7 ms·

There's a one-word shortcut for all that: fascism.

hypeatei 8mo ago
That word makes a lot of people uncomfortable and many will shut their brains off when they see it. It's a perfect word to describe what's happening, but sometimes describing the characteristics of it is better for engagement. There are a lot of reactionaries in today's political landscape.
- Ygg2 8mo ago
  > It's a perfect word to describe what's happening I don't think it really fits, but the US is sliding towards illiberal democracy.
  - hypeatei 8mo ago
    Ultra nationalist, cult of personality, using violence to suppress opposition... you don't see any parallels, really? EDIT: Illiberalism is a tenet of fascism as well.
    - gadflyinyoureye 8mo ago
      You forgot to couple with that the oligarchy. https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746 https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746 So yes, the US has enough of the hallmarks to be considered a fascist state. It doesn't need to tick every single box for that title. Edit from Wikipedia: Fascism (/ˈfæʃɪzəm/ FASH-iz-əm) is a far-right, authoritarian, and ultranationalist political ideology and movement that rose to prominence in early-20th-century Europe.[1][2][3] Fascism is characterized by support for a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy, subordination of individual interests for the perceived interest of the nation or race, and strong regimentation of society and the economy.[3][4] Opposed to communism, democracy, liberalism, pluralism, and socialism,[5][6] fascism is at the far-right of the traditional left–right spectrum.[1][6][7] What constitutes a precise definition of fascism has been a longrunning and complex debate among scholars.
      - Ygg2 8mo ago
        Ok, but what are the hallmarks of a fascist state?
        maxfurman 8mo ago
        Look up "On Fascism" by Umberto Eco, it's not that long and was written long enough ago that you can't say it was influenced by any of our current leaders.
        Ygg2 8mo ago
        I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Umberto Eco is a great writer, but whenever his list of ways to describe Blackshirts comes up, it fails. First, it's very fuzzy. You don't have to have all aspects, but many aspects are present in many systems without it being outright fascist. --- Is 5 out of 14 enough to make something fascist? Are "Appeal to a frustrated middle class", "Fascist societies rhetorically cast their enemies as 'at the same time too strong and too weak'", "Newspeak" and "Obsession with a plot" enough? I think it confuses rhetorical devices like "Fascist societies rhetorically cast their enemies as 'at the same time too strong and too weak'" and "Newspeak" as hallmarks of Fascism when they are just a tool. George Orwell famously pointed that calling things "fascist" and "Nazi" is in itself an example of Newspeak, because it's not used to describe a government system that is far-right, authoritarian, and extremely xenophobic, but it's used as a label to say something is Bad™. It also confuses its populist roots and enemies at the time. "The cult of action for action's sake," and especially anti-intellectualism. --- Like take Starship Troopers, an extremely fascistic society. Let's score it on Eco's scale. It definitely has "Rejection of Modernism", "Disagreement is treason", "Cult of action", "Fear of Difference", "Life is Warfare", "Everybody is a hero", and "Newspeak". So 7/14. - Cult of tradition doesn't exist that much per se. Granted, I could have missed it. - Appeal to the frustrated middle class; as far as we see, there isn't one . - Obsession with plot isn't really a thing, because the Bugs aren't really a plot; they are a clear and present danger. The internal enemies if any aren't mentioned. - Casting enemies as "at the same time too strong and too weak." Bugs are shown more or less realistically, they are a difficult enemy that can be defeated. - "Selective populism". It's not so much selective populism as state enforced labor to gain citizenship. - "Contempt for the weak" there isn't much out-group to belong to. The Terran Federation covers the globe, and almost everyone is a citizen. There isn't any contempt for underlings, even if there are military cross branch out-groups. Like real world counterparts jarheads, squids and wingnut. - If Machismo exists, it's mutated to cover both sexes. Granted, I might have missed a few, but still, shouldn't Eco's 14 traits light up more for a more fascistic society?
    - Ygg2 8mo ago
      Sure, I see ultranationalism. And if I squint, I can see that a huge chunk of the US population is pro-Trump, but that's not culty overall. You can still speak against him, as far as I can tell. Compare this to, say, Mao Zedong. If you spoke against him, your life was forfeit, and even that's not fascism. If this is one of those fuzzy definitions, it definitely isn't on the strong side. Where is the rampant militarism, the worship of death, and of the military?
      - miltonlost 8mo ago
        > Where is the rampant militarism ICE
      - hypeatei 8mo ago
        > rampant militarism, the worship of death, and of the military? See: the recent events in Minneapolis and the massive increase in funding for ICE. You don't have to look very hard to see what the new brownshirts are doing in blue cities and the MAGAs covering for them. Oh also the federalization of the National Guard and US Marine deployment to Los Angeles. Things move quickly and people forget but that's exactly their playbook: flooding the zone with so much shit that it's hard to keep track.
      - voidUpdate 8mo ago
        There's been quite a lot of worship of the military in america... Also haven't armed forces been deployed domestically a few times in the current presidency?
        Ygg2 8mo ago
        Sure, but Trump was not campaigning on that; if anything he campaigned on being the most peaceful president. Hitler didn't campaign on honoring treaty of Versallies, and avoiding war with neighbors.
        voidUpdate 8mo ago
        And yet, off the top of my head, he has started as many wars as Hitler has
  - Spivak 8mo ago
    Fascism isn't really a form of government though, it's a political ideology and aesthetics that we see echoed through different regimes. You can be a democracy on paper while in practice being a single party corporate oligarchy with a cult of personality surrounding the head of state. Ur-Fascism describes the ideology of MAGA exactly. Clearly there's some apprehension admitting this, it's a strong-man political ideology that has evolved many times organically throughout history. It doesn't necessarily imply that the regime is bad or evil or anything but the problem ends up being that the term exists because governments that adopt this ideology end up converging on the same unsavory behaviors despite any initial differences. That convergence is I think what a lot of Americans are afraid of because we're already doing most of them.
eastbound 8mo ago
[flagged]
- sixothree 8mo ago
  Your usage of "Your side" is telling. It seems like this is a team sport for you and you've picked a side. Unfortunately you might have sided with fascists.
- freejazz 8mo ago
  "Your side"
  - eastbound 8mo ago
    So how do we respect each other’s ideals AND make peace?
    - freejazz 8mo ago
      Probably by not starting with "your side"
- hypeatei 8mo ago
  Isn't this a delightful Catch-22. If you forewarn about a developing Fascist movement, you're simply taking away the meaning from the word until it's too late and the Fascists take power. You cannot call anything Fascist, for there may be something more Fascist that may need the power of the word. But ah! We couldn't call out their fledgling movement full of dog whistles and double speak so no one was aware enough to stop them as a fledgling movement! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45349597 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45349597
- mmustapic 8mo ago
  Ah, yes, let's concede just a bit of fascism, not a lot.
- righthand 8mo ago
  Yeah the other side doesn’t over use socialism or communism or terrorist. And conservatives haven’t been refusing to make concessions in Congress and the Senate for decades.
rayiner 8mo ago
The irony is that almost every single one of the countries these foreigners come from would do exactly the same thing were the shoe on the other foot. If running government-funded research to maximize the opportunities for native born people is “fascism,” then every country in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East is “fascist.” Borderless universalism is a niche idea even in the west, and virtually non-existent outside it.
- satao 8mo ago
  you present a lot of conviction yet there is not a single source for your opinion that was presented.
  - busterarm 8mo ago
    He's from one of those countries.
- 5upplied_demand 8mo ago
  Imagine using this logic in the 1930s when scientists from Germany, Hungary, and Italy were flocking to the US. Did the advances they helped spur actually maximize opportunities for native born people in the long run? Would we be better off if we had blocked them from researching in the US?
- tzs 8mo ago
  > The irony is that almost every single one of the countries these foreigners come from would do exactly the same thing were the shoe on the other foot. I'm having a hard imagining Canada, Australia, New Zealand, France, Norway, Switzerland, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, or Italy, to name a few countries of the countries from which scientists have come to work on NIST projects putting these kind of restrictions on American scientists coming to work on non-classified research at their labs.
bregma 8mo ago
[flagged]
- t-3 8mo ago
  > Government interference in people's lives is socialism. No, that's called 'governance'. Literally the whole job of government is interfering in people's lives.
- 0x696C6961 8mo ago
  No man, that's called an oligarchy.
- deleted 8mo ago
  [deleted]
- ErroneousBosh 8mo ago
  Sounds like you're not a fan of socialism. How's it working out for you, spending a third of your income on rent but not actually having any rights to stay in the property you rent, and a further third on "health insurance" that'll take your money and run, leaving you to choose between a lifetime of debt or just plain dying if you ever get ill?
sgnelson 8mo ago
Got to love the fact that a large amount of users of HN still refuse to see the truth before their very eyes.
- epolanski 8mo ago
  The issue is that when people start abusing words like "fascism" out of context they make those words lose meaning. The US is definitely undergoing authoritarian tendencies, but it remains structurally constrained by separation of powers, federalism, and independent courts and media, features that fascist regimes systematically dismantle. If you start calling everything fascism you are essentially helping those you call fascists because they can easily refute your thesis and gaslight you on the very realities of the authoritarian descent the country is going through.
  - throwaway173738 8mo ago
    What do you call it when the authoritarians start, then? Are we not allowed to call it that until we’re not allowed to go to the courts or to speak about what’s happening?
    - epolanski 8mo ago
      You call it for what it is: an executive with authoritarian tendencies. Democracy is not an on/off light bulb, it's a material under constant stress that can bend a lot before breaking. But if you start calling it broken, while it's bending your thesis is easily refutable and you get called out for being a radical whatever.
      - hypeatei 8mo ago
        > You call it for what it is: an executive with authoritarian tendencies. Okay, but that's beating around the bush and a very milquetoast way to describe it. > easily refutable and you get called out for being a radical whatever. This is equivalent to being punched repeatedly by a bully and being scared that he'll cry "assault!" when you punch him back. At some point, you cease to exist if you don't act.
HelloNurse 8mo ago
As an example of the likely future of science in the USA, read about Trofim Lysenko.
1234letshaveatw 8mo ago
[flagged]
- plaidthunder 8mo ago
  There are generous ways to interpret a critique of "redditification". 1. An increase in comments that aim to gather social approval as opposed to advancing a conversation or sharing knowledge -- often including meta commentary on threads e.g., "reddit moment". 2. Topics start to become more general and lose the tech/startup scene focus of the site. These are legitimate. Reddit threads are stereotypically full of noise and HN should avoid that. However there's a third form of the critique that I think should be avoided. 3. Too many comments seem to reflect values and worldviews rooted in [socially] liberal ideals. Because of this, it's probably useful to give some context for what in particular constitutes "redditifcation". That way dang and any other mods can try to address it with particular policy decisions.

That word makes a lot of people uncomfortable and many will shut their brains off when they see it. It's a perfect word to describe what's happening, but sometimes describing the characteristics of it is better for engagement. There are a lot of reactionaries in today's political landscape.

Ygg2 8mo ago
> It's a perfect word to describe what's happening I don't think it really fits, but the US is sliding towards illiberal democracy.
- hypeatei 8mo ago
  Ultra nationalist, cult of personality, using violence to suppress opposition... you don't see any parallels, really? EDIT: Illiberalism is a tenet of fascism as well.
  - gadflyinyoureye 8mo ago
    You forgot to couple with that the oligarchy. https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746 https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746 So yes, the US has enough of the hallmarks to be considered a fascist state. It doesn't need to tick every single box for that title. Edit from Wikipedia: Fascism (/ˈfæʃɪzəm/ FASH-iz-əm) is a far-right, authoritarian, and ultranationalist political ideology and movement that rose to prominence in early-20th-century Europe.[1][2][3] Fascism is characterized by support for a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy, subordination of individual interests for the perceived interest of the nation or race, and strong regimentation of society and the economy.[3][4] Opposed to communism, democracy, liberalism, pluralism, and socialism,[5][6] fascism is at the far-right of the traditional left–right spectrum.[1][6][7] What constitutes a precise definition of fascism has been a longrunning and complex debate among scholars.
    - Ygg2 8mo ago
      Ok, but what are the hallmarks of a fascist state?
      - maxfurman 8mo ago
        Look up "On Fascism" by Umberto Eco, it's not that long and was written long enough ago that you can't say it was influenced by any of our current leaders.
        Ygg2 8mo ago
        I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Umberto Eco is a great writer, but whenever his list of ways to describe Blackshirts comes up, it fails. First, it's very fuzzy. You don't have to have all aspects, but many aspects are present in many systems without it being outright fascist. --- Is 5 out of 14 enough to make something fascist? Are "Appeal to a frustrated middle class", "Fascist societies rhetorically cast their enemies as 'at the same time too strong and too weak'", "Newspeak" and "Obsession with a plot" enough? I think it confuses rhetorical devices like "Fascist societies rhetorically cast their enemies as 'at the same time too strong and too weak'" and "Newspeak" as hallmarks of Fascism when they are just a tool. George Orwell famously pointed that calling things "fascist" and "Nazi" is in itself an example of Newspeak, because it's not used to describe a government system that is far-right, authoritarian, and extremely xenophobic, but it's used as a label to say something is Bad™. It also confuses its populist roots and enemies at the time. "The cult of action for action's sake," and especially anti-intellectualism. --- Like take Starship Troopers, an extremely fascistic society. Let's score it on Eco's scale. It definitely has "Rejection of Modernism", "Disagreement is treason", "Cult of action", "Fear of Difference", "Life is Warfare", "Everybody is a hero", and "Newspeak". So 7/14. - Cult of tradition doesn't exist that much per se. Granted, I could have missed it. - Appeal to the frustrated middle class; as far as we see, there isn't one . - Obsession with plot isn't really a thing, because the Bugs aren't really a plot; they are a clear and present danger. The internal enemies if any aren't mentioned. - Casting enemies as "at the same time too strong and too weak." Bugs are shown more or less realistically, they are a difficult enemy that can be defeated. - "Selective populism". It's not so much selective populism as state enforced labor to gain citizenship. - "Contempt for the weak" there isn't much out-group to belong to. The Terran Federation covers the globe, and almost everyone is a citizen. There isn't any contempt for underlings, even if there are military cross branch out-groups. Like real world counterparts jarheads, squids and wingnut. - If Machismo exists, it's mutated to cover both sexes. Granted, I might have missed a few, but still, shouldn't Eco's 14 traits light up more for a more fascistic society?
  - Ygg2 8mo ago
    Sure, I see ultranationalism. And if I squint, I can see that a huge chunk of the US population is pro-Trump, but that's not culty overall. You can still speak against him, as far as I can tell. Compare this to, say, Mao Zedong. If you spoke against him, your life was forfeit, and even that's not fascism. If this is one of those fuzzy definitions, it definitely isn't on the strong side. Where is the rampant militarism, the worship of death, and of the military?
    - miltonlost 8mo ago
      > Where is the rampant militarism ICE
    - hypeatei 8mo ago
      > rampant militarism, the worship of death, and of the military? See: the recent events in Minneapolis and the massive increase in funding for ICE. You don't have to look very hard to see what the new brownshirts are doing in blue cities and the MAGAs covering for them. Oh also the federalization of the National Guard and US Marine deployment to Los Angeles. Things move quickly and people forget but that's exactly their playbook: flooding the zone with so much shit that it's hard to keep track.
    - voidUpdate 8mo ago
      There's been quite a lot of worship of the military in america... Also haven't armed forces been deployed domestically a few times in the current presidency?
      - Ygg2 8mo ago
        Sure, but Trump was not campaigning on that; if anything he campaigned on being the most peaceful president. Hitler didn't campaign on honoring treaty of Versallies, and avoiding war with neighbors.
        voidUpdate 8mo ago
        And yet, off the top of my head, he has started as many wars as Hitler has
- Spivak 8mo ago
  Fascism isn't really a form of government though, it's a political ideology and aesthetics that we see echoed through different regimes. You can be a democracy on paper while in practice being a single party corporate oligarchy with a cult of personality surrounding the head of state. Ur-Fascism describes the ideology of MAGA exactly. Clearly there's some apprehension admitting this, it's a strong-man political ideology that has evolved many times organically throughout history. It doesn't necessarily imply that the regime is bad or evil or anything but the problem ends up being that the term exists because governments that adopt this ideology end up converging on the same unsavory behaviors despite any initial differences. That convergence is I think what a lot of Americans are afraid of because we're already doing most of them.

eastbound 8mo ago

[flagged]

sixothree 8mo ago
Your usage of "Your side" is telling. It seems like this is a team sport for you and you've picked a side. Unfortunately you might have sided with fascists.
freejazz 8mo ago
"Your side"
- eastbound 8mo ago
  So how do we respect each other’s ideals AND make peace?
  - freejazz 8mo ago
    Probably by not starting with "your side"
hypeatei 8mo ago
Isn't this a delightful Catch-22. If you forewarn about a developing Fascist movement, you're simply taking away the meaning from the word until it's too late and the Fascists take power. You cannot call anything Fascist, for there may be something more Fascist that may need the power of the word. But ah! We couldn't call out their fledgling movement full of dog whistles and double speak so no one was aware enough to stop them as a fledgling movement! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45349597 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45349597
mmustapic 8mo ago
Ah, yes, let's concede just a bit of fascism, not a lot.
righthand 8mo ago
Yeah the other side doesn’t over use socialism or communism or terrorist. And conservatives haven’t been refusing to make concessions in Congress and the Senate for decades.

rayiner 8mo ago

The irony is that almost every single one of the countries these foreigners come from would do exactly the same thing were the shoe on the other foot. If running government-funded research to maximize the opportunities for native born people is “fascism,” then every country in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East is “fascist.” Borderless universalism is a niche idea even in the west, and virtually non-existent outside it.

satao 8mo ago
you present a lot of conviction yet there is not a single source for your opinion that was presented.
- busterarm 8mo ago
  He's from one of those countries.
5upplied_demand 8mo ago
Imagine using this logic in the 1930s when scientists from Germany, Hungary, and Italy were flocking to the US. Did the advances they helped spur actually maximize opportunities for native born people in the long run? Would we be better off if we had blocked them from researching in the US?
tzs 8mo ago
> The irony is that almost every single one of the countries these foreigners come from would do exactly the same thing were the shoe on the other foot. I'm having a hard imagining Canada, Australia, New Zealand, France, Norway, Switzerland, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, or Italy, to name a few countries of the countries from which scientists have come to work on NIST projects putting these kind of restrictions on American scientists coming to work on non-classified research at their labs.

bregma 8mo ago

[flagged]

t-3 8mo ago
> Government interference in people's lives is socialism. No, that's called 'governance'. Literally the whole job of government is interfering in people's lives.
0x696C6961 8mo ago
No man, that's called an oligarchy.
deleted 8mo ago
[deleted]
ErroneousBosh 8mo ago
Sounds like you're not a fan of socialism. How's it working out for you, spending a third of your income on rent but not actually having any rights to stay in the property you rent, and a further third on "health insurance" that'll take your money and run, leaving you to choose between a lifetime of debt or just plain dying if you ever get ill?

sgnelson 8mo ago

Got to love the fact that a large amount of users of HN still refuse to see the truth before their very eyes.

epolanski 8mo ago
The issue is that when people start abusing words like "fascism" out of context they make those words lose meaning. The US is definitely undergoing authoritarian tendencies, but it remains structurally constrained by separation of powers, federalism, and independent courts and media, features that fascist regimes systematically dismantle. If you start calling everything fascism you are essentially helping those you call fascists because they can easily refute your thesis and gaslight you on the very realities of the authoritarian descent the country is going through.
- throwaway173738 8mo ago
  What do you call it when the authoritarians start, then? Are we not allowed to call it that until we’re not allowed to go to the courts or to speak about what’s happening?
  - epolanski 8mo ago
    You call it for what it is: an executive with authoritarian tendencies. Democracy is not an on/off light bulb, it's a material under constant stress that can bend a lot before breaking. But if you start calling it broken, while it's bending your thesis is easily refutable and you get called out for being a radical whatever.
    - hypeatei 8mo ago
      > You call it for what it is: an executive with authoritarian tendencies. Okay, but that's beating around the bush and a very milquetoast way to describe it. > easily refutable and you get called out for being a radical whatever. This is equivalent to being punched repeatedly by a bully and being scared that he'll cry "assault!" when you punch him back. At some point, you cease to exist if you don't act.

HelloNurse 8mo ago

As an example of the likely future of science in the USA, read about Trofim Lysenko.

1234letshaveatw 8mo ago

[flagged]

plaidthunder 8mo ago
There are generous ways to interpret a critique of "redditification". 1. An increase in comments that aim to gather social approval as opposed to advancing a conversation or sharing knowledge -- often including meta commentary on threads e.g., "reddit moment". 2. Topics start to become more general and lose the tech/startup scene focus of the site. These are legitimate. Reddit threads are stereotypically full of noise and HN should avoid that. However there's a third form of the critique that I think should be avoided. 3. Too many comments seem to reflect values and worldviews rooted in [socially] liberal ideals. Because of this, it's probably useful to give some context for what in particular constitutes "redditifcation". That way dang and any other mods can try to address it with particular policy decisions.