Inventing and punishing thoughtcrimes seems to be a favored tactic among dictators. Trump-MAGA and ICE remind me most of Stalin and his NKVD (secret police). Solzhenitsyn wrote about how ordinary citizens would frequently be arrested/shot/sent to the gulag over mere assertions that they held anti-Soviet/anti-Communist beliefs, or had counter-revolutionary sympathies. It was illegal to not rat out others who you suspected held such beliefs and inclinations - if you didn’t you could be shot yourself.
I think we’re getting there. I soon expect to see federal government websites and apps where you can report your friends/neighbors/family members for anti-capitalist and/or anti-fascist and/or anti-evangelical-Christian leanings.
From Wikipedia (Great Terror article)
The purges were largely conducted by the NKVD, which functioned as the interior ministry and secret police of the USSR. Soviet politicians who opposed or criticized Stalin were removed from office and imprisoned, or executed, by the NKVD. The purges were eventually expanded to the Red Army high command, which had a disastrous effect on the military. The campaigns also affected many other segments of society: the intelligentsia, wealthy peasants—especially those lending money or other wealth (kulaks)—and professionals. As the scope of the purge widened, the omnipresent suspicion of saboteurs and counter-revolutionaries (known collectively as wreckers) began affecting civilian life.
The campaigns were carried out according to the general line of the party, often by direct orders by the Politburo headed by Stalin. Hundreds of thousands of people were accused of political crimes, including espionage, wrecking, sabotage, anti-Soviet agitation, and conspiracies to prepare uprisings and coups. They were executed by shooting, or sent to Gulag labor camps. The NKVD targeted certain ethnic minorities with particular force (such as Volga Germans or Soviet citizens of Polish origin), who were subjected to forced deportation and extreme repression. Throughout the purge, the NKVD sought to strengthen control over civilians through fear and frequently used imprisonment, torture, violent interrogation, and executions during its mass operations.
It blows my mind how computer illiterate people are these days. All while congratulating themselves on their “tech skills” in comparison to “old people” who they claim “don’t understand technology” like they do. Most everyone, up until maybe, what, 10 years ago, knew how to use a desktop computer and desktop software like browsers and word processors and spreadsheets and email clients. Now if the software isn’t a phone app and if the interaction is more than voice-recognition or pictures or video or sound, people are helpless and happy that they’re helpless.