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Fake news is bad. But phony record is even worse | Natalie Nougayrede

Strongmen are rewriting the past to suit their intentions, but republics arent immune either, writes Guardian columnist Natalie Nougayrde

On 22 July, the Hungarian “ministers ” Viktor Orbn stood before university students and delivered a speech designation Will Europe belong to Europeans? It contained jogging texts about how a Soros plan was in place to bring in hundreds of thousands of migrants every year if possible, a million to the territory of the European Union from the Muslim world. The intent was to transform the continent into a brand-new, Islamised Europe. This, Orbn insisted, was what lay behind Brussels continuous and stealthy withdrawal of strengths from the national states. Orbn has form when it comes to this kind of paranoid image. Hes an authoritarian populist who has made a habit of rekindling xenophobia and anti-Muslim sentimentality. He eagerly enlarges far-right scheme beliefs about the Christian majority being threatened by demographic replacing. His word isnt precisely forgery word about the current, however. It comes laced with historic distortion.

Not since the treaty of Trianon, he gloated, has our society been as close as it is today to regaining its confidence and vitality a reference to the post-first world war convention that deprived Hungary of two-thirds of its territory. Orbns steering theory is that Hungary must seek redress for historical humiliations. The prompting is that, as his government confrontations with the EU on movement quotums, it is avenging grievances sprung in the 20 th century. Orbns manipulations going any further, and commit absolutely rewriting dark chapters of the past. Hes on the record as telling Mikls Horthy, the Hungarian captain who cooperated with the Nazis, was an exceptional statesman.

Of course, hes not alone in twisting record to further his political goals. In Recep Tayyip Erdoans Turkey, school volumes have been modified to de-emphasise Ataturk, the founder of the secular republic. Its all part of an effort to change that gift and extol the Ottoman past, as Erdoan carves out ever more superpowers for himself.

Controlling memory is at the heart of the Putin regime in Russia. Not only has Stalin been rehabilitated, with new shrines built to honour him throughout the country, but historians and human rights activists who work to document Stalinist crime have come under political pressing. Some, like Yury Dmitriyev, have been tried on trumped-up bills. And rewriting the Soviet past doesnt merely serve domestic political intents. Belying the offences of Soviet position in center and eastern Europe, and excusing the MolotovRibbentrop pact with the Nazis, offer justification for Moscow reclaiming its zone of influence.

Donald Trump gives a communication in Warsaw. Image: Petr David Josek/ AP

In Xi Jinpings China, any mention of the repugnances of the Cultural Revolution or of the Tiananmen square murder is stamped out because its seen as certain challenges to Communist party rule. Collective amnesia is what the existing regime attempt on issues that risk eroding greater legitimacy. Its not enough to hurl dissenters in prison or censor knowledge; the past is purged.

And while its inviting to repute the rewriting of record is something observed exclusively in illiberal or tyrannical organizations, it has increasingly become a feature of democracies. Donald Trumps speech in Warsaw last month strove to cast Polands historical struggle for freedom and liberty as a civilisational combat for clas qualities, tradition and God, rather than an aspiration to democracy. The narrative wholly left out of the rich and went political tapestry that gave rise to the solidarity move. In a unusual turn, Trump also reaped a similarity between the threat Islamist terrorism constitutes to the west and the danger of being subjected to bureaucracy and regulation. His nativist eyesight of the west as an embattled fortress of Christian societies in culture jeopardy manifested is not simply a personal political credo, but a wider is making an effort to rewrite the history of liberal republics and the principles they are meant to uphold.

In Britain, Brexiteers have proven willing to supply their own version of record. Nostalgia for the working day of empire and their swashbuckling spirit comes accompanied with the mantra that the European project was a tyrannical straitjacket all along. Britain never had a say in anything the EU ended, and now it has the opportunity to free itself, so the fib departs. Never thoughts that Britain was at the counter, a full and influential is part of a team its citizens and its economy have benefited from. Extremism adapts not only the sensing of existing realities( as mediations limp forwards ), it also adapts the past to suit one set of beliefs.

George Orwells 1984 contains a well-known word about record and the great importance: He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past. We obsess rightly about the impact of imitation information, but todays nationalist furies has become even more deeply rooted in the bia of biography, which citizens in many countries lap up despite the fact “its by” poison. The past has always been a battleground. The 20 th century proved to what extremes country controller over remember could go. Primo Levi, who experienced the nightmare of Nazi concentration camps, formerly wrote that the entire biography of the Reich can be re-read as a crusade against memory.

One of the backings of living in a republic is that researchers, students, writers and citizens at large can all access the past without having to subject themselves to any form of centralised, censoring see. The philosopher Tzvetan Todorov has described this as one of “the worlds largest” inalienable impunities, alongside the freedom to speculate and express oneself. Yet the security of recall in democratic civilizations may not be as assured as we recollect. Some legislators want to lead us in a procession towards forgetfulness. But that acces lies a nature of senselessness and treachery. Learning about biography, and being able to question some of the narratives advanced in the name of politics is as important as knowing where to get reliable information. Can record save us from ourselves? questioned the historian Timothy Snyder at a recent conference on the national states and the many deceits legislators attach to it. Perhaps it can.

Natalie Nougayrde is a Guardian leader novelist, correspondent and foreign affairs commentator