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PaperclipPerfector  4mo ago (text post)   38816 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 15, 2024

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He’s a Nazi without the killing the Jews.

Bro, that's like saying "he's water without being wet". The Holocaust is the biggest defining characteristic of Nazis by a lot.

The Holocaust is the biggest defining characteristic of Nazis by a lot.

I mean like, it's not. The jews and various leftoids want you to think that. But by far the germans didn't think of it that way. Most of the civilians were perfectly fine with a house, husband-and-wife-son-and-a-dog styled national socialism. The jews weren't the raison d'etre, they were just an obstacle to the real goal.

I mean, we do think of it that way now. During the regime, aiui Germans mostly tried pretty hard to not think about it at all.

Ehhhh, Jew-hate was pretty central. It wasn't everything but it was a lot. It's underplaying it to say "they were just an obstacle to the real goal" when the real goal was racial supremacy.

The virulent anti-semitism was a major and defining aspect of Nazism, true. But there were other significant and distinctive aspects of their ideology such that I think it can be meaningful to describe someone as Nazi-without-the-Jew-killing. I don't think that label describes Trump well though. For instance:

  • Nazism considered military struggle and conflict a natural and desirable part of human existence. While I'm cynical about the "no wars" rhetoric we get from Trump and his ilk, he's certainly far less dedicated to war for its own sake.
  • Nazi ideology famously supported killing the disabled and infirm. Trump obviously has suggested nothing like this.
  • Trump is much more individualist than the Nazis. Their collectivism was not compassionate, but it was a collectivist ideology nonetheless.

Trump has many flaws, but he ain't a Nazi.

Yes, I think the key distinguishing factor between Nazism specifically vs. nationalism or fascism generally is the belief in social Darwinism and eugenics at the volk-scale. They genuinely believed that a glorious future awaits, when the best and brightest and strongest dominate the world and mold it for the betterment of all. It's one reason so many killed themselves at the end: they had fully internalized that in losing, their inferiority was manifest, and so suicide was not just practical, but a moral duty to humanity.

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