The Path to Dystopia

In the modern era, the greatest threat to civilization lies not in external forces but within the human psyche, as Carl Jung observed: “The greatest threat to civilization lies in our inability to deal with our own psyche. We are our own worst enemies.” The Latin proverb Homo homini lupus, or “man is a wolf to man,” captures this eternal truism, as Jung described in Civilization in Transition. Our wolflike tendencies emerge most viciously during periods of collective mental breakdown, what Jung termed a “psychic epidemic.” Today, the United States and the broader global order teeter on the edge of such an epidemic, driven by mass psychosis, totalitarianism, and a surveillance-fueled erosion of justice and truth. These forces—amplified by corrupt foreign policy, reckless geopolitics, and technological manipulation—converge to push humanity toward a dystopian future.

The Anatomy of Mass Psychosis

Mass psychosis, as Jung and others have described, is an epidemic of madness that sweeps through societies, reducing individuals to morally and spiritually inferior states. When gripped by this collective delusion, people become irrational, emotional, and prone to criminality, unable to observe themselves objectively. Historical examples, such as the witch-hunts of the 16^th-17^th centuries in Europe and America, saw thousands of women scapegoated by societies consumed by fear and delusion. Similarly, the 20^th century’s totalitarian regimes—Communism, Fascism and others—represented collective psychoses, where societies turned on themselves, urged on by ruling elites projecting imagined enemies.

The psychogenic triggers of mass psychosis begin with a flood of negative emotions, mainly fear, anxiety and panic. These emotions, if confronted, can be overcome, but they can also lead to a psychotic break, where individuals or groups devise pathological ways of seeing reality, blending fact and fiction to quell their terror. Joost Meerloo, in his analysis of totalitarianism, described this process as menticide—a systematic “killing of the mind” through psychological manipulation. Totalitarian regimes, whether Communist, Fascist, or technocratic, sow fear through waves of terror, using propaganda to spread misinformation and confusion. As Meerloo noted, “Each wave of terrorizing creates its effects more effectively after a breathing spell,” breaking down the minds of the masses with contradictory reports, nonsensical information, and outright lies. “Logic can be met with logic, while illogic cannot,” he wrote, explaining how totalitarians overwhelm populations with a barrage of falsehoods, leaving no time for rational counterarguments.

In the modern era, technology amplifies this process to unprecedented levels. Smartphones, social media, television, and the internet, combined with algorithms that censor dissenting voices, allow ruling elites to assault the minds of the masses with remarkable frequency. The addictive nature of these technologies ensures that many voluntarily subject themselves to propaganda, as Meerloo warned: “Modern technology teaches man to take for granted the world he is looking at… No rest, no meditation, no reflection, no conversation. The senses are continually overloaded with stimuli.” Isolation, another tool of totalitarians, further exacerbates susceptibility to delusions. As Pavlov discovered, conditioned reflexes are more easily developed in isolated individuals, who lack the positive examples of others to anchor their sanity.

The result is a society where rulers transform into godlike figures and the ruled regress to a childlike state of obedience. Hannah Arendt observed that the citizens of totalitarian regimes exhibit reactions akin to those of a “sick schizophrenic,” handing over control of their lives to politicians and bureaucrats. Only a deluded ruling class would believe they possess the knowledge to control society top-down, and only a psychologically regressed population would accept such domination. This dynamic, rooted in mutual delusion, leads to mass suffering and social ruin.

In 1984, Orwell depicts truth as malleable, manipulated by the Party to serve its totalitarian control. Through propaganda, censorship, and "doublethink," truth is erased, rewritten, or distorted to align with the Party’s narrative. Objective reality collapses, leaving only the Party’s imposed version of truth, enforced through fear and surveillance.

The American Polycrisis: Surveillance, Vengeance, and the Erosion of Justice

The United States in 2025 exemplifies this descent into mass psychosis, as described by Thom Hartmann in his August 26, 2025, article, “Permanent Chains: When Surveillance Becomes Guilt.” Hartmann warns that the US system of government is being refashioned into a “surveillance-fueled engine of political vengeance,” echoing the chilling Soviet maxim, “Show me the man, and I’ll show you the crime.” This principle, attributed to figures like Lavrentiy Beria, involves targeting individuals first and fabricating charges later—a tactic now pulsing through American institutions under the influence of Donald Trump and his allies.

Hartmann cites the case of Kilmar Abrego García, a father and husband legally residing in Maryland, who was illegally deported to El Salvador, tortured in a notorious concentration camp, and now faces trumped-up human smuggling charges based on dubious testimony. Similarly, John Bolton, a vocal Trump critic, faced an FBI raid on his home and office in 2025, ostensibly for retaining classified documents—a charge mirroring those Trump himself faced, for over a hundred pounds of documents, which he then lied about. These cases reflect a broader pattern where dissenters, from student protesters to political figures like Adam Schiff and Letitia James, are targeted with manufactured charges, often based on minor infractions or political speech.

The tools enabling this vengeance are distinctly modern: AI-driven surveillance, facial recognition, StingRay cellphone spoofing devices, and social media mining. At protests, law enforcement uses these technologies to harvest data on attendees, flagging them for future persecution. As Hartmann notes, “Big Brother is now AI, drones, and facial recognition systems feeding centralized dossiers.” The result is a system where identity becomes guilt, and dissent becomes criminal. The Trump administration’s actions—purging nonpartisan officials, replacing them with loyalists like FBI Director Kash Patel, and building a paramilitary ICE force—further erode the rule of law, replacing it with arbitrary, corrupt personal rule.

David Frum, in his August 25, 2025, article, “Trump Is Sending a Terrifyingly Clear Message,” underscores this shift. Trump’s second term is marked by a systematic dismantling of institutional checks, with loyalists like Pam Bondi and Dan Bongino executing his whims without regard for legality. Frum warns that even if a future administration attempts to reverse these changes, the damage to public trust in the rule of law may be irreversible. Trump’s messaging—that law is merely a tool for revenge—undermines the distinction between right and wrong, convincing supporters that justice is a game of “who screws whom.”

Meanwhile, DOGE reportedly uploaded sensitive personal data to vulnerable cloud servers, risking exposure to hackers. Using AI, Musk et al can analyzes this data, potentially uncovering personal, immoral, or criminal secrets. This capability enables targeted blackmail, as compromising information could be leveraged to coerce people into compliance. Such manipulation may explain politicians’ votes on certain issues.

As Stephen Miller sends ICE against day laborers and other law-abiding immigrants & migrants, taking parents from children, leaving the latter helpless; the agency that was investigating human traffickers was disbanded. Trump is allowing El Chapo's family into the country, and cutting deals with MS-13, so that they don't squeal on El Salvador president Bukele, for the deals he cut with MS-13. Trump is making deals with the worst of the worst, at the same time that ICE is rounding up innocent people, like Kilmar Abrego Garcia, from hair salons and 7-11s where they work, with no regard for habeus corpus; Stephen Miller should be in prison, along with Trump, for all their crimes, such as using the US military against its own citizens. If they get away with this, the country is cooked.

The Israel Conundrum: Complicity in Genocide and Global Instability

Compounding this domestic crisis is the US’s foreign policy, particularly its unwavering support for Israel, as outlined by Jeffrey Sachs and others. The US’s complicity in what Sachs calls the “ongoing genocide in Gaza” and Israel’s expansionist actions in the West Bank represents a moral and strategic failure. This support, driven by a nexus of the CIA, the Military Industrial Complex, and lobbies like AIPAC, overrides public opinion and ethical considerations. Sachs argues that this policy, fueled by campaign finance, vote-buying, and potential blackmail, alienates the international community and undermines Israel’s own survival.

The Israeli government’s actions, including what Ted Rall and Jon Kiriakou describe as a deliberate failure to prevent the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack, further complicate this picture. It became publicly known soon after October 7 that Israeli spies had obtained "Jericho Wall," a 40-page Hamas blueprint detailing the attack, over a year prior. At the time, officials dismissed it as “aspirational.” Days before the attack, soldiers warned of Hamas rehearsing similar tactics, including drone strikes and border breaches, yet these alerts were ignored by the top brass.

Rall asserts that Israel knew what was going to happen, in exquisite detail, and allowed the attack to take place, to justify aggressive actions in Gaza and potentially the West Bank. Kiriakou notes that Israeli settlers had for two weeks warned of unusual activity, yet after the attack, IDF response times were delayed by 8-20 hours, indicating a calculated decision to let the attack unfold. This narrative, if true, points to a cynical manipulation of crisis to advance territorial ambitions, with the US as a complicit partner.

The US’s role as an “honest broker” in international diplomacy is thus undermined, and no other country will believe that the US is not, as Kiriakou laments, “in bed with Israel.” Rejoins Rall, “We’re not only in bed, we’re on the bottom.” The reliance on AI-driven military technologies, developed by companies like Palantir and Microsoft, further entrenches this complicity, creating an “AI Murder, Inc.” ecosystem where profit motives override human rights. If Israel escapes accountability, international law, the ICJ and ICC, etc will be revealed to be completely impotent, in a dog-eat-dog world .

The Descent into Dystopia

Picture this: by 2030, drones patrol the perimeter of a “Greater Israel” that has annexed swaths of Jordan and Syria, and is in an unending war with its neighbors. The US is a fractured shadow of its former self, governed by a technocratic elite ensconced in fortified enclaves. The Neuromesh, a Palantir-Mossad-CIA joint venture, blankets the nation in AI-driven surveillance, its algorithms dictating resource allocation and social control. In the heartland, the bottom 90% scrape by on Universal Basic Income, their lives mediated by AI slop and deepfake propaganda. Unemployment is rampant, with student debt defaults and climate disasters like mega-hurricanes leaving millions dead, soon-to-die, or displaced. FEMA has been replaced by private security firms that only help the people who can afford it. The Neuromesh flags dissenters for ICE raids; Trump’s allies operate shadowy networks of influence. The dollar, collapsed, is replaced by a crypto tied to World Liberty Financial, enriching the Trump family and their backers. Truth is a relic, buried under layers of lies from the Ministry of Truth, tweeted on TruthSocial, as the world lurches toward midnight.

This dystopian vision is not inevitable, but it requires urgent action to prevent. Jung’s call to “bring order to our own minds” is the first step, encouraging individuals to resist delusion and live as examples of sanity and integrity. Spreading truth to counter propaganda, using humor to delegitimize demagogues, and creating parallel structures, as Vaclav Havel proposed, can foster enclaves of freedom within a totalitarian society. Hartmann’s recommendations—demanding transparency on surveillance, banning warrantless StingRay use, and restoring DOJ independence—are critical to dismantling the surveillance state.

Reversing the Tide: The Power of Action

The path to reversing this descent lies in collective action. As Thomas Paine wrote, “Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered, [but] the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.” Citizens must actively resist the ruling elite’s efforts to consolidate power, whether through protests, legal challenges, or building parallel societies. The truth, as Jung noted, is stronger than lies, and humor can dismantle the demagogue’s aura of invincibility. By fostering communities of resistance and demanding accountability, individuals can light a beacon of hope, as Jung envisioned, inspiring others to break free from the collective psychosis. Without a radical shift toward truth, justice, and diplomacy, the nation risks sliding into a dystopian nightmare where technology serves the powerful, and the many are left in a world without hope. Yet, by heeding the warnings of Jung, Arendt, Meerloo, and others, and taking bold, concerted action, humanity can reclaim its sanity and steer toward a better future.