A (tenured professor) friend recommended Occupied, a 2015 Norwegian TV show on Netflix that is surprisingly timely. In the first episode, the prime minister has to decide whether it is better to die on one’s feet or live on one’s knees. Citing the priceless nature of even a single human life, he decides that Norwegians must accept subjugation by the EU and Russia.
(The initial plot premise doesn’t make obvious sense. Norway shuts down its oil and gas production in a noble effort to save Spaceship Earth from climate destruction. The EU wants Norwegian oil and gas and brings in the Russians to force Norway to turn it all back on. But since the Russians compete with Norway in oil and gas production, why would the Russians want to pressure Norway? Wouldn’t the Russians be better off just selling EU its own production at a higher price? This is never explained, but if you can suspend your disbelief on this one point, the rest of the series makes sense.)
As the episodes unfold, Norwegians gradually surrender what had been their rights. Just like Americans facing the threat of coronaplague, about half of the people simply assert that their rights have not been eliminated, just slightly adjusted (e.g., children who get a weekly email from a teacher and two hours/week of Google Classroom hangout are still receiving their right to an education) while a clandestine resistance emerges of people who want their former constitutional rights as they were previously understood.
I’ll be interested to hear what readers think about whether this movie captures the mindset of government leaders around the world today when it comes to dealing with the threat of coronaplague!
(My Dutch friend: “All of the rights that Americans fought and died in multiple wars to defend, they gave up in one governor’s press conference.” The screenwriters thought it would take a war for people in a Democracy to lose their rights, but a respiratory virus turned out to be sufficient to erase liberty!)
Related:
- to save some shekels, part of the series is actually filmed in Lithuania
- Russians don’t enjoy the show as much as we do (Vyacheslav Pavlovsky, the Russian ambassador in Oslo, told Russia’s Tass news agency that “Russia, regrettably, has the role of the aggressor. In the worst traditions of the cold war, [this show] decided to scare Norwegian viewers with a nonexistent threat from the east,” he said.)
Of course it does. It shouldn’t surprise anyone that entertainment in Norway mirrors the United States in presenting the fait accompli narratives of the elite. MIT Technology review wrote early in the Coronaplague that the future of America was people accepting invasive surveillance in exchange for their most basic freedoms as a “small price to pay.”
Look, walk around Lincoln. Ask you neighbors about other topics. This is just a short list of things you can ask them to make them accuse you of being a lunatic, an antisemite, a racist, and worse:
“Do you know that Patrisse Cullors (co-founder of BLM) is a self-avowed “Trained Marxist?” (True!)
Do you know that Chesa Boudin, the San Francisco District Attorney in Nancy Pelosi’s district is the son of Weather Underground terrorists? (True!)
Do you know that Bobby Rush was the co-founder of the Illinois Black Panthers and has never apologized for it? (True!)
Do you know that George Soros funded Barack Obama’s campaign before he was even a U.S. Senator? (True!)
Do you know that Soros met with Nancy Pelosi and Elizabeth Warren right after Trump’s election to plot strategy to destroy his Presidency? (True!)
Do you know that Penny Pritzker ran the bank that wrote the book on subprime mortgage lending, which precipitated the 2008 financial crisis? (True!)
Do you know that Australia’s weapons bans were constructed by Rebecca Peters, an employee of George Soros’ Open Society Institute? (True!)
https://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/democrats-soros-trump-231313
All of those things are true, but they don’t know them, because they either choose not to know them, or they have never been reminded, or they definitely do know them and think it’s great!
Almost everything in the MIT Tech. Review article from March 17, 2020 has been panning out, including the implication that all your freedoms are not worth the paper they are printed on, are 100% negotiable, and must be rescinded or restricted at any time, into perpetuity:
“The intrusive surveillance will be considered a ***small price to pay for the basic freedom to be with other people.***”
Nobody’s going to force this to a vote! There aren’t going to be any challenges to Gideon Litchfield and Imperal College’s authority over the rights of hundreds of millions of people. Your role in your future is to do what you’re told.
https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/03/17/905264/coronavirus-pandemic-social-distancing-18-months/
>I’ll be interested to hear what readers think about whether this movie captures the mindset of government leaders around the world today when it comes to dealing with the threat of coronaplague!
The only quibble I have is that you’re not generalizing enough. The movie captures the mindset of elites around the world today when it comes to dealing with everything, not just coronaplague. My early prediction that climate change was going to fuse with coronavirus sometime in June turned out to be premature because of George Floyd and BLM, which I don’t think anyone could have predicted. That forced climate change onto the back burner for a few months, but it can all be intersected very easily. The homework has been done and the three crises are going to be brought together in the public mind very soon. My guess is the first hurricane to strike the U.S.
https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/c-change/subtopics/coronavirus-and-climate-change/
Astonishing sentence from the Harvard link above:
“Why are Emerging Infectious Diseases on the Rise?”
“But a look at the origins of COVID reveals that other forces may be in play.”
The author does some really amazing prestidigitation here, tying the origin of COVID-19 to species loss and climate change. I hadn’t heard anyone of his stature make that kind of attempt before. The fact is that we still do not know the origin of COVID-19. We do not know if it originated in a wet market in Wuhan, or as a result of China’s vast effort to collect and study bat viruses by sending researchers into their caves, or whether there is some other explanation for the virus that the Chinese have not provided to the world. In a few paragraphs, the author manages to completely gloss over all of that and instead lump COVID-19 in with all other infectious diseases, climate change and species loss. Did the Chinese write that themselves?
It’s a great show, but I disagree that it’s timely: it was obviously inspired by successful Russian invasion and annexation of Crimea. In the same way interests are strategic and more about projection of power and destabilization than about the need for specific resources.
BTW, the big topic for Russians is “No to NATO advancement to the east”. While Soviet Union was surrounded by buffer countries, this changes as former Warsaw Pact started to join NATO (did you know that NATO had MIG fighters on active duty at one time? At Poland). So essentially the primary reason for Crimea annexation and military support of east Ukrainian separatists is to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO. NATO would not accept a country with ongoing war on it’s territory.
Another parallel for the show is of course German occupation of Norway, which was quite collaborative. Interestingly, show kinda manages not to pass judgement, so whoever watches the show can choose who is positive and who is negative character 🙂
1984 was written in 1948 — reading it today is painful because it is so relevant (Junior Anti-Sex League). Huxley’s Brave New World is another dystopia that has aged very well (Orgy Porgy!).
Read Heinlein’s The Moon is a Harsh Mistress to get the bad taste out of your mouth. TANSTAAFL. Heinlein’s short story, The Man Who Sold The Moon, must have inspired Elon Musk.
I shouldn’t have been, but I have been astonished at how quickly and easily my fellow countrymen in our Great State of Maskachusetts have not only knuckled under, but embraced their role as freelance informers and enforcers based on the thinnest of “scientific” justifications. I have become more and more conspiracy minded as we have gone along.
Remember the Marathon Bombings? That’s the first time, out of the blue, when I heard the phrase “shelter in place”. Suddenly, the order went out that everyone had to stay in their houses. With no legal authority even being offered. And every one in in the whole damn Boston region went along with it meekly, with barely a peep. “We have to be Safe!” “Boston Strong!”
I remember remarking at the time that the whole thing felt like a test run – like the powers that be were seeing what they could get away with (or how far the conditioning had taken hold). Now, it seems, they are performing another experiment, on a much larger scale. I wonder what the next one will be?
Well, the middle class in this country and elsewhere does not have “fighting spirit” to oppose simply because they have quite a bit to lose as opposed to the proletariat of yore. The very fear of losing your job is quite enough for the population you mention to be utterly submissive.
As to volunteer snitches and enforcers, they bear eerily resemblance to their counterparts during and after the Bolshevik coup in Russia of 1917 where 18-20 year olds from middle class families of that time(doctors, lawyers, etc) were the most ardent supporters and enforcers of the new order, with a substantial part of them becoming part of the new “elite”. A minor linguistic difference was in labeling the enemy: “kontra” (a counter-revolutionary) vs. todays’ “racist” and punishment harshness (going to a labor camp vs. compulsory diversity training) . But who knows, perhaps local commissars will eventually get there.
Hence, no need for conspiracy theories, the ruling elite may be too silly just yet to realize what power they have now over their subjects.
@Ivan:
…volunteer snitches and enforcers…were the most ardent supporters and enforcers of the new order, with a substantial part of them becoming part of the new “elite”.
Meet Lenin Gutierrez, who just hit the jackpot to the tune of $34,000+ for enforcing the mask order at a San Diego Starbuck’s.
https://nypost.com/2020/06/25/starbucks-barista-who-refused-karen-without-mask-gets-21k/
“Tips for Lenin Standing Up to a San Diego Karen”
https://www.gofundme.com/f/tips-for-lenen-standing-up-to-a-san-diego-karen
Note that in San Diego, the “Karens” are using their white privilege *not* to wear masks, in this usage.
@Jimbo:
On August 29, 1949, the USSR detonated its first nuclear device in Kazhakstan. “Sheltering in Place” really got started in America during the 1950s after as a part of Truman’s Federal Civil Defense Administration. Anyone who was a child during the 1950s will remember the drills. Back then, it was called “Duck and Cover.”
Here’s Bert the Turtle, “Duck and Cover”
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a few thoughts on this series:
The writers could have written a story in which Norwegian armed forces fought to the death to defend the their nation. That would have been a completely different plot line.
What’s interesting is that Norway is an ally of the most mighty superpower in world history, yet the USA doesn’t lift a finger to help Norway. This may reflect Norwegians’ view of the value of NATO or it may be something else that was a necessary part of the story that the writers wanted to tell.
As SK mentions, the Norwegian audience was very familiar with occupation of the country that occurred in the early 1940s. That’s probably the reason why there are characters in the series who choose to accommodate the occupation while others resist it. Norwegians must have made similar decisions during the previous occupation.
Also, there’s something you should keep in mind regarding your Dutch friend’s remarks about rights and freedoms secured during previous wars. In both world wars, the swamp in Washington imposed conscription, a massive assault on freedom of millions of Americans. The government also took over management of the economy. This is what you call “central planning” or whatever. Presumably you would call that a serious reduction in economic freedom.
Having spent the majority of my government career interacting with NATO/EU diplomats and military members, I found this series captured their attitudes and decision processes extremely well. Season 1 was great, season 2 sort of jumped the shark.