7 ms·

Mods, can we get a (1995) on here?

by syntheticnature 10y ago

Florin_Andrei 10y ago
Sure, but the ideas described are largely timeless.
- ChuckMcM 10y ago
  I think it is important to understand that this was in 1995 looking forward, as opposed to trying to create things that describe the current situation and cherry picking details to fit the narrative. I have often expressed the opinion that Donald Trump's campaign, and his vision for the country, is reflective of a fascist ideology. That is hard for someone to hear who doesn't consider themselves a fascist but supports Trump because it challenges them to see that both statements that they hold to be true, can not be true. To sway their feeling of cognitive dissonance they attack the facts and assert bias and cherry picking. Umberto Eco knows nothing of Trump's campaign as he writes, so he cannot be cherry picking his facts out of the current affairs. That is why I consider it important to know this was written in 1995.
  - cpr 10y ago
    Actually, what we have now in the US is full blown fascism, which technically means the government and corporations together in a "fasces," a bundle of sticks. Calls for caution in the face of the madness of our current immigration and essentially open borders, and for taking radical Islamism seriously, don't amount to anything like fascism.
    - tdb7893 10y ago
      Wikipedia has different definitions (example below). I don’t know where you get your definition from. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism “a genus of political ideology whose mythic core in its various permutations is a palingenetic form of populist ultranationalism”
      - frabbit 10y ago
        http://marxism.halkcephesi.net/Antonio%20Gramsci/1924/11/democracy_fascism.htm http://marxism.halkcephesi.net/Antonio%20Gramsci/1924/11/dem... "[F]ascism and democracy are two aspects of a single reality, two different forms of a single activity: the activity which the bourgeois class carries out to halt the proletarian class on its path[.]"
        AnimalMuppet 10y ago
        Yeah, well, I'll actually believe Wikipedia over Gramsci on the question of what Fascism is...
        frabbit 10y ago
        Yeah, no point straining yourself by reading an analysis by someone who was actually around at the time and locked up by the fascists for opposing them. After all, you have your part to play in maintaining the hegemony. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Gramsci#Imprisonment_and_death https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Gramsci#Imprisonment_a...
        AnimalMuppet 10y ago
        Yeah, but Gramsci is not an unbiased observer. He's going to have a very ideologically biased view of many things, fascism among them.
  - flubert 10y ago
    >That is hard for someone to hear who doesn't consider themselves a fascist but supports Trump because it challenges them to see that both statements that they hold to be true, can not be true. To sway their feeling of cognitive dissonance they attack the facts and assert bias and cherry picking. I wonder what people's thoughts are about a "crying wolf" type of phenomena developing? What if people just started shrugging their shoulders, and saying if I support Trump and that's fascist, then I'm a fascist, oh well? Kind of like "racism" as a term is starting to lose its sting. People just say, "I thought everyone was racist", and "I thought there is no such thing as race (so therefore you can't be a racist)".
    - theorique 10y ago
      I wonder what people's thoughts are about a "crying wolf" type of phenomena developing? What if people just started shrugging their shoulders, and saying if I support Trump and that's fascist, then I'm a fascist, oh well? Kind of like "racism" as a term is starting to lose its sting. People just say, "I thought everyone was racist", and "I thought there is no such thing as race (so therefore you can't be a racist)". I definitely believe this is happening. The Left is overplaying their hand because their targeted adversary is doing reasonably (and unexpectedly) well. So they are deploying out the big words like "racist" and "sexist" and now, "fascist". And lots of American voters are reading his platform and policies and thinking, "hmm, that policy seems like common sense - does that mean that (1) the Left is in error in labeling Trump a fascist or (2) I, myself, am a fascist and maybe fascism is not really that bad?" Ultimately, a single word is too reductive to apply to a candidate and his policies. But lots of voters are too lazy to read or listen to full sentences and paragraphs, so we are locked into these simplifications.
      - Florin_Andrei 10y ago
        > But lots of voters are too lazy to read or listen to full sentences and paragraphs, so we are locked into these simplifications. I would say you could take it for granted that a large majority of people are like that most of the time. And I think it's very likely that this phenomenon was consciously and cynically exploited, and therefore facilitated the lowering of standards and the rise of bullshit in American politics in the last 20 years or so.
  - Florin_Andrei 10y ago
    Oh, I agree 100%. I read the previous comment as "that article is too old". But yes, it's precisely how old it is that makes it relevant now.
    - syntheticnature 10y ago
      Oh, it was more along the lines of "Okay, and we're slowly getting to the Trump bit...?" before I myself realized that the article was of legal drinking age in the US. So closer to your and ChuckMcM's thinking, though it didn't come across in my comment requesting the year be added.

Mods, can we get a (1995) on here?

Florin_Andrei 10y ago

Sure, but the ideas described are largely timeless.

ChuckMcM 10y ago
I think it is important to understand that this was in 1995 looking forward, as opposed to trying to create things that describe the current situation and cherry picking details to fit the narrative. I have often expressed the opinion that Donald Trump's campaign, and his vision for the country, is reflective of a fascist ideology. That is hard for someone to hear who doesn't consider themselves a fascist but supports Trump because it challenges them to see that both statements that they hold to be true, can not be true. To sway their feeling of cognitive dissonance they attack the facts and assert bias and cherry picking. Umberto Eco knows nothing of Trump's campaign as he writes, so he cannot be cherry picking his facts out of the current affairs. That is why I consider it important to know this was written in 1995.
- cpr 10y ago
  Actually, what we have now in the US is full blown fascism, which technically means the government and corporations together in a "fasces," a bundle of sticks. Calls for caution in the face of the madness of our current immigration and essentially open borders, and for taking radical Islamism seriously, don't amount to anything like fascism.
  - tdb7893 10y ago
    Wikipedia has different definitions (example below). I don’t know where you get your definition from. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism “a genus of political ideology whose mythic core in its various permutations is a palingenetic form of populist ultranationalism”
    - frabbit 10y ago
      http://marxism.halkcephesi.net/Antonio%20Gramsci/1924/11/democracy_fascism.htm http://marxism.halkcephesi.net/Antonio%20Gramsci/1924/11/dem... "[F]ascism and democracy are two aspects of a single reality, two different forms of a single activity: the activity which the bourgeois class carries out to halt the proletarian class on its path[.]"
      - AnimalMuppet 10y ago
        Yeah, well, I'll actually believe Wikipedia over Gramsci on the question of what Fascism is...
        frabbit 10y ago
        Yeah, no point straining yourself by reading an analysis by someone who was actually around at the time and locked up by the fascists for opposing them. After all, you have your part to play in maintaining the hegemony. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Gramsci#Imprisonment_and_death https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Gramsci#Imprisonment_a...
        AnimalMuppet 10y ago
        Yeah, but Gramsci is not an unbiased observer. He's going to have a very ideologically biased view of many things, fascism among them.
- flubert 10y ago
  >That is hard for someone to hear who doesn't consider themselves a fascist but supports Trump because it challenges them to see that both statements that they hold to be true, can not be true. To sway their feeling of cognitive dissonance they attack the facts and assert bias and cherry picking. I wonder what people's thoughts are about a "crying wolf" type of phenomena developing? What if people just started shrugging their shoulders, and saying if I support Trump and that's fascist, then I'm a fascist, oh well? Kind of like "racism" as a term is starting to lose its sting. People just say, "I thought everyone was racist", and "I thought there is no such thing as race (so therefore you can't be a racist)".
  - theorique 10y ago
    I wonder what people's thoughts are about a "crying wolf" type of phenomena developing? What if people just started shrugging their shoulders, and saying if I support Trump and that's fascist, then I'm a fascist, oh well? Kind of like "racism" as a term is starting to lose its sting. People just say, "I thought everyone was racist", and "I thought there is no such thing as race (so therefore you can't be a racist)". I definitely believe this is happening. The Left is overplaying their hand because their targeted adversary is doing reasonably (and unexpectedly) well. So they are deploying out the big words like "racist" and "sexist" and now, "fascist". And lots of American voters are reading his platform and policies and thinking, "hmm, that policy seems like common sense - does that mean that (1) the Left is in error in labeling Trump a fascist or (2) I, myself, am a fascist and maybe fascism is not really that bad?" Ultimately, a single word is too reductive to apply to a candidate and his policies. But lots of voters are too lazy to read or listen to full sentences and paragraphs, so we are locked into these simplifications.
    - Florin_Andrei 10y ago
      > But lots of voters are too lazy to read or listen to full sentences and paragraphs, so we are locked into these simplifications. I would say you could take it for granted that a large majority of people are like that most of the time. And I think it's very likely that this phenomenon was consciously and cynically exploited, and therefore facilitated the lowering of standards and the rise of bullshit in American politics in the last 20 years or so.
- Florin_Andrei 10y ago
  Oh, I agree 100%. I read the previous comment as "that article is too old". But yes, it's precisely how old it is that makes it relevant now.
  - syntheticnature 10y ago
    Oh, it was more along the lines of "Okay, and we're slowly getting to the Trump bit...?" before I myself realized that the article was of legal drinking age in the US. So closer to your and ChuckMcM's thinking, though it didn't come across in my comment requesting the year be added.