The difficult thing about the breakdown of society as we've grown used to it is that it's usually not an abrupt collapse. The Decline and Fall of the Romans took a few hundred years from the end of the Republic to Romulus Augustus.

It's also not clear-cut that it *has* occurred, except in retrospect when an inflection point might (or might not) become clearer.

When you're living through it, every step on the path to neo-fascism seems *unwelcome*, sure, but not necessarily decisively catastrophic in itself.

It's happening here and in the US, as well as several other democracies.

Legal aid cuts.
Postal vote suppression.
Attacks on the BBC.
Hatch Act violations.
Limiting judicial review.
AI facial recognition.
Militarised police forces.
Packing the Lords.
Packing federal courts.

Gaslighting the public, and no-one being able to effectively call it out.
WW2 fetishisation.
Culture wars posturing.
Spreading conspiracy theories.
Actual fascist flags being paraded in the streets.
ID cards.
Curtailing trans rights.
Withdrawal from multilateral world bodies.

Climate change denial.
Brexit.
Increasing suppression/delegitimisation of protest.
Sidelining of Parliament.
Centralisation of control in Downing Street.
Demonisation of "activist lawyers".
"Fake news".
QAnon/5G/chemtrails/Pizzagate/antivaxxers getting mainstream coverage.

The rule of law is gradually being undermined.

Politically, too, no-one resigns for anything any more.
There are no consequences for political misdemeanour. "Nothing matters any more"

But it's slow, complex, and multi-faceted. *No-one* can see all the many pieces at once.

I've written before about normalcy bias - the belief that if we just keep doing what's always worked before, it'll work out fine, as it always has done, even when it's patently no longer a normal situation.

That misplaced belief applies at a societal level too.

Democracies are vulnerable through complacency.

"That kind of thing doesn't happen *here*", we in our Western democracies think.

"That kind of thing" is definitely happening here, and the freedom we take for granted is definitely at risk of being lost.

The trouble is, one always sounds alarmist or overdramatic saying these things. It's the slow advance of the deterioration that makes it so hard to know when the sagging has become an irreversible collapse. Until it is clear in retrospect, those warning of it sound shrill or mad.

There's a belief that "the arc of history is long, but it bends towards justice"; sadly, there's not a lot of evidence to support that hopefulness.

Bending that arc takes ongoing effort by everyone, of all politics. As Popper warned us, the price of freedom is eternal vigilance.

What's the solution? I don't have a simple answer.

Write to your representatives, demand they stand up for the rule of law against the issues that most disturb you from the list above (or the many others I could have included!).

Look for opportunities to protest, even locally.

Support organisations doing good work to support the rule of law (e.g. legal challengers of government overreach; groups defending the right to protest, etc.).

Join a political party and demand it does its part to stand up for open politics, and free and fair elections.

And talk about this with your friends - not just like-minded mutuals on Twitter, but less-political friends too.

Break them out of that normalcy bias, because it's only by the people demanding their rights that justice and the rule of law can withstand autocracy and corruption.

Addendum: literally every day it seems like there’s a new assault on the rule of law. Today’s move by the UK government:

Well, there you have it, the rule of law takes another crushing blow as the Internal Market Bill passes

Don't be surprised if Parliament is suspended or some other emergency powers brought in. Not that they need to; they're already issuing covid-related laws by ministerial fiat.

It's been a while since I wrote this thread but I hardly need draw your attention to what's happening in the US right now. I mean, it's *possible* that the arc of history still bends toward justice, but it's not looking great for the long term...