Let's define fascism - Because every thread is a new definition

[Toucan]

I'm really not. My point is that no one can agree on what fascism actually is so I'm reluctant to label something "fascist" just because it upsets my sensibilities. HOWEVER, if a government explicitly states that it is a fascist government then I'm cool with it.

I have no issue whatsoever with a government saying "so we're fascists now" and then other people saying it's a fascist regime. I do have an issue with the slobbering masses yelling "FASCIST! YOU'RE A FASCIST CUNT! FAAAAAAAASCIST!" because they don't know what it means. I don't know what it means. No one knows what it means. But if a government in power releases a statement or manifesto or whatever that states "this is a fascist government" then I'll accept the fascist label. However, if a government does not apply the fascist label, then I am forced to compare its policies to previous examples that are widely agreed to be fascist regimes.

The term "fascist" is now a pejorative used by people who tend to lean left politically to discredit their opposition. At least here in the USofA. It's the same with the "socialist" label, but there seems to be a lot more agreement on what "socialism" actually is and it is more strongly defined.

Full disclosure: I have a BS and MS in political science so I fully admit to being autistic in regards to government. Yes, I was completely unemployable and had to get a second MS in order to find work outside of a coffee shop. Or, in my case, the alcohol industry.

I suppose thats reasonable. I just happen to believe that fascism is more of a 'you'll know it when you see it kind of thing. Fascist has a rightly earned negative connotation so I can't imagine too many people today and in the future willingly using it to describe themselves but I feel that they still should be described as fascist if they clearly display the attributes of one.
However I really do agree the word has been cheapened lately and it no longer holds the same impact or inspires the same kind of revulsion that it should hold, which is sad and possibly dangerous.

And Im sorry I insinuated you were a grammar nazi.

 

[AnOminous]

Just because Mussolini came up with the idea of fascism doesn't mean that every slight veriation of that idea needs to be called something completely different and be judged using completely different metrics.

He came up with the name, not the idea. I doubt he even came up with the name itself. Probably he took credit for it from someone else. D'Annunzio is probably the forefather of fascism, although I don't think the word existed at that time, or at least not in its full sense as referring to a very specific political philosophy.

 

[kinglordsupreme19]

A) A belief that a nation or a community is functionally equivalent to an organism.
B) A belief that the organism is defined by a set of shared immutable characteristics of its members (for example, race, language, geography, religious background, etc).
C) That all efforts should be made to ensure that the organism flourishes, with little consideration given to constituent members or entities outside the organism.

 

[mindlessobserver]

Reading through all the posts, I keep seeing the one unifying factor of various forms of fascism being the religious overtones. A supplantation of the national myths and religion with the doctrines of the State to buttress and justify control over all segments of society, from the economy to the arts. Sort of divine right monarchy on steroids.

 

[The Hansome Goblin]

In the watered-down sense of the word, anyone who advocates any sort of nationalist ideology. They can be Third Way, Third Positionist or any other sort of cross-ideological, hybrid ideology and it makes absolutely no difference if you even so slightly hint at the integrity of the nation-state and the idea of excess multiculturalism being a bad thing.

In a more actual sense, modern fascism is best defined as government driven extreme nationalism to the point of blatantly disregarding the interests of all nations but your own, which is essentially a far-right position, regardless of whether you subscribe to a more corporatist or populist perspective of fascism.

 

[Slap47]

Fascism isn't an ideology. It's like Caudillismo, a manner of ruling.

You have a charismatic leader that wants individuals to put the state before their own interests. It can take the form of radical national socialism or as a puppet regime that whores out the country for foreign businesses under the auspices of preserving traditional values.

Mussolini had no ideology, he simply sought to grow the Italian states influence. He both applied socialist policy and kept himself well connected with large corporate leaders.

I would argue that North Korea and even USSR should be considered fascist states.

Alot of people get offended by anybody daring to claim that Hitler applied socialist policy and retarded conservatives make the argument that Hitler was a socialist but the reality is that Hitler's ideology wasn't clear-cut on economics and only dictated one thing - all business must benefit the state.

 

[Your Weird Fetish]

I suppose thats reasonable. I just happen to believe that fascism is more of a 'you'll know it when you see it kind of thing. Fascist has a rightly earned negative connotation so I can't imagine too many people today and in the future willingly using it to describe themselves but I feel that they still should be described as fascist if they clearly display the attributes of one.

It's one of the great injustices of world history that communism hasn't ended up the same way.

 

[Toucan]

It's one of the great injustices of world history that communism hasn't ended up the same way.

I think its because communists are sexier than fascists. They have the whole 'viva la revolution' deal and at least pay lipservice to the idea of equality and stuff. Fascists on the other hand only appeal to people who have a rather suspect fetish for nazi uniforms

 

[Your Weird Fetish]

I think its because communists are sexier than fascists. They have the whole 'viva la revolution' deal and at least pay lipservice to the idea of equality and stuff. Fascists on the other hand only appeal to people who have a rather suspect fetish for nazi uniforms

Fascists were very sexy before WW2. I think the main difference is that communists were our "allies" and it gave them a window to market themselves better and infect our institutions.

 

[Slap47]

It's one of the great injustices of world history that communism hasn't ended up the same way.

Problem is that the USA installed fascist governments to suppress democratic movements and only the communists made any effort to seriously oppose those governments. Doesn't help that the church in Latin America really does have far too much power and the the wealth hoarding by a small % of kleptocrats can be really felt, especially in civil war ridden countries that basically had to deal with having fruit companies as their governments.

In Russia its hard to argue against the progress the country experienced. In ww1 the Germans took on the Russian Empire with only a small % of their army and absolutely destroyed them. In ww2 the Germans threw an overwhelming majority of their army at the Russians and got their face kicked in. Kinda hard to argue that Hitler progressed Germany anywhere since he lost so much land and killed so many people. He doesn't really have any concrete policies outside of militarism (the autobahn was started by the Weimar Republic and expanded with slave labor during the Nazi period).

And of course, through all that the American and western European moderate and radical left were condemning the USSR for rights abuses. On the other hand, the Nazi opposition to Hitler was silenced or liquidated during his rule.

I think its because communists are sexier than fascists. They have the whole 'viva la revolution' deal and at least pay lipservice to the idea of equality and stuff. Fascists on the other hand only appeal to people who have a rather suspect fetish for nazi uniforms

Fascism is a radical form of nationalism but its not the only form of extreme nationalism. In the USA extreme nationalism takes the exact opposite form because the national identity takes the form of anti-authoritarianism, localism and civil liberties. Compare that to the Prussian idea of a strong centralized state that takes priority over every individual that Hitler romanticized and Mussolini wanted to create.

Fascism in the USA can only come from a strange journey through a person reading some obscure books or watching some dumb documentaries or through extreme racism. It's an entirely foreign idea to non-racist Americans that the culture doesn't allow to just appear naturally. "Blood and soil" and an absolute dedication to the state doesn't really work with a diverse country of immigrants or a country that argues that the right to criticize, choose and even oppose the federal government is what makes it the greatest.

Fascism in Italy is still alive because many blame Italy's problems on the fact that it has a weak central government that allows mobsters to rule large parts of the country and because Italians want a government that will stick up for them rather than kowtow to the EU and its strange "end of whites" plan.

 

[Gone_Fission]

It's hard to define what fascism is because fascism itself is an incoherent mish-mash of various ideas cobbled together by political opportunists. Unlike the various forms of liberalism or Marxism, fascism doesn't really work as a logically consistent ideology, it's just authoritarian gut impulses grafted onto other ideologies.

Personally, I think of fascism as being more of a reactionary and authoritarian trend within capitalist societies in periods of decay, that attempts to sublimate inwardly focused economic class struggles into outwardly focused national and racial struggles under the directives of a strong centralized state.

 

[Forever Train Engineer]

I think fascism is just communism, but with more focus on racial superiority. It does with throwing away the religious establishment, and doing away with private businesses in favor of state-owned businesses, and for the "common interest of the superior race."

 

[Gone_Fission]

I think fascism is just communism, but with more focus on racial superiority. It does with throwing away the religious establishment, and doing away with private businesses in favor of state-owned businesses, and for the "common interest of the superior race."

That's how fascism and its propenents like to present fascism, but in practice it often involves a good amount of privatization of industry, like in the case of Nazi Germany, and the economic status of the already wealthy is secured even moreso than in liberal capitalism, seeing as how now striking workers can just be jailed as enemies of the state.

Ironically, "communist" countries like Stalin's USSR were more effective at embodying the fascist ideal than the actual facsists ever were.

 

[Toucan]

Fascism in Italy is still alive because many blame Italy's problems on the fact that it has a weak central government that allows mobsters to rule large parts of the country and because Italians want a government that will stick up for them rather than kowtow to the EU and its strange "end of whites" plan.

Fascisim in Italy still lives because the collaborators and industrialists were allowed to live by the Allies. Had the Allies allowed the anti fascist partisans sort out the reformation of the country themselves, well lets just say nobody would be driving a FIAT anymore.

When you go to italy you will see that modern right wing movements are composed almost exclusively of upper and upper-middle class people, all of them very prim and proper with maybe one or two skinheads here and there. If you look at the manifestos of parties like Lega Nord and Forza you will find some really weird ideas about turning italy into a corporate state, almost like something out of an Ayn Rand Novel. Obviously this appeals to the upper classes and it is the upper classes that are largely fascist sympathisers in italy.

Because the communists failed to take power in the closing days of the war and push the shit in of the capitalist class the germ of fascism was preserved in Italy. It is to the eternal shame of the Italian partisans that more people wernt strung up from that filling station gantry beside Mussolini.

 

[Forever Train Engineer]

Ironically, "communist" countries like Stalin's USSR were more effective at embodying the fascist ideal than the actual facsists ever were.

Especially when you take into consideration of Stalin's dislike for Ukrainians, Chechens, and even more non-Russian ethnic groups within pre-WW2 USSR

 

[feedtheoctopus]

Fascism is less of a coherent ideology then it is a tendency. That's a bit vague, sure, but the major "thinkers" behind fascism were never specific to begin with. In general it's an outlook, it's not a political program. When you interpret it that way fascism becomes more easy to understand.

The basic defining features of this outlook are thus:

1. Romanticization of past/obsession with perceived national decline

2. Contempt for democratic norms and notions of equality/Machiavellian outlook on politics ("winning is more important than acting nobly")

3. Belief in the moral supremacy of the state (i.e, "what is law is right")

4. Hyper-nationalism/fetishization of cultural identity

5. Belief that hostility between different nations/groups of people is the norm, and therefore attempts at peace and cooperation are inherently futile/general contempt for diplomacy

6. Human beings are approached in terms of their perceived usefulness, rather then as individuals with rights ("X group needs to be "removed" because they're a drain on taxes", that sort of thinking)

It should be noted that one or all of these trends/beliefs exist within every political system. It is when they reach a point of dominance over the entire structure that a government can be called reasonably "fascist". Until then fascism exists as a potentiality rather than a formal political faction. The alt-right for example, while clearly fascist in character, is far from "unified" in any meaningful sense and, indeed, a lot of people involved in that sort of thing often have serious disagreements with each other about how their ideal government would look.

I would argue fascism doesn't rest on totalitarianism, so much as totalitarianism is simply an inevitable end result of fascisms normalization within a political culture. I can't tell you how many "libertarians" I've run into who start preaching for ethnic cleansing and state violence the moment somebody they don't like comes up. Everybody wants "freedom", just so happens most people want it for them and nobody else

 

[ICametoLurk]

Marx was wrong. There is no international class struggle between the proles and bourgeois. There is only the Proletarian nations in a life and death struggle against Bourgeois nations.

You know, like this (Engels actually defended the war the USA had with Mexico btw)

 

[Midlife Sperglord]

Fascism = every ideology I disagree with.

I am paraphrasing Tumblr’s definition.

 

[Corbin Dallas Multipass]

I'd define it as an effectively totalitarian government (fake or heavily rigged democracies can count here). Because it's so heavily characterized by the totalitarian leader or party, it's not easy to define it far past this to me. I guess it's pretty much just a dictatorship in my mind, with all the censorship and suppression that goes along with that.

 

[Tranhuviya]

An authoritarian socio-economic system with a focus on the inherent qualities, real or imagined, of the host country's people.