# Differences between fascism and socialism/communism **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 6, 2013, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/differences-between-fascism-and-socialism-communism/665457 "2013-08-06T00:55:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/differences-between-fascism-and-socialism-communism/665457/61 "2013-08-15T15:16:02Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Fascism and communism and socialism all derive from the same family tree . . . No, socialism/communism is in the Enlightenment/rationalist tradition of Voltaire, fascism in the Romantic tradition of Rousseau. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/differences-between-fascism-and-socialism-communism/665457/62 "2013-08-15T16:11:40Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > No, socialism/communism is in the Enlightenment/rationalist tradition of Voltaire, fascism in the Romantic tradition of Rousseau. This is disputed, as Marxism can be explained as a rejection of Enlightenment values. From _The Better Angels of Our Nature_ by Pinker: > [@](#): > > A child of the counter-Enlightenment, then, does not pursue a goal because it is objectively true or virtuous, but because it is a unique product of one’s creativity. The wellspring of creativity may be in one’s own true self, as the Romantic painters and writers insisted, or it may be in some kind of transcendent entity: a cosmic spirit, a divine flame. Berlin elaborates: > > “Others again identified the creative self with a super-personal “organism” of which they saw themselves as elements or members - nation, or church, or culture, or class, or history itself, a mighty force of which they conceived their earthly selves as emanations. Aggressive nationalism, self-identification with the interests of the class, the culture or the race, or the forces of progress - with the wave of the future-directed dynamism of history, something that at once explains and justifies acts which might be abhorred or despised if committed from calculation of selfish advantage or some other mundane motive - this family of political and moral conceptions is so many expressions of a doctrine of self-realization based on defiant rejection of the central thesis of the Enlightenment, according to which what is true, or right, or good, or beautiful, can be shown to be valid for all men by the correct application of objective methods of discovery and interpretation, open to anyone to use and verify.” > > The counter-Enlightenment also rejected the assumption that violence was a problem to be solved. Struggle and bloodshed are inherent in the natural order, and cannot be eliminated without draining life of its vitality and subverting the destiny of mankind. As Herder put it, “Men desire harmony, but nature knows better what is good for the species: it desires strife.” The glorification of the struggle in “nature red in tooth and claw” (as Tennyson had put it) was a pervasive theme in 19th-century art and writing. Later it would be retrofitted with a scientific patina in the form of “social Darwinism,” though the connection to Darwin is anachronistic and unjust: _The Origin of Species_ was published in 1859, long after romantic struggleism had become a popular philosophy, and Darwin himself was a thoroughgoing liberal humanist. > > The counter-Enlightenment was the wellspring of a familiy of romantic movements that gained strength during the 19th century. Some of them influenced the arts and gave us sublime music and poetry. Others became political ideologies and led to horrendous reversals in the trend of declining violence. One of these ideologies was a form of militant nationalism that came to be known as “blood and soil” - the notion that an ethnic group and the land from which it originated form an organic whole with unique moral qualities, and its grandeur and glory are more precious than the lives and happiness of its individual members. Another was romantic militarism, the idea that (as Mueller has summarized it) “war is noble, uplifting, virtuous, glorious, heroic, exciting, beautiful, holy, thrilling.” A third was Marxist socialism, in which history is a glorious struggle between classes, culminating in the subjugation of the bourgeoisie and the supremacy of the proletariat. And a fourth was National Socialism, in which history is a glorious struggle between races, culminating in the subjugation of inferior races and the supremacy of the Aryans. ---
**Author:** ![MrQwertyasd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@MrQwertyasd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrQwertyasd)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/differences-between-fascism-and-socialism-communism/665457/63 "2013-08-15T23:32:41Z")
> [@](#): > > In what ways is fascism right wing? In its centralized control of the economy? In its massive expansion of social welfare programs? In its massive public works programs? > > Fascism and communism and socialism all derive from the same family tree,and most fascists were former socialists themselves. The terms “left” and “right” appeared during the French Revolution of 1789 when members of the National Assembly divided into supporters of the king to the president’s right and supporters of the revolution to his left. One deputy, the Baron de Gauville explained, “We began to recognize each other: those who were loyal to religion and the king took up positions to the right of the chair” Fascism tends to be a strengthening of already established powers, leftism tends to be a reduction or gross replacement of them. Hence the Romanovs were shot in the cellar, a regicide which has not happened in a fascist coup. So they don’t derive from the same family tree at all. ---
**Author:** ![Melab](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9f8e36/32.png) [@Melab](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melab)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2013, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/differences-between-fascism-and-socialism-communism/665457/64 "2013-08-27T23:24:08Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > In what ways is fascism right wing? In its centralized control of the economy? In its massive expansion of social welfare programs? In its massive public works programs? > > Fascism and communism and socialism all derive from the same family tree,and most fascists were former socialists themselves. As if control is synonymous with socialism. ---
**Author:** ![Melab](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9f8e36/32.png) [@Melab](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melab)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2013, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/differences-between-fascism-and-socialism-communism/665457/65 "2013-08-27T23:31:11Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > The [Pournelle chart](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pournelle_chart) uses two axes of political ideology – the horizontal axis maps how the state is regarded, with state-haters on the left end and state-worshippers on the right; the vertical axis maps how reason is regarded, with irrationalists or romantics on bottom and rationalists on the top. This allows Jerry Pournelle to distinguish communists from fascists, placing them in the upper-right and lower-right corners respectively. Both placed all power with the state, but their intellectual traditions and world-views were vastly different – communists were the heirs of Voltaire, fascists of Rousseau. See [Romanticism vs. Enlightenment.](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RomanticismVersusEnlightenment) He puts libertarians and Objectivists in the upper left quadrant, as rationalist state-haters, while classical anarchists go in the lower left quadrant as romantic state-haters. (N.B.: Rational **ists** are not necessarily ration**al.)** Communists? Heirs of Voltaire? Wasn’t voltaire all about liberty and not equality? ---
**Author:** ![Melab](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9f8e36/32.png) [@Melab](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melab)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2013, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/differences-between-fascism-and-socialism-communism/665457/66 "2013-08-28T00:06:26Z")
> [@Melbourne](#): > > that the left, because of their trade-union roots, holds to the view that you can make the world better for every individual by making it better for every group, and the right, in opposition to the left, holds the view that you can make the world better for every group by making it better for every individual. Not sure why it bothers me, but I’m pretty sure this group/individual thing is bogus. ---
**Author:** ![Melab](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9f8e36/32.png) [@Melab](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melab)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2013, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/differences-between-fascism-and-socialism-communism/665457/67 "2013-08-28T00:11:18Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > Doesn’t Objectivism define the meaning of life as perpetuation of life, as only life makes values possible? Yes. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/differences-between-fascism-and-socialism-communism/665457.md?page=3)