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4/19/2023 2:26 am  #1


Ur-Fascism

Umberto Eco was born in Italy in 1932 so grew up watching the Italian fascists and German fascists do their thing.

 Ur-Fascism is the cult of tradition. 
1. The cult of tradition. “One has only to look at the syllabus of every fascist movement to find the major traditionalist thinkers. The Nazi gnosis was nourished by traditionalist, syncretistic, occult elements.”
 
2. The rejection of modernism. “The Enlightenment, the Age of Reason, is seen as the beginning of modern depravity. In this sense Ur-Fascism can be defined as irrationalism.”
 
3. The cult of action for action’s sake. “Action being beautiful in itself, it must be taken before, or without, any previous reflection. Thinking is a form of emasculation.”
 
4. Disagreement is treason. “The critical spirit makes distinctions, and to distinguish is a sign of modernism. In modern culture the scientific community praises disagreement as a way to improve knowledge.”
 
5. Fear of difference. “The first appeal of a fascist or prematurely fascist movement is an appeal against the intruders. Thus Ur-Fascism is racist by definition.”
 
6. Appeal to social frustration. “One of the most typical features of the historical fascism was the appeal to a frustrated middle class, a class suffering from an economic crisis or feelings of political humiliation, and frightened by the pressure of lower social groups.”
 
7. The obsession with a plot. “The followers must feel besieged. The easiest way to solve the plot is the appeal to xenophobia.”
 
8. The humiliation by the wealth and force of their enemies. “By a continuous shifting of rhetorical focus, the enemies are at the same time too strong and too weak.”
 
9. Pacifism is trafficking with the enemy. “For Ur-Fascism there is no struggle for life but, rather, life is lived for struggle.”
 
10. Contempt for the weak. “Elitism is a typical aspect of any reactionary ideology.”
 
11. Everybody is educated to become a hero. “In Ur-Fascist ideology, heroism is the norm. This cult of heroism is strictly linked with the cult of death.”
 
12. Machismo and weaponry. “Machismo implies both disdain for women and intolerance and condemnation of nonstandard sexual habits, from chastity to homosexuality.”
 
13. Selective populism. “There is in our future a TV or Internet populism, in which the emotional response of a selected group of citizens can be presented and accepted as the Voice of the People.”
 
14. Ur-Fascism speaks Newspeak. “All the Nazi or Fascist schoolbooks made use of an impoverished vocabulary, and an elementary syntax, in order to limit the instruments for complex and critical reasoning.”
 
From his description it seems we might have some here in the land of the free and home of the brave.


 Freedom is just another word for nothin' left to lose.
 
 

4/19/2023 6:20 am  #2


Re: Ur-Fascism

A little to close to home.


If you would only recognize that life is hard, things would be so much easier for you. - Louis Brandeis
 

4/19/2023 7:20 am  #3


Re: Ur-Fascism

Sounds like "Lord of the Flies."

 

4/19/2023 6:10 pm  #4


Re: Ur-Fascism

Sounds like Fox news
 


Hey! That's me up there!
 

Yesterday 2:07 pm  #5


Re: Ur-Fascism

xoxoxoBruce wrote:

Umberto Eco was born in Italy in 1932 so grew up watching the Italian fascists and German fascists do their thing....



Did you know that Mussolini, who wrote the Fascist manifesto, was not originally a Fascist, but a follower in another party?
Do you know that there's another ideology to which almost everything you and Eco wrote also applies equally?
Did you know that both these ideologies are not so much rejections of modernism as they are rejections of what they call "Capitalism," and that both launch from a point of criticising the excesses of modern economies?
Did you know they both reject classical liberalism, and opt instead for collectivism?
That both reject private property, individual rights, and open markets?
That both hate minority populations?
That both have produced major wars, purges, prison camps and more dead bodies than any other ideology in history -- by orders of magnitude, so not in a small way?
Did you know that Nazism stands for "National Socialism"?
Did you know that one of these forms of Socialism produced Hitler, and the other produced Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, the Kim Jongs, Mugabe, Castro, Ceacescu, Hoxha, Maduro...and a host of lesser dictators?

So what is this other Socialism?  It's Communism, of course.

So why do we get so interested in Fascism, which is essentially dead and buried...and not at all concerned about its bigger, even more homicidal cousin, which is still very much alive? And why are we trying various forms of Socialism again, when Socialism, both Nazi and Communist, has killed at least 140 million people and immiserated billions more?

 

Yesterday 6:09 pm  #6


Re: Ur-Fascism

I want to know more about this threat of socialism. Could you name one socialist politician who has been elected in American politics in the last 50 years?


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Yesterday 6:37 pm  #7


Re: Ur-Fascism

There's two who, tonight, are possibles to be elected president and vice president.   Now, that's not to say they'll succeed in getting their agenda implemented, because at least some of America is resistant to such things.  But if they get their way, they'd have America going full Socialist.

Why don't we learn from history? Although Socialism has been tried, and tried, and tried in the last century, it's always had two reliable effects: one is piles of dead bodies, and the other is utter economic failure.  There are no exceptions. Anytime Socialism has been permitted to run the state, death and economic dysfunction have ensued.  So what on earth would make anybody try it again?

That is, unless he/she was a fully-indoctrinated Socialist.  And there are too many of those still around.
 

 

Today 11:55 am  #8


Re: Ur-Fascism

I didn't have any socialist candidates on my ballot. What state are you in?


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Today 12:37 pm  #9


Re: Ur-Fascism

Flint wrote:

I didn't have any socialist candidates on my ballot. What state are you in?

Yeah, you did.

The state of euphoria.
 

 

Today 8:30 pm  #10


Re: Ur-Fascism

IC wrote:

Anytime Socialism has been permitted to run the state, death and economic dysfunction have ensued.   

It is socialism in France.  Not as exotic as done in Russia.  In Russia, when socialism failed, then communism took over.

Socialism is everyone shares in the wealth.  When socialism breaks down, then communism is everyone works to enrich the Central Committee of the Communist Party.

Fascism is similar to communism.  It also must deceive the masses so that the Central Committee prospers.  Both need a free press suppressed.

Every country has some variation of socialism.  Some work better than others.  Socialism appears to work best when dominated by free market forces.  So both France and the US (at different times) were the most productive nations in the world since WWII.  US mostly.  France for a short period.

The state of euphoria is also called the state of utopia.

Last edited by tw (Today 8:32 pm)

 

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