[DVaut1]

[ QUOTE ]
Bluffthis, if you took some time to study Poli Sci you would find that totalitarianism is a very specific term refering to a very specific type of political state organisation, not just a word to bandied about to donate a lack of democracy or freedom.

The conditions for totalitarianism to be possible have not existed till the twentieth century.

[/ QUOTE ]

If there's one thing that's very clear to me in this thread (and on this forum in general), it's that it becomes exceedingly easily to know who has spent some time in college (or higher) studying social sciences, and doing actual research (even if it was as limited to something like a 15 or 20 page paper for a college class) -- research that you would be held accountable for, on some level or another -- research that would require vigorous study, and a demonstration of what's quantifiable, what isn't, and how empirical evidence can shed light on what M correctly calls a never-ending game of conjecture; and (contrast that) with people who haven't received such training, who studied other subjects during their higher education (or didn't receive a higher education at all), and rely on rather strange generalizations and incoherent premises to make arguments that even children could deconstruct -- "take a look at these verses in the Koran, they will help to explain a millenium of Muslim behavior, both in positions of state authority and within Muslim society/interactions between Muslims and non-Muslims in the world at large".

I think one explanation is clearly a lack of formal training in authentic research and academic study in the field of the social sciences, although perhaps there are others.