this post was submitted on 24 Aug 2024
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Memes

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[–] [email protected] 69 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)
[–] [email protected] 107 points 3 weeks ago

Italy's taking the picture

[–] [email protected] 80 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

Milei, Meloni, and Orban already ran by the cameraman.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 weeks ago

right? I was like... these guys are only aspiring to fascism, where's Orban?

[–] [email protected] 41 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

they already are fascist, so no reason for them to run towards it, also they're included in the EU

[–] [email protected] 13 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

also they're included in the EU

So's Germany, France, and ~~Latvia~~ Austria. AKA everyone pictured except the US.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

tbh I was just too lazy to insert every european flag, so I just put the EU one there and the countries I know some politicsl shit about

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 weeks ago

That's fair 😁

[–] [email protected] 12 points 3 weeks ago

Italy should actually be in the front

[–] [email protected] 42 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

democratic is a bit of a stretch though

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[–] [email protected] 35 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (21 children)

I think calling everyone a fascist would just water down the impact of the fascist world just like the far right- or far left-wing words which nowadays are just used on more left/right parties but are kinda not close on their agenda like the 20th century parties were where these definitons came from.

But educate me if some of these countries have parties which really apply most general aspects of the fascism movement

[–] [email protected] 77 points 3 weeks ago (6 children)

the guy running for chancellor in Austria (Herbert Kickl) is calling himself "Volkskanzler", guess who also called himself that? fucking Hitler. so no, I don't think I'm over reacting

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

For people like me, that's "People's Chancellor".

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[–] [email protected] 52 points 3 weeks ago (8 children)

Wanting to ban mosques, the quran and muslim clothing like niqabs sounds pretty fascist to me (that’s what the biggest political party in The Netherlands wants). Thinking the European far right (that is rapidly gaining grounds) isn’t fascist or fascist leaning is a wild take.

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

A few of the AFD highlights

Member of the Bundestag suggested to shoot every migrant at the border.

Another one claimed not every SS member was a bad person. Which lost them the support of French and Italian fascist.

Leader of the party in Thüringen, a history teacher, used a slogan of the SA.

There is many more...

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 weeks ago

Yeah. Scary stuff. I live in central Berlin, and it's pretty relaxed here. Did the Mauerlauf last weekend and immediately when you cross the Brandenburg border to some of these villages, they're full of AfD advertisement. Berlin is definitely the Portland of Germany :D

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Germany definitely counts. The AfD is above 20%, in some states they might even govern alone. They probably will be part of the next government after the next election and they definitely are fascist.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

It's mind boggling how a suspiciously nazi friendly party can get so many votes. Doesn't Germany have some serious anti-nazi laws written into it's constitution, or is that treated like a joke too like in Hungary?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 weeks ago

Nazi symbolism is forbidden and some slogans. One of the leaders of AfD was recently fined for using one such slogan. The secret service tasked with protecting the constitution (Verfassungsschutz) is watching the AfD and a mechanism to outlaw the party is currently worked on. We need to wait for the repost of this secret service to really start the mechanism. Once started it is estimated to need at least 4 years to get a result. So even if successfull the AfD will be in the government in a lot of states till then and possibly be in the federal government.

Germany is slow when it comes to prosecuting the far right. Usually when there are big protests against the far right the police distracts from them by arresting former member of the far left terror organization RAF which has been inactice for decades.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Many are populist parties, with the feeling that fascism is just waiting behind a hidden corner.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 weeks ago

Not even slightly hidden

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (5 children)

An example, a Dutch minister for the biggest party (PVV, in my opinion (very close to being) a fascist party) was an active member on an internet forum called Stormfront which is known to be a forum for neo-nazis

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

We are allowed by court to call members of the FPÖ Kellernazis (people who are secretly Nazis when drinking with their buddies under the cellar) the FPÖ will most likely be the strongest party after the next Nationalrats election on September 29th. They will have something between 30 to 35% which is pretty strong. They have actual plans in their program to overthrow governments via referendum of the public and other things. So yes, it fits.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

if calling it what it is waters it down so be it

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (2 children)

There is no careful use of language that can stop people from preferring hatred. Humans are machines for making the world worse, and they will continue to do so, and while they do it they will rationalise doing it, and while people get hurt (including themselves) they will blame the victims.

"It's not fascism!" they complain as minorities are scapegoated and children die. Just get used to the fact that anything that is pointed entirely towards harming people for fun and profit is going to attract a range of derogatory words, and maybe think about how to stop humans from hurting humans instead.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Humans are machines for making the world worse

This sounds like fatalistic capitalist/imperialist realism.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 weeks ago

This started with “the war on terror.” And then any time there was anything someone didn’t like, it was “terrorism.”

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I need to make a bot to post this any time fascism gets mentioned.


The western left’s use of the term fascism, is borderline white-supremacist at this point. Fascism was a form of colonialism that died by the 1940s, and is only allowed to be demonized in public discourse, because it was a form of colonialism directed also against white europeans. It was defeated, and Germany / Italy / Japan reverted to the more stable form of government for colonialism (practiced by the US, UK, France, the Netherlands, Australia, etc): bourgeois parliamentarism.

British, european, and now US colonizers were doing the exact same thing, and killing far more people for hundreds of years in the global south, yet you don’t hear ppl scared of their countries potentially "adopting parliamentary democracy”. They haven't changed, and their wealth is still propped up by surplus value theft from the super-exploitation of hundreds of millions of low-paid global south proletarians.

This is why you have new leftists terrified that the UK or US or europe “might turn fascist!!”, betraying that the atrocities propagated by those empires against the global south was and is completely acceptable.

Make no mistake about it: parliamentary / bourgeois democracy is not only a more stable form of government, it's also far more effective at carrying out colonialism, and killing millions of innocent people.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 3 weeks ago (5 children)

Fascism is a pretty specific ideology. If you want to learn more, Umberto Eco made a list.

I get where you're getting at: the role of past and ongoing colonialism is still being downplayed. But you're wrong. There are very good reasons why we should fear fascism in particular.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

The USA genocided an entire continent under it's current form of government, and committed and is still committing countless other atrocities. Look at what Europe did to Africa and Asia under that same form.

Bourgeois parliamentarism is a much more stable shell for colonialism than any other form of government has proven to be. Demonizing a dead form of colonialism (fascism) lets them off the hook, and never forces them to look at what their own governments are currently doing. They get to keep their chauvinist / supremacist myth about "liberal democracy" being the superior form of government, without challenging it.

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

I'd also like to add that hitler was very specific about his desire to emulate the US model of colonialism: and do to eastern europe, what the US had already done to its native peoples.

The only difference between lebensraum and manifest destiny, is that bourgeois democracy was far more effective at indigenous genocide than fascism was.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2017/03/nazi-germanys-american-dream-hitler-modeled-his-concept-of-racial-struggle-and-global-campaign-after-americas-conquest-of-native-americans.html

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Umberto Eco completely ignores the material basis for fascism, which is usually the downwardly mobile petit bourgeoisie. Fascism takes advantage of superstructural elements, which is why Eco’s list contains the elements it does in a kind of grab bag fashion. But it still has a material basis, itself being a response to a crisis within capitalism. Would highly recommend The Jakarta Method for further reading on what people are discussing in your replies and in this thread.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Umberto Eco completely ignores the material basis for fascism, which is usually the downwardly mobile petit bourgeoisie.

The Nation, 2017: Trumpism: It’s Coming From the Suburbs

But scapegoating poor whites keeps the conversation away from fascism’s real base: the petite bourgeoisie. This is a piece of jargon used mostly by Marxists to denote small-property owners, whose nearest equivalents these days may be the “upper middle class” or “small-business owners.” FiveThirtyEight reported last May that “the median household income of a Trump voter so far in the primaries is about $72,000,” or roughly 130 percent of the national median. Trump’s real base, the actual backbone of fascism, isn’t poor and working-class voters, but middle-class and affluent whites. Often self-employed, possessed of a retirement account and a home as a nest egg, this is the stratum taken in by Horatio Alger stories. They can envision playing the market well enough to become the next Trump. They haven’t won “big-league,” but they’ve won enough to be invested in the hierarchy they aspire to climb. If only America were made great again, they could become the haute 
bourgeoisie—the storied “1 percent.”


[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Yes, that’s what I’m talking about. Funny how Trump is a fascist no matter what definition you use.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 weeks ago

Trump isn't a fascist. In action he is actually a pretty standard reactionary liberal. You will notice that Biden has continued the salient policies that made liberals call him a fascist, such as extreme and horrible border policies (Dems actually outflanked the GOP on this from the right), anti-China policy, and extending militarism (like maximum pressure on Russia via Ukraine).

He's mostly just openly racist whereas the political class usually wraps itself in polite jargon bullshit before it fucks with a bunch of brown people.

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Eco is not a definitive authority and his little checklist is extremely ahistorical.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 weeks ago

A much better read on how fascism inevitably arises out of liberal capitalism https://orgrad.wordpress.com/articles/liberalism-the-two-faced-tyranny-of-wealth/

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 23 points 3 weeks ago

Hardship most likely

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 weeks ago

Yeah but ours is "good fascism" 😆

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