Comment by umanwizard
3 days ago
What's your definition of fascist and what is your argument that Meloni's party is fascist?
I'm not arguing or disagreeing with you -- genuinely curious about your perspective.
The most damning bit in her Wikipedia article is this: "In 1992 Meloni joined the Youth Front, the youth wing of the Italian Social Movement (MSI), a neo-fascist political party founded in 1946 by followers of Italian fascism. She later became the national leader of Student Action, the student movement of the National Alliance (AN), a post-fascist party that became the MSI's legal successor in 1995 and moved towards national conservatism."
But that does not necessarily mean she is herself a fascist, but rather that she was a member of various organizations that were originally founded by fascists then later moderated (roughly similar to the French FN/RN).
On the other hand, lots of people you could fairly describe as fascist or far-right claim to not be so, so it's possible she genuinely is and the moderate turn of these parties is a sham. As someone who doesn't follow Italian politics I have no way of knowing which is the case.
> various organizations that were originally founded by fascists then later moderated (roughly similar to the French FN/RN).
The reason those journalists were targeted is because they infiltrated one of those organizations and found that they were in fact still very much fascist behind closed doors (or at the very least racist and antisemitic).
Racist and antisemitic are not the same thing as fascist (all three are awful, of course). Though racism is usually part of fascism, there are lots of other elements of fascism too.
According to Wikipedia: "It is characterized by 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."
Most of these elements are not directly related to antisemitism or racism.
Racist doesn't mean fascist, but you can't be fascist without being racist.
As long as the executive doesn't control the judges, or insist on carrying a two speed justice, you can't really be fascist country.
Ergo a fascist party is one which is at least nationalist, if not ethnonationalist, and insist on curbing the rule of law : X should be less equal than Y in front of the law (assuming the same social class).
You can be fascist without being racists. Not all countries contain only one genetic population.
1 reply →
> But that does not necessarily mean she is herself a fascist, but rather that she was a member of various organizations that were originally founded by fascists then later moderated (roughly similar to the French FN/RN).
Inane.
Why?
It's just like how joining the hitler youth makes you a nazi
6 replies →
I’m all for giving people the benefit of the doubt but at some point you have to call a spade a spade.
France's RN appears moderated. They are financed by Putin, my friend [1]. Meloni's coalition party also has ties with Russia [2].
[1] https://www.politico.eu/article/marine-le-pen-plays-down-her...
[2] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jun/12/matteo-salvini...
To expand a bit, Matteo Salivni is the leader of Lega (formerly Lega Nord), the other far-right party in Italy's government.
Salvini's ties to Russia of course go way beyond a couple Aeroflot tickets: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/albertonardelli/salvini...