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They broke the labor unions, and sent union organizers to the concentration camps—they were among the first to go. They employed mass slave labor. They collabor
by alabastervlog 1y ago
They broke the labor unions, and sent union organizers to the concentration camps—they were among the first to go. They employed mass slave labor. They collaborated closely with and enriched capital owners. Collectivism wasn't a feature of their government.
They weren't socialist at all. It's a common talking point from modern fascist apologists (I'm not accusing you of being one—this nonsense leaks out into the popular culture and just gets picked up by accident, too) but it has zero basis in reality if you run down a list of what they did. It doesn't remotely look like what an even lightly-socialist-leaning government would do. Such claims are always supported by pointing at the name (LOL. LMFAO.), making things up, and maybe cherry-picking a couple things that seem socialist-ish if you squint really hard and don't put them in context. There's some early rhetoric about it, but zero action, that was just a cynical appeal to populism, usually accompanied with attempts to redefine socialism itself to mean not-socialism—they wanted the word, but not the meaning.
- ty6853 1y agoThe 'communist' countries generally did these same things. The russians famously just straight up executed anarcho-communists and competing socialist factions and any union of persons associated with such. They employed essentially slave labor in the fields, taxing their grain to the point they could hardly survive. Party bosses were the 'capital' owners enjoying private cars, prime apartments, and de facto private ownership of the fruits of the working class. Of course there is no real communism, there is no real socialism, and there is no real fascism. Nevertheless if I'm talking to some guy on a street I'll understand what he means if talks about com-bloc eastern europe or asia, and I understood OP was referring to communist countries in the way in which the term is typically used.
- dragonwriter 1y ago> The 'communist' countries generally did these same things. There's a reason that Communists that don't follow Leninism or its derivatives tend to view the countries that call themselves “Communist” (all of which follow Leninism or one of its derivatives) as only rhetorically socialist in system and substantively state capitalist at best, as they are run by a narrow and self-perpetuating elites exploiting the working class through, among other means, control of the non-financial means of production.
- Anthony-G 1y agoI don’t know why you’re being downvoted because what you say is correct. As a socialist, I can’t really disagree with what you other than “there’s no real facism” but I guess what you mean by that is something like Mussolini’s vision for society differed from what he actually presided over after the fascists achieved state power.
- tlogan 1y agoThe real labor unions were also banned in communist countries. Labor unions in communist countries were directly controlled by the Communist Party.
- Der_Einzige 1y agoI hate that all the bluster about "socialist or non socialist" doesn't bring up the evidence for each side. It's very much a "it started socialist but they were used and quickly purged from the party" situation. 1. Evidence for socialism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beefsteak_Nazi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beefsteak_Nazi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strasserism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strasserism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_R%C3%B6hm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_R%C3%B6hm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturmabteilung https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturmabteilung 2. Evidence against socialism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Long_Knives https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Long_Knives https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mefo_bills https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mefo_bills https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_Meeting_of_20_February_1933 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_Meeting_of_20_February_... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrielleneingabe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrielleneingabe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freundeskreis_der_Wirtschaft https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freundeskreis_der_Wirtschaft https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_sector_participation_in_Nazi_crimes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_sector_participation_i...
- cess11 1y agoBy socialism they meant nationalism way, way earlier than the Night of the Long Knives. See for example this pamphlet: https://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/haken32.htm https://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/haken3...
- Anthony-G 1y agoThat’s some good propaganda! As much as I disagree with him and his views, Goebbels sure was a skilled polemicist. The German Propaganda Archive is an excellent historical resource that I wasn’t aware of until now. Thanks for the link!
- cess11 1y agoRandall Bytwerk has produced some books as well, you might be interested in his work on Julius Streicher.