Fascism is the New Black

[Terxpahseyton]

Sure it does, people who are rather sickened by the process and wrangling with huge bureaucratic machines and making policy concessions to purse holders won't find much appeal in making slow and steady reforms via a watered down party of their choice, but rather in a completely radical movement, engaged in the process of completely sweeping everything away and starting anew because this time...it's different. They have a plan and a vision. What could be better than that!?

Yes I think you are right that this explains the search for a more authoritarian approach. Yet, it still fails to account for the antagonism against others other than the "huge bureaucratic machines" you mention, most favorably minorities. Something I have most of all accounted for in my own theory and you seem to want to dismiss out of hand so to replace it with this standard slogan of wisdom of yours.

 

[Birdjaguar]

During most of the 20th century, there was the idea that any country could pick his own political system and live in his little autarcy with his ideological friends. This has only caused misery and quickly convinced most people that it was wiser to open up to the rest of the world. The most striking example is probably Deng's reforms during the 1980's in China.

Since then, the world never ceased to open itself even more. The booming in financial activities as well as the new technologies have accelerated even more the move. And the outcome is a world which is amazingly interdependent, where basically the decisions of any country affects all other countries. This means that we cannot really go radical in a specific country because the counter-effect towards the surrounding environment would be disastrous. The best example for that is probably Greece.

This, somehow, limits the freedom of a government within its own country. We don't have any real alternatives to pick really, especially regarding economics. I think the fact our fate is more dependent on the international context than on the actions of our politicians is considered by some people as a loss of control which they find a bit scary.

The general feeling is often that governments are too soft, too lenient, letting things happening to them rather than taking the fate of the country in their hand. And if right-wing politicians are getting popular, it's because they give the feeling they are tough, that others won't play with them the way it's done to the current leaders. They are strong and they will show them who we are.

I personally think that's just play acting and that it's not in being "more tough" in your attitude that Nigel Farage or Marine Le Pen could bring anything good to the UK or France, but I think those supporting them actually believe it.

I think you are correct. Interdependence is growing faster than our political systems can adapt.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

It did that before. The share of international trade of total economic output reached hights before WWI it only reached again in the 70s, I think, definately not before. I actually remember the 80s, but I am not certain.
In any case, that means two things: Our economies worked best when international trade was curtailed (something no one cares about because the theory of comparative advantages makes everything alright, apparently.. or some such BS) and the last time economies outpaced politics within the context of modern societies and economies, it lead to mass depression and two world wars.

I am not embracing the hysterical and absolute hints I just dropped, honestly. I am just too smart for that kind of crap. But I do think that this hints towards relevancy for further thought. However, that would question the entirety of economic and political orthodoxy. So nothing happens. Because our (scientific) elites are still dumb like that.

 

[cardgame]

So what have we done about raising the minimum wage, taking corporate money out of electoral campaigns, ending gerrymandering, ending "voter ID laws," giving unions more power against management, or stopping the wholesale massacre of unarmed civilians by random madmen? Or anything else that actually moves the foundation of our democracy to a better place?

Do you mean the police?

 

[Cutlass]

I'm not a prolific poster nor have I been here long, but I do happen to view the Republican party as a bunch of dirty neoliberals.

Young people today are reacting against the faithlessness and anomie of the preceding decadent generations who have bankrupted the young to pay for the largess of the old. They want structure and order which the demagogues exploit. People need something to unite them whether it be religion, ideology, a monarch, national values and if they do not then society decays and polarizes.

"Neo-liberal" is a misnomer. They are actually anti-liberals.

 

[Vectors]

"Neo-liberal" is a misnomer. They are actually anti-liberals.

Define "liberal"

 

[brennan]

Simple: the cold war ended and simpletons around the world cannot contain within their tiny minds any narrative for this more complex than 'socialism failed'. They then look at problems within society and conclude that anything a bit 'leftie' is probably to blame. They also retreat to intellectually lazy knee-jerk reactions that exemplify the conservative, reactionary right. Like blaming everything on immigrants.

 

[Vectors]

Simple: the cold war ended and simpletons around the world cannot contain within their tiny minds any narrative for this more complex than 'socialism failed'. They then look at problems within society and conclude that anything a bit 'leftie' is probably to blame. They also retreat to intellectually lazy knee-jerk reactions that exemplify the conservative, reactionary right. Like blaming everything on immigrants.

conservative and reactionary are different, the former prefers the status quo whereas the latter desires status quo ante

 

[brennan]

In the UK we have a party that combines the two instincts marvellously come to think of it so does the States.

 

[Sonereal]

My experience with CivFanatics has been the website maintains a contingent of prolific posters who describe themselves as "reactionaries," and I address this thread primarily to them. What - in your opinion - accounts for the resurgence of "hard" right wing ideologies throughout the developed world? How can people, especially the young in regions that consume American mass media, embrace reactionary principles that have become actively taboo in many circles? Is this the culture war? Who is winning the culture war?

I answered a similar question on another website about what attracts some Western middle class males to fly to the Middle East to join ISIS, and I believe the answer is just general dissatisfaction with the current status quo. Fascism is an appealing ideology because it enters the public debate by blaming both sides of the aisle for whatever plagues the country.

It isn't hard for people to consume the mass media of a country or group of people and still despise that country's ideas or that group of people. It isn't all that rare to meet a white racist who will listen to rap/hiphop or watch basketball.

However, the thread title talks about fascism, while the post talks about reactionaries, which I believe are two very different ideologies. A reactionary wants to turn back the clock to a society's "golden days", while fascism is more revolutionary in that it wants to fundamentally change the relationship between a people, the state, and their shared history and culture. A fascist will happily co-opt popular progressive and socialist ideas to further political and social ends.

So, why do the young embrace reactionary principles that have become taboo in many circles? It is because those principles are not taboo in every circle. In the 1980s, if you held very fringe beliefs, it was harder to share ideas and communication with other people who share your beliefs. With the internet, if I live in a nearly all black neighborhood in a predominately black city in a predominately black state, I can still share my anti-black views with others easily over the internet.

American mass media runs the gambit from strongly supporting free markets, democracy, and the American way to presenting America in a bad light culturally and morally. It was Americans, for example, who influenced anti-homosexuality laws in one African country, and the American responsible for that last I checked was charged with crimes against humanity or something in Massachusetts because of it.

To posters with more mainstream views, I posit that Western democracy's greatest threat is the resurgence of authoritarian, right wing beliefs in the Anglo-European middle and working classes. I point to the emergence of the Tea Party in the United States, the rise of the UKIP in Britain, and the overall amazing performance of hard right political parties throughout Europe for evidence of this assertion.

I don't know about UKIP specifically, but while the Tea Party is right-wing, or even reactionary, I wouldn't call them fascist or even authoritarian.

If anything, the Tea Party's ultra strong emphasis on small government and individualism would run straight contrary with a couple of core tenants of fascism.

I'm not a prolific poster nor have I been here long, but I do happen to view the Republican party as a bunch of dirty neoliberals.

Define "liberal"

(in a political context) favoring maximum individual liberty in political and social reform.

Economic liberalism is the ideological belief in organizing the economy on individualist lines, meaning that the greatest possible number of economic decisions are made by individuals and not by collective institutions or organizations.

By the first definition, while there are Republicans who actually do want to maximize individual liberty in political and social contexts, the broader Republican party has a habit of pushing for policies and laws that end up restricting the social or political freedoms of certain classes of people. Really, it is a mixed bag.

By the second definition, the Republicans are more of a mixed bag, with some being supportive of free trade with others being highly supportive of protectionist tariffs to "right unfair trade imbalances", but nobody in the real world would actually call the Republicans universally a "neoliberal party".

 

[Hygro]

"Neo-liberal" is a misnomer. They are actually anti-liberals.

While I don't think they support liberty as much as with other forms of liberalism, I think that's a hard sell. Neoliberals are for classic economic liberalism and modern social liberalism.

And political Hobbesian dystopianism

 

[Kyriakos]

There are by now a number of 'far-right' parties in the EU. And they all rose as a direct result of the austerity and/or subsequent mass disillusionment with what the EU has become.

Such parties are even ruling (as either major or minor partners in party alliances) in some countries, such as Denmark and Finland. Hungary also has a very large far-right party. In Greece it seems that GD is falling still, and had 6,7% in the 2015 election.

Usually such parties rise also due to the sense that the mainstream parties are frauds/crooks or subordinate to foreign countries' interests. Which is why GD fell notably as a result of the Syriza gov here, losing something like 2,5% from the previous (Euro) election (although it should be noted that in Euro elections such parties typically get a larger percentage than in national ones, eg look at Ukip).

The trend won't likely change unless austerity ends and the EU returns to something at least less corrupt and misanthropic than it currently is.

 

[Wastl]

There are by now a number of 'far-right' parties in the EU. And they all rose as a direct result of the austerity and/or subsequent mass disillusionment with what the EU has become.

No, there hasn't been a single right-wing party that rose in any significant amount due to "austerity" apart from perhaps Golden Dawn in Greece, and that one had other issues as well. This is just another attempt by you to shoehorn something into the balance that simply doesn't belong there.

If anything, the opposite is true. Being way to lenient and having to spend way too much money on other European countries is what caused some right-wing parties to rise.

Disillusion with the EU is a valid point, though even that one can be split into different parts, as the reason why people are disillusioned with the EU can be very different in all the countries. Some are unhappy about the general way things are dealt with, some are unhappy about financing others even though the rules say they shouldn't have to, and some are just unhappy about the number of foreigners coming in or the way the other parties in the country deal with this issue.

 

[Kyriakos]

^Ehm, so austerity is not a factor cause it has caused GD, a party that before 2009 had around 0,1%, to get in parliament, because reasons, ok. I suppose austerity played no role in the (further) rise of Front National or even Ukip. Or 'True Fins', that farcical far-right pariah party currently in finnish government, which seems to have made a career out of 'please don't place us under austerity we are good german vassals ;_;' ).

Not seeing where you base your view. Just look at how (non) prominent far-right parties were in the EU before 2008-2010 and the austerity charade.

 

[Formaldehyde]

American mass media runs the gambit from strongly supporting free markets, democracy, and the American way to presenting America in a bad light culturally and morally. It was Americans, for example, who influenced anti-homosexuality laws in one African country, and the American responsible for that last I checked was charged with crimes against humanity or something in Massachusetts because of it.

Yes, it is true they can't completely control the media yet, which they label as a liberal plot to destroy America. But that doesn't mean they don't wish to do so.

Regarding the "crimes against humanity" for fomenting hatred of homosexuals in Africa, that is certainly news to me. Source?

I don't know about UKIP specifically, but while the Tea Party is right-wing, or even reactionary, I wouldn't call them fascist or even authoritarian.

If anything, the Tea Party's ultra strong emphasis on small government and individualism would run straight contrary with a couple of core tenants of fascism.

Both are extremely authoritarian. The Tea Party notion of small government is largely a myth. What they really mean is that they don't want to have to pay for social programs like welfare, rational healthcare for everybody, and even public TV and libraries. That they don't want the federal government telling them they can't practice their Christian version of Sharia law at least at the state level.

But they demand a strong military to continue to fight their arch-foes, the socialists, in their eternal Cold War struggle which has now been expanded to include other forces of evil, such as liberals, atheists, agnostics, Muslims, recreational drug users, and Latinos who want to immigrate.

So yes, it is different than the old fascism to a considerable extent. Yet it embodies many of the same elements. But instead of the government controlling corporations, they control government instead.

By the first definition, while there are Republicans who actually do want to maximize individual liberty in political and social contexts, the broader Republican party has a habit of pushing for policies and laws that end up restricting the social or political freedoms of certain classes of people. Really, it is a mixed bag..

They only want to maximize their own liberty by allowing them to continue to discriminate against those they hate while highly restricting the liberty of everybody else. This is an entirely false form of "individualism" which even redefines "freedom" to mean the right to persecute others who merely have slightly different morals or personal opinions.

 

[Atticus]

I dunno, merely hating immigrants doesn't count as "fascism". Sure, they're asses, but they still haven't slaughtered any minority in the middle of the night with bats and knives.

I'm not sure how the Tea Party is "Fascist."

They're not fascist, but it looks like they could be swayed to that. I'd imagine fascism per se can't be very popular, but large groups of people can be persuaded to accept it, perhaps with misinformation.

Or 'True Fins', that farcical far-right pariah party currently in finnish government, which seems to have made a career out of 'please don't place us under austerity we are good german vassals ;_;' ).

Except, austerity is the policy which "True Finns" are actively putting forward. Since they became part of the government coalition, almost every aspect of government spending has been cut. I believe that's what their voters want too, and it's the only of their policies that I don't think is pulled straight from the ass.

They are also more or less anti-EU party, to call them German vassals makes no sense either.

Not that I want to defend them, but I'd rather welcome critique that is factually correct.

 

[Kozmos]

Yes I think you are right that this explains the search for a more authoritarian approach. Yet, it still fails to account for the antagonism against others other than the "huge bureaucratic machines" you mention, most favorably minorities. Something I have most of all accounted for in my own theory and you seem to want to dismiss out of hand so to replace it with this standard slogan of wisdom of yours.

Antagonism against others I account on cognitive bias that the brain naturally uses to set up the us vs them divide. The brain does this in every aspect of life. You have to work to overcome this and be educated in this respect. Suffice to say, that amount of training is not universal, let alone widespread.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Surely they could have still fit the throwing of roles of tape on it.
Or was that a late warning sign? I never quit penetrated the argument.

 

[Berzerker]

Gov Jerry Brown (D-Cal) argued in favor of the war on pot based on people getting high and lowering production... That sounds like a fascist to me, sacrifice our liberty for somebody else's almighty dollar? So whats his argument against slavery?

 

[jackelgull]

Gov Jerry Brown (D-Cal) argued in favor of the war on pot based on people getting high and lowering production... That sounds like a fascist to me, sacrifice our liberty for somebody else's almighty dollar? So whats his argument against slavery?

It's uneconomical?