The metaphorical book burnings have started, just with a 21st Century twist. But first, some history, lest we forget.
Germany in Olden Times
In the 1930s, there were a well-documented series of ritual book burnings carried out by the German Student Union, targeting books deemed subversive or deemed to represent ideologies opposed to Nazism. The burnings included books written in English, French, Jewish authors, people like Albert Einstein and Helen Keller.
As with any good, well-planned authoritarian campaign, the Nazis compared this to Luther's ritual burning of the papal bull. As with many authoritarian comparisons, it wasn't similar, the Nazis engaging in cultural genocide which later morphed into actual genocide.
Canada in More Recent Times
Canada had a short-lived brush with the attempted authoritarian control of science, in our case. The government of Stephen Harper engaged in a campaign to close and/or destroy research libraries and research documents. His government also tried to muzzle scientists, especially any who were engaged in climate and/or environmental research.
I was told of a personal situation where a National Park Interpreter (Park interpreters give guided walks and presentations about the natural world as it exists in Canada's National Parks) was smacked down for presenting a comedic scene between a caribou and a pika that asked "why do people do what they do".
In and around 2013, the Harper government conducted what has been described a chaotic series of closures of federal research libraries and the destruction of research material. This sad time in Canadian history has been told in many ways from many sources, such as:
The conclusion quickly reached was that the Harper government was engaging in a long-term strategy to suppress Canadian science, a story documented here.
Book Burnings 21st Century Style
Fast forward to the past two weeks. The Trump administration has seemingly engaged in the removal of research files and data related to public health, environmental research and other related areas.
There's a Canadian connection here, interestingly. A Canadian researcher was contacted by a colleague to see if she was aware of the imminent destruction of key data sets held by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In a matter of hours, a number of archivists managed to download and save the entire CDC website. The story first appeared here:
Some studies that could inform future decisions about the H5N1 virus (bird flu) also appeared to be at risk. Also disappearing was a website containing the names of the January 2020 insurrectionists, and websites that monitor HIV infections.
There is an Internet Archive, but it could become a target of the Trump Administration and his Brown Shirt goons. However, the Internet Archive is backed up here in British Columbia as well, putting it beyond the reach of the aforementioned goons.
This campaign of destruction might seem puzzling, but keep in mind two things. First, the Republican Party in the USA has become increasingly antagonistic towards science, a fact that should be apparent to pretty much anyone. Second, Trump is the one quoted saying: "If We Stop Testing, We'd Have Fewer Cases".
No Donald. If you stopped testing, you'd have the same number of cases, you just wouldn't know about them and wouldn't know enough about what was happening to make sensible public health decisions. Which, I suppose is exactly the problem Trump was having. This is one more reason why the USA had one of the highest death rates during COVID. Poorly informed and proud of it.
One Final Note
It's worth remembering these stories and what happened here in Canada around 2013/14. One of the future contenders for Prime Minister in an election that will likely take place this spring, was a Cabinet Minister in Harper's government. Pierre Poilievre has provided no reassurance that any future government of his won't engage in the same kind of tactics we're seeing south of the 49th. I wouldn't trust him as far as I could spit.
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