Memes

I think you’re underselling the legitimate dire fear modern leftists have when they see the brutality of the periphery returning home.

Liberal democracies have historically been as brutal to their domestic populations as any historical fascist formulation. You can look at how the US treated (and still treats) it's internal colonies / minorities. Nazi Germany explicitly wanted to carry out in eastern europe, what the US successfully carried out against native peoples, and failed.

Even outside of internal colonies, if you look at how the US or Britain treated its workers or its poor of their own races(they arguably entirely defeated its domestic working class movement, rebased their countries on finance capital, and exported class struggle to the global south), it doesn't look any different than how the historical fascist countries also defeated their working class movements.

To me, the basis of this is western chauvinism, and belief that "liberal democracy" isn't far worse. By pointing a finger at fascism, they get to keep their belief in the supremacy of their mode of government, that continues to wreak havoc on not just the globe, but internally also. It's a subtle form of western-supremacist scapegoating (pointing a finger at a settler-colonialism that dared to attack western countries also)