tends to be the DNA that ends up with more copies in play. It is the purpose of life to convert all matter in the universe into DNA, or tools used by DNA.
Thank you for an excellent analysis of the era, movie, Wells, and Mosley. I think it's the best you've made. (although as a Gen X Briton, I'm obviously biased)
The Italian Fascists were handed control of the state executive because the Italian bourgeoisie were terrified of the Italian proletariat. The PCd'I was an extremely powerful force in Italian society in the '20s and '30s, and it was the most revolutionary party outside Russia; the Sinistra, under the leadership of, among others, Amadeo Bordiga, Bruno Fortichiari, and Ruggero Grieco, was the dominant wing of the party for most of its (pre-war) existence. Unfortunately, the revolution never came, and the party was bolshevized.
Okay, this is brilliant - and I actually saw all of “Things to Come” many years ago, without realizing what Feral points out here. I will quibble that Fascism/Nazism tend to portray their Perfect Future People as a product of returning to the (largely imaginary) past, while it’s Communism that wholeheartedly embrace the idea of rejecting the past to create a (basically impossible) Perfect Future, but in practical terms both are about destroying the present to make something better (and imaginary and impossible) that turns out to be nightmarishly brutal and grossly incompetent, it’s just a difference in framing.
7:40 I love that no one can just say "this is a movie about Blackshirts" but has to go the long way around and say something like "many people are remarking on how there seems to be apparent parallels between these characters and Blackshirts"
Well, no, because the blackshirts in England were Fascists, and Wells's heroes are international socialists. You can argue that that is a difference without a difference, if you like, but we have reason to believe Wells didn't think so.
Though I doubt you'd be able to make a video on it, as it has a relatively generic dystopia, from the shows you cover I think you'd absolutely love 'Brazil', from the deranged mind of Terry Gilliam.
I watched "Things to Come" thirty years ago and was struck by the parallels between that 1936 movie and the USA in the 1960's. Not everybody wanted to go to the moon.
The one thing with political systems and revolutions that almost every regime seems to forget is that no matter how humanitarian or progressive or interested in advance that system might be, it will still be filled with very fallible human beings and our innate desire to either subjugate others or destroy ourselves. We're animals and we keep forgetting that we're animals with really base drives. And that's what gets us each time.
Franco is an odd case in that he wasn't himself a fascist so much as a conservative monarchist from the start. But he led a coalition that included the Falangists, which were essentially fascists. Franco's policies were very much of the _right wing military dictatorship_ mold rather than fascist. But that gets into the decades long "what is fascism" discussion.
@@feralhistorian Well yes, thats why I said "put in the fascist club". Personally I don't think it matters very much. If youre a Jew in a concentration camp, a Russian in a gulag, or a Spaniard in whatever they had, the technicalities of how the means of production is owned is irrelevant. Its the totalitarianism thats the problem. Saying communism is of the left and fascism is of the right is basically just used as a proxy to 'prove' that anyone on that side is wrong. The difference between a communist and a liberal lefty is much greater that between said lefty and a small c conservative.
@@feralhistorian I suppose, if we reduce terminology down to the bones. Removing the specifics of the Catholics Religion and history, and just deal with absolute basics themselves. Perhaps Franco's Spain could be described as being Socially Conservative with Fascist allies. While Hitler's Germany could be described as being Fascist with Social Conservative allies.
@@feralhistorian Totally correct on that Feral. I'm sure I don't have to tell you but there is a channel named TIK who covers Fascism, Nazism and Communism and their relationship in great detail. Excellent stuff. From what I have read Mussolini hated the Nazis and thought they were barbaric. Mosely apparently told his followers to fight for Britain when the war broke out. So yeah "What is Fascism" Turn your papers in on Friday people so they can be graded.
Couple of side notes. When it was premiered some in the audience laughed at the outlandish idea of London being bombed by fleets of aircraft. There was a brief scene in the 21st Century showing a large flat screen TV that is transparent when off. LG introduced one at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show.
I really like your videos and approach to history, as a complex multilayered ongoing process with innumerable factors and actors driving it. Personally i dont like easy answers, i find all the nuance makes history a lot more interesting, like solving a really big puzzle.
But why does the space gun have a front sight? Did the breed a giant that we never see to aim it? Between Metropolis, which looks at some of the same issues from basically an opposite POV, and SoTtC we can see pretty much the creation of the esthetic of "The Future". Images from both films are definitive.
I laughed at the giant front sight the first time I saw this. I pictured some guy standing in the ground, staring up the barrel, yelling "more left, little more, no back!" trying to line it up with the Moon.
"The myth [is] that... humanity will improve itself. But we don't really change much, we just moderate our worst tendencies with cultural norms, legal boundaries and comforts."
Wasn't that a book, ten or twelve years ago? I remember two college-agers in a bookstore talking about how liberals cannot possibly be fascist because they don't hate black people. I remember thinking it was sad that dictionaries were apparently a lost technology.
I had a political science prof once describe fascism and communism as two sides of the same coin. The main difference was that nazism was fascism based on the national identity (hence National Socialism) while communism was fascism based on an international identity (hence International Communism).
Throw in liberalism with this. All three ideologies essentially revolved around solving the issue of the death of God. Communism wanted to replace God with the proletarian revolution, Fascism wanted to replace God with the racial community and its egregore in the shape of the Führer, and Liberalism tries to replace God with the individual and its liberation from all limitations and chains. All three religions are explicitly trying to replace God, they are biblically speaking antichrist
Yes, and that is the quickest way to summarize. Imposing their respective societies onto humanity by any means, to the exclusion of all others, were their end goals. Calling it "progress". Two flavors of the same poisoned candy.
I actually liked that one. Star-Maker had some interesting world-building, but then he wandered off into endless repetition of "being in a hive-mind is awesome -- just trust me, bro".
I love how every scfi utopia has an underlying tone of benevolent fascism, either as a story trope or as the antagonist. You should review a lot of Anime from Akira to Appleseed to many others commenting on post WWII Japan and progressive thinking
Sci-fi futures always end up somewhere on the fascist scale and political systems all decay into feudalism. All systems are Monarchies, it's just a question of how does one get to be King.
I'd love a look at the Principality of Zeon from Mobile Suit Gundam, they in many ways resemble that kind of technocratic optimistic utopianism, well not so much the Zabi dictatorship, but Char's Neo Zeon and the original ideals of Zeon Zum Deikun really have a lot of parallels with that zealous revolutionary spirit seeking a better future, though not always in a constructive way. That likely is why Zeon, and Zeonic characters are so popular among the fanbase because they speak to that inner desire for a better world and their adherents are willing to do whatever it takes to get there.
Robert was pretty much superior to every single futirism and space author out there, really makes me mad that Starship Troopers is pretty much his only work that has reached true fame
@victorkreig6089 If This Goes On is one of my favorite stories of the continuum. The only time the FPN has any agency is when he becomes an apostate and accepts the chance to flee when it is offered. From that point he is just along for the ride and he is presenting the tale of rebellion against a repressive religious/Fascist state from the perspective of a fly on the wall. Who could pull that off, let alone even attempt it? After all, the FPN has to be the Hero, right?
I'd like to hear your thoughts on "the world set free" Wells seems to like to end his books on "global-unity is good: notes, and similarly TWSF features a group of holdout war mongers that need to be dealt with. It also suffers a bit from his british-centric way of thinking where things revolve around the british dollar, language, science, and culture Just curious what sort of takeaways you might highlight
Excellent video. If you’d care to continue mining this particular vein of sci-fasc-fi you might explore THE IRON DREAM as presented by Norman Spinrad. It’s a ride, to say the least.
Sorry for an unhinged rant but I really feel like some puzzle piece just clicked in the place in my brain!!! Really reminds me of Gundam and how it is really built on the concept of great, revolutionary wave crushing and failing - the technology meant to liberate man leads to tighter cages and even emergence of the "new type" of man fails to live up to its transformative potential, to the point that this new man is reduced to an elite soldier and nothing more. There's even a prescient mirror of how progressive revolution of Zeon Deikun gets gradually transformed into reactionary Neo Zeon, literally coming back to Earth from the deep space out of spite and revenge. Funny how it reaches this conclusion not after ww2, but after 60s and 70s Japan student protests.
Good shit as always, my dude. Look forward to the next segment. Question. You delve into Trek a lot. Have you any future plans to dig into Strange New Worlds?
What I find interesting about the film is that it's a rare example of World War II speculation. It's like what we do now with World War 3 but it's like one of maybe two other pieces of media from the time that I even know about that does that.
A number of Wells long fiction is like that, War in the Air and The World Set Free are 2 I know about
It is funny to watch now. The war goes on and on... and then there's a pandemic (probably inspired by Spainish Flu), but this causes zombies...
As a film, maybe it was rare. But the written literature of the 1920s & 1930s was full of examples of what a new World War could look like. Largely, these novels and short stories were specifically written out of the experience of the Western Front, where long years of attritional warfare destroyed a generation and laid waste to massive swaths of the countryside. They projected forward what might happen if airplanes began to drop chemical weapons on civilian targets en masse. They expanded on the experience of the Russian Civil War, which quickly devolved into a chaotic stew of ideologies and petty warlords. Stephen Vincent Benet's "By The Waters Of Babylon" has a man of the future wandering the ruins of New York City, laid waste by carpet bombing. Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" recounts how a "Nine Years War" in the 1940s & 1950s wreaked the world and paved the way for the totalizing ways of "Fordism," an ideology marked by planned economics, eugenics, sex positivism, and recreational drugs.
It's predictive programming. These wars are all planned.
Since I found this channel, it's become one of my favourite watches and I look forward to the weeks upload.
Same, but my favorite shows have a tendency of getting canceled. 😓
I hope he keeps uploading after he finds his way off that mountain! 🙂
Let's also have a moment of respect for Things to Come's set-makers, stage-hands, costumers, and model-makers. They did some hella good-looking futuristic tech with what I assume was mostly wood, cloth, and plaster!
WW4 will be fought with mostly wood, cloth, and plaster.
~Albert E. probably
Indeed; practical, hand made effects/sets really hold up. I was watching Excalibur the other day and it felt far more real than most modern digital movies.
I will never agree with anyone that uses the word hella, learn to speak or don't do it at all
@@victorkreig6089 But what if I am speaking to the erudition on the nature of the Asgardian goddess of death?
@@victorkreig6089 And yet you understand what he means. Don't be an ass.
Insightful as always. One of the biggest takeaways is the caution to try to understand how a group sees itself, and the reminder that that's entirely possible to do without adopting that group's views yourself.
Standard operating procedure for a truly intelligent person.
Except most people are literally too stupid to do that
@@victorkreig6089 planet earth IRL
That’s actually a satisfying answer to the question of why the competing ideologies of that era used the same tactics to achieve the same ends while remaining violently opposed to one another, without seeming to notice how essentially identical they were.
Happens to religions all the time. Which is what they really were.
@@MM22966
Religions tend to be culturally richer than ideologies, whose myths are more easily countered by cynicism.
I once saw a comment regarding a political test mentioning that the Authoritarian Left and the Authoritarian Right would actually have a lot in common that they could sit down and talk about.
@@joelnotsure2871
My comment got removed.
@@The_Fat_Controller. something something horseshoe theory
Now that you've looked at Wells' presentation of his utopian optimism, you could look at Lewis' critique of Wells in the space trilogy.
I was about to say exactly the same thing- especially with That Hideous Strength, and Lewis’ brief mention of BUF.
Also, perhaps you know this, but Orwell wrote a critique of That Hideous Strength, and then went on to write 1984, which in some ways has elements that critique Lewis’ dystopia (mostly, Lewis’ idea of divine salvation from it).
Look to GK Chesterton. His writings inspired Lewis, as they did Gandhi.
"The world is what the saints and the prophets saw it was; it is not merely getting better or merely getting worse; there is one thing that the world does; it wobbles. Left to itself, it does not get anywhere; though if helped by real reformers of the right religion and philosophy, it may get better in many respects, and sometimes for considerable periods. But in itself it is not a progress; it is not even a process; it is the fashion of this world that passeth away. Life in itself is not a ladder; it is a see-saw."“
I have loved the word grok since the day I came across it in "Stranger in a Strange Land", which, incidentally , is still one of my favorite books of all time. Love your show.
Used to have a buddy named Grok. Actually, his name was Garth, but he couldn't pronounce that word.
Fiction and slang always give us words to articulate more precisely things that formal and 'proper' language doesn't quite capture. 'Grok', 'Sass', 'Belly-feel', whatever... the closest that real English comes to any of that is the archaic 'Ken', and that's still more intellectual than visceral (not to mention being a dialect word unless you count it as a loan; the status of Scots as either a dialect or a language is still pretty up-in-the-air).
It was almost two books that happened to be sharing the same covers. One of those was absolutely magnificent and the other kind of went in a really weird direction and which I look kind of like one might at a weird uncle whose refrigerator is constantly filled with bizarre types of cheese that he never seems to actually eat. But the weird doesn't detract from the magnificent.
@@MrMortullGerman uses “Ken”
@@MrMortull Ken is Old English, that's where the Scots got it from.
Feral Historian drops a video, everything else stops 🤘
Just in time for me to get back from the library and start preparing dinner!
Awesome
Yeah it's zased
@@The-future-is-in-the-past Zased is czinge.
I would argue the problem with acting “for the people” is that the moment you make that invocation you have forsaken the individual, reduced everything and everyone down to a series of abstract principles. Then you try to force flesh and blood people through that abstract mold and get frustrated when not everyone fits through it and the only response you can think of is doubling down on your philosophy because the only alternative then is to forsake your beliefs and thus risk killing a part of who you are. Self reflection is painful, blaming everything else is easy.
Except usually those people ARE going with what the people want, you however are implying that a small minority should dictate the will of the people simply because they too are citizens. The rest of the world is not America, the idea of rights is a myth to all of them and to apply the idea of protecting the minority from the majority in any other nation is a joke
"you have forsaken the individual, reduced everything and everyone down to a series of abstract principles."
Well, yeah. It's eugenics taken to the logical next step.
Life is a highway. Everyone must drive between the lines. Anyone who can't shouldn't be allowed to drive; the alternative is a road to ruin. The only question is how wide to make the lanes.
@@jliller Or perhaps whether to also provide turn lanes and parking spaces.
@@lwilton And off-ramps. "Well, you guys are pretty weird, but as long as you're weird way over there, it's not my problem".
Of course, this is too much like NOT ruling the world, for some people.
Also known as: The Communist Philosophical Doom Spiral!
A debating opponent of H.G. Wells's critique was G.K. Chesterton - sadly only remembered for writing detective stories & the breadth of his insights largely forgotten today. Essentially he was an journalist. I think his words resonate with a perennial truth especially in the late line:
"The world is what the saints and the prophets saw it was; it is not merely getting better or merely getting worse; there is one thing that the world does; it wobbles. Left to itself, it does not get anywhere; though if helped by real reformers of the right religion and philosophy, it may get better in many respects, and sometimes for considerable periods. But in itself it is not a progress; it is not even a process; it is the fashion of this world that passeth away. Life in itself is not a ladder; it is a see-saw."
@@walther.laufer-68 quite fond of his fence.
ua-cam.com/video/mHBZqEOwpnM/v-deo.htmlsi=TKSbQkyKLWIzYFtS
Alan Watts didn't forget him.
@@richardhall5489 thanks for that! I need to stand on my head more often.
I honestly think GKC is seriously overlooked for our time. The apostle of common sense, a title of great book btw.
@walther.laufer-68
You're welcome. Alan Watts paints a lovely picture of him.
@@richardhall5489👍
That book by Dale Ahlquist was a real eye opener.
Very nice going there with the Mosley connection. History seems to gloss over the fact that fascism was a movement which ran through most of Europe back in the 30's and not just in one particularly country. It's a very blatant movie, in that respect, but all great Sci-fi reflects it's time. It is very different watching it with 90 years hindsight, though. However, the sheer ambition of the movie cannot be undenied. Those sets and costumes are absolutely beautiful. "Whings ovar the whorld" old chap, thanks for another great video.
And the mic drop at the end calling out Umberto Eco..... priceless!
This is a man who understands the internet. After 18 minutes of insightful commentary on a truly arcane subject, ends it by throwing a bomb at a dead Italian philosopher.
Always was fascinated by Things to Come, from how it predicted the Battle of Britain to its portrayal of a post-apocalyptic setting (a first I think). The most difficult part of the film is the third act. He does a fantastic job putting into the context of its time. I (stupidly perhaps) never considered how this tied into Mosley and the Black Shirts.
Without being in the time or place of the original audience, subtle cultural signals are always missed. It's why movies that can stand the test of time are actually pretty rare.
For all of Eco's writing skills, he couldn't abstract from his own experiences or impulses. Frankly, you can see Stephen King for a more modern example.
What strikes me is how the third act seems to foretell our current rise of stupidity in a revolt against the "elites" by the common people who think progress has gone to far in a way they can't quite describe without targeting ancient minorities.
Would love to see your take on Yul Brynner's "The Ultimate Warrior." The 70s were a smorgasbord of post-apocalyptic, urban decay, gangs/cults out of control movies (e.g. "The Warriors" and "The Omega Man") that, when taken as a whole, reveal the societal fears and anxieties of that era.
Fist of the North Star
Oh my gosh, another person remembering The Ultimate Warrior! 🫡
Yes, that late ‘60s to 1977 period is practically nothing but dystopian hell sci-fi. One might make the case that The Ultimate Warrior is taking place in the Mad Max universe.
@@steveharrison9901We're kind of doing that again, aren't we? Even the traditionally-optimistic Star Trek has gotten very dark lately, to the point of making a show about a black-ops agency now. And it seems like an awful lot of written sci-fi is set in one dystopia or another. Not to mention the zombie-apocalypse fad that ran vigorously from 2004's Dawn of the Dead until the cancelation of The Walking Dead.
how have i just learned about this channel, love the format, something about a guy sitting outside and talking about films is genuinely appealing
The film inspired me as a kid to dig deeper on politics and philosophy, which I did. Your take on the film is spot on. Love this channel more and more. Brilliant.
Dude, you have me watching 90 year old movies so I can enjoy your videos more. Great Job.
Watch “NEWS BENDERS 1968” you’ll be blown away 😅
@@LeAndreWatts I will give it a try, Thanks.
The way you discuss things with such nuance really shows the fall of discourse in mainstream media.
Excellent essay. Wells is truly a man who 'thought about things'. One of my favorite Wells vook is 'The War in the Air". Written around 1908, it's basically 'The Shape of Things to Come' without the hope.
Another author I've discovered that is quite thought provoking is H. Beam Piper. I'd go with "Space Viking", "The Cosmic Computer", Oomphal in the Sky", "A Slave is a Slave", and maybe just for fun "Lone Star Planet"
There's nothing more absurd than the notion that state will ultimately render itself obsolete if only given all the power it could ever want.
On the contrary, one that had that goal, and could retain it thru several generations, well could.
However the final group in power would then ossify the society in the current shape, so that they could remain themselves an ossified and useless extension at the very top, never in fact giving up the power they no longer need to keep the privilege they still desire.
And in ossifying the society to retain their power and privilege, at a stroke they would destroy all that they had worked for generations to create.
What always amuses and annoys me is that American Leftists can easily recognize this truth when it comes to corporate leaders and Republican politicians, but are utterly blind to it where Democrat politicians are concerned.
Rightist people aren't perfect either, but seem to at least generally accept the notion that anyone can become corrupted.
@@lwilton Very pretty "No, only yes." You've seem to have explained a why for DoritioWorldOrder's conclusion.
When I first watched this movie, I couldn’t help notice that the "Wings over the world" and the use of the "Gas of Peace'' had similar parallels with the Royal Air Force practices at the time with Imperial Policing.
This included bombing and strafing "unruly" tribes and their villages with follow-up ground support provided by Rolls Royce Armour Cars.
I’m so glad we learned not to do this
@@celiacresswell6909 Have we?
The Unification Wars of Terra from 40k is definitely inspired by this. If you haven't yet you should check out the short story 'The Last Church'
There was always a thick undercurrent of historical inspiration in GW's fiction/lore, often straying into outright copying and plagiarism. I honestly think that Warhammer/40k is a gold mine well worth digging into for the purposes of comparative analysis even if a person has no interest in the games themselves... a weird distillation of late-20th-century perspectives on everything thus far through the lens of 'there must always be conflict'.
@@MrMortull 80% of writing for 40k is horse shit garbage though, especially now
@@victorkreig6089 20% good writing is really good, in light of Sturgeon's Law.
the last church is the purest form of a reddit atheist circle jerk.
@@victorkreig6089 Infinite and the Divine, the Darktide campaign, Mechanicus, the Priests of Mars Trilogy, Warhammer Crime, Titanicus, Assasinorium: Kingmaker, the Big Dakka, etc.
I recently started listening to Dies The Fire by S.M. Sterling because of your video and I just have to thank you. I haven't had so much fun with a series in a long time.
I'll tell you what's to come; a good time watching Feral Historian.
Hey! New video, thanks! And great job calling out Umberto Eco, I appreciate that.
My man!
We need to boost your signal, so many people need to hear your wisdom. Great stuff as always brother.
Someone dropped FH's name in a super chat in a recent Nerdrotic live stream.
Absolutely fantastically insightful video, it touches brilliantly on matters I've long thought of. Particularly the bold revolutionary and energetic quality of the futurist movements of the 20th century are things that in most scholarship since ww2 have been brushed off as having been nothing but purely aesthetical propaganda. Something I felt really misunderstands such a pivotal component to why these movements captured the interests of so many.
That's on purpose, not coating it in propaganda lies would make people see that even communism as garbage as it is thought peasant brainless farmers deserved more basic intellectual respect than post-war people did. The NSDAP and Italo fascists were very much of the opinion that if you treat people with respect and that they are competent instead of just borderline room temperature IQ they generally don't hate you as much. Of course that's how all governments treat people now so they all are regarded poorly across the board, and have become stupider in the process for it sadly
Ew a furry.
Fresh Feral means this IS a good morning.
I did like the movie, and I enjoy your commentary on it. It is a window into Wells and that time in the world. The film also has a scene depicting the horrors of trench warfare and gas warfare. Good review, you said what I was thinking about the subject.
Your content appears to be substantially undervalued.
Great, thoughtful video. Ideologies aside, while watching the segments I noticed A) How vastly influential the sets, costumes, and miniature designs were on the science fiction pulp magazine cover art of the 1930s & 1940s; B) The miniature cities seem to be very influential on the 1976 Logan's Run. The design is still pretty amazing.
The art direction was amazing. I do have a soft spot for Art Deco.
Even striping away all the political and social commentary, this film is still fascinating to watch from a purely visual standpoint. The sets, costumes, and visual effect all had a profound influence on many other productions, well into the modern era. Probably the best example would be: SKY CAPTAIN AND THE WORLD OF TOMORROW. On a side note: Many people will know H.G. Wells as an author of Speculative Fiction/Science Fiction. But many don't realize that he, like his fellow Englishman, George Orwell was an essayist and wrote many no-fiction books on
It's interesting to see that "togas and vaguely Greek clothing is how we will dress in the future" trope goes back so far. Gene Roddenberry loved that one.
@@Green_Tea_Coffee If you look into the word "Classical" you will see where it comes from.
Always a great day when I see a new video from feral
My Dad loved this film. He once told me "I am a fascist, I'm not a Nazi".
He fought in WW2. On the side of the Allies.
Another excellent video essay...thanks very much
I really enjoy these reviews. And he gets enough right to keep it interesting 😎
The same switch in how his books are perceived happened really badly in The Time Machine too. When he’s only interacted with the Eloi and sees the future as a utopia he thinks it’s because of communism. Later he discovers the morlocks and how grim things really are when Wells wrote it he probably intended it to be how the working and capital class would evolve without communism. However when I read it in the 2010s I thought it was about the evolution of the communist party rulers vs the people they ruled, because I knew how the USSR ended up working.
It always reminds me of how, in the modern US, everyone wants their children to become college-educated office drones, even if a trade-school plumber is making better money and probably contributing more to society. Even the utterly-useless "gender studies" sort of degrees are seen as being worth tens of thousands of dollars, while a kid who wants to be an electrician or auto-mechanic is seen as an embarrassment to his family.
Thank you for posting another great video
I remember watching this back in the day.
Glad to see your videos are catching on
You were at 1000 subs not too long ago, glad to see this channel is getting the recognition it deserves. 500k by Jan 2026 guaranteed! I just love this content, going out into the woods and talking about the philosophy of science fiction settings with my friends was one of my prime leisure activities in my teens and twenties. Good memories brought to life.
Gross a furry.
Thank you. I always look forward to these hitting my feed late Friday evening.
The *Ends* always justify the *Memes.*
Fellow Fabian, George Bernard Shaw, pacifist and vegetarian that he was, actually managed to be quite honest about how authoritarian the Fabian system would be after a certain point. Using the hypothetical example of some bohemian man, he said such individuals could never be allowed to work the minimum effort, for just for their own needs, but they must be compelled to work for the greater society, at some determined-from-above minimum surplus output.
In both Shaw's and Wells' visits to the Soviet Union, I think both at the height of the planed Ukrainian Famine-Genocide, the Holodomor, they both managed to "overlook" what was going on--well it wouldn't have played very well to the then narrative that the Russians had the future and it "worked".
In regards to Wells' "Imperial Progressivism" which the 4th part of _Things to Come_ unironically champions, a good antidote is the first two books of CS Lewis' Space/Ransom Trilogy, where the character of Weston is largely a stand-in for Wells himself.
All ideologies are violent, the only real difference between most is how honest they are about it
Because words only get you so far then eventually you have to take action if you want to see any further advancement that's just how "persuasion" works
@@victorkreig6089 You have a broader definition of 'violent' than I do. For example, a willingness to use violence in defence of oneself, others and their property, is not what I would call violent, while an ideology that promotes physically assaulting people who disagree with it would qualify.
And, of course, there are some ideologies that are explicitly pacifist. Mind, that sort of ideology doesn't tend to stick around for very long when the people who believe in violent conversion are free to practice.
Fresh Feral? Hell yeah.
Nail, head, etc. Spectacular video.
Watching this video makes for an interesting game of weighing which is more caught up in its own ideology.
I love the space gun’s front sight!!!
Great video, breath of fresh air really
"To be GOVERNED is to be watched, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, regulated, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, checked, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures who have neither the right nor the wisdom nor the virtue to do so. To be GOVERNED is to be at every operation, at every transaction noted, registered, counted, taxed, stamped, measured, numbered, assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, prevented, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished. It is, under pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general interest, to be place under contribution, drilled, fleeced, exploited, monopolized, extorted from, squeezed, hoaxed, robbed; then, at the slightest resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, vilified, harassed, hunted down, abused, clubbed, disarmed, bound, choked, imprisoned, judged, condemned, shot, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and to crown all, mocked, ridiculed, derided, outraged, dishonored. That is government; that is its justice; that is its morality."
-Pierre-Joseph Proudhon
Always good to see Proudhon dropped into the comments.
That sounds like a guy who didn't have a working toilet.
@@MM22966 Prisons have working toilets.
Wow! Welcome to Canada since 2915..,Okay, okay probably since forever but not quite as obvious.
Criminy. Dude didn't live to see the end of American Civil War. I cannot imagine what he'd have to say about the modern State.
If you look at the model of the futuristic underground city, it's got to be the inspiration for the institute in fallout 4.
I was thinking that on my first FO4 playthrough, taking the elevator down. I was a little disappointed that Father didn't have huge shoulderpads and a little cape.
@@feralhistorian I was thinking Hunger Games/PanAm.
@@feralhistorian Had the devs not been forced to scrap the story he just might have
@@feralhistorian a deep dive on the institute's goals and ideals might be interesting.
I found the film on UA-cam before your essay. It does feel like the essence of Fallout video game storyline are in here, especially in Act 2 of the story.
Wells did touch on something prescient, humans, as a people and culture, need something to push against. If it is not outward, then that energy will be directed inward. Seems we are genetically predisposed to conquest.
"I'm escaping to the one place that hasn't been corrupted by capitalism: SPACE!"
steel sharpens steel, always
We are. The DNA that spreads itself more aggressively tends to be the DNA that ends up with more copies in play.
It is the purpose of life to convert all matter in the universe into DNA, or tools used by DNA.
can i ask do you play sid meier's alpha centauri or have a plan to make a video about this game?
That is a great game.
@@Kerrvillian1962 YES
Thank you for an excellent analysis of the era, movie, Wells, and Mosley. I think it's the best you've made. (although as a Gen X Briton, I'm obviously biased)
The Italian Fascists were handed control of the state executive because the Italian bourgeoisie were terrified of the Italian proletariat. The PCd'I was an extremely powerful force in Italian society in the '20s and '30s, and it was the most revolutionary party outside Russia; the Sinistra, under the leadership of, among others, Amadeo Bordiga, Bruno Fortichiari, and Ruggero Grieco, was the dominant wing of the party for most of its (pre-war) existence. Unfortunately, the revolution never came, and the party was bolshevized.
Ahh been waiting for this to drop.
Okay, this is brilliant - and I actually saw all of “Things to Come” many years ago, without realizing what Feral points out here.
I will quibble that Fascism/Nazism tend to portray their Perfect Future People as a product of returning to the (largely imaginary) past, while it’s Communism that wholeheartedly embrace the idea of rejecting the past to create a (basically impossible) Perfect Future, but in practical terms both are about destroying the present to make something better (and imaginary and impossible) that turns out to be nightmarishly brutal and grossly incompetent, it’s just a difference in framing.
I also watched the video you recommended a while back on the same subject. It also was fabulous.
7:40 I love that no one can just say "this is a movie about Blackshirts" but has to go the long way around and say something like "many people are remarking on how there seems to be apparent parallels between these characters and Blackshirts"
Well, no, because the blackshirts in England were Fascists, and Wells's heroes are international socialists. You can argue that that is a difference without a difference, if you like, but we have reason to believe Wells didn't think so.
Though I doubt you'd be able to make a video on it, as it has a relatively generic dystopia, from the shows you cover I think you'd absolutely love 'Brazil', from the deranged mind of Terry Gilliam.
I watched "Things to Come" thirty years ago and was struck by the parallels between that 1936 movie and the USA in the 1960's. Not everybody wanted to go to the moon.
The film is on youtube for anyone who is interested. The Historian's points give it new perspectives.
The one thing with political systems and revolutions that almost every regime seems to forget is that no matter how humanitarian or progressive or interested in advance that system might be, it will still be filled with very fallible human beings and our innate desire to either subjugate others or destroy ourselves. We're animals and we keep forgetting that we're animals with really base drives.
And that's what gets us each time.
The Gas of Peace. The Freemasonry of Science. What a wild movie.
On the other hand General Franco, which is also put in the fascist club was pro royalist, and handed power over to the king when he died.
Franco is an odd case in that he wasn't himself a fascist so much as a conservative monarchist from the start. But he led a coalition that included the Falangists, which were essentially fascists. Franco's policies were very much of the _right wing military dictatorship_ mold rather than fascist. But that gets into the decades long "what is fascism" discussion.
@@feralhistorian Well yes, thats why I said "put in the fascist club".
Personally I don't think it matters very much. If youre a Jew in a concentration camp, a Russian in a gulag, or a Spaniard in whatever they had, the technicalities of how the means of production is owned is irrelevant. Its the totalitarianism thats the problem. Saying communism is of the left and fascism is of the right is basically just used as a proxy to 'prove' that anyone on that side is wrong. The difference between a communist and a liberal lefty is much greater that between said lefty and a small c conservative.
@@feralhistorian I suppose, if we reduce terminology down to the bones. Removing the specifics of the Catholics Religion and history, and just deal with absolute basics themselves.
Perhaps Franco's Spain could be described as being Socially Conservative with Fascist allies.
While Hitler's Germany could be described as being Fascist with Social Conservative allies.
@@Hugebull Krauts weren't fascists either, the vast majority of state control came after the start of the war not before
@@feralhistorian Totally correct on that Feral. I'm sure I don't have to tell you but there is a channel named TIK who covers Fascism, Nazism and Communism and their relationship in great detail. Excellent stuff. From what I have read Mussolini hated the Nazis and thought they were barbaric. Mosely apparently told his followers to fight for Britain when the war broke out. So yeah "What is Fascism" Turn your papers in on Friday people so they can be graded.
Couple of side notes.
When it was premiered some in the audience laughed at the outlandish idea of London being bombed by fleets of aircraft.
There was a brief scene in the 21st Century showing a large flat screen TV that is transparent when off. LG introduced one at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show.
Wow, Wells did a movie, I had no idea! And the guy on the poster looks just like you!
Gibson's: The Gernsback Continuum, is a nice Eco of these ideas.
I really like your videos and approach to history, as a complex multilayered ongoing process with innumerable factors and actors driving it. Personally i dont like easy answers, i find all the nuance makes history a lot more interesting, like solving a really big puzzle.
A map that doesn't show anything smaller than a mile tends not to be very useful for navigating a neighborhood.
There are very few things better than Fresh Feral in the morning- mickey mouse 1933. Great post, lots to consider here.
Love the videos, as always, warrior. :)
But why does the space gun have a front sight? Did the breed a giant that we never see to aim it? Between Metropolis, which looks at some of the same issues from basically an opposite POV, and SoTtC we can see pretty much the creation of the esthetic of "The Future". Images from both films are definitive.
I laughed at the giant front sight the first time I saw this. I pictured some guy standing in the ground, staring up the barrel, yelling "more left, little more, no back!" trying to line it up with the Moon.
always a pleasure. such a sweet format.
The novel was probably one of the many inspirations for Warhammer 40k.
Nobody, and i mean nobody except FH talks about the nuance of the fascist and communist movement sof the 20th century. Bold. Bravo!
You missed something interesting about the movie. Things to Come was ground layer for the plague/disease zombie genre with the Wandering Sickness.
"The myth [is] that... humanity will improve itself. But we don't really change much, we just moderate our worst tendencies with cultural norms, legal boundaries and comforts."
Thank you, Captain! May I have another?
Have you read H. Beam Piper's "Space Viking"? Some fun/thought provoking political stuff there.
Great stuff as always
A useful reminder that Wells coined the phrase “liberal fascism” and meant it as a good thing.
Wasn't that a book, ten or twelve years ago?
I remember two college-agers in a bookstore talking about how liberals cannot possibly be fascist because they don't hate black people.
I remember thinking it was sad that dictionaries were apparently a lost technology.
@@stevenscott2136 by Jonah Goldberg, 2008. So, just over seventeen years back.
I had a political science prof once describe fascism and communism as two sides of the same coin. The main difference was that nazism was fascism based on the national identity (hence National Socialism) while communism was fascism based on an international identity (hence International Communism).
Throw in liberalism with this. All three ideologies essentially revolved around solving the issue of the death of God. Communism wanted to replace God with the proletarian revolution, Fascism wanted to replace God with the racial community and its egregore in the shape of the Führer, and Liberalism tries to replace God with the individual and its liberation from all limitations and chains. All three religions are explicitly trying to replace God, they are biblically speaking antichrist
They are all the bastard children of Marx
@@Svevsky As a Puritan, I give your comment a solid thumbs up.
Yes, and that is the quickest way to summarize. Imposing their respective societies onto humanity by any means, to the exclusion of all others, were their end goals. Calling it "progress". Two flavors of the same poisoned candy.
He was very, very close to understanding it.
My favorite UA-cam channel.
Goofy trivia- Raymond Massey ( star of the film) was the father in law of the best Sherlock Holmes ever, Jeremy Brett.
Fascinating! Would love to see what you make of the works of Olaf Stapledon and his reoccurring themes of eugenic utopias.
I've been kicking around something with _Last and First Men_ for awhile . . .
I actually liked that one. Star-Maker had some interesting world-building, but then he wandered off into endless repetition of "being in a hive-mind is awesome -- just trust me, bro".
I love how every scfi utopia has an underlying tone of benevolent fascism, either as a story trope or as the antagonist. You should review a lot of Anime from Akira to Appleseed to many others commenting on post WWII Japan and progressive thinking
Sci-fi futures always end up somewhere on the fascist scale and political systems all decay into feudalism. All systems are Monarchies, it's just a question of how does one get to be King.
I'd love a look at the Principality of Zeon from Mobile Suit Gundam, they in many ways resemble that kind of technocratic optimistic utopianism, well not so much the Zabi dictatorship, but Char's Neo Zeon and the original ideals of Zeon Zum Deikun really have a lot of parallels with that zealous revolutionary spirit seeking a better future, though not always in a constructive way.
That likely is why Zeon, and Zeonic characters are so popular among the fanbase because they speak to that inner desire for a better world and their adherents are willing to do whatever it takes to get there.
Feral Historian uploads, I click. 👍
So glad that the algorithm brought me to your channel. Excellent content and a fellow historian!
Same here!
Brilliant. Now do one on Heinlein's Future History.
Robert was pretty much superior to every single futirism and space author out there, really makes me mad that Starship Troopers is pretty much his only work that has reached true fame
@victorkreig6089 If This Goes On is one of my favorite stories of the continuum. The only time the FPN has any agency is when he becomes an apostate and accepts the chance to flee when it is offered. From that point he is just along for the ride and he is presenting the tale of rebellion against a repressive religious/Fascist state from the perspective of a fly on the wall. Who could pull that off, let alone even attempt it? After all, the FPN has to be the Hero, right?
I'd like to hear your thoughts on "the world set free"
Wells seems to like to end his books on "global-unity is good: notes, and similarly TWSF features a group of holdout war mongers that need to be dealt with.
It also suffers a bit from his british-centric way of thinking where things revolve around the british dollar, language, science, and culture
Just curious what sort of takeaways you might highlight
I'd love to see your take on Kipling's scifi (With the Night Mail & As Easy as ABC)
Excellent video. If you’d care to continue mining this particular vein of sci-fasc-fi you might explore THE IRON DREAM as presented by Norman Spinrad. It’s a ride, to say the least.
Grok mentioned. Heinlein inbound
Like a shipping container full of moon rocks shot from a railgun.
15:07 As long as there are Liberty Forsaken bugs, bots, squids, and traitors.. Spreading Democracy will require ordinance.
Waring after warning among our own history or recent memory reminds me of Cipolla's essay on the 5 Laws of Human Stupidity.
It would be interesting to see this movie made today and see what it would predict for the future.
Sorry for an unhinged rant but I really feel like some puzzle piece just clicked in the place in my brain!!!
Really reminds me of Gundam and how it is really built on the concept of great, revolutionary wave crushing and failing - the technology meant to liberate man leads to tighter cages and even emergence of the "new type" of man fails to live up to its transformative potential, to the point that this new man is reduced to an elite soldier and nothing more.
There's even a prescient mirror of how progressive revolution of Zeon Deikun gets gradually transformed into reactionary Neo Zeon, literally coming back to Earth from the deep space out of spite and revenge.
Funny how it reaches this conclusion not after ww2, but after 60s and 70s Japan student protests.
Been waiting for this one. So many great lines "for the people" in this film.
Good shit as always, my dude.
Look forward to the next segment.
Question.
You delve into Trek a lot.
Have you any future plans to dig into Strange New Worlds?