I’m surprised the comments seem to be defending authoritarianism like it’s any more acceptable than fascism.
“Stalin may have had millions of people killed and fueled the negative reputation of communism world wide for nearly a century, but at least he wasn’t a fascist.”. I don’t seem to understand why democratic social ownership is considered a worse alternative than letting a centralized tyrannical government harm people unchecked.
Authoritarian != communism. Authoritarianism applies equally to communism and fascism. The latter two describe ideology, where ‘authoritarian’ describes scale. Your sentence is like if I said I I use reds, not apples, in my pies. It sort of makes sense, but not really.
You said: ‘I don’t seem to understand why democratic social ownership is considered a worse alternative’ yes, exactly! That’s socialism, which is an economic – not a political – system. You can combine that with democracy or communism or fascism.
I really recommend you learn what all these terms mean, because it’s not only super fascinating, but we can each understand and communicate better when we can build upon common concepts.
I’ve been a democratic socialist for years. Communism is not an authoritarian belief, it is a socioeconomic model separate from that concept. Stalinist Communism -in practice- was an absolutely authoritarian dictatorship with well documented hardship suffered by the Russians, that people for some reason can’t seem to unhook from actual proper communism and will defend to the death in a fit of tribalist rage as if all communism is good communism. I chose to define Democratic Socialism rather than use the term intentionally, because I felt like just blurbing it out would come across as a buzzword. I’m not opposed to communism and would prefer socialism, but I am absolutely not going to advocate for Stalinist Communism.
I don’t know, the thing annoying me about the tread is everyone is correcting the person by saying “They’re Communist, not Fascist!” instead of saying that it was “Authoritarian rather than Fascist”. I feel like framing it in the latter way unhooks the term from authoritarianism, but also doesn’t preclude it from possibly becoming authoritarian like any other socioeconomic system. I feel like the prior framing gave the impression that Stalinist Communism had nothing to do with authoritarianism in general, which I will absolutely disagree with. Stalinist Communism was absolutely not Fascism, but it was absolutely an Authoritarian Dictatorship and I don’t appreciate the implication that it wasn’t.
I don’t know if any of that makes sense, I have a hard time articulating my points. Feel free to critique and thank you for the conversation.
Words have meanings - if people start calling left-leaning authoritarians “fascists” and no one corrects them, the red-hats will never understand how to differentiate; or why to differentiate.
I’m using the definition of fascism as it relates to dictator advocacy. I know that confuses a lot of people who associate socialism with left and fascism with right, but it is proper use of the term.
The etymology is rooted in Italian authoritarianism from root words meaning a political gathering of men.
Who has defined fascism as such? How do the practices of Stalinism root in Italian authoritarianism?
Defining fascism as any form of authoritarianism broadens the term so much as to render it useless.
It’s useful to be able to talk about the ways in which the ideologies which governed Franco’s Spain and Mussolini’s Italy are more similar to each other than say, something like the DPRK under Juche. If we want to refer to something as authoritarian, we already have the word authoritarian.
Authoritarian is the word you’re looking for, not fascist.
I’m surprised the comments seem to be defending authoritarianism like it’s any more acceptable than fascism. “Stalin may have had millions of people killed and fueled the negative reputation of communism world wide for nearly a century, but at least he wasn’t a fascist.”. I don’t seem to understand why democratic social ownership is considered a worse alternative than letting a centralized tyrannical government harm people unchecked.
I’m not defending anything like that, but:
Authoritarian != communism. Authoritarianism applies equally to communism and fascism. The latter two describe ideology, where ‘authoritarian’ describes scale. Your sentence is like if I said I I use reds, not apples, in my pies. It sort of makes sense, but not really.
You said: ‘I don’t seem to understand why democratic social ownership is considered a worse alternative’ yes, exactly! That’s socialism, which is an economic – not a political – system. You can combine that with democracy or communism or fascism.
I really recommend you learn what all these terms mean, because it’s not only super fascinating, but we can each understand and communicate better when we can build upon common concepts.
I’ve been a democratic socialist for years. Communism is not an authoritarian belief, it is a socioeconomic model separate from that concept. Stalinist Communism -in practice- was an absolutely authoritarian dictatorship with well documented hardship suffered by the Russians, that people for some reason can’t seem to unhook from actual proper communism and will defend to the death in a fit of tribalist rage as if all communism is good communism. I chose to define Democratic Socialism rather than use the term intentionally, because I felt like just blurbing it out would come across as a buzzword. I’m not opposed to communism and would prefer socialism, but I am absolutely not going to advocate for Stalinist Communism.
I don’t know, the thing annoying me about the tread is everyone is correcting the person by saying “They’re Communist, not Fascist!” instead of saying that it was “Authoritarian rather than Fascist”. I feel like framing it in the latter way unhooks the term from authoritarianism, but also doesn’t preclude it from possibly becoming authoritarian like any other socioeconomic system. I feel like the prior framing gave the impression that Stalinist Communism had nothing to do with authoritarianism in general, which I will absolutely disagree with. Stalinist Communism was absolutely not Fascism, but it was absolutely an Authoritarian Dictatorship and I don’t appreciate the implication that it wasn’t.
I don’t know if any of that makes sense, I have a hard time articulating my points. Feel free to critique and thank you for the conversation.
Words have meanings - if people start calling left-leaning authoritarians “fascists” and no one corrects them, the red-hats will never understand how to differentiate; or why to differentiate.
“shooting a home invader and killing the neighbor next door are both violent killings, so we should classify them both as murder” - you, probably.
I’m using the definition of fascism as it relates to dictator advocacy. I know that confuses a lot of people who associate socialism with left and fascism with right, but it is proper use of the term.
The etymology is rooted in Italian authoritarianism from root words meaning a political gathering of men.
Who has defined fascism as such? How do the practices of Stalinism root in Italian authoritarianism?
Defining fascism as any form of authoritarianism broadens the term so much as to render it useless.
It’s useful to be able to talk about the ways in which the ideologies which governed Franco’s Spain and Mussolini’s Italy are more similar to each other than say, something like the DPRK under Juche. If we want to refer to something as authoritarian, we already have the word authoritarian.
Source?