In the U.S. context this impacts agencies that regulate industry and offer beneficial state services (healthcare, food inspection, pollution monitoring) and not services that impact state control (DHS, the military, or domestic secret police (FBI)).
The longstanding goal has been to undo the new deal
I recommend _Culture in Nazi Germany_ by Michael H. Kater. [1]
Propaganda was the control they wanted. 3rd party companies and organizations allowed for a pseud disconnect with the shared propaganda. See this paper, music group, artist supports our ideology and we are not paying them for it.
Centrally controlled does not mean being centrally employed. Just take a look at all the big businesses that assisted fascism for financial gain. Lot of it being slave labor. [0]
I honestly don't understand this. Businesses have been doing loads of things along with the last government as well - silencing/reducing certain views while promoting others, and creating a monoculture throughout schools, universities, and businesses. Why do you only see it when this side does it (or some fraction of it)?
Fascists generally want everything centrally controlled, but the mechanism generally used is government control of industry. The government itself might become relatively small because government functions are performed by industry in government control. Or by the military, not the civilian government.
I find the constant equating of illegal immigrants with Jews who lived legally in Germany for many generations and who had done nothing illegal or wrong at all very disturbing. It minimizes what happened there.
If not for Nazi Germany, would the behavior of the current admin, especially with respect to ICE, be labeled “fascist”? My impression is that the optics of vanning people is reminiscent of the optics of what happened in Germany, and so the label comes out. This is bolstered by Nazi Germany being probably the most covered topic in American history class for the past many decades, as well as similar coverage in Hollywood, to the point where “bad guy” and Nazi/fascist are basically synonyms.
I mean, you can be just as callous and say that those who remained in Germany after the country legally revoked their citizenship[1] had, in fact, done something illegal by remaining there. They were just as illegal as a kid who has lived here since she was 3 months old.
Yours is also the same argument that was made for years about not including LGBT people among the victims of the Holocaust, since they had in fact broken the law by existing.
So in your comparison, on the one hand are laws that are shared by literally every nation (having and maintaining a border), and on the other hand is a historical edge case where citizenship was deleted.
I think it’s pretty easy to achieve consistency by just being opposed to deleting citizenship, but being in favor of maintaining and enforcing a border? No contradiction there.
I don’t see what’s calloused about it, either. People voluntarily relocate with their children, who do not have a choice in the matter, all the time. If the parents are sneaking into and hiding in a country, I don’t see what’s so different about the family being removed to their place of origin vs the family voluntarily relocating, from the perspective of the child.
Once the child is 18 they have their own choice to continue hiding in a country they are not in legally or to return to their place of origin. Like, if I was forcibly returned to where my family is from in Europe due to similar circumstances, I would not be that upset about it. These people are only mad because the place they are from sucks. That is not the problem of America or Americans.
What are you talking about? Revocation of citizenship, denaturalization, exile, banishment, etc are some of the oldest functions of law there are. For as long as states and the concept of citizenship have existed, revocation of citizenship has been a thing.
Hell, entire countries were started by populations that were denaturalized.
And countries regularly denaturalize their own citizens, both in the past and present.
During war, it's even more common, especially among naturalized citizens. Germany considered itself in a state of war from an enemy foreign and within, denaturalization and then expelling of non-citizens was in their right, just as it was in the right of literally every Western nation to do the same during times of war, which they did. In fact, just having the wrong ideas or saying the wrong thing were grounds for denaturalization here and elsewhere.
In the period that the Nuremburg Laws were passed, rates of denaturalization world-wide had reached a high point. World War I had increased the rate, and it continued accelerating after, with denaturalization laws passed and used in practice by every country that had fought in it. In the decades before Germany's denaturalization laws, literally tens of millions of people had been denaturalized from their homelands.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were denaturalized and exiled in order to establish the State of Israel. Millions of black South Africans were denaturalized and were made citizens of Bantustans. Today, the Royhingya are stateless because they were denaturalized. In 2013, hundreds of thousands of black Haitians had their citizenship revoked.
The idea that citizenship cannot be revoked is a recent US/UN thing for some reason. And even then it's still wrong, because the US has a long history of denaturalizing its undesirables.
> I don’t see what’s calloused about it, either. People voluntarily relocate with their children, who do not have a choice in the matter, all the time. If the parents are sneaking into and hiding in a country, I don’t see what’s so different about the family being removed to their place of origin vs the family voluntarily relocating, from the perspective of the child.
[0][1]:
> Neighbors like Eboni Watson say they ducked for cover as they heard several flash bangs.
> "They was terrified. The kids was crying. People was screaming. They looked very distraught. I was out there crying when I seen the little girl come around the corner, because they was bringing the kids down, too, had them zip tied to each other," Watson said. "That's all I kept asking. What is the morality? Where's the human? One of them literally laughed. He was standing right here. He said, 'fuck them kids.'"
> “It was heartbreaking to watch,” she said. “Even if you’re not a mother, seeing kids coming out buck naked and taken from their mothers, it was horrible.”
> "They just treated us like we were nothing," Fisher said.
Okay so what percent of historical citizenships have been revoked? What percent would it be for you to not consider it an edge case? My estimate is an upper bound of 1% of citizenships historically were deleted. I would call that an edge case. Not because it doesn’t matter, but because being for enforcement of borders and residency laws does not make you automatically for deleting citizenships, and conflating the two is incorrect. If it is 5% or 10% then I would be wrong to use the language “edge case” but I believe my point stands regardless.
I had not read about the “naked zip tied children” case. If that happened as described, the officers involved should be disciplined. I do wish this could be done in a more orderly fashion as that would reduce the chances of illegal conduct from the officers, though with the American election cycle I can understand why the regime may feel like it needs to act quickly.
You're saying that ICE only targets illegal immigrants? how do they know who's an illegal immigrant? skin colour? Because that's the criteria they're applying right now.
Also what do you say about ICE detaining legal residents? you stated "equating illegal immigrants with Jews [...]" as if ICE is only detaining illegal immigrants. They're not. They're detaining anyone who isn't white enough. Members of the Trump regime have also threatened to deport legal citizens who are just exercicing their free speech. You're anti free speech as well?
When is your moral framework going to kick in and call a spade a spade?
ICE doesn’t do law enforcement against citizens. It does affect citizens tangentially but not directly. ICE will not come after citizens for crimes. That would be regular local police, state police or FBI/ATF, etc. ICE is immigration enforcement. Some people may not like that especially illegal residents but it would be a poor way to affect citizens like fascists or communists did.
What do you mean? If you mean interfering with officers carrying out their duties, then yes, people do get arrested for that. But you would get arrested for interfering with any law enforcement. People do get to protest but they do not get the right to protest violently nor do they get a right to interfere with law enforcement just because they disagree with the law.
Just like if you want to protest eminent domain but officers come in to move out protesters getting in the way of construction. People will get arrested. You can protest peacefully. You cannot interfere with official acts or be violent.
ICE will (and already are to an extent) come after anyone who looks like trouble. If they want to superficially follow the law, they beat people up and release them after 23 hours after "discovering" the person is a citizen. Then, repeat as many times as necessary.
Since nobody actually knows who ICE is, it can devolve pretty easily from there. The most pedestrian would be protection money to avoid detention, from citizens and non-citizens, it doesn't matter.
Kind of the same role they played during the civil rights struggle. They are there to bolster law enforcement when local law enforcement may be overwhelmed enforcing federal law.
Trump has actively talked about denaturalizing his enemies [1]. You would be technically correct that he's not going after citizens, but that's only because he'll declare everyone he doesn't like antifa and thus not worthy of citizenship.
A move, I should point out, that the Nazis did to the Jews and Communists.
In his 1995 essay "Ur-Fascism", cultural theorist Umberto Eco lists fourteen general properties of fascist ideology.[17] He argues that it is not possible to organise these into a coherent system, but that "it is enough that one of them be present to allow fascism to coagulate around it". He uses the term "Ur-Fascism" as a generic description of different historical forms of fascism. The fourteen properties are as follows:
"The cult of tradition", characterized by cultural syncretism, even at the risk of internal contradiction. When all truth has already been revealed by tradition, no new learning can occur, only further interpretation and refinement.
"The rejection of modernism", which views the rationalistic development of Western culture since the Enlightenment as a descent into depravity. Eco distinguishes this from a rejection of superficial technological advancement, as many fascist regimes cite their industrial potency as proof of the vitality of their system.
"The cult of action for action's sake", which dictates that action is of value in itself and should be taken without intellectual reflection. This, says Eco, is connected with anti-intellectualism and irrationalism, and often manifests in attacks on modern culture and science.
"Disagreement is treason" – fascism devalues intellectual discourse and critical reasoning as barriers to action, as well as out of fear that such analysis will expose the contradictions embodied in a syncretistic faith.
"Fear of difference", which fascism seeks to exploit and exacerbate, often in the form of racism or an appeal against foreigners and immigrants.
"Appeal to a frustrated middle class", fearing economic pressure from the demands and aspirations of lower social groups.
"Obsession with a plot" and the hyping-up of an enemy threat. This often combines an appeal to xenophobia with a fear of disloyalty and sabotage from marginalized groups living within the society (such as the German elite's "fear" of the 1930s Jewish populace's businesses and well-doings; see also antisemitism). Eco also cites Pat Robertson's book The New World Order as a prominent example of a plot obsession.
Fascist societies rhetorically cast their enemies as "at the same time too strong and too weak". On the one hand, fascists play up the power of certain disfavored elites to encourage in their followers a sense of grievance and humiliation. On the other hand, fascist leaders point to the decadence of those elites as proof of their ultimate feebleness in the face of an overwhelming popular will.
"Pacifism is trafficking with the enemy" because "life is permanent warfare" – there must always be an enemy to fight. Both fascist Germany under Hitler and Italy under Mussolini worked first to organize and clean up their respective countries and then build the war machines that they later intended to and did use, despite Germany being under restrictions of the Versailles treaty to not build a military force. This principle leads to a fundamental contradiction within fascism: the incompatibility of ultimate triumph with perpetual war.
"Contempt for the weak", which is uncomfortably married to a chauvinistic popular elitism, in which every member of society is superior to outsiders by virtue of belonging to the in-group. Eco sees in these attitudes the root of a deep tension in the fundamentally hierarchical structure of fascist polities, as they encourage leaders to despise their underlings, up to the ultimate leader, who holds the whole country in contempt for having allowed him to overtake it by force.
"Everybody is educated to become a hero", which leads to the embrace of a cult of death. As Eco observes, "[t]he Ur-Fascist hero is impatient to die. In his impatience, he more frequently sends other people to death."
"Machismo", which sublimates the difficult work of permanent war and heroism into the sexual sphere. Fascists thus hold "both disdain for women and intolerance and condemnation of nonstandard sexual habits, from chastity to homosexuality".
"Selective populism" – the people, conceived monolithically, have a common will, distinct from and superior to the viewpoint of any individual. As no mass of people can ever be truly unanimous, the leader holds himself out as the interpreter of the popular will (though truly he alone dictates it). Fascists use this concept to delegitimize democratic institutions they accuse of "no longer represent[ing] the voice of the people".
"Newspeak" – fascism employs and promotes an impoverished vocabulary to limit critical reasoning.
From a European perspective, it's really hard not to see much/all of this resonating in MAGA USA.
> From a European perspective, it's really hard not to see much/all of this resonating in MAGA USA.
That might be partly because there've been 10 years of everything being called fascism, rather than any genuine thought that selects fascism out of a group of alternatives.
This is so lazy. I literally posted a list of things that typify facism in an article from 30 years ago.
In case it’s not clear: Trump looks like a racist and a facist to many Europeans. He’s stoking division for policitical ends, extending and normalising the use of the army under laughably thin pretext. What is shocking is how little Americans see to notice or care. But given the state of your media, perhaps that’s to be expected?
Under Umberto Eco’s definition of Ur-Fascism[1] (the usual one I reach for, though others are available) what GP is referencing is most closely aligned with #13 Selective Populism, which at least from my viewpoint outside the US is seemingly correct.
At the risk of sounding dumb, I've never found this list of traits particularly illuminating. Many of these are found in the left political faction in the US as well (4, 7, 8, 13[1] and 14 immediately come to mind) and some are absent from the right. How do you weight which ones are important and who's really "fascist"?
The whole exercise feels like going on WebMD and diagnosing yourself with cancer because of some vague symptoms. Doesn't mean that nothing is wrong with you, but it's not necessarily cancer either.
[1] This one happened in this very thread where someone accused the Supreme Court and Congress of being complicit. Like, ok.
An autocrat attacking and destroying societal institutions, bringing industry to heel under his dictats, and running concentration camps to perform ethnic cleansing (while being primed to move on to ideological cleansing). It's not "Fascism" in the sense of being Mussolini's party, but if you're willing to label National Socialism / Naziism as "fascism" then the label most certainly applies to Trumpism.
I think it is quite evident that the modern far-right movement in the US (including those in power today) can be characterized as fascist.
"The cult of tradition," characterized by cultural syncretism, even at the risk of internal contradiction. When all truth has already been revealed by tradition, no new learning can occur, only further interpretation and refinement.
"The rejection of modernism," which views the rationalistic development of Western culture since the Enlightenment as a descent into depravity. Eco distinguishes this from a rejection of superficial technological advancement, as many fascist regimes cite their industrial potency as proof of the vitality of their system.
"The cult of action for action's sake," which dictates that action is of value in itself and should be taken without intellectual reflection. This, says Eco, is connected with anti-intellectualism and irrationalism, and often manifests in attacks on modern culture and science.
"Disagreement is treason" – fascism devalues intellectual discourse and critical reasoning as barriers to action, as well as out of fear that such analysis will expose the contradictions embodied in a syncretistic faith.
"Fear of difference," which fascism seeks to exploit and exacerbate, often in the form of racism or an appeal against foreigners and immigrants.
"Appeal to a frustrated middle class," fearing economic pressure from the demands and aspirations of lower social groups.
"Obsession with a plot" and the hyping-up of an enemy threat. This often combines an appeal to xenophobia with a fear of disloyalty and sabotage from marginalized groups living within the society. Eco also cites Pat Robertson's book The New World Order as a prominent example of a plot obsession.
Fascist societies rhetorically cast their enemies as "at the same time too strong and too weak." On the one hand, fascists play up the power of certain disfavored elites to encourage in their followers a sense of grievance and humiliation. On the other hand, fascist leaders point to the decadence of those elites as proof of their ultimate feebleness in the face of an overwhelming popular will.
"Pacifism is trafficking with the enemy" because "life is permanent warfare" – there must always be an enemy to fight. Both fascist Germany under Hitler and Italy under Mussolini worked first to organize and clean up their respective countries and then build the war machines that they later intended to and did use, despite Germany being under restrictions of the Versailles treaty to not build a military force. This principle leads to a fundamental contradiction within fascism: the incompatibility of ultimate triumph with perpetual war.
"Contempt for the weak," which is uncomfortably married to a chauvinistic popular elitism, in which every member of society is superior to outsiders by virtue of belonging to the in-group. Eco sees in these attitudes the root of a deep tension in the fundamentally hierarchical structure of fascist polities, as they encourage leaders to despise their underlings, up to the ultimate leader, who holds the whole country in contempt for having allowed him to overtake it by force.
"Everybody is educated to become a hero," which leads to the embrace of a cult of death. As Eco observes, "[t]he Ur-Fascist hero is impatient to die. In his impatience, he more frequently sends other people to death."
"Machismo," which sublimates the difficult work of permanent war and heroism into the sexual sphere. Fascists thus hold "both disdain for women and intolerance and condemnation of nonstandard sexual habits, from chastity to homosexuality."
"Selective populism" – the people, conceived monolithically, have a common will, distinct from and superior to the viewpoint of any individual. As no mass of people can ever be truly unanimous, the leader holds himself out as the interpreter of the popular will (though truly he alone dictates it). Fascists use this concept to delegitimize democratic institutions they accuse of "no longer represent[ing] the voice of the people".
"Newspeak" – fascism employs and promotes an impoverished vocabulary in order to limit critical reasoning.
Depends on how you measure things. Trump did not receive a majority of all possible votes, nor did he receive a majority of all votes that were cast. He did receive a plurality of votes that were cast.
But then again the oldest trick in the authoritarian‘s playbook is to abandon the path of democracy by tilting the scales in their party’s favor. which is why you want strong independent institutions and separation of powers in a democracy, something the current administration does not appear to be in favor of.
