Fascism: Right or Left?

[UncleLenin]

I want to know what people think of Fascism.

I should give you some information on Fascism. Mussolini was the father of Fascism. If you went solely by what you read in the 'New York Times' or the 'New York Review of Books',or what you learned from Hollywood, you could be forgiven for thinking that Benito Mussolini came to power around the same time as Adolf Hitler-or even a little bit later-and that Italian Fascism was merely a tardy, watered down version of Nazism. Germany passed it's hateful race policies, the Nuremberg Laws, in 1935, and Mussolini's Italy followed suit in 1938. German Jews were rounded up in 1942, and Jews in Italy were rounded up in 1943. A few writers will casually mention, in parenthetical asides, that until Italy passed it's race laws there were actually Jews serving in the Italian government and the Fascist Party. And on occasion you will notice a nod to historical accuracy indicating that the Jews were rounded up only after the Nazis had invaded northern Italy and created a puppet government in Salo. But such inconvenient facts are usually skipped over as quickly as possible.

Throughout the 1920s and well into the 1930s, Fascism meant something very different from Auschwitz and Nuremberg. Before Hitler, in fact, it never occurred to anyone that Fascism had anything to do with anti-Semitism. Indeed, Mussolini was supported not only by the chief rabbi of Rome but by a substantial portion of the Italian Jewish community(and the world Jewish community). Moreover, the Jews were over-represented in the Italian Fascist movement from it's founding in 1919 until they were kicked out in 1938. Race did help turn the tables of American opinion on Fascism. But it had nothing to do with the Jews. When Mussolini invaded Ethiopia, Americans finally started to turn on him. Many Americans claimed it would be hypocritical to condemn it. But over time, largely due to his subsequent alliance with Hitler, Mussolini's image never recovered.

It is only by examining his life and legacy that we can see how right,and left, he was. Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was named after three revolutionary heroes. The name Benito, a Spanish name, as opposed to to the Italian equivalent, Benedetto, was inspired by Benito Juárez, the Mexican revolutionary turned president who not only toppled the emperor Maximilian but had him executed. The other two names were inspired by now-forgotten heroes of anarchist-socialism, Amilcare Cipriani and Andrea Costa. Mussolini's father, Alessandro, was a blacksmith and ardent Socialist with an anarchist bent who was a member of the First International along with Marx and Engels and served on the local Socialist council.

Alessandro's "Heart and mind were always filled and pulsing with socialistic theories,"Mussolini recalled."His intense sympathies mingled with socialist doctrines and causes. He discussed them in the evening with his friends and his eyes filled with light," On other nights, Mussolini's father would read him passages from 'Das Kapital'. When villagers brought their horses to Allessandro's shop to be shod, part of the price came in the form of listening to the blacksmith spout his socialist theories.

Mussolini was a congenital rabble-rouser. At the age of ten, young Benito led a demonstration against his school for serving bad food. In high school he called himself a socialist, and at the age of eighteen, while working as a substitute teacher, he became the secretary of a socialist organization and began his career as a left-wing journalist. Mussolini undoubtedly inherited his father's hatred of traditional religion, particularly the Catholic Church. When Mussolini was ten, the priests had to drag him to mass, kicking and screaming. Later in life, as a student activist in Switzerland, he made a name for himself by regularly offending devout Christians. He particularly liked to ridicule Jesus, describing him as an "ignorant Jew" and claiming that Jesus was a pygmy compared to Buddha. One of his favorite tricks was to publicly dare God to strike him dead, if he existed. Mussolini's Nietzschean contempt for the "slave morality" of Christianity was sufficiently passionate that he'd sought to purge Christians of all kinds from the ranks of Italian Socialism.

On March 23, 1919, Mussolini and a handful of others founded the Fasci di Combattimento in Milan, aim to form a popular front of pro-war leftists, from socialist veterans groups to Futurist, anarchist, nationalist, and syndicalist intellectuals. Some highlights from their program:

1.Lowering the minimum voting age to eighteen, the minimum age for representatives to twenty-five and universal suffrage, including for women.

2."The abolition of the Senate and the creation of a national technical council on intellectual and manual labour, industry, commerce and culture."

3.End of the draft.

4.Repeal of titles of nobility.

5."A foreign policy aimed at expanding Italy's will and power in opposition to all foreign imperialisms."

6.The prompt enactment of a state law sanctioning a legal work-day of eight 'actual' hours for all workers.

7.A minimum wage.

8.The creation of various government bodies run by workers' representatives.

9.Reform of the old-age and pension system and the establishment of age limits for hazardous work.

10.Forcing landowners to cultivate their lands or have them expropriated and given to veterans and farmers' cooperatives.

11.The obligation of the state to build "rigidly secular" schools for the raising of "the proletariat's moral and cultural condition."

12."A large progressive tax on capital that would amount to a one-time 'partial expropriation of all riches'."

13."The seizure of all goods belonging to religious congregations and the abolition of episcopal revenues."

14.The "review" of all military contracts and the "sequestration of 85% of all war profits."

15.The nationalization of all arms and explosives industries.

Ah,yes. Those anti-elitist, stock-market-abolishing, child-labor-ending, public-health-promoting, wealth-confiscating, draft-ending, secularist right-wingers!

This is only a small part of the information you can find about Fascism.
Here is a link for a book about Fascism:

http://books.google.ie/books/about/Liberal_Fascism.html?id=hbteczFpo4kC&redir_esc=y

This book has quite a few things that you will disagree with, but most of it is fact. The writer is a conservative so expect a bit of bias.

[Flying Purple People Eater]

Fascism is blatantly right-wing and has stayed right-wing from its' advent. It was the 20th century's greatest weapon against leftism - utterly annihilating socialist movements wherever they were found (the first victims of the NDSAP were indeed socialists, anarchists and communists after all). It proposes a return to reactionary power-systems and social values, the restoration of capitalism, ultra-nationalism and destruction of working-class achievements and struggle.

Most fascists were massive opportunists too. The Italian fascists and the Nazis were famous for appropriating leftist rhetoric and transforming them to fit their savage agenda. They also catered to every crowd in order to get majority-support - going to a pro-union town and calling unions 'the beacon of the future', before heading to a more conservative town and calling it a 'judeo-communist ploy'. In reality, they put in place an ultra-conservative capitalist police state that was fueled by military exploits.

Now if you think that has any relation to the ideals of the French Revolution, then you'd be mad. Fascism never was and never can be leftist, neither morally nor economically.

[Comrade Jacob]

One on the things that defines the right-wing is justifying and/or supporting inequality.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-wing_politics
The same with capitalism, fascism is a belief on inequality and because of that I will have to go with right-wing.



EDIT:
I really don't want to take the path of the condescending arse-hole but are you a Marxist? You ask our opinions on loans, you show off your Nazi like flags and then go into depth trying to convince us that fascism is more left-wing than right-wing...

[Brutus]

Fascism is capitalist reaction. It cannot possibly be left-wing; opposition parties are outlawed, unions are crushed, independent workers' organisations are outlawed. How can anyone think it is left-wing?

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

This is really in the wrong forum.

But yes, it moves beyond the quixotic, out-dated, left-right scale, as does ideology and political philosophy in general. It is normally an expression of capitalist reaction in times of extreme crisis, combined of course with a virulently racist, nationalist, corporatist ideological underbelly.

[Sasha]

Why don't you first tell us what you think. Esp considering how well your last thread went down...

[Brutus]

Why don't you first tell us what you think. Esp considering how well your last thread went down...

I take it you are referring to his reichskreig?

[ВАЛТЕР]

You know when people say there is no such thing as a stupid question? Well they're lying, this is an example of a stupid question. Also, this coming after you make some Nazbol, bullshit excuse for a 'socialist' flag, which is basically the reichskreig flag plastered with hammer and sickles and red stars in MS paint.


So, I am with Psycho. YOU tell US what you think fascism is. Since you seem to consider yourself a Marxist, you should be able to explain to us why fascism is what it is, whose class interests does it serve, and what the nature of property relations are under fascism. None of which are hard questions for any Marxist to answer.

[Crux]

Mussolini was a traitor and an opportunist, not that such people might not be left in a formal sense but the Fascists most certainly wasn't. They were a party of strikebreakers and muscle for the Italian capitalists. And while not overtly anti-Semitic at first they had their own freemason-marxist conspiracy theories. Certainly there are differences between the German Nazis and the Italian Fascist, but none of that difference is in regards to whether they are far right or not. You are a god damned fool if you believe even a word of the Fascist party program. It's about as much worth as the pre-election promises of any bourgeoisie politician, probably even less. They bent their knee for the pope and Italian capitalism.

Oh and Jonah fucking Goldberg? You're sure you're not just trolling us, man?

[Decolonize The Left]

http://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/scale_super/0/4109/1790940-memes_cant_tell_if_troll_or_just_really_stupid_mem ebase_35_s500x475_179361_580.jpg

Is this thread serious?

Fascism obviously has many 'working-class elements' to it as it is a nationalist ideology and nationalism always appeals to the working class in some sense. But in no way, shape, or form, can fascism be considered anything leftist or even centrist. Fascism is a far right, reactionary, ideology and to even remotely attempt to paint it otherwise suggests ulterior motives.

[UncleLenin]

You know when people say there is no such thing as a stupid question? Well they're lying, this is an example of a stupid question. Also, this coming after you make some Nazbol, bullshit excuse for a 'socialist' flag, which is basically the reichskreig flag plastered with hammer and sickles and red stars in MS paint.


So, I am with Psycho. YOU tell US what you think fascism is. Since you seem to consider yourself a Marxist, you should be able to explain to us why fascism is what it is, whose class interests does it serve, and what the nature of property relations are under fascism. None of which are hard questions for any Marxist to answer.


I think Fascism goes beyond left and right, it can be more leftist than rightest or vice versa. And as for the last thread in which my flag slightly resembled the National Socialist flag, who cares whether it looks like the National Socialist flag or not. I can use whatever flag I choose, and there is nobody to stop me. I am a very strong believer in free speech and if you have a problem with that, I couldn't care less.

[Sotionov]

In my book, those in favour of social stratification are on the right - those in favour of egalitarianism are the left.

[Paul Pott]

Mussolini in his youth was a leftist. Then he got in hot water during world war I for his nationalist stances.

After that, he developed his own ideology mixing class collaborationist nationalism with quasi-syndicalist rhetoric and populism. The plan was to appeal to all classes, often with contradictory promises.

All fascists certainly rejected the "free market" and other things that American conservatives hold dear. In fact, they did not oppose capitalism, but liberalism, an economic policy. Fascism in power was unmistakably a reactionary, right wing movement concerned mainly with defeating the left. However, it was a strand of right wing politics that often found itself at odds with the monarchy and catholic traditionalism, which would eventually be its downfall.

[UncleLenin]

Oh and Jonah fucking Goldberg? You're sure you're not just trolling us, man?

It doesn't matter who wrote the book, it is the facts that count.

[Decolonize The Left]

I think Fascism goes beyond left and right, it can be more leftist than rightest or vice versa. And as for the last thread in which my flag slightly resembled the National Socialist flag, who cares whether it looks like the National Socialist flag or not. I can use whatever flag I choose, and there is nobody to stop me. I am a very strong believer in free speech and if you have a problem with that, I couldn't care less.

Fascism does not go beyond left and right... unless you are a fascist. Fascism is firmly rooted in the right: it involves discrimination, bigotry, nationalism, imperialism, and authoritarianism de facto. It is totally incompatible with any form of leftism.

Also, I understand that you are feeling a bit of heat right now for your flag thread. It may be that you are just young and not aware of the full impact of your actions. But the truth is that while you can make whatever flag you want, no leftists are going to want to rally underneath your proto-fascist flag. And no leftists are going to want to adhere to your misguided flattery of fascism in general. So if you are just rather naive, which is questionable at the moment given the trolling nature of your posts, I would suggest that you take this post as a friendly indication of the reality of this situation.

[Paul Pott]

I think Fascism goes beyond left and right, it can be more leftist than rightest or vice versa. And as for the last thread in which my flag slightly resembled the National Socialist flag, who cares whether it looks like the National Socialist flag or not. I can use whatever flag I choose, and there is nobody to stop me. I am a very strong believer in free speech and if you have a problem with that, I couldn't care less.

Fascist movements in history had "left" wings within the movement - the SA, the Strasser brothers, some say Joseph Goebbels, and some of the Italian fascists and Spanish falangists are examples. These were the center of the working class base of fascism.

None of these held power. The "right wing" of fascism always prevailed. The SS, mostly a petit-bourgeoise organization, beat out the SA, for example, and Hitler never took some of his populist promises seriously.

[UncleLenin]

Fascism does not go beyond left and right... unless you are a fascist. Fascism is firmly rooted in the right: it involves discrimination, bigotry, nationalism, imperialism, and authoritarianism de facto. It is totally incompatible with any form of leftism.

Also, I understand that you are feeling a bit of heat right now for your flag thread. It may be that you are just young and not aware of the full impact of your actions. But the truth is that while you can make whatever flag you want, no leftists are going to want to rally underneath your proto-fascist flag. And no leftists are going to want to adhere to your misguided flattery of fascism in general. So if you are just rather naive, which is questionable at the moment given the trolling nature of your posts, I would suggest that you take this post as a friendly indication of the reality of this situation.

Bullshit, go read a book.

Perhaps that Jonah Goldberg book I recommended.

[Brutus]

Mussolini stated he had an alternative to capitalism and socialism. It appears that uncle Lenin believe him.

[Brutus]

Bullshit, go read a book.
A lovely post devoid of useful content. Please elaborate on why this is bullshit?

[Crux]

Bullshit, go read a book.

Perhaps that Jonah Goldberg book I recommended.
Uhm so let me get this straight you think Fascism is left wing because some neo-conservative american wrote a book about it? Can we expect your next thread to be about how Obama reconciles his marxism with his muslim faith?

[UncleLenin]

Mussolini stated he had an alternative to capitalism and socialism. It appears that uncle Lenin believe him.

I am a leftist. I disagree with plenty of things Mussolini believed in. It is very worrying how most of my comrades are in denial, the fact is, Fascism isn't right wing. If you read the book I recommended, you would understand why it isn't right-wing. This forum is full of bias. While it can be useful for many things, when it comes to topics of extreme controversy, it is impossible for anyone here to talk about it in an un-biased way.

I employ my fellow comrades to see reason.

[Crux]

I am a leftist. I disagree with plenty of things Mussolini believed in. It is very worrying how most of my comrades are in denial, the fact is, Fascism isn't right wing. If you read the book I recommended, you would understand why it isn't right-wing. This forum is full of bias. While it can be useful for many things, when it comes to topics of extreme controversy, it is impossible for anyone here to talk about it in an un-biased way.

I employ my fellow comrades to see reason.
Extreme controversy? Dude, I gave you an answer, but you seem to think conservatives are more persuasive than marxists. And no, it isn't in any way shape or form a "fact" that fascism is left-wing. You think this is the first discussion we've ever had on fascism? If you'd stop letting yourself get fooled by conservatives and start to listen what people are actually telling you for a second that would be great.

[UncleLenin]

Uhm so let me get this straight you think Fascism is left wing because some neo-conservative american wrote a book about it? Can we expect your next thread to be about how Obama reconciles his marxism with his muslim faith?

No actually, Obama is a shit president.

Jonah Goldberg is not the only person who has wrote about this, there are many others.
One cannot argue with fact either.

[Omsk]

Ah,yes. Those anti-elitist, stock-market-abolishing, child-labor-ending, public-health-promoting, wealth-confiscating, draft-ending, secularist right-wingers!

You should be banned for posting this garbage.

What a bullshit book from a conservative idiot. Typical American conservative imbecile.

"Hitler was a socialliiisstt!!! They believed in free health care!!"

The user who opened the thread is an obvious troll, just ban him now, or you can wait until he finally fully reveals himself.

[Crux]

You should be banned for posting this garbage.

What a bullshit book from a conservative idiot. Typical American conservative imbecile.

"Hitler was a socialliiisstt!!! They believed in free health care!!"

The user who opened the thread is an obvious troll, just ban him now, or you can wait until he finally fully reveals himself.
For once we agree, Omsk.

[Fred]

It is interesting to read some of the information the OP provides about Mussolini. But as other comrades have stated categorically, fascism is always a right-wing movement. It's primary base is the disenfranchised petite-bourgeoisie. The ruined shop keepers, small farmers, that is, small businessmen and artisans made up the base. Fascist movements always gain traction when there is a threat to the established order from the left. Fascism is a hammer made to slam down on the proletariat. It doesn't, btw, have to be racist, I don't think, but it always is because ultra-nationalism inexorably leads there.

[JPSartre12]

I do hope that the people who chose "Leftist" in the poll options were joking ...

[Decolonize The Left]

I am a leftist. I disagree with plenty of things Mussolini believed in. It is very worrying how most of my comrades are in denial, the fact is, Fascism isn't right wing. If you read the book I recommended, you would understand why it isn't right-wing. This forum is full of bias. While it can be useful for many things, when it comes to topics of extreme controversy, it is impossible for anyone here to talk about it in an un-biased way.

I employ my fellow comrades to see reason.

So let me sum up your argument here:

Fascism is leftist.
Because I read it in a book written by a neo-con.
We should all be fascists.
Don't argue, just read the book.
Read the book!
I'm just saying, fascism is leftist. Read the book.

That seem about right? I'll be recommending your ban sooner rather than later.

[UncleLenin]

Extreme controversy? Dude, I gave you an answer, but you seem to think conservatives are more persuasive than marxists. And no, it isn't in any way shape or form a "fact" that fascism is left-wing. You think this is the first discussion we've ever had on fascism? If you'd stop letting yourself get fooled by conservatives and start to listen what people are actually telling you for a second that would be great.

Well, if you can present me with facts to prove Jonah Goldberg wrong, then go ahead. But believe me, I have done extensive research on this subject, and everything has pointed to the left. Also, you will have to write a 413 page long book to prove Goldberg wrong.

Quite a few people are saying that Fascism was a reactionary capitalist ideology. That argument is essentially a left-wing argument. I have never heard a right-winger say that.

[Decolonize The Left]

Well, if you can present me with facts to prove Jonah Goldberg wrong, then go ahead. But believe me, I have done extensive research on this subject, and everything has pointed to the left. Also, you will have to write a 413 page long book to prove Goldberg wrong.

Quite a few people are saying that Fascism was a reactionary capitalist ideology. That argument is essentially a left-wing argument. I have never heard a right-winger say that.

Yes, well, that is because we are left-wing. So we make left-wing arguments. We don't make right-wing arguments because...

[UncleLenin]

So let me sum up your argument here:

Fascism is leftist.
Because I read it in a book written by a neo-con.
We should all be fascists.
Don't argue, just read the book.
Read the book!
I'm just saying, fascism is leftist. Read the book.

That seem about right? I'll be recommending your ban sooner rather than later.

Do as you wish. I will be leaving this website to search for one that isn't full of leftists in denial

[Fakeblock]

I heard stormfront is a great one.

[helot]

Quite a few people are saying that Fascism was a reactionary capitalist ideology. That argument is essentially a left-wing argument. I have never heard a right-winger say that.

Right wingers would say one of two things about fascism, either it's the same as communism (due to Stalin) or that it's the only thing that can save us from present society. Both, however, is little more than propaganda.


Fascism emerged due to a strong labour movement and the threat of revolution. Its aim was to destroy working class organisations. If this is left wing then the left needs to be fought against by the working class.

[JPSartre12]

Well, if you can present me with facts to prove Jonah Goldberg wrong, then go ahead. But believe me, I have done extensive research on this subject, and everything has pointed to the left.

With all due respect comrade, it sounds as if you're taking what was said in the book that you read as the absolute, unshakable truth without reading about the topic from many different sides by many different people, and then using critical thinking to formulate your own opinion vis-à-vis theirs.

What is it, specifically, that has proven to you that fascism belongs on the Left? Its core tenets are profoundly anti-Marxist: class collaboration as opposed to class conflict, nationalism instead of questioning the anthropologic development of the State, imperialism rather than the dissolution of States and borders, etc. Is there a certain part of fascist theory that you find to be "Left", and if so, what? I'm genuinely interested on where you see a philosophic connection between the two.


Also, you will have to write a 413 page long book to prove Goldberg wrong.

The length of a book says nothing about its quality or character. Example A, the Manifesto - it's very short, but is one of the most prominent writings in the history of printing and has had a deep historical impact.

Others, such as Atlas Shrugged, is a waste of paper. But that's just my opinion.

[Decolonize The Left]

This is a lost topic friends. Either post pictures of animals and trains or let it be.

[Sam_b]

Please do not post images of animals or trains or whatever because you shouldn't do that in these parts of the forum.


I will be leaving this website to search for one that isn't full of leftists

I hate to be that guy, but 'fixed your post'.

You'll be back. They always come back.

[Decolonize The Left]

Please do not post images of animals or trains or whatever because you shouldn't do that in these parts of the forum.



I hate to be that guy, but 'fixed your post'.

Indeed. Do not spam threads with pics please. I was kidding.

[Comrade Chernov]

@ OP:

A leftist using "evidence" from a conservative american columnist to "prove" that Mussolini and Fascism were left-wing?

Mussolini was a populist, and secular, but that doesn't make him left-wing. Try harder, OP, otherwise stop wasting your time. How the fuck can you call yourself a leftist if you believe the writings of a conservative?

https://images.encyclopediadramatica.se/thumb/9/9e/HA_HA_HA,_OH_WOW.jpg/500px-HA_HA_HA,_OH_WOW.jpg

[Sam_b]

I think we've all probably confirmed that OP is a troll, so if he goes away not much value will really be lost.

[Tim Cornelis]

I think we've all probably confirmed that OP is a troll, so if he goes away not much value will really be lost.

Not necessarily, he strikes me as someone who hasn't 'streamlined' his paradigm yet.

Maybe Uncle Lenin can give a definition of "left-wing" and how fascism corresponds to it, rather than point to a book.

[Per Levy]

Maybe Uncle Lenin can give a definition of "left-wing" and how fascism corresponds to it, rather than point to a book.

to him fascism/national socialism nationalized industries that makes them leftists, since nationalization is leftist. he also said that italys fascism wasnt racist or anti-semitic at all, see here:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2645670&postcount=23

[rednordman]

I always have a laugh at all these people (mainly neo-cons) who wax lyrical about how the left are so misguided and thick and are really fascists without even knowing it. I laugh even more at the masses of useful idiots who actually believe them, simply because they want to. Its basically the same thing as when some left-wingers used to call everyone who opposed them as fascists without actually giving a good solid reason. Easiest thing to do in the world - get a proper argument ffs!

If fascism is a left-wing ideology, try giving example of wealthy people who got persecuted? who weren't because they where allegedly left-wing, or a Jew?

[G4b3n]

I think we might actually have a National Bolshevik on our hands.
Also, the history portrayed in this monstrosity is a bit off to say the least, as a history major and someone who attempts to defend real history from bourgeois (including fascist) propaganda, I can not help but cringe.
Hitler viewed Mussolini as a major ideological inspiration, the greatest statesman in politics, note that Mussolini bullied and seduced his way into power in Italy in 1922, before Hitler even attempted his miserable failure of a coupe in 1923, in which he fell to the ground due to his fearful reaction to gunfire and broke his collar bone, then fled the scene leaving his followers to spill their blood. Sadly, the feeling was not mutual, Mussolini viewed Hitler was an incompetent child.

Also, while it is true that Italian fascism did not have roots in anti-Semitism, it would be a gross exaggeration to say that the Jews were "over represented". Hitler simply built onto Mussolini's rabid anti-communism and formed a sort of Judeo-communist conspiracy, which then had a major affect on world fascism.

Your argument that Mussolini is somehow leftist because of his name is just laughable. He was a "socialist" in his youth, but was kicked out of the Italian socialist party for his support for the imperialist war (WWI), as has already been stated, he was traitor and an opportunist. He had no business calling himself a socialist in the first place.

What leftist would have his armed thugs smash worker's strikes and terrorize socialist institutions?

There is nothing left wing about fascism in a historical or contemporary sense. Any neo-conservative imbecile who argues this has a better chance of proving that their God exists, honestly.

[Tim Cornelis]

to him fascism/national socialism nationalized industries that makes them leftists, since nationalization is leftist. he also said that italys fascism wasnt racist or anti-semitic at all, see here:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2645670&postcount=23

All of which is either true or there's something to be said for it. Mussolini denied the existence of a biological concept of race, and initially he had Jewish fascist members in his regime (though latter enacted anti-semitic policies under pressure of Nazi-Germany). It's not that far fetched to consider nationalisation leftist, it's wrong, but not weirdly wrong. Remember that leftism isn't monopolised by the revolutionary left (many on this site use them interchangeably). Considering fascism left-wing, but still a hostile ideology, is compatible with communism.

As Sotionov said, the left-wing scale is essentially egalitarianism versus social stratification and thus we find fascism on the far-right. But someone calling it left-wing does not make him sympathetic toward it per se, even when he is a leftist himself.

[Sotionov]

There is nothing left wing about fascism
Well, a lot of people think bolshevism is left-wing. Those seeing something left-wing in bolshevism are not inconsistent in saying that there is something left-wing in fascism.

[G4b3n]

Well, a lot of people think bolshevism is left-wing. Those seeing something left-wing in bolshevism are not inconsistent in saying that there is something left-wing in fascism.

I see what you are saying, however, I do not regard these components of Bolshevism to be leftist at all.

To be sure, could you list these aspects that are being brought into question?

[TheEmancipator]

Only McCarthyism can possibly claim that fascism was left-wing, if only to make sure the good people of the USA wouldn't vote for baby-eating commies.

Look at the results :

http://intheknow7.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/democratic-socialism-hitler-obama-marx.jpg

Mind boggling. Particularly the description of Obama as a "charismatic radical" and an advocate of democratic socialism.

[Red Economist]

Voted "not sure", as there wasn't an option for "neither". The left-right distinction is an extremely crude and ridiculous attempt to categorize political ideologies by whether they are for equality/ineqaulity or increasing or reducing state power- without ever identifying the class character of the state.
By saying it's right wing, you ignore it's often very socialist rhetoric and appeal to the working class as a way of trying to solve capitalism's crisis. By saying it's left-wing you totally forget that this is simply rhetoric and that fascists are supporters of big business who will go out of their way to crush communists, socialists, anarchists, trade unions and anyone interested in workers rights.
It is irrelevant for Marxists, as the real political division comes down as to which mode of production Fascism represents; capitalism or communism. And it sits firmly in capitalist territory even with it's often 'socialist' disguises.

[Luís Henrique]

Here is a link for a book about Fascism:

http://books.google.ie/books/about/Liberal_Fascism.html?id=hbteczFpo4kC&redir_esc=y

This book has quite a few things that you will disagree with, but most of it is fact. The writer is a conservative so expect a bit of bias.

That is not a book about fascism, sorry. It is a book about what Americans call "liberalism", which very mistakenly and sophistically tries to equate that with fascism. Basically it is a personal revenge; the author got tired of hearing conservatives being called "fascist" and so attempts retribution by calling liberals "fascist".

The author is not a conservative; he wants to be a conservative when he grows up, which isn't likely to happen in this century. He has absolutely no sense of history, and so delves into several ridiculous anachronisms and fails to understand what role either fascism or American "liberalism" play in History.

Luís Henrique

[#FF0000]

It is very worrying how most of my comrades are in denial, the fact is, Fascism isn't right wing.

No. In rhetoric, it's syncretic, employing both left wing and right wing "talking points" (hate the phrase but for lack of a better one...). In practice, it is thoroughly right with and obviously reactionary, because their entire ideology is about folding every individual, every group, every class, into the "organic nation" and under the deified State. Of course there's some "pro-worker" stuff in their rhetoric and in their policies -- fascists are populists and collaborationists. Everything is done in the spirit of giving people what they need to best play their role in society and best serve the State.

If you can fall so easily for rhetoric (or for the bullshit of a two-bit American neo-conservative pundit) then you'll fall for anything, dude.

[Luís Henrique]

It's not that far fetched to consider nationalisation leftist, it's wrong, but not weirdly wrong.

There is a difference between "nationalisation" as for instance practiced by South American populist regimes - which pretty much means "statisation" - and "nationalisation" as practiced by Nazism - which basically meant taking the private property of a Jew and transforming it into private property of an "Aryan" sympathiser of the regime.


Remember that leftism isn't monopolised by the revolutionary left (many on this site use them interchangeably). Considering fascism left-wing, but still a hostile ideology, is compatible with communism.

With a kind of "communism" that doesn't care for the physical integrity of its adherents, perhaps.

Fascism is a street brawl tool of the bourgeoisie for killing communists and social-democrats and other assorted leftists or "leftists" and destroying working class organisations. To the point that a communist can see the destruction of working class organisations as "compatible with communism", then fascism may be so. But in the real world, even those will have to consider fascism left-wing while looking at it from their graves.


As Sotionov said, the left-wing scale is essentially egalitarianism versus social stratification and thus we find fascism on the far-right. But someone calling it left-wing does not make him sympathetic toward it per se, even when he is a leftist himself.

By your definition, yes, it does; at the very least it makes one deluded into the idea that fascism is (by your, or Sotionov's, definition of what "left" is) somehow egalitarian.

Luís Henrique

[Comrade Chernov]

This was honestly the funniest thread I've read on a forum in ages.

[Teacher]

Next the OP will say the Ku Klux Klan are left-wing because of their communal values

[Decolonize The Left]

Next the OP will say the Ku Klux Klan are left-wing because of their communal values

Everyone's equal underneath the sheets.

[Sotionov]

I see what you are saying, however, I do not regard these components of Bolshevism to be leftist at all.

To be sure, could you list these aspects that are being brought into question?
Well, as I stated in the message #12 of this thread, my view is that those in favour of social stratification are on the right - those in favour of egalitarianism are the left.

[Turinbaar]

I've heard the word "secular" thrown about too many times on this website in discussions of fascist dictatorships. You can make whatever reference you want to Mussolini's personal attitude to christianity, but you cannot say that a regime founded on the Lateran Pact, which created vatican city as an independent state, bailed out the vatican bank, purged the church of its liberal membership, and re-affirmed Catholicism's central role in Italian society, is a secular one.

[Crux]

Well, as I stated in the message #12 of this thread, my view is that those in favour of social stratification are on the right - those in favour of egalitarianism are the left.
In that case, by your own definition, fascism is about as far right as it gets. The Corporate state, that is the Fascist conception of the state, is by definition anti-egalitarian both in theory and practice. If you scratch the surface on some of their populist rhetoric you will see they were in fact quite open about this. This is a central part of their opposition to democracy and the yearning for a "Natural Order". Like any politician of the right of course they hope to delude their supporters that they will be on the top of this order.

[Vireya]

I'd say Fascism has leftist elements due to its socialist genesis, but for the most part it is rightist.

The thing is that the form it takes is dependent on the nation's culture. Fascism does have the capacity to be leftist, and even socialist, if the host nation's culture permits. The main problem I see with Fascism is the focus on the state, and speficially the leader, not the nation itself. From my point of view, Fascism isn't nationalist, it's a fetishistic cult for racists to circlejerk to.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

"Left" and "right" are ambiguous terms. Those that subscribe to some variety of bourgeois ideology identify leftism with the liberal bourgeoisie, and rightism with the conservative bourgeoisie and the landlords. To us, the "left" position is the proletarian position. Fascism obviously isn't proletarian, although its adherents sometimes put on workerist, "leftist" airs - either as a cynical ploy or as a reflection of the mass basis of fascist movements in the petite bourgeoisie.

[Ann Egg]

Like Leninism and Stalinism, fascism and Hitlerism are right-wing, authoritarian ideologies.

[Vireya]

Like Leninism and Stalinism, fascism and Hitlerism are right-wing, authoritarian ideologies.

Eh....I wouldn't categorize Stalinism and Leninism as rightist, though certainly authoritarian. Stalinists and Fascists have vastly different social agendas. The Soviets legalized abortion and openly discouraged the nuclear family as a staple of civilization.

[Sotionov]

In that case, by your own definition, fascism is about as far right as it gets.
I never claimed otherwise.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Like Leninism and Stalinism, fascism and Hitlerism are right-wing, authoritarian ideologies.

Care to justify this little bit of sectarian baiting?

[Sotionov]

I agree with her. As I have said, for me social stratification = right-wing, egalitarianism = left-wing, and therefore, I, too, consider Leninism and Stanism right-wing along with Fascism and Hitlerism.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

I know, but it would be very uncharitable to assume that Ann Egg shares your views.

[Philo]

Depends what we mean by "right" and "left." By the notion of the "right-left" political spectrum employed in mainstream liberal political discourse, it broke the spectrum and was neither "left" nor "right."

In the sense of "left" and "right" employed by us on the revolutionary left, they were solidly and unambiguously rightist forces of reaction.

[Vireya]

Depends what we mean by "right" and "left." By the notion of the "right-left" political spectrum employed in mainstream liberal political discourse, it broke the spectrum and was neither "left" nor "right."

In the sense of "left" and "right" employed by us on the revolutionary left, they were solidly and unambiguously rightist forces of reaction.

I've never considered Fascism to be reactionary or even conservative, because it really isn't if you look at it. Unlike conservatives, Fascists are modernists, they don't wish to reverse technological or social advancement, atleast not back to anything conservatives would want. They are also generally against the same sort of social stratification (they despise hereditary positions).

[Philo]

I've never considered Fascism to be reactionary or even conservative, because it really isn't if you look at it. Unlike conservatives, Fascists are modernists, they don't wish to reverse technological or social advancement, atleast not back to anything conservatives would want. They are also generally against the same sort of social stratification (they despise hereditary positions).

This is exactly what I was talking about. It is "reactionary" in the sense employed by us leftists, in that it was fundamentally a reaction to working-class revolution which functioned -whatever the professed beliefs of some of its adherents- as a way to stop or mitigate such revolution. Furthermore, they were against the social stratifications of Europe at the time not out of some Enlightenment belief in the equality of all people, but because those elites were seen as "degenerate," as cynically failing to preserve the greatness of the culture or the nation in the face of various forces that (supposedly) threatened it.

This certainly goes for economics; to the extent fascism was anti-capitalist, it was anti-liberal-capitalist. That is, it wanted to preserve the unity of "the nation" or "das Volk" in the face of the perceived threat of organization along class lines rather than, say, nationalism. As for "social advancement," I can hardly see in what sense they were in favor of it, unless by "advancement" you mean that they repudiated the status quo in favor of some rebirth of the primordial national spirit, reconnection with the blood and soil or something.

Finally, whether they were "modernist" in some thin cultural-criticism sense is largely irrelevant, as they were certainly not "modernist" in the sense of their stance vis a vis the Enlightenment, universalism, science, etc. Reactionary modernism was not that uncommon. Look at T.S. Eliot!

I'd suggest books like The Reactionary Mind by Corey Robin (for the general dynamics of reaction) or The Wages of Destruction by Adam Tooze for some background on this.

[Sea]

I voted that it's left, and in the time between when I voted that and now when I'm making this post, fascism hasn't scooted over to the left one bit.

Either this election is rigged, or voting isn't really magic after all. :(

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

Wasn't fascism originally sold as a 'third way' between the capitalist and communist conflict? I've seen other fascist groups use terms like 'third position' and such. Like the neo-fascist American Third Position, which is an actual political party here in the U.S.

It's irrelevant either way, because fascism (and it's more generic 'Ur-Fascism') is undoubtedly rightist despite the rhetoric of its advocates.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I agree with her. As I have said, for me social stratification = right-wing, egalitarianism = left-wing, and therefore, I, too, consider Leninism and Stanism right-wing along with Fascism and Hitlerism.Well you also confuse the petty bourgoise with the prolitariet, so I can see how you are so confused. And Stanism is right-wing, you are correct on that... stan was an asshole and a bigot.

In general this discussion of "left vs. right" wing in this thread has been totally divorced from any class considerations. It's shocking for radicals to ignore this central feature, but I guess not too surprising since in general, relationship of political position to class is ALWAYS absent mainstream representations of politics. This is the way that US conservatives (and liberals actually) have been able to turn political definitions on their head and argue totally inconsistant and illogical things (like any liberalism is socialism, like Hitler being a leftist, etc).

Mussolini was a member of the right-wing of the Social Democratic movement in Itally - and from what I understand a prominent one; he edited their newspaper. He was also ideosyncratic in his ideas which was not unusual in the worldwide socialist movement at the time where people might be revolutionary marxists, reformists, liberals basically, or social chaovanists (racists). In the US, the head of the right-wing of the Socialist Party was pro-Jim-crow and anti-immigration while the left-wing had future Wobblies and CP members and people like Eugene Debs who were against segregation and nationalism.

But at any rate, Mussolini was removed from the Socialist Party for supporting WWI and he tried to rally pro-war socialists while at the same time increasingly dennoucing marxism (and being paid weekly by the British government as was recently disclosed). He explicitly broke with socialism and dennouncded it and renounced the whole idea of class struggle and instead placed the "national struggle" as the focus of social change.


The nation has not disappeared. We used to believe that the concept was totally without substance. Instead we see the nation arise as a palpitating reality before us! ... Class cannot destroy the nation. Class reveals itself as a collection of interests—but the nation is a history of sentiments, traditions, language, culture, and race. Class can become an integral part of the nation, but the one cannot eclipse the other

So the whole basis of his shift was rejecting class for "nation" and in his views this meant a cross-class group of people with one language and some kind of bullshit of a spiritual common culture. Hence National Syndicalism... not a force of workers in their own interests, but a "national" union based on..?

If Mussolini was a leftist, one would imagine that he would have supported the two red years in Italy when workers occupied factories and took over some towns. Instead the blackshirts were the vigilantes who sought to "restore order to the nation" and Musolini called for a strong man to step in to take over and re-unite a nation divided by class struggle. The blackshirts and then the fascists were consiously and openly opposed to socialism and class struggle more generally because they claim it disrupted national harmony (like the right then and today... mass forclosures or unemployement aren't "disruptive" it only becomes disruptive and harmful if people try and fight back against this condition).

Furthermore, Mussolini came to power through allianaces with the right-wing in Itialy and initially ruled as part of a right-wing coalition.

So to argue that fascism or Mussolini (post the outbreak of WWI for Mussolini anyway) are left-wing is absolute absurdity by every possible measure: what he said himself, what his politics were, who he was supported by, historical and philosophical tradditions he drew on, and the social base of fascism itself (the middle class who are worried about revolution and social "disorder").

Those on the left today (including the ones on here talking abstractly about "authritarian" policies) and all the mainstream pundits and hacks who write up lists of policies and attribute this to left-wing and that to right-wing based on idealist notions that such policies exist in the abstract can basically create any definitions they want by picking and choosing what to highlight. The real question is not some list of policies (for example, the UK in some points in the post-war era had about as much nationalized industry as so called "communist" countries) but who creates the polices for what reason and on what basis. Don't be confused by surface details, the content is the fundamental part and in class societies the content is almost always based in class. Failing to recognize this (actually, it seems like more of a consious rejection of this) is part of Mussolini's trajectory... obscuring and covering this class aspect is part of how modern capitalist politics try and win workers to policies against their interests. Don't do that.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Here's an interview in Salon.com with the author of the book cited in the OP:

http://www.salon.com/2008/01/11/goldberg_2/

I think it's pretty easy to see that he is trying to fit fascism into a paradigm of his own. His first fallacy is that socialism is "state rule" in the abstract. Second his attempt to connect fascism with Keynsian liberalsm and then with neoliberal-era modern liberalism is also just totally loopy.

The grain of truth in a connection in his examples of liberal fascism (liberal anti-smoking bans, etc) is not in the idea of a "holistic rule" (because capitalism itself creates that and every bourgois government by naturure makes "common laws") but in middle class attempts to control personal behavior. This is a tendancy of the bourgoise who need to control the behavior of the masses and is an anexitey common to the middle class who have very little social control and so often express angst over this by a desire to make people "behave properly" so that society runs more smoothly (for them). These upper-class/middle class social coalitions lead to things like prohibition on the one hand but also some top-down social reforms and charities on the other. The bourgoise can sometimes just use their economic power or hegemony to compel certain behaviors among the masses, but the middle class generally has to use political power (and if that fails, vigilanteism and intimidation through violence).

What he describes as "liberal fascism" in social issues is what we usually describe as bourgois moralism. The economic argument is the standard post-Keynsian era "government programs=socialism" argument.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

Wasn't fascism originally sold as a 'third way' between the capitalist and communist conflict? I've seen other fascist groups use terms like 'third position' and such. Like the neo-fascist American Third Position, which is an actual political party here in the U.S.

It's irrelevant either way, because fascism (and it's more generic 'Ur-Fascism') is undoubtedly rightist despite the rhetoric of its advocates.
Yes there is indeed confusion amongst the fascists themselves over where they stand on the political spectrum. British fascist Oswald Mosley claimed "I am not, and never have been, a man of the right. My position was on the left and is now in the centre of politics". These claims are unfounded and essentially the irrational attempts of fascists to differentiate themselves from other right-wing ideologies that are seen to be too weak at preventing left-wing upsurges during revolutionary periods.

[Crux]

You'll be back. They always come back.
Actually he won't. Or if he does come back I'll have to ban his sockpuppet as well.

[Thirsty Crow]

Mussolini was a member of the right-wing of the Social Democratic movement in Itally - and from what I understand a prominent one; he edited their newspaper.
I don't think so. From what I remember, he was an organizer heavily involved in anti-war efforts.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Originally, Mussolini was part of the Maximalist faction in the Italian Socialist Party, in opposition to reformists around Turatti. He was involved in efforts against the war in their early stage; he made a sharp turn to social-chauvinism in the late 1914, as did part of the Italian syndicalist movement.

[Vireya]

Yes there is indeed confusion amongst the fascists themselves over where they stand on the political spectrum. British fascist Oswald Mosley claimed "I am not, and never have been, a man of the right. My position was on the left and is now in the centre of politics". These claims are unfounded and essentially the irrational attempts of fascists to differentiate themselves from other right-wing ideologies that are seen to be too weak at preventing left-wing upsurges during revolutionary periods.

I think the contradictory rhetoric between fascists is more due to the ideology's own syncretic nature, which it does indeed draw from both leftist and rightist theories. Depending on what direction they'd come into Fascism from, would influence their perception of where Fascism sits on the spectrum.

[Dagoth Ur]

Jesus Christ I've never seen such a pathetic thread on a leftist forum. The definition of fascism is simple:

Fascism = the most reactionary segments of the national bourgeoisie and proletariat in class alliance against the rise of unified workers (ie communists).

They are by definition reactionary (which some in this thread don't seem to understand simply means counterrevolutionary) and inherently differ from nation to nation. Nazism for instance would never prevail in America, so we have libertarians instead.

Voted Right-wing because I'm not an anticommunist.

EDIT:
Fuck you autocorrect

[Vireya]

Jesus Christ I've never seen such a pathetic thread on a leftist forum. The definition of fascism is simple:

Fascism = the most reactionary segments of the national bourgeoisie and proletariat in class alliance against the rise of unified workers (ie communists).

They are by definition reactionary (which some in this thread don't seem to understand simply means counterrevolutionary) and inherently differ from nation to nation. Nazism for instance would never prevail in America, so we have libertarians instead.

Voted Right-wing because I'm not an anticommunist.

EDIT:
Fuck you autocorrect

Eh, it isn't really counterrevolution either. Fascists revolt against "conservativism", liberalism, and laissez-faire capitalism, communism revolts against liberalism, capitalism, and tradition. They're both revolutionary, they're simply to different sorts of revolutions.

American "Libertarianism" is horrible stuff, but it isn't even remotely related to Fascism in practice or theory.

[Dagoth Ur]

Except that its the textbook definition of fascism realized through the lens of a liberal nation. Sure it's nothing like Nazism but nazism is German fascism only capable of existing in the 30's version of Germany.

And fascists are only "revolutionary" in the sense that the word is used I their rhetoric. No fascist has ever led a revolution... ever. Italy, Spain, Germany all show us a group that consolidated all anticommunists into broad front. The foolish proles who bought into such fascist faux-revolutionary rhetoric were exterminated in every nation. Fascists are a tool used by the big bourgeoisie to crush a worker's rebellion they can't handle. Their rhetoric is meaningless metaphysics.

But let's to get to the meat of your statement. Are you actually trying to claim fascism ever interfered with capitalism?

[Vireya]

Except that its the textbook definition of fascism realized through the lens of a liberal nation. Sure it's nothing like Nazism but nazism is German fascism only capable of existing in the 30's version of Germany.


And fascists are only "revolutionary" in the sense that the word is used I their rhetoric. No fascist has ever led a revolution... ever. Italy, Spain, Germany all show us a group that consolidated all anticommunists into broad front. The foolish proles who bought into such fascist faux-revolutionary rhetoric were exterminated in every nation. Fascists are a tool used by the big bourgeoisie to crush a worker's rebellion they can't handle. Their rhetoric is meaningless metaphysics.

But let's to get to the meat of your statement. Are you actually trying to claim fascism ever interfered with capitalism?
No, not really. Liberal nation trying to be fascist will fail, same as a liberal nation trying to be socialist (i.e, social democracy). If you study Fascism, it and "Libertarianism" have little in common

Eh, I see your point. I suppose. However, I'm not a communist, liberal, or fascist, so I have a different perspective of the situation. You're using "revolution" in such a manner that only a communist uprising is recognized as a "revolution". The reality isn't so. A revolution can be for better or worse, progress or regress. A revolution isn't necessarily beneficial, it is simply a rapid and drastic collapse of the status quo.

Ok, can you rephrase that? What do you mean by Fascism "interfering with capitalism"?

[Dagoth Ur]

No, not really. Liberal nation trying to be fascist will fail, same as a liberal nation trying to be socialist (i.e, social democracy). If you study Fascism, it and "Libertarianism" have little in common
Guess what else has little in common, 30's Germany and '13 America. Fascism reflects these differences.


Eh, I see your point. I suppose. However, I'm not a communist, liberal, or fascist, so I have a different perspective of the situation. You're using "revolution" in such a manner that only a communist uprising is recognized as a "revolution". The reality isn't so. A revolution can be for better or worse, progress or regress. A revolution isn't necessarily beneficial, it is simply a rapid and drastic collapse of the status quo.
Actually you're using an entirely skewed definition of revolution. A revolution is an event that causes one system to be replaced with another. It's not a collapse of the status quo alone there has to be a drive towards something else. The fascists in all senses represented the maintenance of the staus quo and if anything return to a purer version of it. And this ins't a Marxist definition at all.


Ok, can you rephrase that? What do you mean by Fascism "interfering with capitalism"?
As in challenging Private Property.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I don't think so. From what I remember, he was an organizer heavily involved in anti-war efforts.I don't know a whole lot about this history, but I'm pretty sure that switching to a pro-war position is what got him kicked out. I think he may have initially gone with the SP neutrality position, but he actually fought in WWI, so I don't think he was anti-war by the end of the conflict - and definately seems to have had an anti-class-war, "pro-nation" stance by the end.

[Jimmie Higgins]

No, not really. Liberal nation trying to be fascist will fail, same as a liberal nation trying to be socialist (i.e, social democracy). If you study Fascism, it and "Libertarianism" have little in common.Weimar Germany was a liberal nation, the right-wing of the Italian liberal movement (as opposed to monarchist, so liberal in this sense means what we now call conservatives, I guess) supported the blackshirts and were part of the coalition with Musolini.


Eh, I see your point. I suppose. However, I'm not a communist, liberal, or fascist, so I have a different perspective of the situation. You're using "revolution" in such a manner that only a communist uprising is recognized as a "revolution". The reality isn't so. A revolution can be for better or worse, progress or regress. A revolution isn't necessarily beneficial, it is simply a rapid and drastic collapse of the status quo. Well a revolution could fail to produce working class liberation and fascism might be the result, but fascism would represent the counter-revolution. Sure there's change, but what kind of change? A bolstering of "order" to stabilize society: this might mean some reforms or government work programs for the unemployed, this might mean Keynsian-like rapid infrastructure investment... and if there is a worker's movement, by definition of what fascism is, it will be crushed, scattered and re-appropriated or replaced by loyal fascist organizations.

The link between fascism and communism is that they rarely gain a mass following outside of severe crisis. They are flip-sides of a responce to mass working class movements: one side hopes to move that beyond the confines of the capitalist system, the other wants to discimpline the masses and act above an indicisive or weak capitalist class to restore stability... but it's the stability of the current society. This is the fundamental common link of fascist movements - in terms of policies and positions, they have historically been all over the map and very fluid. The bourgoise doesn't necissarily want to have extra-legal vigilantes enforcing order through violence (because this is a bit distruptive too) and so that's why, you're right in a way, fascism can't just slowly be elected into power by gathering supporters over time like some 3rd party. But if the ruling class feels that it's riskier or just too unworkable to allow workers and the oppressed to revolt and paralyse the official government, they will support fascism (or at least factions of the ruling class) and there are many examples of this historically.

[Popular Front of Judea]

[I]t is curious that American conservatives and libertarians have not seen fit to discuss the view of fascism held by one of the heroes of modern American libertarianism, the Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises. In his book “Liberalism,” published in 1927 after Mussolini had seized power in Italy, Mises wrote:

It cannot be denied that Fascism and similar movements aimed at the establishment of dictatorships are full of the best intentions and that their intervention has for the moment saved European civilization. The merit that Fascism has thereby won for itself will live on eternally in history.

Why libertarians apologize for autocracy | Salon
(http://www.salon.com/2011/08/30/lind_libertariansim/)

If you study Fascism, it and "Libertarianism" have little in common

[Sotionov]

Well you also confuse the petty bourgoise with the prolitariet, so I can see how you are so confused.
You delude yourself that some workers, even though they don't oppress or exploita anyone ara a part of the bourgoise, and that some oppressors are workers, not a part of the ruling class, so I can see why you would call my view that Leninism is not left-wing "confused".

[Jimmie Higgins]

You delude yourself that some workers, even though they don't oppress or exploita anyone ara a part of the bourgoise, and that some oppressors are workers, not a part of the ruling class, so I can see why you would call my view that Leninism is not left-wing "confused".Prols have no investment in the system "nothing to loose but your chains".

Small businesspeople litterally have an investment in maintaining their position and keeping their ability to make a living with privite productive property. For the most part they (and I suspect you too) would run in horror if worker's ever did try and emancipate themselves... and this fear of a more powerful social force below them is what drives many people in this general category towards supporting fascism. As a group they are just competeing induviduals and so a system where the condition for the advancement of once is the advancement of all is impossible for them: they advance through competition on the market or as professionals.

Many people in this category might choose to support the proletarian movement, but then again any induvidual might do that in a time of revolution anyway. The ones who don't will probably back some kind of counter-revolution and I think maybe part of the reason that fascism emerges from the middle class in crisis is because they don't have much economic weight and they can't really permanently block-up economically because they ultimately compete. So if you can't strike (they'd only hurt themselves by witholoding their services and big industry can carry on ok without them anyway) to make an impact over all of society, what do you do? Maybe put on some jackboots and force people to behave as you want them to, intimidate the masses into behaving, use state power to reign in some of the exesses of big business. If capitalists stop production, it causes crisis - if worker's stop their labor, it causes crisis. If the middle class withhold their economic power, it hurts sales in some sectors of the economy and Wal-Mart picks up some extra business.

[Sotionov]

Following that sort of thinking, socialists should appeal only to the homeless and tenants, being that people who own the house or the apartment that they live in have 'more then their chains' to lose, and somehow, by your logic, they therefore 'litterally have an investment in maintaining their position' and the current system.

[Dagoth Ur]

No they don't. Simply because they don't own productive capital. That's why a small bourgeoisie has an interest in maintaining capital rule, even though it more often than not fucks him over. His interest is the very fact that he would cease to own property privately and be able to excise profit from it privately. Every worker gains from the socialization of the MoP, and every bourgeoisie loses the very thing that makes them bourgeoisie.

Protip: houses, cars, and other property that does not generate profit from being operated is not private property. This is the myth of a so-called "middle" class.

[Sotionov]

The supposed "petty-bourgoise" don't own capital. They own means of production, and they are not bourgeoise big or small if they don't oppress or exploit anyone, being that means of production (or any other property) become capital only when used for exploitation. You don't have to be exploited in order to be a non-capitalist, it's enough not to be an exploitator.

[Vireya]

Guess what else has little in common, 30's Germany and '13 America. Fascism reflects these differences.


Actually you're using an entirely skewed definition of revolution. A revolution is an event that causes one system to be replaced with another. It's not a collapse of the status quo alone there has to be a drive towards something else. The fascists in all senses represented the maintenance of the staus quo and if anything return to a purer version of it. And this ins't a Marxist definition at all.


As in challenging Private Property.

Yeah...no. Libertarianism has no doctrinal relation to Fascism. Fascism is about state worship or race worship, Libertarianism is about " keep da gubmint outta muh walut" and " da taxz r ebil!".

How is Fascism supporting the status quo? I can see your point some what from an economic standpoint, since the forms of Fascism that rose to power did reinforce capitalism (albeit in a different from), but socially its a completely different story. Fascism was more a social and cultural revolution than an economic one, Mussolini and Hitler both acknowledged that.

Mussolini: "We deny the existence of two classes, because there are many more than two classes. We deny that human history can be explained in terms of economics. We deny your internationalism. That is a luxury article which only the elevated can practise, because peoples are passionately bound to their native soil."

Hilter: "The Economy is something of secondary importance."

[Dagoth Ur]

No the MoP and Capital are synonymous. The MoP however require proletarian power to be operated in a productive format. The exploitation entirely arises from the theft of surplus value from those whose work in fact generated it.

And yeah you're bourgeoisie if you own capital because all capital requires someone to operate the capital. The smallest bourgeoisie only exploit themselves and their families (mom and pop bullshit) but they're still exploitative.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Following that sort of thinking, socialists should appeal only to the homeless and tenants, being that people who own the house or the apartment that they live in have 'more then their chains' to lose, and somehow, by your logic, they therefore 'litterally have an investment in maintaining their position' and the current system.
We should appeal to them - homeless people generally aren't an economic class, they are unemployed or reserve labor. We should also appeal to middle class people and academics as much as we can, but on the basis of supporting proletarian movements.

As for the possessions and benefits and any reforms that workers have currently... Well why would working class revolution diminish these things rather than make them more available (or replace them with something better) for all workers? It's capitalism which makes holding onto a decent life so hard for workers... A radical workers movement would want to ensure that we can provide for our needs without having to beg for wages on the labor market.

[Vireya]

We should appeal to them - homeless people generally aren't an economic class, they are unemployed or reserve labor. We should also appeal to middle class people and academics as much as we can, but on the basis of supporting proletarian movements.

As for the possessions and benefits and any reforms that workers have currently... Well why would working class revolution diminish these things rather than make them more available (or replace them with something better) for all workers? It's capitalism which makes holding onto a decent life so hard for workers... A radical workers movement would want to ensure that we can provide for our needs without having to beg for wages on the labor market.

Ok, but how would you avoid wage labor? Even if the MoP are communized, one would still need to work on a wagely basis, that is if the work for a large company.

[Dagoth Ur]

Yeah...no. Libertarianism has no doctrinal relation to Fascism. Fascism is about state worship or race worship, Libertarianism is about " keep da gubmint outta muh walut" and " da taxz r ebil!".
Except that libertarians fetishized pretty much all fascists from Franco to Pinochet. Also who do libertarians hate the most? Communists. What do libertarians want to do? Return to an idyllic 1950's or 1880's economy.


How is Fascism supporting the status quo? I can see your point some what from an economic standpoint, since the forms of Fascism that rose to power did reinforce capitalism (albeit in a different from),
State capitalism was nothing new or different. And while anti-liberal (simply because liberalism was blamed for the massive number of communists in German society at the time) the fascists effectively exterminated the communists in Western Europe and liberals returned to power in every nation (even in the countries where fascism wasn't rooted out through war). Fascism is a tool of the big bourgeoisie not a real ideology.


but socially its a completely different story. Fascism was more a social and cultural revolution than an economic one, Mussolini and Hitler both acknowledged that.

Mussolini: "We deny the existence of two classes, because there are many more than two classes. We deny that human history can be explained in terms of economics. We deny your internationalism. That is a luxury article which only the elevated can practise, because peoples are passionately bound to their native soil."

Hilter: "The Economy is something of secondary importance."
You shouldn't read too much into what idealists who don't understand the world at all write down. The so-called "social" revolution just means killing commies and returning to an idealized point in the past (the two main hallmarks of a fascist and two distinct qualities of the Libertarian).

[Jimmie Higgins]

Ok, but how would you avoid wage labor? Even if the MoP are communized, one would still need to work on a wagely basis, that is if the work for a large company.
I think this is an assumption and i'm not sure what you are basing it on or what conditions this would apply to, so i apologize in advance if my response is miss characterizing your argument. but if i'm understanding you here, i think that if people are compensated through some kind of currency or credit after a revolution, that is not the same as competing for wage work on the labor market.

In the labor market, individual workers need some kind of wage to survive because they have no other means to do so really (maybe the black market). The capitalist however just needs some workers, but not particular individual workers. They also strive to de-skill tasks and make workers interchangeable. So when workers compete for jobs there is an inherent downward pressure on wages. If production was collectively controlled and managed, then workers are not in competition and a wage is merely compensation (and IMO, even this does not need to be permanent but can eventually be done away with).

[Sotionov]

No the MoP and Capital are synonymous.
No.
Marx, Capital:
"We know that the means of production and subsistence, while they remain the property of the immediate producer, are not capital. They become capital only under circumstances in which they serve at the same time as means of exploitation and subjection of the labourer.”

Bukharin, The ABC of Communism:
"But do machinery and buildings always take the form of capital? Certainly not. If the whole of society were a cooperative commonwealth producing everything for itself, then neither machinery nor raw materials would be capital, seeing that they would not be means for the creation of profit for a small group of rich persons. That is to say, machinery, for example, only becomes capital when it is the private property of the capitalist class, when it serves the purpose of exploiting wage labour, when it serves to produce surplus value."

Workers that own their means of production and don't exploit anyone are not capitalists or any sort or size.


The smallest bourgeoisie only exploit themselves.You're talking nonsense. It is impossible to exploit oneself just like it is impossible to steal from oneself.


We should appeal to them - homeless people generally aren't an economic class, they are unemployed or reserve labor. We should also appeal to middle class people and academics as much as we can, but on the basis of supporting proletarian movements.

As for the possessions and benefits and any reforms that workers have currently... Well why would working class revolution diminish these things rather than make them more available (or replace them with something better) for all workers? It's capitalism which makes holding onto a decent life so hard for workers... A radical workers movement would want to ensure that we can provide for our needs without having to beg for wages on the labor market.
There is no reason for non-proletarian workers (non-oppressive and non-exploitatory people) not to support anti-capitalist struggle, any more then the proletarian workers that own houses, cars etc. Moreover, some parts of the proletariat actually have a positive incentive to be anti-working class, if they are managers/ coordinators.

[mo7amEd]

I didn't read all the comments, but I did read the thread post, and it is interesting indeed.

I do see fascism as extremely right wing for several reasons, and I am sure people before me have brought up many valid points.

What I want to add is that Fascism (and it's history) serves a very good lesson for me, as I am sure I would be VERY receptive for this ideology had it not been for what I know of it today. Take Iraq (my homecountry) and Syria for instance, other Middle eastern countries. In the 20s and 30s, Iraq had a very large communist movement in the country, and all progressives (or anti-religious, anti-monarchist, pro-secularist etc) would join a leftist movement if they were interested in change, they did so UNTIL the birth of Arab nationalism/Arab socialism (which drew probably all of their inspiration from Fascism and National Socialism/Nazism from Europe at the time). All of the sudden you had a movement that was anti-establishment, pro-"development", pro-secularist, pro-"workers' rights" AND nationalistic in nature. Imagine all Arab intellecuals that see their lands being split up between the Imperialists, while they know history of Arab golden ages. Of course the nationalistic feelings will start to develop, and all the progressive people will try to establish a new "Arab nation" to combat all the Imperialists etc. This time, all seculars etc saw the Pan-Arabs (the fascists of Middle east basically) as a more attractive anti-establishment movement than the Leftist movements. This is sad because these fascist movements came to power in Iraq and Syria (Baath party with Saddam and Assad as leaders), and they have been the biggest anti-communists in Middle east, and they all dropped their ideals and ideas AS FAST at it fitted them, and they all turned to opportunistic populist semi-fascist movements.

Wherever you see fascists claiming to be pro-workers or pro-people, you see them turn reactionary, collaborating with the elit class/upper class and populist.

Reading the first post of this thread, I can't help to see similarities between the development of Mussolini's fascism and Arab nationalism. I also can't help to see similarities between Mussolini's early life with for instance my own, as I have seen my country (Iraq) being massacred, humiliated time after time by USA, by Saudi terrorists, by Iranian paid terrorists, by Islamists etc etc. In these conditions, when you see your own people die every single day, it is not far off to develop nationalistic feelings. Fascism helps me remember that nationalism is always wrong, in every case, at every time and age and has never brought any progressive change.

------
Disclaimer: sorry for all the grammatic errors, but I don't have the energy to spellcheck :)

[Vireya]

I think this is an assumption and i'm not sure what you are basing it on or what conditions this would apply to, so i apologize in advance if my response is miss characterizing your argument. but if i'm understanding you here, i think that if people are compensated through some kind of currency or credit after a revolution, that is not the same as competing for wage work on the labor market.

In the labor market, individual workers need some kind of wage to survive because they have no other means to do so really (maybe the black market). The capitalist however just needs some workers, but not particular individual workers. They also strive to de-skill tasks and make workers interchangeable. So when workers compete for jobs there is an inherent downward pressure on wages. If production was collectively controlled and managed, then workers are not in competition and a wage is merely compensation (and IMO, even this does not need to be permanent but can eventually be done away with).

Ah, ok. That makes sense, thanks. It seems I was misunderstanding what was meant by "wage labor".

[Dagoth Ur]

@sotionov: of course they're not capitalists because capitalists privately own the MoP. When the proletariat controls the MoP we all do.

And I've always said the capital is that which produces value. Resources in the ground, empty factories, and taxis with no driver don't count as capital. Part of productive capital is in and of itself theft of the labor of proles. This is why all bourgeoisie are exploiters (and no one exploits just himself they exploit their whole family) and all proles are exploited. Anything else is simply a matter of degrees.

EDIT:
Arab Nationalism is fascism how? It was started by socialists and communists. Even ba'athism wasn't fascist in certain instances, like how in Syria it was an alliance of leftists against Islamism versus Iraq where it was an alliance of rightists against communists and Islamists.

[Vireya]

Except that libertarians fetishized pretty much all fascists from Franco to Pinochet. Also who do libertarians hate the most? Communists. What do libertarians want to do? Return to an idyllic 1950's or 1880's economy.


State capitalism was nothing new or different. And while anti-liberal (simply because liberalism was blamed for the massive number of communists in German society at the time) the fascists effectively exterminated the communists in Western Europe and liberals returned to power in every nation (even in the countries where fascism wasn't rooted out through war). Fascism is a tool of the big bourgeoisie not a real ideology.


You shouldn't read too much into what idealists who don't understand the world at all write down. The so-called "social" revolution just means killing commies and returning to an idealized point in the past (the two main hallmarks of a fascist and two distinct qualities of the Libertarian).

Ok, alot of modern socialists wank to Stalin and the USSR, doesn't make them Stalinists. Just because Libertarians thought Fascism was some kind of laissez-faire amusement park doesn't mean the two have a true connection. The Libertarians would've been purged in a Fascist state. Beyond being capitalists, they aren't allied to eachother....at all.

What...Fascist = liberals returning to power? I hope youre talking about after the war.

Oh come on, Fascism wasn't simply "kill commies", Fascism had an entirely different view of things than the regimes they replaced and the conservatives. Not only that, the Libertartians were rooted in classic liberal thought, while the Fascist arose out of nationalist strains of syndicalism.

[Popular Front of Judea]

I am curious if you point to any classical liberals that were purged strictly for their stated beliefs? Mises left Austria and then Switzerland because he was Jewish not because he feared persecution for his stated classical liberal beliefs.


Ok, alot of modern socialists wank to Stalin and the USSR, doesn't make them Stalinists. Just because Libertarians thought Fascism was some kind of laissez-faire amusement park doesn't mean the two have a true connection. The Libertarians would've been purged in a Fascist state. Beyond being capitalists, they aren't allied to eachother....at all.

[Dagoth Ur]

Ok, alot of modern socialists wank to Stalin and the USSR, doesn't make them Stalinists. Just because Libertarians thought Fascism was some kind of laissez-faire amusement park doesn't mean the two have a true connection. The Libertarians would've been purged in a Fascist state. Beyond being capitalists, they aren't allied to eachother....at all.
Nazis would purge libertarians too. The only thing that makes fascists work together is killing communists.


What...Fascist = liberals returning to power? I hope youre talking about after the war.
Check out Spain, Taiwan, South Korea, Chile, etc. Nazi Germany would have suffered the same fate.


Oh come on, Fascism wasn't simply "kill commies", Fascism had an entirely different view of things than the regimes they replaced and the conservatives. Not only that, the Libertartians were rooted in classic liberal thought, while the Fascist arose out of nationalist strains of syndicalism.
Well fascism in America would have to be based on liberalism because its our national ideology. You cannot be an American nationalist and non-liberal. And despite the various hobbies of various fascists (killing Jews for Hitler, sucking at everything for Mussolini) but the reason they were empowered by liberals, monarchists, and all other anticommunists is directly because they would kill the commies.

[mo7amEd]

EDIT:
Arab Nationalism is fascism how? It was started by socialists and communists. Even ba'athism wasn't fascist in certain instances, like how in Syria it was an alliance of leftists against Islamism versus Iraq where it was an alliance of rightists against communists and Islamists.

How is "It was started by socialists and communists." valid by itself? With that logic, fascism isn't fascism since, according to the first post of the thread, it was started to:


aim to form a popular front of pro-war leftists, from socialist veterans groups to Futurist, anarchist, nationalist, and syndicalist intellectuals.

Arab socialism, which was a word coined by Michel Aflaq (the father of Ba'a'thism), was a way to "combine" nationalism with socialism. If you see his earlier ideas, and the continuous ideas of Ba'athism, it draws a lot of influence from Italian fascism. Now, I don't know what you mean with Arab nationalism specifically, as an "Arab nationalist" can be anyone with whatever ideas and/or ideologies but is in favor of the creation of an Arab nation. However, the two biggest Pan-Arabist movements have been Ba'athism and Nasserism, the first being according to me fascist in nature, the other I have very little knowledge of tbh.

[Dagoth Ur]

Arab nationalism is only fascist if it resists communism. When it fights against imperialism, islamism, and Zionism it's self-determination.

[mo7amEd]

Arab nationalism is only fascist if it resists communism. When it fights against imperialism, islamism, and Zionism it's self-determination.

lol is that your answer? and here I am trying to put an effort to answer you. what are you really saying? are you vaguely saying that arab nationalist movements sometimes can be progressive? well, no can't, it never can, as any other nationalist movements. if anything, history teaches us that, ESPECIALLY the past 2 centuries in the ME.

[Dagoth Ur]

Except Marx, Lenin, and pretty much every other real communist disagree. Nationalism is valuable for all oppressed peoples. Until a people have sovereignty talking about anti-nationalism is infantile ultra-leftism.

[Vireya]

Nazis would purge libertarians too. The only thing that makes fascists work together is killing communists.


Check out Spain, Taiwan, South Korea, Chile, etc. Nazi Germany would have suffered the same fate.


Well fascism in America would have to be based on liberalism because its our national ideology. You cannot be an American nationalist and non-liberal. And despite the various hobbies of various fascists (killing Jews for Hitler, sucking at everything for Mussolini) but the reason they were empowered by liberals, monarchists, and all other anticommunists is directly because they would kill the commies.

For all intents and purposes Nazism and Fascism are two variants of the same philosophy, it's pointless to call them out separately unless we're critiquing Fascist doctrine and not comparing Fascism with an opposing or unrelated ideological tradition. That having been said, I'd say it is intellectually dishonest to say that Fascism's only catalyst is Communism. It probably would've risen even if the "Marxist" states of the 20th century hadn't existed. There was still plenty people disgruntled with Liberal bullshit to "fuel the fire", so to speak.

I don't understand what point you're trying to convey here. Are you trying to say liberals would eventually rise to power within a Fascist regime?

Eh....it would depend on what definition of liberalism one would be talking about. Modern American Liberalism à la the Democrats isn't what I'd call nationalist, the American Conservatives (right liberals) à la Republicans and "Libertarians" are arguably at least nominally nationalist, when there's a dollar to be made in it. We'd also need to explore if American culture is based in liberalism or the even older Enlightenment values from which liberalism sprang.

Nonetheless, such a movement could not possibly be Fascist. Fascism as an ideology opposes liberalism and the enlightenment. It would draw influence from it, and perhaps at most be "para-fascist" or "quasi-fascist". It'd be like how Social democrats were influenced by socialism, but simultaneously upholding practices Socialism opposes, there by making it pseudo-socialist capitalism.

[Sotionov]

of course they're not capitalists because capitalists privately own the MoP. When the proletariat controls the MoP we all do. You're again talking nonsense. MoP are only capital if used for exploitation. If workers that use a concrete piece of MoP, e.g. a factory, own and control that MoP, they're not capitalists, and that MoP is not capital- if those workers don't exploit anyone. There is no need for "all" to control the MoP in order for it to not be capital.

Also, if the "proletariat" control the MoP, that means that the MoP is still capital, because without the capitalists owning the MoP the workers that control it are not proletariat.

[Jimmie Higgins]

You're again talking nonsense. MoP are only capital if used for exploitation. If workers that use a concrete piece of MoP, e.g. a factory, own and control that MoP, they're not capitalists, and that MoP is not capital- if those workers don't exploit anyone. There is no need for "all" to control the MoP in order for it to not be capital.

Also, if the "proletariat" control the MoP, that means that the MoP is still capital, because without the capitalists owning the MoP the workers that control it are not proletariat.It's all in the context of a "relationship to the means of production". Prols use MoP in capitalism and would in socialism - the difference is their relation to it: they have no control over it in capitalism, they have collective democratic control over it in socialism. In capitalism the MoP are owned privitely by capitalists - small producers also own their own means of production and this is where their interests are similar - in maintaining privite ownership of the means of production. Prols have no means of production other than their own labor - collective running of the means of production, not privite ownership (or state ownership) of the MoP is the "working class interest" here.

[Sotionov]

In capitalism the MoP are owned privitely by capitalists - small producers also own their own means of production and this is where their interests are similar - in maintaining privite ownership of the means of production.Capitalists live, it is in the interest of workers to live, therefore they are both equally bad. You're making no sense. Capitalist uses the MoP to exploit, if some artisan has private property over his MoP he is not a capitalist, and doesn't have an interest in maintaining capitalism, because he doesn't exploit anyone. Society cannot abolish private property over the MoP that take one person to operate (such as artisan tools), without making the one operating it an employee subjugated to the state/society.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Capitalists live, it is in the interest of workers to live, therefore they are both equally bad. You're making no sense. Capitalist uses the MoP to exploit, if some artisan has private property over his MoP he is not a capitalist, and doesn't have an interest in maintaining capitalism, because he doesn't exploit anyone. Society cannot abolish private property over the MoP that take one person to operate (such as artisan tools), without making the one operating it an employee subjugated to the state/society.Oy! Yes capitalists and workers live, what are you talking about? If socialism was a system of deciding who lives and who dies, yes, the outcome of living would be in the interests of both classes!

But we are talking about how society produces what it needs in order to function and so capitalists and prols have a TOTALLY different relation to that process - one owns and controls and profits through exploitation, and one has no power but must participate in this process because they have no other way of making a living realistically. The small producer only doesn't exploit until he or she gets a big order from a client and then decides to hire a few others. In terms of their relationship to the way society produces, they have a small amount of autonomy as a small producer and therefore in that role, their interest is only to improve their position WITHIN capitalism. To side with the destruction of private productive property, is to go against their own class interests... they may do that more than the capitalists because they have much less control in the system and in daily life sometimes their lives are a lot like workers and they are impacted by the same SOCIAL oppressions faced by prols. But in their role in the economy, they have an interest in preserving competitive capitalist relations and property relations.

If you define "capitalist" by one who exploits without reference to HOW (i.e. the capitalist market, privite ownership of the MoP) then Aristocrats and Roman slavers are "capitalists".

[Sotionov]

I am not denyind the notion that capitalist and wage-workers have opposing interest, I am denying the notion that workers who are not wage-workers are by virtue of that - capitalist ("small-capitalist"/ "petit-bourgeois"), which they are not if they don't exploit anyone.


The small producer only doesn't exploit until he or she gets a big order from a client and then decides to hire a few others.
And prole doesn't become a capitalist until he gets a loan


their interest is only to improve their position WITHIN capitalism. To side with the destruction of private productive property, is to go against their own class interests...
No. Their interest is to ABOLISH capitalism, because they don't exploit anyone and to side with the destruction of exploitation is clearly in their interest. Also, they are in the same class as the proles- the working class.


If you define "capitalist" by one who exploits without reference to HOW
Exploitation is either by being a boss, and thereby directly making unearned income ("surplus value") from the workers, or by being a rentier and making it indirectly.


then Aristocrats and Roman slavers are "capitalists".
No, but they were exploitators.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I am not denyind the notion that capitalist and wage-workers have opposing interest, I am denying the notion that workers who are not wage-workers are by virtue of that - capitalist ("small-capitalist"/ "petit-bourgeois"), which they are not if they don't exploit anyone.What is the small producer's relationship to the means of production? They own their own means of production. What about the capitalist? They control the means of production, the processes around that, and because of that they can exploit those without their own means of production. Your argument is like saying that the tadpole and the frog have opposing interests.


And prole doesn't become a capitalist until he gets a loanUm, yeah. A prole who gains access to their own means of producing for themselves, changes his/her relationship to the means of production.


No. Their interest is to ABOLISH capitalism, because they don't exploit anyone and to side with the destruction of exploitation is clearly in their interest. Also, they are in the same class as the proles- the working class.Well some are anti-corporate, anti-big business, but they are not anti-capitalist unless they want to destroy private ownership of productive property. Since they make their living off of private ownership, they do not have an interest in getting rid of capitalism - just repairing it in an untenable way since it's not possible for modern society and population levels to exist under artisan production and single-family farming.

[/quote]No, but they were exploitators.[/QUOTE]So they are capitalists in your view since the only thing that seems to differentiate the capitalist class from other classes in society is exploitation by your argument.

Marx and most marxists have understood class as a relationship to the means of production. Small producers may live similarly and may become allies of the workers, but it would be due to factors OTHER than their relationship to the means of production - i.e. their class interests.

[Sotionov]

What is the small producer's relationship to the means of production? They own their own means of production. What about the capitalist? They control the means of production, the processes around that, and because of that they can exploit those without their own means of production. Your argument is like saying that the tadpole and the frog have opposing interests.What is the prole relationship to air? They breathe it. What about the capitalist? They breathe it. Therefore, saying that prole have the opposite interest to capitalists is like comparing tadpole and the frog.


Well some are anti-corporate, anti-big business, but they are not anti-capitalistA worker that owns the means of production is not anti-corporate and anti-big business, if those corporations and big businesses don't exploit anyone. Therefore, the workers, whether he owns or not his MoP, if he doesn't exploit anyone is acting in his interest when he is anti-capitalist and anti-ruling class in general.


unless they want to destroy private ownership of productive property. Since they make their living off of private ownership, they do not have an interest in getting rid of capitalismNon sequitur. Capitalism can be abolished with allowing the private property of MoP, in cases where MoP take one person to operate. Actually, in order for a society to become classless, such private property must be allowed, otherwise a new class society is established whethe the state/majority becomes the ruling, exploiting class.


So they are capitalists in your view since the only thing that seems to differentiate the capitalist class from other classes in society is exploitation by your argument.You asked were they capitalists. I said NO. Do you ever read what I write?


Marx and most marxists have understood class as a relationship to the means of production.And they are wrong in that being that such definition is pointless and potentially reactionary (supporting of a class society). Class is not about ownership but about hierarchical stratification of society.

[Jimmie Higgins]

What is the prole relationship to air? They breathe it. What about the capitalist? They breathe it. Therefore, saying that prole have the opposite interest to capitalists is like comparing tadpole and the frog.now you're just trolling.


Non sequitur. Capitalism can be abolished with allowing the private property of MoP, in cases where MoP take one person to operate. Actually, in order for a society to become classless, such private property must be allowed, otherwise a new class society is established whethe the state/majority becomes the ruling, exploiting class.yes, the majority does become the ruling class: socialism. Prols can produce through cooperation, private ownership is the BASIS for exploitation... This is why the enclosures happen, this is why vagabond and trespassing laws were created!


You asked were they capitalists. I said NO. Do you ever read what I write?yes I do read what you write... That's why I am so confused because there is no logical basis for your claims! You are basically arguing that the only defining feature of capitalists is exploitation, but it's the how and why of their particular exploitative process that distinguishes them as a exploiting group distinct from past exploiters.

Capitalists exploit indirectly... Why? Because of the privatization of the means of production. Aristocrats exploited directly... Why? Because people could produce and gather all by themselves, so exploitation was just the ruling class taking a cut from the peasant production through the potential use of direct force. Capitalists can exploit only because of private productive property which means that most of the population has no choice but to sell their labor. Since we need to eat, this is what allows capitalists to exploit us.


And they are wrong in that being that such definition is pointless and potentially reactionary (supporting of a class society). Class is not about ownership but about hierarchical stratification of society.And by the way marx called people in the 1860s who wished for a society run on the basis of artisan production antiquated and reactionary... Um more than a century later someone making that same argument is just absurd. Small producers can not unite because they are in competition on the market, they have no economic power and this is why when they do try and run society it tends to emerge as fascism. I don't think you are a fascist, but I think the overlap is revealed in your total fear of democracy and collective emancipation.

[Sotionov]

now you're just trolling.
If showing the irrelevancy of your analogies is trolling, then yes.


yes, the majority does become the ruling class: socialism. Sorry, I'm a gainst all class societies, and my definition of socialism is a classless society, a society without social stratification, and if you're not for that, you're a reactionary in my book.


You are basically arguing that the only defining feature of capitalists is exploitation, but it's the how and why of their particular exploitative process that distinguishes them as a exploiting group distinct from past exploiters.Yes.


Capitalists exploit indirectly... Why? Because of the privatization of the means of production.No. Private ownership of MoP (that take more then one person to operate) is the basis of direct exploitation. There are different forms of direct exploitation and they can be coupled with different forms of oppression, thereby making different exploiting classes- slaveowners, feudalists, capitalists. Indirect exploitation happens in trade- interest and rents, and is only a capitalist trait.


And by the way marx called people in the 1860s who wished for a society run on the basis of artisan production antiquated and reactionary...Marx was a technological utopian and a technocrat (along with being wrong about the fundamentals of economy and plagiarising the few good things he said from Proudhon) so his opinion is irrelevant. Of course, this comment of his was just a demagoguerist lie, being that no one really advocated a society of artisans until the catholic movement of distributism and neo-luddites showed up.


Small producers can not unite because they are in competition on the market, they have no economic power and this is why when they do try and run society it tends to emerge as fascism.They can't unite, so when they do, they produce an economy that is half-way to bolshevik state-capitalism? I don't see the logic there.


I don't think you are a fascist, but I think the overlap is revealed in your total fear of democracy and collective emancipation.I don't see the point in throwing around nonsense. I'm for a horizontalist society where everyone is emancipated from any boss except himself, and where decisions in all organizations are made (directly-) democratically, so saying stuff like you just said is plain defamation.

[Vireya]

Soti and Jimmie, this argument of yours is getting ridiculous.

The Petit Bourgeois are perfectly capable of caring for the workers and not being an asshole, but that still makes them a capitalist because of their relation to the MoP, not their attitude towards the proletariat. No matter how benevolent a PB is, he's still in a position of economic privilege over his employees and has very little power to actually change it even if he wanted to.


Also, Marx isn't some kind of god. The guy had it right about the roots of the problem, but his answers to them were lacking. People act like he invented socialism or some shit.

[bcbm]

Except Marx, Lenin, and pretty much every other real communist disagree. Nationalism is valuable for all oppressed peoples. Until a people have sovereignty talking about anti-nationalism is infantile ultra-leftism.

where is sovereignty possible?

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Except Marx, Lenin, and pretty much every other real communist disagree. Nationalism is valuable for all oppressed peoples. Until a people have sovereignty talking about anti-nationalism is infantile ultra-leftism.

Support for national liberation is not the same as support for nationalism. National liberation entails the destruction of national oppression - the special oppression of certain national groups (and not all peoples are national groups - there is for example no Romani nation). Whether that is accomplished in one unified "national" state, in several states (as in the case of the German nation), in multinational blocs etc., is perfectly irrelevant. For example, the Bolsheviks supported the national liberation of the Tatars, Kalmyks, etc., but not the bourgeois Tatar or Kalmyk nationalists that wanted to split regions inhabited by these nations from the RSFSR.

[Sotionov]

The Petit Bourgeois are perfectly capable of caring for the workers and not being an asshole, but that still makes them a capitalist because of their relation to the MoP,
What are you talking about? If there is a distinction of the "petit-bourgeois" and the workers, then they are capitalist because of their relation to the workers and MoP, and it doesn't matter that they're "petit", if they're bourgeois.

What I'm saying that term "petit-bougreois" applied to workers that own their MoP but don't exploit anyone (like artisants, peasants, and workers in workers' coops) is nonsensical, because if they don't exploit anyone they're not bourgoise, neitheir "petit" nor "grand".

[Vireya]

What are you talking about? If there is a distinction of the "petit-bourgeois" and the workers, then they are capitalist because of their relation to the workers and MoP, and it doesn't matter that they're "petit", if they're bourgeois.

What I'm saying that term "petit-bougreois" applied to workers that own their MoP but don't exploit anyone (like artisants, peasants, and workers in workers' coops) is nonsensical, because if they don't exploit anyone they're not bourgoise, neitheir "petit" nor "grand".

The petty bourgeois are bourgeois, yes, for the PoV of the proletariat there's little need for the distinction as far as combatting capitalism goes. It is only studied to understand the interplay between different strata within the capitalist class itself, understanding the enemy is important as is understanding the potential enemies within such as the lumpenproletariat.

Ok are you talking about people that are self employed and don't employ anyone else? If so, I'd personally consider them proletarian.

[Sotionov]

They're not proletarian, being that they're not exploited, but they're not capitalists/ bourgeois (big or small/ petit ou grand) being that they don't exploit anyone.

[Vireya]

They're not proletarian, being that they're not exploited, but they're not capitalists/ bourgeois (big or small/ petit ou grand) being that they don't exploit anyone.

You don't have to be exploited to be part of the proletariat, you have to be a worker. They'd be a self managing prole, the goal socialism strives for on behalf of all of the proletariat.

[Sotionov]

Not according to Marxism, whose term the proletariat is.

[Dagoth Ur]

Proletarians are defined by Marxism exclusively by their relationship to the MoP. If you live off of private property you hold you are bourgeoisie, if you live off your labor you are proletarian.

[Dagoth Ur]

For all intents and purposes Nazism and Fascism are two variants of the same philosophy, it's pointless to call them out separately unless we're critiquing Fascist doctrine and not comparing Fascism with an opposing or unrelated ideological tradition.
I would never say Nazism could be understood as anything short of Germany's version of fascism (circa 1930's, the FRG fascists were very different from their Nazi predecessors). Fascism is a specific type of reaction not a real ideology. All the idealism is just a hodgepodge of conflicting moralist nonsense not worth much investigation at all.


That having been said, I'd say it is intellectually dishonest to say that Fascism's only catalyst is Communism. It probably would've risen even if the "Marxist" states of the 20th century hadn't existed. There was still plenty people disgruntled with Liberal bullshit to "fuel the fire", so to speak.
Yeah but they're weak minded shit so the liberals win almost always. Fascism is when the most reactionary chunks of bourgeoisie and proletarian societies form a collaborationist front to kill what is threatening the "nation", "faith", or whatever else their metaphysics dream up as a God.

And how can you claim fascism would have happened without Marxism? That's a blatantly unmaterialist statement. What exists only exists because of what is around it.


I don't understand what point you're trying to convey here. Are you trying to say liberals would eventually rise to power within a Fascist regime?
They always have. History has shown that all fascist nations that weren't overthrown in war or by communists were eventually overthrown by liberals from within. This is precisely because liberals employ fascist to preserve the economic base from the threat of Marxists, sacrificing many of their own rights in the process, because as soon as the threat is over the liberals will rise to the top of the order by default. Liberalism is the master ideology of capitalism because it is the most stable political system possible under imperialism.


Eh....it would depend on what definition of liberalism one would be talking about. Modern American Liberalism à la the Democrats isn't what I'd call nationalist, the American Conservatives (right liberals) à la Republicans and "Libertarians" are arguably at least nominally nationalist, when there's a dollar to be made in it. We'd also need to explore if American culture is based in liberalism or the even older Enlightenment values from which liberalism sprang.
The Constitution and Bill of Rights are prime examples of liberal documents. The entirely of American society is liberal in a way that, to this day, no European nation even approaches. Hence the peculiar nature of our particular fascism, libertarianism. Also all supporters of capitalism are nationalists by the mere fact that they all support the necessity of borders. Not all nationalists can be painted with the same brush.


Nonetheless, such a movement could not possibly be Fascist. Fascism as an ideology opposes liberalism and the enlightenment. It would draw influence from it, and perhaps at most be "para-fascist" or "quasi-fascist". It'd be like how Social democrats were influenced by socialism, but simultaneously upholding practices Socialism opposes, there by making it pseudo-socialist capitalism.
Libertarianism flows from liberalism but hardcore ancaps and objectivist randites object to most liberal premises, like bourgeoisie democracy, equal rights before the law, and most importantly state enforcement of ideology. To be honest simply taking libertarian society to its logical conclusion looks a bunch like fascism. Warlord bourgeoisie with armies of thugs keeping contract-slave workers in bondage.


where is sovereignty possible?
In western bourgeoisie countries the nation is being oppressed by no one. These nations oppress each other sure but that doesn't invalidate the soverign powers of the nation over itself.

[Orange Juche]

This isn't something that a vote decides, facts aren't democratic. We can vote whether or not the sun is purple, if YES gets an overwhelming majority, it still isn't. Fascism is right wing, whether or not someone (or everyone) agrees doesn't change that.

[Ismail]

They always have. History has shown that all fascist nations that weren't overthrown in war or by communists were eventually overthrown by liberals from within. This is precisely because liberals employ fascist to preserve the economic base from the threat of Marxists, sacrificing many of their own rights in the process, because as soon as the threat is over the liberals will rise to the top of the order by default. Liberalism is the master ideology of capitalism because it is the most stable political system possible under imperialism.I am reminded of this quote (originally written in 1927):

“Against the weapons of the Bolsheviks, weapons must be used in reprisal, and it would be a mistake to display weakness before murderers. . . . Fascism can triumph today because universal indignation at the infamies committed by the socialists and communists has obtained for it the sympathies of wide circles. . . . It cannot be denied that Fascism and similar movements aiming at the establishment of dictatorships are full of the best intentions and that their intervention has, for the moment, saved European civilization. The merit that Fascism has thereby won for itself will live on eternally in history. But though its policy has brought salvation for the moment, it is not of the kind which could promise continued success. Fascism was an emergency makeshift. To view it as something more would be a fatal error.”
(Ludwig Von Mises. Liberalism: A Socio-Economic Exposition. Kansas City, MO: Sheed Andrews and McMeel. 1978. pp. 49-51.)

Replace "European civilization" with capitalism and you just about have the Marxist view of Fascism.

[Popular Front of Judea]

Note I just thanked you Ismail.

[TheEmancipator]

This isn't something that a vote decides, facts aren't democratic. We can vote whether or not the sun is purple, if YES gets an overwhelming majority, it still isn't. Fascism is right wing, whether or not someone (or everyone) agrees doesn't change that.

But left-wing and right-wing spectrums are also a matter of perspective. As I said earlier, some people in America associate fascism with the left because they've been spoonfed the "similarities" between fascism and communism.

In Europe fascism has always been associated with the right perhaps because of the clear anti-communist nature of it as well as Europe always have the age old reactionary vs progressive as left and right instead of conservative vs liberal, the latter not really allowing space for fascism and communism.

All in all, left wing and right wing are usually decided by those oppose the ideology in question rather than hard facts. I would not say I am "left-wing" for example, but I know that most who would meet me and discuss my views would label me that. Nowadays the only reason politicians use these terms is because they know they can attract their tribalistic automatons to the polling station. Hence why "left-wing" Socialist Parties in Europe still attract so many lefties even though they are just a liberal party in disguise.

The position of an ideology really depends on the ideological position of the people judging it.

[Brutus]

Ismail (or Von Mises) just summed fascism up fantastically. Paul Preston sums up the western democracies attitude to fascism rather well: they wanted fascism to turn its gaze eastward in order to combat the Bolshevist threat, thus Blaldwin's non-intervention pact in the SCW, and his nonchalance at someone associated with fascist Italy buying all of the planes available on the commercial market in Britain, when it was obvious they we destined for Franco

[Comrade #138672]

Interesting discussion. Although the TS is either a fascist sympathizer or a troll.

[bcbm]

In western bourgeoisie countries the nation is being oppressed by no one. These nations oppress each other sure but that doesn't invalidate the soverign powers of the nation over itself.

not on a national basis, though some greeks and others in the european south may disagree. and in any case these countries are part of the global workings of capitalism and subject to it so i don't think a true 'sovereignty' is possible in these conditions

[Dagoth Ur]

"True sovereignty" is idealism. Sovereignty is simply the ability to resist being coerced into submitting your nation to another. Most nations are coerced to some level or another but most of the western ones do the coercing the most. Imperial nations have sovereignty.