For centuries, Europeans have had to cope with censorship. As a matter of fact, one might even regard censorship as one of those vaunted “European values,” although few modern Europeans, brainwashed by globalist propaganda, will believe it.
Soon after the invention of the printing press, the Roman Catholic Church imposed a rigid system of censorship covering much of the Christian world. It tended to be more inflexible in those areas where literacy rates were low, such as Spain and other places in Southern Europe. In the Netherlands, which in the mid-15th century led the world with almost 20% literacy, reaching 80% in the early eighteenth century, censorship was negligible in comparison with most other countries.
The Church’s control of what people were permitted to read was weakened by the Reformation and the revolutions between 1789 and 1848. Afterward censorship in various forms has become a standard feature of many secular regimes.
After Germany attained practically 100% literacy at end of the nineteenth century, a few other countries have managed to do the same, but today, with the massive use of social media, literacy is declining rapidly. In Germany, up to a third of grade school graduates are functionally illiterate. The situation is not essentially different in other European nations, perhaps slightly better in Southern Europe.
At the same time, new forms of censorship are being introduced in the EU. Today, it is the European Commission, the unelected government of the EuSSR, that is engaged in a determined effort to censor social media. This assault is focused on “hate speech,” which is a broadly defined notion. Essentially, people are being prevented from venting their anger, irritation, and yes, even hatred: all perfectly normal and legitimate human emotions. Basically, here we have yet another effort by a bunch of unelected, mediocre politicians to prevent criticism of their policies. Many are left to wonder how to deal with this new turn of the screw by a totalitarian regime.
However, it should not be too hard to counter the renewed EuSSR attack on “hate speech.” By systematically avoiding “hate speech,” one can still exert effective criticism, for instance by using hyperbole and sarcasm. This has an additional advantage of being very hard to identify by new technologies such as AI. It is therefore uncertain whether the EU Commission will succeed in silencing its critics.
In this context, it may be enlightening to take a look at how Argentinian dissidents dealt with the sudden advent of ruthless censorship in the mid-1960s. In late June, 1966, a US-sponsored coup installed a military dictatorship under General Juan Carlos Onganía. The junta targeted anyone deemed to be “leftist,” “socialist,” “communist” or “radical” (a political party that was radically anti-clerical) and censorship was correspondingly broad. Curiously, the wives of army colonels played a central role in the censorship system. Their lack of general knowledge and education provided an occasional comic note, as when they prohibited books on cubism to be imported, believing it had to with Cuba, where Fidel Castro had come to power a few years before. For anyone trying to speak his mind in public or comment on issues of general interest, there was precious little room for maneuvering.
Juan Carlos Onganía
In May 1967, the first issue of a new popular history magazine was published: Todo es Historia (Everything Is History). The cover of that first issue featured a portrait of Juan Manuel de Rosas, who was leader of Argentina from 1828 to 1852 and was universally despised by the liberals who had been in power since Rosas was ousted. In the historical narrative that had come to dominate the nation, Rosas was by far the most despicable figure.
However, since Rosas had done everything he could to prevent the English, and to a lesser extent the French, from taking over the local economy, he was also considered by many nationalists as the nation’s true hero. After all, a more outspoken nationalist could hardly be found among nineteenth-century historical figures.
The choice for Rosas to grace the cover of the new magazine was therefore obviously relevant, and at the same time an eloquent criticism of the military regime that was universally understood. In other words, it was a kind of meme. It should be noted that in those days, newspapers, magazines and popular books were usually sold (and displayed) through thousands of kiosks at the street corners of Buenos Aires and other Argentinian cities.
‘Todo es Historia’, May 1967
The cover of the second TeH issue (June 1967) featured the portrait of Hipólito de Yrigoyen (yet another meme!), the president of Argentina who was ousted by the first military coup in 1930. Having managed to maintain Argentina’s neutrality during the First World War in spite of English pressure, he was also considered a true nationalist and worthy successor of Rosas. On a deeper level, certain sectors of the public believed the rumors that Yrigoyen actually was also an (illegitimate) son of Rosas.
Most importantly, however, the second issue of TeH carried an article on the fate of the Rosales, an Argentinian navy gunboat that in 1892 set sail to participate in the big international naval show in Spain as part of the festivities in honor of the Fourth Centennial of Columbus’ discovery of the New World in 1492. However, the ship never made it across the Atlantic, because it sunk off the Uruguayan coast during a storm. Only the officers managed to save their lives and their accounts of the event were eagerly reported by the Argentinian press. That is, until a few days later the ship’s cook was found to be alive as well after he washed ashore in Uruguay. His story was different: when it was clear the Rosales was about to sink, the officers forced the crew below deck, closed the hatches and saved themselves in the ship’s single lifeboat. The cook saved his life by jumping overboard.
The resulting scandal seriously damaged the prestige of the Argentinian navy and military officers in general. By publishing this story, TeH founder and editor Félix Luna struck a serious and very effective blow against the Onganía regime. Moreover, since it was all true and well-documented, the regime could do nothing about it. Although the Argentinian economy was doing remarkably well, the junta was universally despised and hated, in no small part due to its idiotic censorship. The 1969 rebellion of workers and students and the first groups of urban and rural guerrillas weakened the regime so seriously that it had to allow elections and exit the stage (1973).
‘Todo es Historia’, June 1967
Although by now TeH has become firmly established as a main feature of the Argentinian historiographical landscape, with overall truly high quality articles, it must not be forgotten that it started out as a kind of covert opposition magazine. True to its origins, it still does not shun controversy.
The Argentinian example contains some valuable lessons for citizens of EU member states who are now confronted by all-encompassing censorship. The historiography of most EU nations is quite well developed and boasts a true wealth of well-documented published research, both in academic journals and popular magazines. Therefore, there is certainly no shortage of stories with a devastating political potential that would be extremely damaging for all branches of the EuSSR regime.
Censorship may work for some time, but certainly in modern societies it is difficult and misleading (and ultimately self-defeating) for those in power to maintain strict censorship for any length of time. To their utter dismay, nineteenth-century European statesmen, such as Klemens von Metternich and François Guizot, already found that out in 1848.
