Back in the dark days of the Soviet Union, dissidents risked being locked up – but not, officially at least, on the grounds that they had committed a political crime. In the Soviet regime’s imagination, treason and mental illness were often two sides of the same coin. Here’s a brief description from Wikipedia of the phenomenon: The KGB [the
Liberals Are Adopting an Old Soviet Tactic: Painting Opponents as Mentally Ill
The pathologization of dissent is not going away. It will intensify as neoliberalism faces crisis after crisis and social polarization grows. Those who claim to be liberals defending democracy will soon be only too ready to snuff it out.
