Two years after its publication, Ariane Bilheran's essay Psychopathologie du Totalitarisme: sommes-nous dans une dérive totalitaire (Psychopathology of totalitarianism: are we in totalitarian drift?) is more relevant than ever. In 2023, the philosopher and clinical psychologist analyzed the drivers of the Covid crisis management. She showed how, through the widespread use of fear as a political tool, segregation (vaccinated/unvaccinated), censorship, and denunciation, the Cov

The author of this precept "never stand surety" is Thales of Miletus (Θαλῆς ὁ Μιλήσιος), whose name has survived through the centuries. Greek philosopher and scholar, born in Miletus around 625-620 BC, died around 548-545 BC, still in Miletus, he is best known for his scientific reasoning! Legend has it that this mathematician and philosopher of nature spent time in Egypt, where he was initiated into Egyptian and Babylonian science through the teachings of the priests.

Who is Sébastien Castellion? He is a great humanist who leads a poor existence, free from any material ties. He lives from his translations and the lessons he gives. His conscience revolts before the burning of Michel Servetus: he cannot remain silent and accuses Calvin. He then chooses the heroic life, without support, without a party, without a protector, without friends to support him openly. Castellion knows that such an attack condemns him, a helpless and isolated indivi

According to one of the seven sages of Antiquity, Bias of Priene, "Most men are wicked". It is perhaps worth revisiting this maxim today to grasp its full depth... and its warnings!

On the 65th anniversary of his death, it may be useful to take stock of his thinking, to ask ourselves how this famous philosopher and novelist would undoubtedly have understood our times, but above all, what we could take away from his work to fill our humanist bag.

Confusing words with actions is a sign of regression into childhood, specifically into magical thinking. But when this magical thinking becomes the way adults operate, and a collective one at that, we are facing a seriously ill society.

Before denouncing totalitarianism in general, have we made sure that it does not reside within ourselves? To find out, we must pay attention to certain processes that take place within groups as well as within individuals. Here is a first glimpse.

This work is masterful, because in a few pages, Leo Löwenthal manages to paint the finest psychological portrait I know, especially for his time, of atomization in a totalitarian period, that is to say, of the role played by terror in transforming the individual into an isolated and desperate cell at the heart of a large mass. This German sociologist and philosopher, linked to the Frankfurt School, who emigrated to the United States to flee Nazism, was aware of the cancellati

Following our report on "The Dictatorship on the Move!", in the latest issue of "Elements", we interviewed Ariane Bilheran at length, who has just published a very rich Psychopathologie du totalitarisme published by Guy Trédaniel. A graduate of the École Normale Supérieure, philosopher, clinical psychologist, doctor in psychopathology, and collaborator of "Antipresse" by our friend and collaborator Slobodan Despot, no one was better placed than Ariane Bilheran to analyze the

International Symposium of Mental Health organized in Portugal by Aliança Saúde Portugal, about the current pandemic of fear propagated in the humanity.

All totalitarian islets create their own "newspeak", for example within companies that operate by terrorizing, harassing and persecuting their employees. All totalitarianism lives off the conquest of "ideological pretension" (Hannah Arendt) and the "rectification of thought" (Mao). To overcome these ideological levels, which are increasingly moving away from the search for truth and knowledge, and to persecute opponents, the instrumentalization of language is necessary.

This summer of 2021, I had the opportunity to visit France, a country I hadn't visited for several years. It was an opportunity for me to observe a serious deterioration in human relations and values, undoubtedly fertile ground for the ongoing paranoiac decompensation.

In the delusional hypochondria of paranoia, illness is everywhere, experienced as dangerous, mortal, the enemy of the living. The sick are opposed to the healthy, as the impure to the pure: the order is given to eliminate (and before that, to "evict" to use the words of Jean-Michel Blanquer, Minister of National Education in France, concerning unvaccinated children) the part of the social body designated as impure.

No great crime, no human tragedy has remained without witnesses. It is as if destiny, or the collective unconscious, assigns this role to certain privileged individuals, and grants them providential protection to accomplish their mission. This is true as much for the "great History" as for the intimate dramas of families and communities.

It is this very pretension to govern this bare life that has clearly emerged since the first quarter of 2020: restrictions on movement to the point of immobilization (lockdowns, isolation), the distance imposed between bodies ("social distancing"), the reduction of faces to the scopic impulse (the sole gaze), constrained breathing, etc.

power that loses its authority descends into violence. And this violence "from above" is mirrored by violence "from below", which will in turn be used by the "top" to legitimize its oppression. This is the phase some countries will enter, while others are already there. What is the possible way out of this vicious circle?

"We have pushed logic so far in the liberation of human beings from the shackles of industrial exploitation that we have sent about ten million people to forced labor in the Arctic regions and the eastern forests, in conditions analogous to those of the galley slaves of antiquity. We have pushed logic so far that to settle a difference of opinion, we know only one argument: death."

The totalitarian regime aims at "total domination" (H. Arendt), that is to say, it interferes in the totality of social, private, and intimate spheres, even in the psyche of individuals.

Series in 3 episodes, published by L’Antipresse, n°286, 287 & 288 23 & 30 May 2021, 05 June 2021 - Translated by Thetranslationbridge.com Ariane Bilheran, normalienne (Ecole Normale Supérieure), philosopher, clinical psychologist, doctor in psychopathology, specialized in the study of manipulation, paranoia, perversion, harassment, and totalitarianism.

Since the beginning of this "pandemic", I had only written a brief article on "health totalitarianism", needing myself to see it clearly enough with hindsight to make a decision. Nevertheless, we can recognize, at a global level, with some nuances depending on the country, the mark of a delusional paranoiac contagion which shows its odious face more and more every day.