4 ms·

Absolutely true, and well said. Communism and fascism have always been two heads of the same hydra. They always appear together, and vie for the same radicals a

by seneca 1y ago

Absolutely true, and well said. Communism and fascism have always been two heads of the same hydra. They always appear together, and vie for the same radicals as potential followers. Benito Mussolini himself was originally a Marxist revolutionary.

larkost 1y ago
I have a hard time with this, and I don't think that you understand the word fascism well enough. Rather I think that what you really mean is that Communism has always wound up in authoritarianism. Fascism of course starts in authoritarianism, and I think that is where you get confused. So some definitions: Authoritarianism: a political system where a smaller group winds up with power, often with a military (or a monopoly on violence) to enforce that power. Often characterized by laws that are selectively enforced one some people, or "some who the law protects but does not bind, and others that the law binds but does not protect". Communism: a philosophy of government where the government holds the "means of production" in the name of the people. In practice this devolves into a singular group ("the Party"), controlled by relatively few people deciding what is best for people, and this usually winds up in authoritarianism in anything larger than a small community (where individual social pressure can keep it in check). Fascism: a philosophy of government that starts with authoritarianism, but goes hard into picking out groups of people from within the country as "the enemy" and blames all of a societies ills on those people (Mussolini picked socialists and labor unions first, Hitler also started with socialists and the disabled before moving on to Poles, Gypsies, Jews, and others). Part of this is also picking a chosen people, and creating a nationalist image around those people (True Italians for Mussolini, "Aryans" for Hitler), while at the same time projecting those people as the victims of the minority that is being blamed. Violence against these enemies is justified as being right (often in religious terms), and any check on that violence is portrayed as evil (e.g.: due process). So the Soviet Union was actually less fascist than the U.S. was at the time (not saying the U.S. was fascist, but we certainly blamed black people for a lot). E.g.: the U.S.S.R. often mostly-correctly propagandized how much better the few black people that were in their country were treated. But the Soviet Union certainly was more authoritarian than the U.S. was.

by seneca 1y ago

larkost 1y ago

I have a hard time with this, and I don't think that you understand the word fascism well enough. Rather I think that what you really mean is that Communism has always wound up in authoritarianism. Fascism of course starts in authoritarianism, and I think that is where you get confused. So some definitions: Authoritarianism: a political system where a smaller group winds up with power, often with a military (or a monopoly on violence) to enforce that power. Often characterized by laws that are selectively enforced one some people, or "some who the law protects but does not bind, and others that the law binds but does not protect". Communism: a philosophy of government where the government holds the "means of production" in the name of the people. In practice this devolves into a singular group ("the Party"), controlled by relatively few people deciding what is best for people, and this usually winds up in authoritarianism in anything larger than a small community (where individual social pressure can keep it in check). Fascism: a philosophy of government that starts with authoritarianism, but goes hard into picking out groups of people from within the country as "the enemy" and blames all of a societies ills on those people (Mussolini picked socialists and labor unions first, Hitler also started with socialists and the disabled before moving on to Poles, Gypsies, Jews, and others). Part of this is also picking a chosen people, and creating a nationalist image around those people (True Italians for Mussolini, "Aryans" for Hitler), while at the same time projecting those people as the victims of the minority that is being blamed. Violence against these enemies is justified as being right (often in religious terms), and any check on that violence is portrayed as evil (e.g.: due process). So the Soviet Union was actually less fascist than the U.S. was at the time (not saying the U.S. was fascist, but we certainly blamed black people for a lot). E.g.: the U.S.S.R. often mostly-correctly propagandized how much better the few black people that were in their country were treated. But the Soviet Union certainly was more authoritarian than the U.S. was.