this post was submitted on 18 Jul 2023
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Governments are inherently fascistic entities. Ruling by so-called democratic majority excludes too many, even when you pretend that the way propaganda works doesn't completely extinguish the concept of democracy. We are all living in a conservative socioeconomic reality that for the most part has many many, many many fascistic elements.
No. States are inherantly authoritarian entities, but authoritarianism is not simply a synonym for fascism. Authoritarianism is essential to fascism and fascism is always authoritarian, but not all forms of authoritarianism are fascist.
Real problem is no one has agree one what fascism actually means anymore. Its definitely not 1930s Italy anymore.
It's understandable that there are arguments about what movement isn't/wasn't fascism because fascist movements are pretty much always deceptive and often claim not to be fascist. Fascist movements, due to their extreme nationalism, also generally want to distance themselves from other fascist movements in other countries.
And I think it's ok if people want to be a bit creative when using the term fascist, but we shouldn't forget it's original meaning completely. For me, the limit is certainly reached when one says "Goverment is always fascist", then the word completely loses it's meaning and simply becomes another term for authoritarian.
Plenty of people agree on what fascism means. Then there are people who use fascism to mean every movement they don’t like. But most dangerous are those looking to muddy the waters. Their goal is to convince people like you that no one knows what fascism means anymore.
If you strip them down to their base mechanics and throw in bigotry and elitism, then yeah, but that's not what governments are. It's like calling all people spooky pale skeletons. When you remove someone's bones and dry them out they are, but inside a living person they are pink and only a part of the whole. Fascism refers to a particular state that a government can be in, but does not apply to all governments.
Fascism is at its core about maintaining societal heirarchy. Bigotry and elitism naturally follow from the belief in heirarchies.
It's no surprise that Mussolini advocated for "class collaboration" (and also coined the term himself), in direct opposition to the fundamentally leftist concept of class struggle.
So in reality they inherently have many fascistic elements that are unavoidable is what you're actually saying. On paper everything looks like roses.
The bigger issue is that the term fascism becomes less useful when applied to all governments, especially because fascism exists outside of government in religious institutions and in culture more broadly. Hell, if you think about it, anyone using violence to achieve a goal are using similar methods to fascists and therefore are fascists. Kind of breaks down when you focus on the mechanism rather than the intent. Government is just a mechanism of authority that can be used to enforce or reject fascism as history has shown.
I disagree, it is very useful to show how the tentacles of it are actually everywhere. It is the mechanism of it that is the bigger problem. The mindset of action disconnected from philosophy is the true battleground, before intent is even part of the conversation. I believe the whitewashing of fascism is a much bigger problem than the efficacy of the term; people understand they don't want fascism in their lives, so if you point out and are able to show how insidious and ever pervasive it is in their own lives, and how they probably have been educated to overlook it; it is very useful. A bunch of scoffing conservatives and their apologists should not dictate the language used.
I guess it really comes down to how one feels about Anarchy. Anarchists may be spot on in general, but I don't have faith in us jumping to a stable stateless society anytime soon. If anything, I believe we need global organizations to solve global challenges. I want people to understand the nature of the state, but I also believe that government is less trouble than it's worth. How else are we going to provide resources for projects that benefit the common good. Are we going to have to build and disband organizations every time we need to build a new project? That would take so much time without a common agreed upon framework that everyone agreed to.
What's really necessary is a united coalition built more democratically and with more teeth than the current UN but with checks on elitism. The issue is that building such a powerful tool is dangerous and could backfire, but I honestly don't see a better way to tackle climate change, global capitalism, pandemics, space travel, and anything else that is large in scope.
I think a global state is far more likely than a stateless society, so I would want to make it as good as possible. After all, what really matters is that we work with what we have and try to build something better.
If we're suggesting possible future organisations, I'm with you about a global authority, but I want it to be run and maintained by some sort of artificial intelligence. There are currently no humans that I can think of that cannot fall victim to their own desires and become corrupt when faced with power. Just take that worry completely out of the equation. I would like to think at the point that we have that level of AI, that that technology will have already found solutions to a lot of our current global problems.
Until then your proposal is sound!
Authoritarianism is not always fascism, even if I did accept your premise. Fascism isn’t just “governments I don’t like.” Perhaps read some political philosophy before coming in with metaphorical guns blazing?
Here’s a link to Ur-Fascism, to start. https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/umberto-eco-ur-fascism
You're splitting hairs and missing the point, your reading comprehension seems to be wanting and you are condescending as fuck.
I’m only condescending to people who deserve it. And language shapes cognition; it’s not my fault you don’t understand that.
Ah, an inferiority complex That explains it.