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This is a response to the question presented by @atamme. Their question was, "Do you think this pandemic has caused the United States government to have totalitarian tendencies?"
Back all the way to January 2020, a virus was identified and some lock-downs began. The result of this virus in the United States of America (U.S.) was the issue of whether the government should be allowed to make legislation against the virus. Some said legislation should cover the whole country to prevent breakouts in places where people disregard the significance of a pandemic. Others said legislation should be given from the states to personalize for the situation of their people. There were, and are, plenty for other opinions anywhere in between.
Totalitarianism is viewed as bad by many, especially due to the examples from history. Examples include Joseph Stalin with the Soviet Union, Adolf Hitler with Nazi Germany, and the People’s Republic of China under Mao Zedong. According to the Britannica, totalitarianism is a "... form of government that theoretically permits no individual freedom and that seeks to subordinate all aspects of individual life to the authority of the state." The use of "state" here can refer a country as well as a simple state as U.S. citizens understand.
Now, my opinion is that the U.S. has some totalitarian tendencies. I have found that these tendencies appear often with any crisis. My understanding is that crises show us the vulnerability of the people around us, which makes U.S. representatives want to help the people they serve. The reason this could lead to totalitarian tendencies is due to the controlling nature of some legislation. The idea of a law is to prevent certain action, which ends up controlling that action.
However, I do not think that the U.S. will become a totalitarian government. There are people who watch the government with intensity to avoid a totalitarian transition. I believe that it is impossible for a government to completely avoid totalitarian aspects, but with careful steps, bad legislation can be avoided.