Read that again. Slowly. If that doesn't make the hair on the back of your neck stand up, it should.

Myriad people immediately flagged the post as sounding eerily similar to one of the Nazi Party's central slogans — "Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer" (one people, one realm, one leader). And they're not wrong to hear the echo. Even if you want to give the DOL every possible benefit of the doubt (you shouldn't), the vibe is unmistakable: nationalist propaganda, identity worship, and "blood and soil" messaging dressed up as patriotism.

And it wasn't even that subtle. The post was paired with a black-and-white montage of Revolutionary-era imagery and propaganda-style art — the kind of aesthetic authoritarian movements love because it sells nostalgia, certainty, obedience, and "purity" in one neat package.

Keep in mind, this is the Department of Labor. Its job is supposed to be enforcing wage-and-hour laws, protecting workplace safety, ensuring fair labor standards, and helping people get employed and trained. Not cranking out memes that wink at fascist tropes and flirt with Nazi-era rhetoric, slogans, and iconography.

This isn't happening in a vacuum. Union leaders and historians are sounding alarms about a "rhetorical shift towards white supremacy" within the federal government, with campaigns featuring idealized, mostly White male workers, "Americanism" over "globalism," and messaging designed to convince the "real Americans" that only people like them belong. Indeed, ICE is recruiting potential agents with the tagline, "We'll have our home again," a lyric tied to white nationalist groups.

When federal agencies start talking like this, it's not "patriotism." It's not an accident. It's propaganda — and it's the point.
Whither Bostock? — via SCOTUSblog

     

Related Stories

• WIRTW #785: the 'sometimes a coffee cup is just a coffee cup' edition
• WIRTW #784: the 'white' edition
• WIRTW #783: the 'Christmas movies' edition

 

• Email to a friend •