An Observation, A Thesis .....

[corevalue]

I thought fascists were lefties. Big state, anti-individual. Your post is full of prejudice.

Mussolini and Franco were lefties? My, you have some reading to do.

[benzlife]

I think that we don't need to worry overmuch about this kind of thing in the facebook age. The power of anonymous interaction is a new power and very influential I think, since it is a power of communication wielded by the little people.

A new hitler, no matter how many people he convinces, is still going to have to accept a vast torrent of online abuse, fun-poking, serious debate etc, from anonynous detractors. Go take a look at Republican Senator McHenry's facebook page after he engaged in an 'extremist' attack on Elizabeth Warren, if you haven't already. THis is completely different from the 1930s, and it makes IMO a sudden collective change of direction to some extremist vector - like nazism - extremely unlikely.

The three things that I think are going to force changes is the increasing energy scarcity, the ageing of the population, and the breakneck speed of technological change, but that is all in all a transformation I see happening in baby steps over 40 years.

I fear that the Internet is heading for greater censorship. Twice this week - on bbc radio - I've heard interviewees suggest that sites like facebook and twitter should be held responsible for the content they display. First in respect to the super injunctions and secondly with respect to Scottish sectarianism.

With the euphoria and huge support a popular and charismatic leader would be swept to power under it would be easy for them to introduce such rules.

On the wider discussion I think there is room for what a previous poster described as an "honest leader" finding support, but that they are likely to come from a group representing anti-capitalist / globalisation views. Whether this party's manifesto gets hijacked by the conventional left (much like the tea-party movement in the us has been hijacked by the republicans) is another question.

[(Blizzard)]

I thought fascists were lefties. Big state, anti-individual. Your post is full of prejudice.

You thought wrong.

Left and right aren't well defined terms, they are used by convention. Historically Hitler and Mussolini were regarded as right-wing. Support for individual rights and the belief in a small state is called liberalism.

The attempt by the American right to change the language - to equate liberalism with socialism, to disguise radicalism and liberalism as neo-conservatism, and to confuse fascism and socialism is exactly the kind of thing Orwell warned about.

I see this as one of the more worrying signs that Americans are becoming more ideologically extreme.

[Democorruptcy]

The BBC won't allow any extremism.

[wonderpup]

Maybe the point about 'extremist's is that they only really gain ground when they seem to many to be right and so not extreme?

For example the level of cuts being proposed in the state at present might once have been seen as 'extremist' in their magnitude- but because the argument has been made that these are desperate times they are seen as justified and so not extreme?

Few people will vote for a leader they see as extremist- but they might vote for one who has views they consider appropriate to the situation- even if these views might be seen as extreme by the standards of another time and place.

[the shaping machine]

Left and right aren't well defined terms, they are used by convention.

No they are well defined, but each wing defines themselves and their opponents using different axis (reactionary versus authoritarian for left and right respectively).

Historically Hitler and Mussolini were regarded as right-wing.

... by the left because they are embarrassed by their own history.

Mussolini was obviously left wing: "Mussolini's early political views were heavily influenced by his father, Alessandro Mussolini, a revolutionary socialist", and old Adolf led the German national Socialist Workers party, which does rather declare it's colours up front.

Support for individual rights and the belief in a small state is called liberalism.

Which is why Margaret Thatcher was often referred to as a liberal.

The attempt by the American right to change the language - to equate liberalism with socialism, to disguise radicalism and liberalism as neo-conservatism, and to confuse fascism and socialism is exactly the kind of thing Orwell warned about.

The contamination of the term liberal is due to the US left, who are now moving on to 'progressive' and will doubtless adopt 'the good guys' eventually. They've even insisted that the colour for the Democrats be blue.

To confuse fascism and socialism is exactly the kind of thing Orwell warned about.

Orwell spent most of his later writing career warning about Socialism. In hindsight he comes over as an early form of Libertarian (his opinion on the rights of firearms ownership is hardly PC).

[thecrashingisles]

For example the level of cuts being proposed in the state at present might once have been seen as 'extremist' in their magnitude.

What cuts?

[Mr Jib Fingers]

However, the US are only one charismatic presidential candidate away from proper Adolf-Hitler right-wing fascism. It is astonishing that their response to a crisis created by neo-liberalism, is a nationwide protest movement campaigning for more neo-liberalism.

How on earth has what's happened in the US been right-wing? Massive government spending, high taxes, a money supply being exploited by state-backed corporations and an intrusive government. Sounds like the Labour party here (oh yeah I forgot they're right-wing too).

Right-wing means small government, sound money and personal freedom.

I'm pretty sure that any movement here is going to come from the left, judging from the fact that anything bad from a lack of civil liberties to an intrusive government is automatically branded 'right-wing'.

[the shaping machine]

Maybe the point about 'extremist's is that they only really gain ground when they seem to many to be right and so not extreme?

If things really do go very wrong (domino national defaults etc) people may abandon the current lot of politicians and look for someone with 'clean hands'.

As others have implied up thread, I think the fear is that if voters start to worry about an empty stomach, they may be prepared to go out on limb and support whoever makes the biggest promises.

[Roman Roady]

Observation : There seems to be a trend towards extremism in many liberal democracies.

Thesis : Extremism will flourish when enough of the population realises that the ruling elite place their own interests ahead of the wishes of the general population, especially during times of economic difficulty.

Edit : Spelling

[LJAR]

If you ignore religious extremism, racial extremism, nationalism, the American revolution, any extremism in antiquity, the KKK and every right-wing extremist movement, government and revolution in history, then yes you are right, extremism is only a left-wing phenomena.

Ironically, the argument that all extremism is left-wing extremism, is itself right-wing extremism.

heh good post.

though it must be said that the BNP, Nazi party, communists, fascists etc are all inherently athoritarian, big government and "left wing" in the way I look at it,

But then every major party in the UK and USA is left wing when I look at it....

It seems most people think that if the government spends money propping up businesses then it is right wing, if it sends money propping up state monopolies and adopts a moralistic tone then it is left wing.

I think if a government spends lots of money that makes it left wing no matter where the money goes.

[Mr Jib Fingers]

I thought old Palin was interested in a small state and less government interference? What's that got to do with facism (apart from saying it is to look trendy of course) ?

[Mr Jib Fingers]

heh good post.

though it must be said that the BNP, Nazi party, communists, fascists etc are all inherently athoritarian, big government and "left wing" in the way I look at it,

But then every major party in the UK and USA is left wing when I look at it....

It seems most people think that if the government spends money propping up businesses then it is right wing, if it sends money propping up state monopolies and adopts a moralistic tone then it is left wing.

I think if a government spends lots of money that makes it left wing no matter where the money goes.

Yep. Most people simply confuse authoritarianism with being right-wing. I guess it's because they were taught anything nasty is right-wing so therefore any extremism is right-wing too and mindlessly repeat it like the sheep in Animal Farm.

Right-wing is about leaving people to get on with stuff, which was why Thatcher got so much stick for being evil and leaving everyone to fend for themselves. The same people also accused her of being massively statist and interfering negatively in almost every aspect of their lives. They don't realise that the two views are pretty much mutually exclusive.

[KingBingo]

It ALWAYS comes from the left, and then get relabelled as 'extreme right-wing' after the event, because the 'left' dominates the media and education sector.

4 posts later.......

However, the US are only one charismatic presidential candidate away from proper Adolf-Hitler right-wing fascism.

sigh...........

Hitler was left wing. National Socialism! German Workers Party!

Just goes to show how powerful the post war left-liberal brainwashing was that people still thing that fascism is not what it is.... Just a different flavour of socialism. i.e. LEFT wing!

[tallguy]

Observation : There seems to be a trend towards extremism in many liberal democracies.

Thesis : Extremism will flourish when enough of the population realises that the ruling elite place their own interests ahead of the wishes of the general population, especially during times of economic difficulty.

Questions :

- Does this thesis hold water?

- Is British society heading towards a tipping point?

- Will the extremism come from the left or the right?

Edit : Spelling

I do think we will get extremism when people get desperate. I don't think it will have anything to do with any kind of political "awakening" in the population. In fact, quite the opposite.

It will have to do with the lights going out and the shelves going empty.

What we are witnessing in Spain and Greece is not extremism. It is popular and mainstream disobedience. When that disobedience is quelled violently, when there is no legitimate democratic avenue left for reasonable dissent, when people get desperate because they are hungry, when a strongman comes along and tells everyone that he will make everything alright, then those countries will get extremism.

"Left, "right...makes no difference. It used to be the "Word of God" and "the divinity of kings". These days it goes by the alias' of "communism", "capitalism", etc etc etc....Those "isms" are just modern variations of the same old phenomenon. A small ruthless elite and the rest of us. Everything else, including whether it is "right" or "left, is irrelevent.

[tallguy]

The BBC won't allow any extremism.

That is precisely why we are going to get it

[dissident junk]

Mussolini and Franco were lefties? My, you have some reading to do.

Mussolini started out as a left-wing journalist. He was one of Italy's most prominent socialists before he was thrown out of the Italian Socialist Party.

It is important to remember that Franco was a military man from a military family, rather than a political ideologue. The Spanish Civil War is far more complex than left vs right.

I think you might have some reading to do.

[Mr Jib Fingers]

"Left, "right...makes no difference. It used to be the "Word of God" and "the divinity of kings". These days it goes by the alias' of "communism", "capitalism", etc etc etc....Those "isms" are just modern variations of the same old phenomenon. A small ruthless elite and the rest of us. Everything else, including whether it is "right" or "left, is irrelevent.

I think it is important if the problem is going to be blamed on being too right-wing and the 'solution' is going to be an even larger government and even more socialism.

[tallguy]

I think it is important if the problem is going to be blamed on being too right-wing and the 'solution' is going to be an even larger government and even more socialism.

You give your cultural conditioning away in your post. You conflate the the rule of states with socialism. There are just ruling elites and the rest of us. That is all. That is always all there has ever been as long as we have had that thing called "civilisation". They just operate under different monikers at different times depending on circumstance, that's all.

The reason you are confused is because you were led to believe that the "free market" is what was in operation in the West. When it all went tits up and your elected "representatives" suddenly went all unexpextedly "socialist" in their socialisation of the global fincial sector's losses, it was bound to be a bit confusing for you; I can see that. The thing is, you've just got to remember that there is no such thing as a "free market", there is no such thing as "socialism", there is no such thing as "capitalism".

There's just "them" and the rest of us. That's all there's ever been.

[KingBingo]

If you ignore religious extremism, racial extremism, nationalism, the American revolution, any extremism in antiquity, the KKK and every right-wing extremist movement, government and revolution in history, then yes you are right, extremism is only a left-wing phenomena.

Ironically, the argument that all extremism is left-wing extremism, is itself right-wing extremism.

This post is typical of the brainwashed generation who 'know about the world' because they have been taught by the left wing educational establishment and the left wing wing BBC. They think they know the facts, where as all they have been taught to do is equate fascism/nationalism and every other type of 'evil' as being right wing. The major flaw in all of this is that fascism, properly understood, is not a phenomenon of the right at all. Instead, it is, and always has been, a phenomenon of the left. This fact — an inconvenient truth if there ever was one — is obscured in our time by the equally mistaken belief that fascism and communism are opposites. In reality, they are closely related, historical competitors for the same constituents.

If you ignore religious extremism

American progressivism, from which today’s liberalism descended, was a kind of Christian fascism (many called it “Christian socialism”). This is a difficult concept for modern liberals to grasp because they are used to thinking of the progressives as the people who cleaned up the food supply, pushed through the eight hour workday, and ended child labor. But liberals often forget that the progressives were imperialists, at home and abroad. They were the authors of Prohibition, the Palmer Raids, eugenics, loyalty oaths, and, in its modern incarnation, what many call “state capitalism.”

If you ignore ........, racial extremism, the KKK

Explain a number of prominent Democrats , perhaps start with West Virginia Senator Robert Byrd. But the Klan of the 1920s was often seen as reformist and modern, and it had a close relationship with some progressive elements in the Democratic Party. The young Harry Truman as well as the future Supreme Court justice Hugo Black were members.

If you ignore ........ nationalism,

You think nationalism is automatically right wing??? Typical brainwashed comment. Explain NATIONAL SOCIALISM, explain the BNP in our own country. Both the right and the left have nationalism. In this country right wing nationalism is UKIP, left wing nationalism is BNP.

If you ignore ........, the American revolution

Yep, I claim that one all right. That was a libertarian revolution that I would reimport here in a heartbeat if I could.

If you ignore............, any extremism in antiquity,

=Total nothing comment.

If you ignore .......... every right-wing extremist movement, government and revolution in history, then yes you are right, extremism is only a left-wing phenomena.

The nub of your know-nothing knee jerk prejudice. You automatically and viscerally believe that EVIL= FASCISM=RIGHT WING and I could argue with you all day and all night but it would make no difference. I cannot reason you out of a position that you did not arrive at by reason in the first place.

You will continue to believe that Hitler and Mussolini were right wing even though that flies in the face of all fact, you think you know something and really you have just been trained to think something is your knowledge, where as actually you have been brainwashed by a guilty left hurriedly redefining fascism after the war.

The National Socialist German Workers’ Party was in every respect a grassroots populist party. Party leaders spouted all sorts of socialist prattle about seizing the wealth of the rich. Mein Kampf is replete with attacks on “dividend-hungry businessmen” whose “greed,” “ruthlessness,” and “short-sighted narrow-mindedness” were ruining the country. Hitler adamantly took the side of the trade union movement over “dishonorable employers.” Upon seizing power, the radicals in the Nazi Party Labor Union threatened to put business leaders in concentration camps if they didn’t increase workers’ wages.Furthermore before the war, fascism was widely viewed as a progressive social movement with many liberal and left-wing adherents in Europe and the United States.

Fascism is a religion of the state. It assumes the organic unity of the body politic and longs for a national leader attuned to the will of the people. It is totalitarian in that it views everything as political and holds that any action by the state is justified to achieve the common good. It takes responsibility for all aspects of life, including our health and well-being, and seeks to impose uniformity of thought and action, whether by force or through regulation and social pressure. Everything, including the economy and religion, must be aligned with its objectives. Any rival identity is part of the “problem” and therefore defined as the enemy. Todays Guardian reading, BBC watching progressive left embodies all of these aspects of fascism.

[dissident junk]

You know what, when Mosley and his blackshirts marched Nazi style through British streets in the 1930s, people standing on the pavements laughed at them.

It is a terrible thing to live in fear. Let it go.

Ah .... this is one of those bits of common knowledge that doesn't entirely depict the nature and influence of British fascism, which, as an ideology, was actually a lot more influential, started prior to the 1920s, and was both a rural and urban phenomenon. Cable Street is only a very small part of the story of British fascism between the wars.

[Mr Jib Fingers]

You give your cultural conditioning away in your post. You conflate the the rule of states with socialism. There are just ruling elites and the rest of us. That is all. That is always all there has ever been as long as we have had that thing called "civilisation". They just operate under different monikers at different times depending on circumstance, that's all.

The reason you are confused is because you were led to believe that the "free market" is what was in operation in the West. When it all went tits up and your elected "representatives" suddenly went all unexpextedly "socialist" in their socialisation of the global fincial sector's losses, it was bound to be a bit confusing for you; I can see that. The thing is, you've just got to remember that there is no such thing as a "free market", there is no such thing as "socialism", there is no such thing as "capitalism".

There's just "them" and the rest of us. That's all there's ever been.

What I meant was that if the meme takes off that it is the free market that has got us into this mess (which it obviously wasn't since we've not had a free market at all) then the solution is going to be a shift to the left and more socialism.

We've obviously got some elements of socialism to a certain extent with redistribution to the poorest from the middle earners in the form of various benefits. We've also had massive transfer of wealth from ordinary people to the state to be used on various government pet projects. I wasn't trying to make out that we've got a 100% socialist government.

Most people seem to be starting to blame capitalism and free-markets for all our problems. Where do you think this will end up leading?

[tallguy]

What I meant was that if the meme takes off that it is the free market that has got us into this mess (which it obviously wasn't since we've not had a free market at all) then the solution is going to be a shift to the left and more socialism.

We've obviously got some elements of socialism to a certain extent with redistribution to the poorest from the middle earners in the form of various benefits. We've also had massive transfer of wealth from ordinary people to the state to be used on various government pet projects. I wasn't trying to make out that we've got a 100% socialist government.

Most people seem to be starting to blame capitalism and free-markets for all our problems. Where do you think this will end up leading?

The point I am making is that everything that has happened in the last two or three years is entirely consistent with what went before. On the way up, there was "no such thing as society". This nicely justified the growing redistribution of power and wealth upwards towards a timy monority. On the way down, "we are all in this together", apparently. Again a justification of the allocation of resources upwards towards a tiny minority. People didn't miond so much on the way up as there were enough crumbs thrown their way as to take their minds off the fact that the majority of the cake was going elsewhere. Obviously, on the way down, people are noticing a little bit more. Hence the increase in surveillance, the "war on terror" as a distraction, the steady removal of civil liberties etc etc etc.

Different methods employed according to circumstance. Same game.

[Mr Jib Fingers]

The point I am making is that everything that has happened in the last two or three years is entirely consistent with what went before. On the way up, there was "no such thing as society". This nicely justified the growing redistribution of power and wealth upwards towards a timy monority. On the way down, "we are all in this together", apparently. Again a justification of the allocation of resources upwards towards a tiny minority. People didn't miond so much on the way up as there were enough crumbs thrown their way as to take their minds off the fact that the majority of the cake was going elsewhere. Obviously, on the way down, people are noticing a little bit more. Hence the increase in surveillance, the "war on terror" as a distraction, the steady removal of civil liberties etc etc etc.

Different methods employed according to circumstance. Same game.

I think you're betraying your prejudices here. Have you actually read the whole "there's no such thing as society" quote? It basically says that we need to look after each other and if you steal from the state you steal from each other. It's actually the exact opposite of the "greed is good" and "every man for himself" message that the left likes to portray it as.

It's amazing how one single misquote can skew what people think of an entire decade of government.

Also I'd say the poor in 1997 were far better off than the poor in 1979 on average and social mobility was far better than it is today.

[the shaping machine]

Fascism, properly understood, is not a phenomenon of the right at all. Instead, it is, and always has been, a phenomenon of the left. This fact — an inconvenient truth if there ever was one — is obscured in our time by the equally mistaken belief that fascism and communism are opposites. In reality, they are closely related, historical competitors for the same constituents.

I agree totally with your message, but I have a minor quibble. The use of the term fascist should really be confined the Italian form of national Socialism. Applying it to the German NSDAP was a sop to the Soviets, who for obvious propaganda reasons disliked anyone using the term socialist in reference to Hitler's Germany.