Totalitarian ritual idolatry is an organizational device, not a religion

Evidence

In respect of administrative resources, tendencies towards increasing democratic involvement have as their dark side possibilities for the creation of totalitarian power. The intensifying of surveillance operations provides many avenues of democratic involvement, but also makes possible the sectional control of political power, bolstered by monopolistic access to the means of violence, as an instrument of terror. Totalitarianism and modernity are not just contingently, but inherently, connected, as Zygmunt Bauman in particular has made clear. — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 401 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Totalitarian propaganda seeks organization, not persuasion or novel doctrine.; Totalitarian rule must not be explained as Weberian charismatic leadership; Totalitarianism is inherently, not just contingently, connected to modernity — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 401 (+3 more)

Related

• Totalitarianism introduces unprecedented concepts of power and reality (similarity 0.85)
• Totalitarian government differs categorically from dictatorship and tyranny (similarity 0.84)
• Totalitarianism is inherently, not just contingently, connected to modernity (similarity 0.82)
• Totalitarian propaganda seeks organization, not persuasion or novel doctrine. (similarity 0.81)
• Totalitarianism concentrates state powers in ways traditional despotism could not (similarity 0.81)
• Totalitarian propaganda organizes masses through existing ideas, not new doctrine (similarity 0.80)
• Imperialism’s global politics supplied the preconditions for totalitarian rule (similarity 0.80)
• Terror is the essence of totalitarian government, not a means to an end (similarity 0.80)
• Totalitarian rule is not monolithic but deliberately overlapping, held by a Führer-principle (similarity 0.78)
• Totalitarian movements borrow secret-society forms while broadcasting their aims openly (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Totalitarian rule must not be explained as Weberian charismatic leadership #qualifies (0.85)
• Totalitarianism adopted tribalism for its isolating value even against its own doctrines #expands (0.80)
• Totalitarianism is inherently, not just contingently, connected to modernity #complicates (0.75) — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 401
• Terror is the essence of totalitarian government, not a means to an end #expands (0.70) — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 808
• Totalitarian mass support comes neither from ignorance nor from brainwashing. #complicates (0.70) — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 1944