Please, oh please. DO tell us your definition of fascist/fascism, who you think ARE fascist, and how you identify. I’ll post a non pit thread for you to ignore shortly.
Ok Ditka. Please enlighten us. This ain’t the pit.
Are you just asking Ditka or all of us.
I’ve looked at the official definition of fascism and found it kind of convoluted.
To me fascism is a response to feeling threatened by things like foreign threats, economic collapse, minorities, terrorism, etc. It’s a strict, authoritarian, right wing movement that believes strongly in social hierarchies and being as strong and ruthless as possible in the face of external and internal threats. They want to purge domestic weakness and strengthen the police and military to deal with threats. Civil liberties are seen as inviting weakness in.
There is also the argument that a nation’s level of pathogens helps predict how fascist it is prone to becoming. The argument is that the fear of infectious diseases make people naturally conformist and afraid of outsiders as a built in method of preventing disease spread. These attitudes make a society ripe for fascism.
Orwell, Politics and the English Language:
I am 100% certain that someone carrying an axe with a bunch of sticks tied around it is a fascist. The rest I can’t be completely sure of.
My opinion:
Fascism is a totalitarian dictatorship. It’s a system where the government is absolute and controls all aspects of society.
Fascism is militaristic. It believes that war is a good thing for society. (Although in some cases, the fascist regime will recognize its limitations and accept that it’s not strong to attack other countries. So it will talk a lot about war but not follow through.)
Fascism is based on a cult of personality. It says that the leader of the nation is at a level above ordinary men and is entitled to blind and total obedience and veneration.
Fascism is nationalistic. It believes that there is a group of people who are inherently superior to everyone else and that these people should rule over everyone else.
Summary: Hateful, bossy jerks are fascists.
Hateful = focusing national animosity on a cultural minority, malicious & misleading propaganda, generally nasty personal disposition appealing to anti-intellectuals
Bossy = telling someone else what to do, totalitarian
Jerks = the sort of people who are not allowed to post here. HD, Shodan, and I are not jerks. SA was. pimpdaddylongstroke & Thaidog were just weird.
A fascist is someone who believes that access to political processes and markets, and protection by the state should be based on racial and cultural identity. When a fascist speaks of democracy s/he sees it as limited to those of a certain race/culture. The state exists to advance the agenda of the preferred race and to protect it from the undesirable races. When people from undesirable races step out of line, the state should come down hard on them. To the extent that other races are allowed to exist, it is to serve the needs of the preferred race.
ETA: fascism is often characterized by wildly conflicting ideologies and belief in conspiracy theories to explain away those conflicting beliefs.
To me fascism is about ultra-conformity. it’s about making sure that everyone stays in their culturally-defined role, by force if necessary. A dictator is not completely necessary. We all know how oppressive a community can be to those who “get uppity.” I hear people ask, “How could anyone be in favor of fascism?” Well, those in charge sure love any system that is all about keeping them in charge. But it extends throughout a culture. Favored groups can act in a fascist nature too, when they choose leaders to enforce the status quo or oppress those trying to change the situation. I am always wary of anyone whose politics is based on The Way It Used To Be. This is someone from a favored group trying to push down at those trying to rise up from lower down the pyramid. Fascists have traditionally harnessed this to push their agenda. Sowing fear among the voters of hated minorities who are gaining “at the expense of us good people.”
Isn’t it funny that the higher you go in the pyramid, the more morally acceptable the pyramid becomes.
Another factor, besides authoritarian and militaristic nationalism, usually coupled with strict defined social roles and sometimes a traditionalist religiosity (or an invented set of rituals aping the religious), is the common characteristic of a lot of bullies - playing on their perceived sense of grievance to get their martyrdom in first, so as to plead justification for whatever they do later to their victims.
This seems like a fairly decent definition. And I would say a person who wants all those things is a “fascist”
“fascists” are anyone who have political beliefs different from mine.
/s
Actually, it is a real concept with a definition in the dictionary and everything.
Right, but his definition is how I see the word used most often, lately.
Is it possible that others are noticing an alarming trend in the rise of fascism in the United States and that some of our citizens are oblivious or complicit?
covering head with arms
Please forgive me. Every single definition/explanation just screams “Trump” to me.
You gotta understand. In my very first presidential election, at the ripe old age of 19, I voted for McGovern.
~VOW
What’s the problem? Trump’s a fascist.
What? No kissy smilie?
kisses
~VOW
I think these posters nailed it:
In the dead Antifa terrorist thread, I wrote this:
I think that accurately reflects how the word is most often used today in modern American political discourse.
If you want a dictionary definition, this one is as good as any:
Benito Mussolini, to offer one prominent historical example.
I identify as someone who hates identity politics. If I must label myself, I consider myself to be a conservative and a capitalist, and don’t really have any sympathy for early 20th-century Italian dictators that got lined up against a wall and shot.
This sounds like you’re describing communist North Korea
Are you for or against that type of radical right-wing, authoritarian ultranationalism?