The word "fascist" is tossed around here pretty regularly. I've been called one a time or two, as have others I generally agree with. Since there's not much agreement on what the words "liberal" and "conservative" mean, the word fascist seems like a vague, general term that doesn't have much meaning to many here. I think it's been cultivated as a put down word for traditional conservatives. Here's the Webster's definition of the word;

FASCISM; A political philosophy, movement, or regime that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition.

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/m...i-fascism.html

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/au...mussolini.html

From his quotes, Mussolini seemed to think fascism was the opposite of socialism. It's also clear that fascism is not about peace, yet Mussolini said that men are "tired of liberty". When Jefferson said "......the tree of liberty must be nourished from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants..." he seems to advocate both liberty and war. Does that make him a fascist?

http://www.secularhumanism.org/libra...britt_23_2.htm

This seems to be a modern day liberal trying to redefine fascism so that it can be applied to many of today's conservatives. In part;


If that's fascism, what is it if it's rewritten with only a few word changes?

The supremacy of environmentalism / safety. Ruling elites identified closely with the EPA and NHTSA. and the trial lawyers that support it. A disproportionate share of natural resources allocated to it, even though domestic needs (tax relief) is acute. Safety and cleanliness are seen as an ever increasing problem, and are used whenever possible to redistribute wealth, punish capitalism, and increase power and prestige of the ruling elite.

If Britt's paragraph is fascism, isn't much of what is advocated by today's liberals / Democrats also fascism? Are not most of the domestic, big government programs advocated by today's Democrats not "autocratic"??

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When church and state are separated, atheism and state are combined.

An accusation of fascism in a discussion forum like this is hardly ever meant to be understood in its full technical totalitarian sense. Almost always, it's just an ideological smear word that short cuts the requirement to provide a reasoned refutation of whatever argument the "fascist" is advancing.

Sound like anybody you know?

I disagree. I have called some people here fascists, and I damn well meant it. Generally I call them "neo-fascists" when they do not exactly fit the mold fo a regular fascist as Mussolini defined it (the only truly fascist goverment ever was that of mussolini).

Fascism is gaining a serious foothold here in the US. I think to a large degree it is the result of people feealing subtly threatened by the new order of things.

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If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen. —Samuel Adams

...and just think what happened to Mussolini!


What are the symptoms of this?

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What you say can and will be used against you.

I believe I know who you might have in mind. However, I read most of the stuff in the Politics forum, and I'm not persuaded (with the possible exception of Siegfriedson) that anyone who posts there regularly would support the full authoritarian apparatus of a fascist society - complete with a "charismatic" dictator and corporate state in America.

My grouse concerning the use of the word "fascist" is that it's often used to denounce rather than to criticise a conservative point of view.

Mussolini argued that you did not need a single charismatic dictator. An oligarchy was more than sufficient to operate a fascist nation. This was essentially his plan for italy following his death. He planned to apoint a small oligarchy to rule the country. The important thing was not, to his way of thinking, that a single dictator ruled the nation, but that the rulers of the nations all shared a common (fascist) outlook.

You really don't think that there are those here would support an authoritarian regime? Look how willing they are to condemn accused terrorists or muslims in general enemies of the state? What is really the difference between the patriot act, which allows "terrorist suspects" (including US citizens) to be secretly arrested and held without access to the courts or an attorney, and the "state protection" law in italy that allowed the governetn to round up "enemies of the state" and wisk them off into the night wihtout trial or counsel? All it takes to get somebody classified as a "terrorist suspect" is a memo from the justice department, which is classified the minute it is written, so nobody ever knows about it. I am not seeing the difference betweent eh two, and frankly once the citizen looses the right to access the courts, it is all over.

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If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen. —Samuel Adams

I essentially view as Fascist any "socialism of the right", any suggestion that an omnipotent state should be used, rather than for egalitarian purposes, to facilitate the maintenance of the existing social order, or a nationalist program. Thus cries of "True American", and demands drug users, muslims, those who speak out be suppressed I view as essentially fascist. Demands that individuals subordinate themself to the President, and cries for National Greatness programs are essentially fascist.

This isn't a way of denouncing a "conservative" point of view in general, it is a way of pointing out defitinitively those who seek to maintain a conservative social order by totalitarian means, and what that really means.

It is no different from calling someone who wants an egalitarian social order and wants to persecute, kill, or maim, the businessmen and intellectuals to get it, demanding everyone subordinate themselves to the Greater Good of the Collective, a Communist.

As if to confirm the accuracy of the assessment of certain forum members as fascist, we have this gem appearing just now;
"Why It’s Time to Deport Liberals"

You will note the reactionary demands for state power to be used oppressively "they have only become more obnoxious in their efforts to dismantle America.", the fascist ideology is not revolutionary, it seeks to maintain an existing or prior order by violent means.

You will note the extreme hypocrisy emanating from such views, at once decrying the "government controls" of the left, and demanding sexual deviants, the content of art and everything people do or say be controlled by a government of his choice. This is not the "conservative" of the 1940s, this is a fascist viewpoint which seeks to subsitute the "government control" of the "liberals" with a greater government control of its own.

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He or she who supports a State organized in a military way – whether directly or indirectly – participates in sin. Each man takes part in the sin by contributing to the maintenance of the State by paying taxes.

~ Gandhi

Like I said, sound familiar?

America is not an omnipotent state: even Nazi Germany was not all powerful.

If there are demands for political views, social preferences, or works of art to be suppressed in America - nobody takes much notice of them: the media is free to identify and to criticise totalitarian tendencies. Opposition is not silenced.

Fascist ideology is revolutionary: it seeks to impose, by force, an authoritarian regime on a liberal society (the "classic" instance, of course, is the destruction of democracy by Hitler in 1933).

The forum members here are not representative of American society, and the extremism of a few of them does not constitute sufficient cause for alarmist claims about a "fascist" USA.

Amen!

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What you say can and will be used against you.

Right on!!

However, it does irk me when people of this ideology try to wrap themselves in Old Glory under the banner of "conservative." Conservatism is another ball of wax altogether and we don't need facists giving us all a bad name.

Ceratinly the fascist sentiment is not prevelant in the US, but it does seem to be growing. As such, I certainly think that it deserves alarm. While I think there will always be a fascist element in every free society, when you see it growing, it is time to point it out.

The US was once pretty much split into 2 groups (lets face it folks, the numebrs back me on this one), you had the democrats and the republicans.....liberals and conservatives. A certain branch of the conservatives seems to split and become the neo fascists (which is a more correct term than the "neo conservative" lable that they prefer.

Currently, they are running the country. This is, IMO, a BAD thing.

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If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen. —Samuel Adams

Please explain by showing examples of conservatives who propose fascist principles. What certain branch of conservatives?

The only place I see anything close to fascism in the US is with the skinhead movement where racism prevails.

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What you say can and will be used against you.

This is the way I see it, daewoo: Conservatism is not a doctrinaire philosophy of government, it's a personal disposition, or an attitude towards change and innovation. To be conservative is to prefer the known to the unknown, the tried to the untried, the limited to the unbounded, and our present (imperfect) society to utopian bliss.

A "skeptical conservative" (as I should describe myself) looks upon the nostrums of rational liberalism as "temporary expedients" that must prove themselves by pragmatic empiricism. Generally speaking, someone with a liberal cast of mind finds it difficult to believe anyone who can think honestly and clearly will think differently from himself.

I think it's a big jump from the conservatism that I've just briefly outlined to the "fascist" tendencies that are denounced when an expression of conservative opinion touches a liberal nerve.

The "neo-cons", whom you have identified as neo fascists, are a very loose clique of American intellectuals and politicians who differ over many issues and seem to disagree as to whether they share an ideology or merely a temperament. They defend capitalism as an imperfect but manageable system which at least tolerates democratic forms: they claim to value the defense of liberty over the pursuit of equality. In what precise sense are they to be feared ?