This is Fascism: a Wake-Up Call by Rosan Smits
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
“This is Fascism: a Wake-Up Call” is a book about the move to fascism throughout the world, but particularly in the United States and Netherlands. I received an advance review copy for Kindle from Net Galley for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.
From the first pages, “This is Fascism” reminded me of a number of books I read in numerous political science classes in college. One of my two degrees is in political science, and while I don’t work in the field, I maintain a deep respect for it.
The book is academic. It’s weighty. It’s deep. Unlike “The Book of Don,” which I recently reviewed, this isn’t a comedy. It’s a historical drama. Horror, even. It visits different points in history from the Nazi Third Reich to present to show that we’re not headed towards fascism. We’re there. And we need to first recognize that fact and then fight against it.
A lot of people on the left like to throw around the term “fascist” when talking about the current American government. Just like those on the right love to yell “communist” at everything they don’t like. The biggest difference, is that Rosan Smits brings the receipts. Literally.
Reading it on my Kindle, I would read 10% of the book at a time — or something like that. While I enjoyed it, it was not something that I could “power through.” I needed to read a little, digest, and come back in a day or two for more.
A couple days ago, I had gotten to 62% and planned to get to 75% in my next reading, but lo and behold, before I even got to 75%, the book ended … kind of. Approximately 30 percent of the book is notes and links and, well, receipts. If there’s something you want to dive into more, it’s probably annotated and you can just go to the link. Very academic.
Frankly, I hope I don’t have to read a follow up to this book. I hope we get our proverbial ish together and return the authoritarians to their rightful places on Elba. Or Rikers. But I don’t have a ton of faith in that. So I’ll be on the lookout for an update in a few years and will be sure to give it a read.
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