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Author Topic: Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists  (Read 11354 times)

Snowman0147

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #45 on: August 04, 2020, 09:59:21 PM »
Quote from: Spinachcat;1143308
But we can have fine tea and a symposium discussing whether they're Nazis or Commies AFTER they are hanging off our spears.

America is burning. Time to bring down the arsonists.


I rather be peaceful, but it isn't like they are giving us option.  I pretty much agree with you 100%.

Brad

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #46 on: August 04, 2020, 10:55:31 PM »
Quote from: Snowman0147;1143339
I rather be peaceful, but it isn't like they are giving us option.  I pretty much agree with you 100%.

The worst person to piss off is the man who just wants to be left alone. He knows more than anyone what he has to lose by acting.
It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance.

Zirunel

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #47 on: August 06, 2020, 02:39:16 PM »
Quote from: GeekyBugle;1143283
Nope, fascism puts everything in the service of the state  "Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state".

Nope again, fascists were happy with a world order with no juice, gypsies, etc. and with the "Arian Race" on top.

Now lets change just a few words:

Fascists want a world order with no juice, gypsies, etc. and with the "Arian Race (The Oppressed by those evul juice, gypsies, etc)" on top.
vs
SJWs want world order with no white, straight, Christian, etc. and with the "oppressed (Who are oppressed by those evul white, straight, Christian, etc)" on top.

A difference without a meaning.

Fair enough re the Mussolini quote; Mussolini's fascism was a rather slippery fish and he was sometimes inconsistent and opportunistic in his pronouncements about what the fascist state actually was and how it worked (as he was about everything) but yes he did often focus on the centrality of The State. But even so, The State was not the be-all and end-all, it was largely just the means for achieving military conquest. "The function of a citizen and a soldier" were to him "inseparable" because war was "the normal state of the people." The role of the state was to unify and control an ethnic or linguistically defined nation to achieve military glory. In his case, it was all about reconstituting a glorious new Roman empire and returning his nation, Italy, to its place in the forefront of history. The state, however important, was only a means to that end.

 then you move from Mussolini to a Nazi conception, where "nation" becomes more bound up with "race" than you see with Mussolini. Broadly similar but different in the details, and some of those detail differences end up being huge.

Zirunel

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #48 on: August 06, 2020, 02:47:47 PM »
Quote from: Shrieking Banshee;1143332
Which is why they wanted to do the whole 'Racial cleansing' element.

Yes. The Nazis, and I would say the Italians as well, never had any notion of conquering the world. But they did want to conquer those whose territory they actually wanted for themselves. At which point they faced the problem of what you do with your enemies once you conquer them. for the Nazis, at least, you could make the case that the "cleansing"approach was reserved for those they didn't want around at all, not even as subject peoples. Then you had the Poles and the Ukrainians, who were to be kept around as serfs. Kept uneducated, they could be tolerated as slaves in the great new Reich, but they could never be part of the Volk, never part of the German nation.

Shrieking Banshee

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #49 on: August 06, 2020, 04:24:31 PM »
Quote from: Zirunel;1143569
Then you had the Poles and the Ukrainians, who were to be kept around as serfs.

Except they weren't. While not as dedicated as the Jewish extermination, the population was pretty much starved and deprived of resources. While it's true that Hitler said allot of conflicting things he stated for a global reich multiple times (And wrote about desiring to conquer the americas).

Trond

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #50 on: August 06, 2020, 04:30:50 PM »
Quote from: GeekyBugle;1143283
Nope, fascism puts everything in the service of the state  "Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state".

Nope again, fascists were happy with a world order with no juice, gypsies, etc. and with the "Arian Race" on top.

Now lets change just a few words:

Fascists want a world order with no juice, gypsies, etc. and with the "Arian Race (The Oppressed by those evul juice, gypsies, etc)" on top.
vs
SJWs want world order with no white, straight, Christian, etc. and with the "oppressed (Who are oppressed by those evul white, straight, Christian, etc)" on top.

A difference without a meaning.

I  think this is a bit of a stretch. Of course there's a difference, and you can sometimes spot the personality types before they claim their allegiance. The biggest buzzword for SJWs is "diversity", which they keep hammering everyone with. They fetishisize blacks, browns, and LGBT+ and treat them like babies. The diversity of thought is of course not included, but it is STILL a kind of diversity that fascists generally would not be happy with.

SJWs also do not harp on about a strong man to lead them, which was always a big thing for fascists. Far-left SJWs seriously think that "the people" will lead after the revolution, just like Stalinistic states are led by "the people".  Sure, they did turn into personality-cult dictatorships. Communists fall backwards into dictatorship every time. Yes the philosophy is THAT stupid. I know some of these people.
« Last Edit: August 06, 2020, 04:33:07 PM by Trond »

Zirunel

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #51 on: August 07, 2020, 09:33:47 AM »
Quote from: Shrieking Banshee;1143574
Except they weren't. While not as dedicated as the Jewish extermination, the population was pretty much starved and deprived of resources. While it's true that Hitler said allot of conflicting things he stated for a global reich multiple times (And wrote about desiring to conquer the americas).


Yes, much of their agricultural output was shipped off to the Reich for the war effort, and a less extreme version of that was envisioned for the future too, but there was no extermination planned, they were to be kept around as subject peoples.

As for the Americas, yes he wanted to be able to project military power as far as the Americas, hence the Amerikabomber program. But no plans for conquest as far as I know.

Zirunel

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #52 on: August 07, 2020, 09:36:50 AM »
Quote from: Trond;1143577
I  think this is a bit of a stretch.

Yes, I agree. If you want to say "SJWs" are authoritarian, fine. But fascist? No, doesn't work.

Greywolf76

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #53 on: August 07, 2020, 11:16:45 AM »
They're not exactly the same.

What we call "SWJism" is nothing but cultural Marxism resulting from the dissemination of the works of left-wingers ideologues and philosophers such as Antonio Gramsci and the Frankfurt School. In America, specifically, you also have the abominable influence and legacy of Saul Alinsky.

But, on the other hand, Fascism and Communist are not, and have never been, enemies. They are both sides of the same coin and they fight for the same things. If anything, they are rivals fighting for the same goals, although they may differ in how to achieve that goal.

Both ideologies are revolutionary, authoritarian, totalitarian, statist and collectivist.

Popular misconceptions aside, both are extreme left-wing (the notion that Nazism and Fascism are "right-wing" was disseminated by English Marxist historians like Eric Hobsbawn and E. P. Thompson in an attempt to distance Nazi-fascism from the left). This is pretty clear to anyone who has read Johann Plenge, Mussolini's "the Doctrine of Fascism", Hitler's "Mein Kampf" or the Nazi Party Platform (also known as the 25-point program).

The slogan "Arbeit macht frei" (Work sets you free), found on the gates of Auschwitz and many other concentration camps is pure Marxism. And if you've read the letters of Marx to Engels you will understand where the Nazis' hate against the Jews comes from.

The main (and perhaps, only) difference is the strong nationalistic* character of both Fascism and Nazism. While Communists (and Anarchists) advocate a class conflict between the proletariat and the bourgeois, Fascists advocated the conflict between proletarian nations and bourgeois nations.

* Note that many left-wing ideologies also have strong nationalistic characteristics and themes: Stalinism, Maoism, Khmer Rouge and Pan-Arabism, to name a few.
« Last Edit: August 12, 2020, 03:05:16 PM by Greywolf76 »

Steven Mitchell

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #54 on: August 12, 2020, 01:31:01 PM »
In theory, practice and theory are the same thing.  In practice, they aren't.

In theory, Marxists and Nazis are different.  One has an ultimate goal of a global government where in theory anyone can rise to the top to tell everyone else what to do.  The other has an ultimate goal of a particular government that controls the globe where in theory anyone of the approved government can rise to the top to tell everyone else what to do.  In practice, extreme force is going to get used either way, six of one, half a dozen of the other.

Pat
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« Reply #55 on: August 12, 2020, 03:26:44 PM »
"Fascist" is one of those words like "liberal" that has so many meanings it's become meaningless unless you precisely define how you're using the word. One highly influential definition comes from Umberto Eco's 1995 essay, "Eternal Fascism: Fourteen Ways of Looking at a Blackshirt", which is an excerpt of his larger article "Ur-Fascism".

Quote from: Umberto Eco
1. The first feature of Ur-Fascism is the cult of tradition.
2. Traditionalism implies the rejection of modernism.
3. Irrationalism also depends on the cult of action for action's sake.
4. The critical spirit makes distinctions, and to distinguish is a sign of modernism.
5. Besides, disagreement is a sign of diversity.
6. Ur-Fascism derives from individual or social frustration.
7. To people who feel deprived of a clear social identity, Ur-Fascism says that their only privilege is the most common one, to be born in the same country.
8. The followers must feel humiliated by the ostentatious wealth and force of their enemies.
9. For Ur-Fascism there is no struggle for life but, rather, life is lived for struggle.
10. Elitism is a typical aspect of any reactionary ideology, insofar as it is fundamentally aristocratic, and aristocratic and militaristic elitism cruelly implies contempt for the weak.
11. In such a perspective everybody is educated to become a hero.
12. Since both permanent war and heroism are difficult games to play, the Ur-Fascist transfers his will to power to sexual matters.
13. Ur-Fascism is based upon a selective populism, a qualitative populism, one might say.
14. Ur-Fascism speaks Newspeak.

(See the essay for more in depth explanations of each of the 14 features.)

Eco is a famous author, and certainly has first hand experience of true fascism -- he grew up in Mussolini's Italy. He doesn't make the mistake of using fascism as a synonym of totalitarianism, or as a simple epithet (e.g. calling the cop who pulled you over a "fascist"), which I think is important. Another important distinction he makes is that fascism isn't a coherent philosophy or movement. It's not socialism, with all its crazy theorists talking about the labor theory or value or new moons. It's not even national socialism, which is a very specific ideology. Some of the 14 points he lists also contradict each other, and that's not a mistake or an inconsistency in the list. Rather, it's a reflection of the nature and source of fascism. It's opportunistic, and perverts rather than displaces its social, political, and national environment.

I think that's an important insight. It's worth remembering that Mussolini was never an intellectual or theorist. He didn't create fascism as a fully thought out set of axioms and ideals, which he then tried to implement. Instead, he worked with what he had, and shifted as needed to adapt to the changing circumstances. Mussolini started as a socialist, and he used that as his framework. But he also adopted elements from extreme nationalism, and whatever suited his ego or the political needs of the moment. Fascism was fluid and inconstant.

But I ultimately think Eco's definition is garbage, because he's defining it too broadly. Fascism is Mussolini, and Franco, and not much else. It's not really a philosophy, or even a specific set of tactics. It's just how a few specific strongmen acquired, maintained, and exercised power. You can't stretch it into an ur-anything, because attempting to differentiate it from dictatorship or totalitarianism in general means you have to draw arbitrary lines and call a random set of attributes "fascism".

It's lot more useful to use a label to precisely define something, and to note specific correspondences, than to apply a meaningless label.

Note Taggie (whom Bugle quoted in the thread's first post) appears to be working off Lawrence Britt's 2003 "The 14 Characteristics of Fascism", which is apparently based on Skip Stone's 2002 "Hallmarks of a Fascist Regime". I'd be inclined to say both are ultimately inspired by Eco's list, but Skip Stone says later in the linked thread that "his [Britt's] and mine are still the only lists of fascist attributes that I know of" as part of his claim that Britt plagiarized him, which makes his petulance risible. In any case, the same critique applies to both, because they are even vaguer and more general than Eco's definition.

Edit: I grabbed my copy of Madeline Albright's Fascism: A Warning, for comparison. I forgot she made a decent point, in the first chapter: She recounted an open discussion with a class of graduate students at Georgetown, where she came to the conclusion that "Fascism should perhaps be viewed less as a political ideology than as a means for seizing and holding power", which echoes what Eco said, and which I largely agree with. They also came up with a list of characteristics that resembles the ones above (charismatic, controls information etc.) -- but ultimately they have trouble differentiating fascism from other forms of authoritarianism. Albright ultimately rejects an academic's attempt to define fascism based on a set of characteristics for a diplomat's intuition, i.e. she uses a variation on the "I know it when I see it" doctrine made infamous in court cases. Which is why I found her book useful for insights into geopolitics, but useless for its purported task of warning against something called "fascism". In practice, Albright's fascism is anything that goes against her neoliberal, globalist, intellectual elitist sensibilities.
« Last Edit: August 12, 2020, 06:20:17 PM by Pat »

Trond

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #56 on: August 12, 2020, 06:20:45 PM »
A political theorist might disagree, but to me fascism (as a term including National Socialism) has these traits:

-Militarism
-Nationalism
-Anti-democracy
-Reverence for the "strong leader", and "strength" in general
-Reverence or lip-service for national traditions (when these clash with the above points, they are thrown out and it all turns to just lip service). Despite this seemingly weak point, it is actually important; this is the reason why many people who were panicking about the rise of communism turned to the fascists. The fascists never said that the national traditions and culture were "bad" and so they seemed safer to many average people in the first half of the 20th century. For instance, church leaders often backed fascists, while communists put them to the axe.

Pat
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« Reply #57 on: August 12, 2020, 06:52:31 PM »
Quote from: Trond;1144593
A political theorist might disagree, but to me fascism (as a term including National Socialism) has these traits:

-Militarism
-Nationalism
-Anti-democracy
-Reverence for the "strong leader", and "strength" in general
-Reverence or lip-service for national traditions (when these clash with the above points, they are thrown out and it all turns to just lip service). Despite this seemingly weak point, it is actually important; this is the reason why many people who were panicking about the rise of communism turned to the fascists. The fascists never said that the national traditions and culture were "bad" and so they seemed safer to many average people in the first half of the 20th century. For instance, church leaders often backed fascists, while communists put them to the axe.

Mao spoke about national traditions in his article "On New Democracy" in 1940:

Quote from: Mao Tse-tung
A splendid old culture was created during the long period of Chinese feudal society. To study the development of this old culture, to reject its feudal dross and assimilate its democratic essence is a necessary condition for developing our new national culture and increasing our national self-confidence, but we should never swallow anything and everything uncritically. It is imperative to separate the fine old culture of the people which had a more or less democratic and revolutionary character from all the decadence of the old feudal ruling class. China's present new politics and new economy have developed out of her old politics and old economy, and her present new culture, too, has developed out of her old culture; therefore, we must respect our own history and must not lop it off.
For instance, he and his successors up to and including Xi showed reverence for some aspects of Confucianism. They even put a statue of him opposite the statue of Mao in Tienanmen Square, just over a decade ago (though they pulled it down not long after, because it's complicated). So your definition includes Maoism.

That's an example of why I think "fascism" is a garbage word, meaning anything or nothing. It's become no more than a generic insult that says more about the speaker's politics than anything else.
« Last Edit: August 12, 2020, 07:22:54 PM by Pat »

Trond

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« Reply #58 on: August 12, 2020, 08:25:44 PM »
Quote from: Pat;1144600
Mao spoke about national traditions in his article "On New Democracy" in 1940:


For instance, he and his successors up to and including Xi showed reverence for some aspects of Confucianism. They even put a statue of him opposite the statue of Mao in Tienanmen Square, just over a decade ago (though they pulled it down not long after, because it's complicated). So your definition includes Maoism.

That's an example of why I think "fascism" is a garbage word, meaning anything or nothing. It's become no more than a generic insult that says more about the speaker's politics than anything else.

I disagree. Chiang Kai-Shek was much more akin to a fascist than Mao. Communists showed very little reverence for Chinese culture in general; it was a very well documented destruction of the Chinese cultural heritage, and much more so than what fascists did in Spain, Italy or Germany. It also speaks to the difference in appeal; communists tend to be appealing to the people who think that society is bad to the core and that everything should be burned down or turned on its head to fit their view. Fascists usually focus on the "glorious past" much more, and also to point to scapegoats as the reason of why the current state seems less glorious.

The similarities come as afterthoughts, when either communists or fascists realize that their systems (particularly communism) don't work.

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Yes, SJWs ARE Fascists
« Reply #59 on: August 12, 2020, 08:35:50 PM »
Quote from: Trond;1144616
I disagree. Chiang Kai-Shek was much more akin to a fascist than Mao. Communists showed very little reverence for Chinese culture in general; it was a very well documented destruction of the Chinese cultural heritage, and much more so than what fascists did in Spain, Italy or Germany. It also speaks to the difference in appeal; communists tend to be appealing to the people who think that society is bad to the core and that everything should be burned down or turned on its head to fit their view. Fascists usually focus on the "glorious past" much more, and also to point to scapegoats as the reason of why the current state seems less glorious.

The similarities come as afterthoughts, when either communists or fascists realize that their systems (particularly communism) don't work.

The bourgeois isn't a scapegoat?

Isn't the bourgeois the reason everything is wrong in socialist/communist thought?

And so you have your "the other".

Don't the fascists think society is fucked? Don't they want to destroy it and burn it down to either return to a glorious past or to build their utopia?

Don't the socialists also want to destroy everything to build their utopia?

Both also require total submission of the citizens, for the greater good and to achieve utopia.

Both also blame "The Other" for the current state of affairs.

Both also were traditionally anti semitic.

Both are also against religion if they can't control it, the fascists want only theirs to exist and the socialist/communist switches to a worship of the state.

Both control the economy
Both are censorious
Both use concentration camps to deal with the undesirables.

Again, you focus on the state as a big difference, it isn't. Their ideologies are so alike it's almost impossible to turn any of them into a liberal but very easy to convert them from fascism to socialism or viceversa.
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