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Notes -
I'm curious, what exactly do you think the word "fascism" means in this context. Can you define it?
I've had in my personal backlog to look into the etymology there: Fascism pretty clearly draws on fasces, the bundle of wooden rods (sometimes with an axe) used to symbolize the power of the law to punish in ancient Rome. This didn't have the negative associations before the 20th century, and early American leaders were huge Rome stans, so it's amusingly depicted behind the podium in the House of Representatives and on the seal of the Senate. Loosely, people throw around the term "fascism" seemingly to describe any government action to punish (implied: something the speaker thinks shouldn't be punished).
But I've wondered specifically how this relates to another similarly-derived English word for a bundle of sticks that is generally taken as a slur. The evolution of language over time is so weird to me.
Reddit etymologists explain why a fascist is a faggot with an axe: https://old.reddit.com/r/etymology/comments/9wt6w2/fascistfaggot_a_common_root/
Interestingly, a “faggot” is also the name for a meat dumpling made of various meats, possibly cognate to the fajita dish: “bundle”.
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I've posted on this before here.
Set up a two-axis "political compass." Let the horizontal axis be the social/cultural axis: "socially conservative"/"right wing" vs. "socially liberal"/"left wing." Let the vertical be the economic axis, with upwards being increasing government intervention in the economy, and downwards being towards laissez faire — "fiscally liberal"/"socialist" vs. "fiscally conservative"/"capitalist" (and with the actual space of interest being confined to a much smaller window somewhere in the middle between those far extremes).
In the lower left, we have the Libertarian Quadrant: "fiscally conservative but socially liberal." Low taxes, low redistribution, low regulation, but left-wing social politics. Above that, we have the Progressive Quadrant: high taxes, high redistribution, high regulation of markets, and left-wing social politics. (The trend of the past decade has been for the Democratic party electorate to actually move closer to the Libertarian/Progressive border on economic issues as they move left on social issues.) Over on the bottom right, we have the Conservative Quadrant of the GOP establishment — the people who think the best way to promote traditional values is to lower taxes, reduce regulations, unleash the free market, and "shrink government until you can drown it in the bathtub." (I could go on about this group, and how they respond to tensions between market forces and right-wing social values — but the tl;dr summary is that "low taxes, small government" must always come before "social conservatism" because having it the other way around is fascism.)
Now, what about the fourth quadrant, above the Conservative Quadrant? People who are socially conservative, but also in favor of wealth redistribution and business regulation? Who want to use the government, particularly over the market, as the Progressives, only for right-wing social ends instead of left-wing ones?
Again, I've had people in all four quadrants label that corner the Fascist Quadrant.
To reiterate from that post I linked:
And:
More than once, I've seen Democrat voters argue that a key reason not to elect Republicans is that the GOP is so solidly anti-government, so determined to "shrink it until it can be drowned in the bathtub," that when placed in charge of the government, they're incapable of running it competently. Well, once in my college days, I responded by asking what would happen if the Republican party stopped trying to cut government, and focused instead on how to run it when in charge. Would that, therefore, be less objectionable?
The answer was not just no, but hell no. That would be the worst-case scenario. Because no matter how bad the "cut taxes, cut regulation, kill the government" GOP was, any socially-conservative right wing party that didn't embrace this, which actually wanted to run the government, and use it toward right-wing ends, would be a fascist party.
I don't remember the context, but in an argument at SSC, I remember someone replying to me that Imperial China, across the millennia from Qin to Qing, was "basically fascist," for similar reasons.
There's the GOP establishment, particularly the never-Trumpers. Dedicated first and foremost to cutting taxes, cutting regulations, cutting spending that doesn't go to big politically-connected firms, cutting anything that gets in the way of corporate profits. Whose support of social conservatism is limited to fighting attempts by the left to use the government against it. Who are in favor of Burkean incrementalism, moving things in the same direction as the left, just much more slowly.
Why was the party elite this way? Because it's the only acceptable form the "right wing" can take, particularly in a modern, Western country. Because any socially-conservative right-wing that isn't this way (particularly when its supporters are mostly white and/or Christian) is definitionally fascist.
Again, you can find people both left and right, with a variety of economic views, who agree with this definition. Again, I know people who fall into this quadrant who agree with this definition, and thus accept the "fascist" label.
If your right acts apoplectic towards the idea of right + using power, but tolerates much more the left using power, or it self even engages in using power for left wing or foreign nationalist causes, then they aren't really much of a right wing conservative party and at least in part made by people who are a false opposition and identify more with the other side.
Trying to squeeze all politics outside of that into fascism is trying to fit too diverse a political space into too tiny a box.
However, it is true that this behavior is very widespread and it accurately.
But by these standards a lot of countries majority populations, including in Europe are made of fascists. As was much of history.
This is genuinely the model that much of the uniparty ideologues, supposed intellectuals, mouthpieces etc promote.
It is also true that there are people who identify as fascists because they think that it is the only allowed way to be nationalists for their people, and not to be oikophobic, support their own demise, etc. But in doing so they are to an extend falling into the opposition's trap. Although one falls also into their trap if they are too eager to favor throwing everyone to their right under the bus to save their own skin, while helping the far left in the process. I will still promote a politics that isn't fascism though while also being against antifa ideology, because it is both strategically superior but also the morally and ideologically superior option.
But generally I am more interested into what people are genuinely after than how they label themselves although I care about those too. But more so about how the use of labels affect politics.
Part of the antifa extremists trick is to label anything else.
It is absolutely true that throughout its history the antifa movement was not about opposing things like imperialism, attrocities, but also about hatred of the right, conservatives, insufficiently far leftists, non communists too since some of the more notable antifascist regimes, and nationalism and the collective group rights and interests of Europeans especially although it has also affected some other groups like Japan as seen of recent.
Obviously the antifa ideology is also promoted by foreign groups who are nationalists for their own and undermining the native group.
To have a sane politics and avoid then, we simply must reject the antifa ideology.
We need to seperate things like murderous imperialism at expense of other nations which is objectionable from being proud of your own people, supporting and identifying with your nation and opposing what would lead to your people's destruction and disminishment, which if done recirpocably has been a much better working system both in theory and in practice than the antifa hatred of moderates, right wingers, conservatives, nationalists, and of European peoples and people insuficiently.
It simply is true that much of the hysteria about fascism is not about opposing evil things but about opposing right wingers, hated ethnic outgroup, and not having far left oikophobic politics. In fact it is about opposing things that a reasonable person who is moderate would support, in favor of a hysteric far left paranoid anti-intellectual overreacting fanaticism.
Another important issue is the right using power. Well, moderate nationalists have existed aplenty, but they have been failing because they let people like Satre and the decolonize our society types get away with it and brand everyone opposing this as supremacist, fascist. They have in part accepted too much of the framing of the far left. The right being more willing to use power to keep antifa types down would have been a good thing.
So, I think part of the discourse about fascism is about pressuring people to be passive losers. This isn't to say that using power for the sake of power is good. I do think keeping down people like Satre, the weatherman underground group, which also included the guy who founded BLM and their fellow travelers and organisations like that is a moral obligation.
This idea of "all or nothing" that exists about the discourses on fascism, where you either allow the antifa types to take over and transform your country into the treatment that usually is reserved for hostile foreign occupation, or else you are the mega evil fascist, is just a false dichotomy. There is a wise sweet spot on how a country ought to be ruled, and its norms. That sweet spot doesn't exist in never ending doubling down in any direction but it does lie in a more conservative, right wing and nationalist direction, to fix the failures of the current situation that is too far to the left and fails to even have sustainable birth rates along with a plethora of other enormous problems.
Additionally, when theorizing about the better system internationally, neither fascism is good, nor is the anti european, antifa ideology good. A universal nationalist system which hasn't really been that rare ideology, which necessitates respecting the rights of other nation states and therefore other peoples national sovereignty, self determination, etc and some of such foundations even if ignored have been part of the development, while concurently the antifa type of system has been increasing. Obviously the "European collectivism and Europeans and European nationalists are inherently evil and not indigenous" is not good for Europeans and European nationalism, and therefore because it tries to screw over Europeans so thoroughly, it is against International Justice. You can't have utopia no matter what system, but a system that takes into consideration the collective group interests of Europeans and of non Europeans and doesn't try to destroy the first, and make them second class citizens, while demonizing millions of people who oppose this agenda, is really a non starter.
The hatred of the antifa uniparty types towards people who don't share their ideology is also very notable negative consequence and makes the transformation of society into a totalitarian direction inevitable unless they are stopped. Not to mention the legacy of actual murders commited by antifascist regimes like the Soviet Union. So there is a moral obligation for the right wing to use power to stop that.
You've summed up my view of the GOP, and why they're useless, pretty well.
Which is why elites of the post-Nuremberg regime fear and hate so much of their own subject populations. Why — as well-detailed by Curtis Yarvin — they reduced electoral politics to a sham, use Jacobin arguments to redefine "democracy" as meaning rule by left-wing technocrats, and denounce any actual democracy as "populism," "demagoguery," and, yes, "fascism."
And that hysteria will continue until the elites that promote it are removed. And, no, there's no voting them out. As Brandon Walsh put it on Twitter, "All of our solutions are fedposts."
I'd say less "let people like…" as were "forced to by people like…" But yes, we need to ditch the framing of the far left… particularly the "fascism bad" framing.
Anyone on the right who isn't a useless GOP establishment-style "conservative," who doesn't actually conserve anything, is eventually going to get tarred with the "fascist" brush; so you might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.
While they will try to put the label on you, not accepting its legitimacy and not playing the role they have designated for you is better choice strategically. Obviously this is a very stigmatized term, and makes it easier for the left to crush the opposition if one makes it easier to attach it to them.
But it is important to also on some level as you say and you are right about that, not to let the threat of the label scare you from opposing them and working with others on the right, including further right against them. Since they will try to label any effective genuine opposition. It is still easier for them to label people if they are ideology is some kind of limitless nationalism, lets bury everyone else perspective.
And I also argued that in terms of preferable policy, I don't think the modern right must be fascists but must act in a manner that the fake right will be inclined to call fascist and also should not treat historical fascism as the epitome of evil which I agree it would be the mistake that would make people align too much with the far left and be too timid to stand for themselves. But there is also no reason to think that means we need to be followers of fascism. Also because the murderous imperialism done by the fascists isn't necessary to oppose this situation, nor desirable in my view, and itself makes it easy to demonize people who oppose the antifa coalition.
As we agree, the reaction to fascism, that reaction is not because of the genuinely bad aspects of fascism, but because far leftists which include people who falsely claim or believe to be moderates hate any of the right wing, preservationist, use of power, and even moderate nationalist elements in general for their ethnic outgroup, and within fascism. They are also highly anti conservative. And really the whole overcomplaining about fascism has always been about the far leftists attacking those insufficiently far to the left. And so, it would be stupid for any genuine right to prioritize crushing people on our right who are probably more willing to oppose the far left anyway. Especially since some of them might choose such symbols but in practice aren't really the reincarnation of Mussolini.
However the stigma remains, and some of it is not just because of this milking but genuine bad elements of fascism.
As for whether having any willingness to not adopt views to the right of me, makes me a far leftist. Well it doesn't, but also I don't mind if my preferred positions means I am sharing some common ground with anyone, provided I am not supporting stupid stuff. I criticize people for sharing common ground with the far left ideas that makes their civilization's demise inevitable.
Part of my problem with modernity is too much doubling down in a far left direction and people compromising with what is essentially driving over the cliff.
But it is impossible to have any sensible viewpoint and not share some ground with extremists, on the issues they have a point. Aristotle figured this out a long time ago. When he compared two vices to a virtue, the virtue often had some elements of what becomes a vice in disproportionate amount.
Also, you ought to note that the kind of people I call antifa, or other components that I would classify as Jewish supremacists who are an important part of this faction, but not all, do not try to present themselves as arch villains and sometimes try to hide their power level and really much of their tactic is to demonize the opposition while present themselves in an overly positive manner.
Another facet of this, I genuinely buy into some extend standard morality of a late 20th century moderate nationalist way of perceiving politics in a politically incorrect manner and I am genuinely out to stop and oppose the things I criticize but I don't have the most far right possible perspective. For example, someone like Jesse Singal who says that white collectivism is evil is genuinely violating white Americans civil rights and should get the attention from the department of justice for that. Obviously he won't.
You could do things like treat defining any moderate nationalism as fascism, or worse Nazism, as blood libel defamation, and go after those doing so. And you actually will be perfectly reasonable to do that.
I believe it is a mistake but also untrue to promote the political compass meme view of history of normal lib left, authleft, lib right and then the evil fascists of the auth right quadrant who are out to genocide everyone. The broad antifa coalition, fails to be correct, moderate, even handed and in fact that is a key part of why they gatekeep what is reasonable and have the agenda I lambasted in these posts and the obsession about fascists.
A lot of people who have compromised with the current situation and spin it as democracy vs evil need to be reminded how it would look like if the system worked as it ought to. Deconstructing their false view to the world and bringing things back to reality is both good on its own merits and strategically useful. They gain a lot of power by capturing institutions but also promoting this propaganda that spins the opposition as extremists villains, and them as the defenders of "our democracy".
Surely, you are not going to get a broad movement, by adopting this self identification as the villains. Moderate nationalism has been more successful in various European countries than in the USA, because a greater proportion of the population see it, correctly, as normal, and share this ideology. And don't treat it having borders and nationalism as ism, bad thing, tm. Nor are they some kind of Nietzscheans. And don't identify as fascists. But yeah historically, moderate nationalist movements failed to do enough to keep the left down and there are lessons to be learned by movements which should be edgier than their historical behavior.
Developing a thick skin and doing what you ought to, but also working to deconstruct their labels, put accurate labels to them, and use influence to punish and put a stop to their defamation. But of course, It helps to be genuinely outraged at the labels these people use which are inaccurate and distortions of reality and how it ought to be classified. Communist/antifa type classifications of classism, racism, are all inherently false, and adopted in one sided manner besides.
It is actually a genuine problem that they react in the manner they do and describe things in the way they do. As if their ethnic outgroup must apologize for its own existence, and having rights, and preserving it self as evil. And so, this mentality that without being fascist doesn't buy into the left's (and fake right, etc) framing is effective against it.
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Setting aside that that's a whacky-ass definition of facism, would you really describe Trump as 'socially conservative, but also in favor of wealth redistribution and business regulation'? AFAICT he's diametrically opposed on all of those things.
He doesn't really fit the actual definition of fascism per Mussolini/Hitler/Franco either, so when the left says that I assume they just mean "popular person that we don't like".
Trump is a social conservative in wanting to protect socially conservative groups to allow them to grow, which is the true long-term threat to social progressivism.
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Using this definition of fascist, I’m forced to ask, what’s so bad about fascism?
This reminds me of Scott’s essay, “Social Justice and Words, Words, Words,” specifically this bit:
And later,
If “fascism” is just a neutral descriptor of one quadrant of the political graph, then supporting fascism should be no more controversial or upsetting than supporting libertarianism or neoliberalism or socialism, and it certainly shouldn’t result in people losing their minds TDS-style. But I think that there’s a bait and switch going on here, that labeling the socially-conservative-yet-fiscally-progressive quadrant “fascism” is a deliberate choice to poison the public discourse by tarring your political opponents as Hitler wannabes.
It’s the same tactic Greatest Generation and Boomer conservatives used when constantly decrying their political opponents as communists for supporting even a modicum of socialism, just in reverse. It seems to me that the tactic wasn’t particularly honest then, and it isn’t particularly honest now.
But again, if I’m wrong, and you’re using “fascism” in a neutral, judgement-free, purely descriptive sense, then what’s the the big deal? Why be so upset about fascism?
Nothing… except that our ruling elites will do anything in their power to stamp it out.
I agree that it shouldn't be that way, but it is that way.
Don't ask me; I'm not. After all, I'm a far-right monarchist with friends who are literal neo-Nazis.
The people in that quadrant aren't my political opponents, they're my allies. And it's our ruling elites who are tarring us as "Hitler wannabes."
I'm saying anyone on the right not content with being the "outer party" branch of the uniparty is going to end up so tarred, so we might as well own it. And recognize that the elites doing said tarring, and making with the "Nazi-punching" and "by any means necessary" rhetoric, are our enemies and must be removed. And thanks to their control of the institutions and to our "democracy" being a sham, there's no lawful, non-violent means to do so.
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There's (in my view, as a progressive anti-authoritarian liberal) a lot of truth to what the parent poster said, but certainly a lot of truth in what you and Scott said. I think the better way of thinking about it is that the "social conservatism, big government" quadrant is a necessary but not sufficient condition for fascism. When taken to its extreme it becomes fascism or akin to it, just as socialism can range from social democrat to libertarian socialist to democratic socialist to authoritarian socialist to Marxist-Leninist to Stalinist to Juchist, but calling all socialists Stalinists/Juchists is silly.
I think we’re in complete agreement. Fascism as it is usually understood is in the “social conservatism, big government” quadrant, but it isn’t the only thing in that quadrant. However, it seems to me that @Capital_Room is pulling a dirty trick. He’s claiming that fascism is just a neutral descriptor (“any socially-conservative right-wing that isn't this way (particularly when its supporters are mostly white and/or Christian) is definitionally fascist”), but then he also says things like,
And
And
Which rather gives the game away. “Fascism is just the neutral umbrella term we use for political ideologies in that quadrant.” Okay, fine. “Which means that obviously you can’t support it.” Wait, why not? “Because it’s fascism!”
As I said earlier, the same definitional trick has been played many times before with communism, racism, sexism, homophobia, etc. What puzzles me is who Capital_Room thinks he’s going to convince with that trick here. Is there anyone on this site who doesn’t immediately realize what he’s trying to do? His goals are especially obvious when he says things like,
In short, it’s just a rhetorical trick to prevent his ideological opponents from supporting social conservatism. The only acceptable conservatism in a modern Western country is one that doesn’t actually conserve anything, just drifts leftward more slowly. Of course, voters are finally wising up to this and voting MAGA, AfD, FPÖ, etc.,
This is where you misunderstand me, because you seem to have mistaken me for a leftist, rather than a far-right extremist who thinks the American Revolution was a mistake.
It's not me, but our elites who say you can't support it. And you won't be allowed to until they're removed.
Again, you have me placed wrong.
Again, this is the position promulgated and, more importantly, enforced by our elites, and which has been absorbed by too many on the right in our country. We on the right need to stop conforming to what's "acceptable" in favor of unacceptable right-wing positions.
Which shows an improvement in attitude… but not strategy. As the saying goes, if voting could change anything, it would be illegal. That's why Trump Derangement Syndrome — as far as the people who rule us are concerned, MAGA must be crushed, no matter what it takes. AfD is going to end up being banned in the name of "defensive democracy" and "never again."
The problem is that the people who rule us are not going to allow us on the right to do anything that might actually work, not so long as they're alive. Our first priority should be figuring out how we're going to deal with them.
Have you considered that a genuine counterrevolution is not an opposing revolution, but the opposite of a revolution? Social conservatism is a bottom-up phenomenon which grows by community functioning and institution building. I understand you're an atheist and thus not welcome in most social conservative communities, but prejudice is lindy.
A social conservative politics which wants to actually work can't just enforce socially conservative norms, although of course arresting gay pride marchers for public indecency is a good thing, or the generational rot will prevent any changes from sticking around. It didn't work in Spain, it's not working in Iran, and it won't work in the USA. Instead a reactionary government needs to prune society so that organic socially conservative community building fills the vacuum in society.
Yes, but this requires certain favorable conditions. Like a sane, functional official religion (every society has an official religion, even if it's unofficially official, like the insane one we have now).
In fact, I think Jim Donald sums up the basic conditions pretty well: "throne, altar, and freehold."
Given the decayed state things are in, that's gotta be a lot of pruning. And certainly a lot of pushing back against globalism and immigration despite their benefits for "line go up" economic metrics. Plus, most of the churches aren't exactly maintaining their congregations all that well. AIUI, the Mormons are barely holding steady because, despite being one of the few with significantly above-replacement birth rates, said excess is only just countering their losses from people leaving. And these don't just come down to things the government is doing, such that merely clearing government away will fix the problem.
And how do you propose to pull off all the pruning? It seems to me to be the sort of thing you need an Augustus for.
(And now I'm reminded of some fellows of my acquaintance who, despite denouncing democracy as "fake and gay," and wanting a government headed by a single man with supreme executive authority who serves for life, insist that this cannot be compared to "monarchism" in any way, because their support for such a leader derives purely from the Führerprinzip, and "Moldbug is a Jew." When pushed on just what exactly the difference is, when you set aside "CEO-king appointed by shadowy cabal of cryptographically-anonymous "shareholders" who direct him to maximize the gold he extracts from the masses to line their pockets" scenarios, between their desired "Führer" and historical monarchies, particularly the non-hereditary ones… and the answer is basically "it'll be more explicitly racist." Bringing up the contrast between Rex Anglorum and Rex Anglie just resulted in more antisemitic ranting about Curtis Yarvin.)
This is defeatist talk. If you want socially conservative institutions and communities, go and join them. They exist in the present day and the government doesn’t harass them enough to get rid of them. Go back to church, join a community org(lions club is always recruiting), and expect to tough it out for a few generations. Even a high immigration scenario has the US population peaking later this century; make social conservatives the ones to whom the future belongs because we show up.
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