It would be wrong to see this as just a prudish or Victorian or even sincerely religious attitude about sex. It’s about control. It’s about the authority of the state intruding into more and more parts of life, and about making more and more people complicit in the abuse of power.
/1
/2 The Nazis’ increasingly all-encompassing laws didn’t just serve policy goals. They served to normalize the idea of the state having authority in every segment of life, and to make more and more people complicit in enforcing that authority. That’s what totalitarianism means.
/3 The Nazis passed anti-Jewish laws that forced more and more people to be complicit in enforcement and part of the machine excluding, shunning, and abusing Jews. The American Right wants abortion laws, IVF laws, contraceptive laws that will make more and more doctors, nurses, etc. complicit.
/4 The fundamental concept is that most people, rather than stand up and say “I’m a terrible person if I go along with this,” will go along and rewrite their mental map to agree with it rather than think themselves terrible.
/5 The anti-trans movement illustrates this. They KNOW there are very few trans kids, but they want to make as many people as possible — coaches, teachers, administrators — complicit in policing and excluding them. Same with the push for censorship of books.
The problems are intrinsic to reactionary ideology aka fascism. State it's self is not the source of the problem but rather is the tool being used by the fascist to implement there will. Just like the nazis did in Germany. It wasn't the government. It was the people in power
Nations states exist to make sure the needs of the people are met. When slthose needs are met and become self sufficient the state goes away (this a very simplified analysis of a very complex issue)
Except no nation state in recent history has ensured the needs of the people are met. At least not all the people. And the state actively works to prevent ppl from becoming self sufficient.
