Comment by Ygg2
8 hours 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.
8 hours 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.
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.
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.
You forgot to couple with that the oligarchy. 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.
Ok, but what are the hallmarks of a fascist state?
2 replies →
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?
Where is the rampant militarism
ICE budget increases.
NG deployed domestically several times.
Renaming DoD to DoW.
Invasion of ~2 sovereign nations
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?
the worship of death? try all the videos of 'lethal kinetic strikes' on speedboats
> Where is the rampant militarism
ICE
> 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.
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