"Communism and Fascism are basically the same!"

[Ephydriad]

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

In my AP US History class we were talking about various political things, and my teacher gave us a copy of the political spectrum, which was something like anarchy - communism - socialism - liberal - centrist - conservative - capitalist - fascist I believe.

So some girl in my class asked what the difference between Communism and Fascism is. I rarely speak up in class, but I was visibly irritated at this question. Someone asserted that THEY ARE VERY SIMILAR, and THE TEACHER, my beloved TEACHER said that the spectrum is actually a circle, so anarchy/communism is RIGHT NEXT TO FASCISM.

I wasn't confident enough in my knowledge of either philosophy to speak up for once, but here are the things I would have liked to respond to that people said in my class:



Communism and Fascism are close on the spectrum
Communism can never work because of human nature
Socialism is unfair Robin Hoodism because the fat cats earned their billions

This was the same class that I had to explain nihilism to. I worry.

So, comrades, can you help me improve my arsenal of rebuttals the next time my US class decides to view the world through Fox News's lens?

[Chapter 24]

Well unfortunately for your teacher, political spectrums are certainly never completely accurate, as they never realy go over the full-length of one's poitical views. Each politcal ideology that is described has their own political, societal, and economic views, so simplifying all of these views into some kind of two-dimensional geographical figure such as a circle or a square is just that, a simplification.
I don't know about your public school history classes, but mine always tries to simplify everything into two political arenas: democracy vs. totalitarianism (under which, of course, fascism and communism are labeled into, thus they can't be all that different). However, history has never proven to be this simple and the only way to convince others that it's not is to point out the textbooks for what they are, utter bullshit.

[mykittyhasaboner]

You should have spoke up, even if your argument would have been very basic. I know when I used to debate in history class, people rarely had much more than a basic argument themselves, so you should try and call people out on this crap.


Communism and Fascism are close on the spectrum
I've never seen a circular political spectrum, but the claim that they are similar is just mad. Communism or Anarchism embrace internationalism ad class conflict; while fascism is known for extreme nationalism and 'class collaboration.' They are total opposites, just like liberal capitalism and socialism.


Communism can never work because of human nature
By far the stupidest but yet oldest and most well known "argument" (or reall non-argument) against socialism. The argument implies that "human nature" is some how always the same and is never changing. This of course is utter nonsense because the nature of human's behavior, organization, consciousness, etc changes WITH the progress of society.


Socialism is unfair Robin Hoodism because the fat cats earned their billions
By doing what? Inhereting money from their bourgeois parents? The corporate fat cats make all their money by exploiting the labor of the workers whom they employ. The bourgeois wouldn't last a week if they had to work for themselves.

[Cumannach]

'In Fascism, a tiny minority own most of the country's wealth. In Communism the vast majority own most of the country's wealth. Complete opposites.'

'Capitalists didn't earn their money, they own shares which pay out dividends. This is where they get their money.'

'The people loved Robin Hood. Long live democracy.'

[Coggeh]

http://www.revleft.com/vb/high-school-commie-t22370/index.html

High school commie guide to the rescue ! :)

Check it out.

[Kassad]

It's really incredible how people come to such irrational conclusions. I'm actually taking the same course currently and I definitely see where you're coming from. It's incredibly tiresome to have to rationalize with people who take such an ignorant stance on world affairs and economics.

Communism, under the laughable assertion that states such as the People's Republic of China and the Soviet Union were communist, is the total destruction of hierarchy. A hierarchy is not constructed in society through someone's social status or title. In the end, in a capitalist state, he who controls the wealth controls all. A quick observation and refutation of all things capitalist comes from observing one of the most extreme forms of capitalism there is: anarcho-capitalism.

Anarcho-capitalism advocates, though nothing more than lip service, the destruction of the state. Regardless, instead of the primitive state being replaced by a workers democracy and a union of the proletariat, it is replaced by a union of people striving for profits. As laughable as this surrealist ideology is, let's take some time to observe their perspective. Through my consistent studies of economists like Ayn Rand, Murray Rothbard and the assortment of those in the American Libertarian/laissez-faire movement, it's obvious that those people just plain do not care about their fellow humans.

Now, this is the first roadblock in their fallacious argument. How can one fathom the destruction of the state and assume that people will be able to survive under a capitalist system? It is obvious that these people don't care about the common worker, so why would they care once the state is gone? That gives them the opportunity for consistent centralization and concentration of wealth. That brings us to the next farce of this system.

If someone has more money that another person and is granted privilege because of it, which capitalism does, there is a hierarchy of wealth. This hierarchy is the basis of capitalist expansion. This gives way to exploitation and monetary manipulation and without any prior regulation, who is to stop that privileged elite from controlling resources and selling them to the highest bidder? That sounds a lot like the current capitalist system, doesn't it? So now we see that through the destruction of capitalism, anarcho-capitalism may rise and through this, capitalism rises once more. Capitalism is a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie and that is fascism in itself.

On the other hand, if the state is destroyed and the means of production are managed by a united working class; a unified proletariat seeking to meet the needs of everyone, why would there ever be a desire for manipulation? Capitalists often say that without the incentive of money, cheap products and commodities would completely take over the market and technological innovation would cease. This is, of course, false, as we know that with workers in power, why would they create mediocre products for themselves? Do you see how ridiculous they begin to sound?

When someone else is in control of your life, your necessities and the market as a whole, they seek profits and cutting quality makes for more profits. Therefore, as they are privileged, why should they care about the modern laborer? They won't, but if that laborer is in control of society, they will create quality products for themselves and society as a whole. Why would the workers sabotage their own nation? It's absurd.

Thus, we see the complete refutation of all things capitalist and the surreal fantasy that 'communism is fascism.' It's a total farce, for at the end of the day, the inception of the wealth hierarchy is nothing short of a dictatorship of the elite. No matter how many times they claim to be minimalizing the state, in the end, they only bring about a more powerful state of the bourgeoisie; a deregulated, unmonitored machine that is a threat to human development as we know it, due to the innate recessions, militarizations and failures of capitalism. The only solution is destroying the manipulation in the system, as once people's needs are met, why revolt? Why cry in opposition? Why be opposed to the system that provides for humanity and ends starvation and oppression? Together, through the destruction of capitalism, we can end hunger and homelessness which capitalism has caused.

Fascism comes from wealth and hierarchy. The destruction of that hierarchy is the core of our revolutionary ideology and the emancipation of humanity.

[rednordman]

There must have been more answers to the girls question of why they are all the same, surely? The 'they are just very similar' answer doesnt cut it at all. You probably should have ask for more detail on it, but at least by leaving it at that the teacher didnt waste anymore of your youth on spinless and comforting false pretenses. I have to ask all off you: Is it just in the USA where kids are getting taught this? Because while both are have had violent histories, to say that they are next to eachother on a polical spectrum is really teaching kids false information imo. Yes i understand how this so called spectrum is supposed to work, but by bending the lines of the spectrum so that communism is (looks) next to fascism, they are just bending the rules of politics and philosophy to suit themselves.

[LOLseph Stalin]

I feel you pain, dude. Several of my teachers have done that circle political thing in the past. Yes, the two ideologies could be similar if you're comparing the totalitarian aspects that we have seen in the USSR and Nazi Germany. Other than that they're very different. Poor teachers, probably haven't even picked up Marx in their life. Even my Civics teacher began by trying to say that in practice Communism is totalitarian while in theory it's not. I quickly shot him down for that, going on about the whole "Dictatorship of the Proletariat" thing. That's definitely one of the most misunderstood phases from Marx.

[LOLseph Stalin]

Communism and Fascism are close on the spectrum
Communism can never work because of human nature
Socialism is unfair Robin Hoodism because the fat cats earned their billions


Your class chose the most ridiculous arguments against Communism. Communism and Fascism are not the same thing. If they were they probably wouldn't be bitter enemies. Also, Communism is NOT against human nature. Hunter gather societies got off fine while living a Communistic lifestyle. And those Bourgeois pigs did not earn their millions. They either inherited it from their bourgeois parents or they got working class slaves to work for them to get them their millions. They don't have to lift a finger when they have people to do it for them.

[Niccolò Rossi]

Your teacher really isn't wrong given his definition of communism. 'Communism' as Stalinist state capitalism shows many parallels to fascist states. The objection you could have made to his claim was that the word 'communism' isn't applicable to the Stalinist state capitalist regimes, despite masquerading under it's guise.

[Coggeh]

Your class chose the most ridiculous arguments against Communism. Communism and Fascism are not the same thing. If they were they probably wouldn't be bitter enemies. Also, Communism is NOT against human nature. Hunter gather societies got off fine while living a Communistic lifestyle. And those Bourgeois pigs did not earn their millions. They either inherited it from their bourgeois parents or they got working class slaves to work for them to get them their millions. They don't have to lift a finger when they have people to do it for them.
This is where i get confused . Whats so communistic really about the hunter gatherer society ? was it the polygamy ? the male superiority ? or the fact that everyone was living in caves ? :blink:

The reason communism doesn't go against human nature is because human nature doesn't exist . We are constantly evolving and adapting to our environmental conditions.People are "greedy" because we live in a system where scarcity drives the economy and the goal of profit .

Eradication of scarcity over time and the profit motive will have immense effects on the way we think and act .

[Cumannach]

This is where i get confused . Whats so communistic really about the hunter gatherer society ? was it the polygamy ? the male superiority ? or the fact that everyone was living in caves ? :blink:


No, because the herds of game, the fish in the rivers, the fruit trees and so on were not the private property of an individual but held in common.

[Coggeh]

No, because the herds of game, the fish in the rivers, the fruit trees and so on were not the private property of an individual but held in common.
Ah .Point taken then . :)

[acc]

Both fascism, and the later strains of communism have their fundamental basis in Marxist economics. Both identify the existence of class conflict, and the existence of labor relations in a Marxist sense. Both reject capitalism as a tool of exploitation. Both seek to replace the system with something else.

For the sake of this post, I will be relying on theory, rather than practice, as no system of either type has ever existed according to the rhetoric they themselves put forward.

While communists embrace class conflict, and seek to overthrow the bourgeoisie to create a dictatorship of the proletariat, fascists instead reject it as unnecessary, and seek to harmonize relations between the classes through the use of syndicates. This harmony effectively, in theory, equalizes the bourgeoisie and the proletariat in a political and economic sense, as ownership of the means of the production is transferred into the hands of the syndicates, of which both the bourgeoisie and the proletariat are members. Some early theorists posited that this would effectively create ownership by the proletariat, as they greatly outnumber the bourgeoisie. Whether this still holds true in the West I will not discuss here.

At the core, however, both ideologies reject capitalism and liberalism - in particular the cult of the individual that leads to both. Both are ultimately collectivist - it is the welfare of the whole community rather than the individual that is welfare. That being said, communists tend to focus on individual welfare on a collective scale, while fascists are willing to sacrifice the welfare of some individuals for the "greater good". In addition, communists view the state as something to be removed, while fascists view it as a tool to accomplish their goals.

This is, in my opinion, the original split - much as leftists continue to split into camps today (Trotskyist, Anarchist, Leninist, etc), the original split occurred between the fascists and the communists, who saw class conflict as a problem, and proposed to differing solutions to them.

So, while at the very heart of the ideology, both fascism and communism are descendents of labor-based economics, their fundamental axioms present differing solutions, and all aspects of the ideology that branch off of that are thus also different.

As such, while your history teacher is wrong to say they are the same, it would be stupid and foolish to ignore the similarities. You cannot combat what you do not understand. Fascism and communism ultimately are more similar than libertarianism and fascism or libertarianism and communism.

[Black Dagger]

Fascism and communism ultimately are more similar than libertarianism and fascism or libertarianism and communism.

I disagree. Libertarianism and communism (esp. individualist anarchism, but anarchism more generally) have more in common than communism and fascism. You've completely ignored the philosophical gulf between the two in favour of an idealised (though you admit this) economic argument. Many libertarians share the social freedom aspects of communism even if they disagree with the communist conception of 'economic fredom' - i.e. freedom from exploitation AKA wage labour. Fascists on the other hand have a completely different conception of liberty - framed within a firmly nation statist ideology (opposed to communist internationalism and anti-statism and the anti-statism of libertarians).

Also, i think the fascism and communism as two kinds of 'extreme' and class conflict' orientated ideologies - as an analysis - is a liberal, not a communist one. Not meant as an insult, it's just i'm pretty sure i've read this argument from a liberal historian previously. It's reductionist, and while yes fascism does address the issue it's role and significance could not be more different. I mean, liberalism itself deals with class conflict in a way? That doesn't make it 'similar' to communism or fascism in any meaningful sense. I think this argument conflates the two as 'extremes'.

[Raúl Duke]

Interestingly, in my AP class I was told to draw out the spectrum, which we never discussed in the normal class, and explain it. I described a bit about anarchism, marxism-leninism, and such. In the one I made, I said that what determines an ideology's position in the spectrum is how they view the concept of equality (although this is/was probably a simplistic view...I needed something of the sort for the purpose of the class). Anarchism places a high value on equality while Fascism and reactionaries (monarchists, religious fundamentalists) put a low value on equality (i.e. they instead value heirarchy, whether to god or to the nation state and such.)

[acc]

You've completely ignored the philosophical gulf between the two in favour of an idealised (though you admit this) economic argument.I was touching solely on economics, as that is generally the way the spectrum is drawn.


liberalism itself deals with class conflict in a way

Yes. It embraces it as necessary for the capitalist structure.

[LOLseph Stalin]

Interestingly, in my AP class I was told to draw out the spectrum, which we never discussed in the normal class, and explain it. I described a bit about anarchism, marxism-leninism, and such. In the one I made, I said that what determines an ideology's position in the spectrum is how they view the concept of equality (although this is/was probably a simplistic view...I needed something of the sort for the purpose of the class). Anarchism places a high value on equality while Fascism and reactionaries (monarchists, religious fundamentalists) put a low value on equality (i.e. they instead value heirarchy, whether to god or to the nation state and such.)

Your teacher must think you're super intelligent or something if he got you to draw and explain the spectrum. :thumbup1: