A question for righties on fascism

[Craig234]

No, as I understand, the Spanish Republicans were a lot more righteous than the Fascists - a lot of American heroes volunteered to go fight for them.

I should say, the Republicans did a lot of wrong too. They were more righteous in their cause than in their behavior.

Wikipedia notes some disagreement in the group:

"Thirty-eight thousand people were killed in the Republican zone during the war, 17,000 of whom were killed in Madrid or Catalonia within a month of the coup. Whilst the Communists were forthright in their support of extrajudicial killings, much of the Republican side was appalled by the murders.[369] Azaña came close to resigning.[362] He, alongside other members of Parliament and a great number of other local officials, attempted to prevent Nationalist supporters being lynched. Some of those in positions of power intervened personally to stop the killings."

 

[Tigerace117]

The Republicans were not the legitimate government as they had deposed their rightful King, Alfonso favored the nationalists.

The Germans may have supported Franco for their own reasons, but that’s not an argument in favor of the Spanish Republicans. Germany got no help from Franco except for some super facists who Franco sent off to die in Russia. However a pro-soviet state on NATOs western border would not have tolerated after the war, so there would’ve been a civil war and strife and maybe a trigger for military intervention by the Soviets sooner or later and so Franco saved lives

I am also not defending mass murder or mass rape, unless you are because it is documented the Republicans did the same thing. Atrocities have been committed by nearly every wartime army to have ever existed, that’s a weak argument.

"Rightful king" according to who? The king had lost a rather large amount of support amongst the Spanish people over the years due to the constant instability, which was he got kicked off the throne in the first place. Not to mention, of course, ****ty conditions for the poor, insurrection in Spain's colonies which required support from France to put down, and a general inability of the Spanish people to express their will. Alfonso favoring a brutal regime--- as he had favored the Primo de Rivera regime--- which conducted all sorts of atrocities very much points to him not being the sort of person one should have on a throne to begin with.

Germany got to test run its new equipment and tactics--- which proved essential during the Second World War. The Francoist regim managed to stay out of active fighting due to a mixture of Franco being too cautious and too greedy to join the Axis, but that doesn't change the fact that Spain was an extremely pro Axis "neutral" supplying Germany with all sorts of resources both from itself and from South America, allowing the Abwehr to operate freely and target Gibraltar, and generally being so pro Axis that nobody was interested in dealing with them for years after the war.

:lamo

What a titanic load of crap. There is no evidence to suggest there would be "another civil war" to begin with; there certainly would be guerilla resistance, as there was in real life, but the fascists would not have had the strength to conduct a full scale "revolution" and nobody was going to support Nazi collaborators.

So no, that is a spectacularly weak claim to justify your fantasy that the guy who had hundreds of thousands of innocent people murdered "saved lives".

Except you absolutely have.....repeatedly. And saying "but the republicans" is not an excuse. Franco continued killing long after the war was over, and targeted numerous other groups besides the communists. And no, most armies have somehow managed not to implement policies of mass rape and executing the families of people who manage to escape them. Your entire argument is nothing more than a desperate attempt to justify fascism because Franco wrapped his regime in catholic imagery.

 

[Tigerace117]

Carranza called for the constitutional convention and rigged the process for delegates to insure the rural farmers had next to no representation. He believed the “superstitions” of the Church were holding Mexico back and passed the anticlerical articles.
These were unjust laws, they were entirely illegitimate as most Mexicans had no say in them being passed.

Calles was able to start a war because Carranza gave him the tools.

You don’t need to literally kill 85% of the population, just enough to terrorize them into not going to mass, or to kill the priests so celebrating sacraments isn’t possible and in fact many Mexican states after the war had no priests at all.

As amusing as it is to see you do a complete 180--- from defending the "peasants are literally vermin" Spanish fascists to crying about how the poor poor cristeros were treated "unjustly"--- it doesn't change the facts. You claimed that the Mexican government tried to "wipe out Catholics". It did no such thing. It merely exercised laws--- admittedly anti clerical ones-- which had previously not been utilized, due to elements of the church supporting Huerta. When Huerta was overthrown, many in the revolutionary upper ranks remembered--- and resented-- it.

 

[AmNat]

you're in denial about being like a Nazi who still defends the holocaust analogously

Your powers of interpretive reading are really something else.

Literally "I demand the freedom to stop black people from moving into my neighborhood. I demand freedom to segregate schools" :lamo

Yes. I know that, as a liberal, you don't understand the concept of freedom of association.

Dang, that's just way out there. For starters, fascism started in Italy during WWI, when comminism was mostly unknown. The Soviet Union did not start until 1922, so fascism predates that.

Hitler did not invent fascism, and your assessment of his help to today's "left" is ridiculous.

Those who refuse to study history deserve to repeat it.

The Bolshevik Revolution began in 1918. People knew good and well what communism meant by the time Mussolini came to power.

 

[EMNofSeattle]

"Rightful king" according to who? The king had lost a rather large amount of support amongst the Spanish people over the years due to the constant instability, which was he got kicked off the throne in the first place. Not to mention, of course, ****ty conditions for the poor, insurrection in Spain's colonies which required support from France to put down, and a general inability of the Spanish people to express their will. Alfonso favoring a brutal regime--- as he had favored the Primo de Rivera regime--- which conducted all sorts of atrocities very much points to him not being the sort of person one should have on a throne to begin with.

Germany got to test run its new equipment and tactics--- which proved essential during the Second World War. The Francoist regim managed to stay out of active fighting due to a mixture of Franco being too cautious and too greedy to join the Axis, but that doesn't change the fact that Spain was an extremely pro Axis "neutral" supplying Germany with all sorts of resources both from itself and from South America, allowing the Abwehr to operate freely and target Gibraltar, and generally being so pro Axis that nobody was interested in dealing with them for years after the war.

:lamo

What a titanic load of crap. There is no evidence to suggest there would be "another civil war" to begin with; there certainly would be guerilla resistance, as there was in real life, but the fascists would not have had the strength to conduct a full scale "revolution" and nobody was going to support Nazi collaborators.

So no, that is a spectacularly weak claim to justify your fantasy that the guy who had hundreds of thousands of innocent people murdered "saved lives".

Except you absolutely have.....repeatedly. And saying "but the republicans" is not an excuse. Franco continued killing long after the war was over, and targeted numerous other groups besides the communists. And no, most armies have somehow managed not to implement policies of mass rape and executing the families of people who manage to escape them. Your entire argument is nothing more than a desperate attempt to justify fascism because Franco wrapped his regime in catholic imagery.

There is no desperation on my part. You’re throwing out walls of text because you’re a communist sympathizer who flatly denies the murderous reality of communism. I have not denied any atrocities committed by the Franco regime, only that they were understandable in the context of the time. Tell me in which communist country are Catholics given religious liberty? They had it in Franco’s regime, in Pinochet’s regime, in the Argentine regime. Not in China or Cuba or Cambodia or anywhere. And since they had genocidal views of the majority of the population they were morally inferior. I’m not going to look at the deaths of people who consciously chose to kill people like me as some form of tragedy, they wanted a war, they got it and they lost. Sucks for them

 

[EMNofSeattle]

As amusing as it is to see you do a complete 180--- from defending the "peasants are literally vermin" Spanish fascists to crying about how the poor poor cristeros were treated "unjustly"--- it doesn't change the facts. You claimed that the Mexican government tried to "wipe out Catholics". It did no such thing. It merely exercised laws--- admittedly anti clerical ones-- which had previously not been utilized, due to elements of the church supporting Huerta. When Huerta was overthrown, many in the revolutionary upper ranks remembered--- and resented-- it.

I never said the peasants were Vermin. In most cases it was urban workers and liberals who supported anti-clerical tyranny while the peasants defended the faith.

I love how you keep writing text that only backs up what I said. I know Mexico had anti-clerical laws and why they had them. I also explained why these laws were illegitimate and explained their intent was to wipe out the church and you back all this up and then say “they never tried to wipe out Catholics” yeah buddy they did. You’re like the southerners who grasp at straws to deny secession was over slavery, at least those people have a thin straw to grasp at. Communists have not even that

 

[Tigerace117]

There is no desperation on my part. You’re throwing out walls of text because you’re a communist sympathizer who flatly denies the murderous reality of communism. I have not denied any atrocities committed by the Franco regime, only that they were understandable in the context of the time. Tell me in which communist country are Catholics given religious liberty? They had it in Franco’s regime, in Pinochet’s regime, in the Argentine regime. Not in China or Cuba or Cambodia or anywhere. And since they had genocidal views of the majority of the population they were morally inferior. I’m not going to look at the deaths of people who consciously chose to kill people like me as some form of tragedy, they wanted a war, they got it and they lost. Sucks for them

:lamo

Aww, am I providing too many facts for the poor poor fascist to get his head around? Maybe you should actually learn some history before you trying debating next time if you can't even handle basic, rudimentary discussion of the situation in Spain.

Franco killed more people than the communists. Several thousand more. I get that you are in full blown "hysterically throwing **** at the wall to see what sticks" mode but I am certainly not a "communist sympathizer" as even a slight bit of research would confirm.

Pinochet literally had women raped by dogs.

"Women were the primary targets of gruesome acts of sexual abuse. According to the Valech Commission, almost every single female prisoner was a victim of repeated rape. Not only would military men rape women, they would also use foreign objects and even animals to inflict more pain and suffering. Women (and occasionally men) reported that spiders and live rats were often implanted on their genitals. One woman testified that she had been "raped and sexually assaulted with trained dogs and with live rats."

Human rights violations in Pinochet's Chile - Wikipedia

That should tell you all you need to know about the sadistic ****ers in that country. Allende was on the KGB payroll, true, but that doesn't change the fact that Pinochet was a psychotic thug.

The Argentine regime got its ass kicked in a war of aggression and murdered thousands of innocent people.

Catholics have religious freedom across the West, and indeed, across most of the world. From the regimes you've picked as the ones you support, however, it's clear that it's not "religious freedom" you are after but rather a brutal regime which "eliminates" anyone who doesn't think the "right way".

And your desperate defense of those regimes says a lot about you.

 

[Tigerace117]

I never said the peasants were Vermin. In most cases it was urban workers and liberals who supported anti-clerical tyranny while the peasants defended the faith.

I love how you keep writing text that only backs up what I said. I know Mexico had anti-clerical laws and why they had them. I also explained why these laws were illegitimate and explained their intent was to wipe out the church and you back all this up and then say “they never tried to wipe out Catholics” yeah buddy they did. You’re like the southerners who grasp at straws to deny secession was over slavery, at least those people have a thin straw to grasp at. Communists have not even that

No, it was the officers of the regime you defend who said that.

Spanish Maquis - Wikipedia

File:Mapa maquis3.PNG - Wikipedia

Maquis were active mostly in mountainous areas throughout the peninsula, preferring forests or areas of dense vegetation that would provide shelter and cover. Another important factor in the location of maqui groups and their survival was the social situation. They had to choose areas in which they could count on the collaboration of at least part of the population, given that without support they could hardly sustain a guerrilla group.

In areas of harsher weather, like in the mountains of León, the maquis would relatively often pass periods of time more or less "undercover", in small groups, in support houses in villages, especially during the winter months.

Among the areas of major maquis activity were the Cornisa Cantábrica, from Galicia to Cantabria, especially the mountains of Asturias and the area north of León; the Iberian System, specifically the area between the provinces of Teruel, Castellón, Valencia, and Cuenca; Centro, which consists of Extremadura, the north of Cordova, Ciudad Real, Toledo and the mountains of the Sistema Central; and two independent areas in the south of Andalusia: Cádiz on one hand and Granada-Málaga on the other.[2] There was also activity in other areas, such as La Mancha and High Aragon."

Lol yeah, you keep desperate shrieking "I win! I win! And handwaving away the actual facts.

 

[EMNofSeattle]

No, it was the officers of the regime you defend who said that.

Spanish Maquis - Wikipedia

File:Mapa maquis3.PNG - Wikipedia

Maquis were active mostly in mountainous areas throughout the peninsula, preferring forests or areas of dense vegetation that would provide shelter and cover. Another important factor in the location of maqui groups and their survival was the social situation. They had to choose areas in which they could count on the collaboration of at least part of the population, given that without support they could hardly sustain a guerrilla group.

In areas of harsher weather, like in the mountains of León, the maquis would relatively often pass periods of time more or less "undercover", in small groups, in support houses in villages, especially during the winter months.

Among the areas of major maquis activity were the Cornisa Cantábrica, from Galicia to Cantabria, especially the mountains of Asturias and the area north of León; the Iberian System, specifically the area between the provinces of Teruel, Castellón, Valencia, and Cuenca; Centro, which consists of Extremadura, the north of Cordova, Ciudad Real, Toledo and the mountains of the Sistema Central; and two independent areas in the south of Andalusia: Cádiz on one hand and Granada-Málaga on the other.[2] There was also activity in other areas, such as La Mancha and High Aragon."

Lol yeah, you keep desperate shrieking "I win! I win! And handwaving away the actual facts.

Lol there’s nothing to win, Franco already did that and so Spain is now a free country with religious liberty and the rightful Monarchy restored and there’s not millions of dead conservatives for you to ignore while praising the famines and political instability of a failing communist Regime. Just like after Pinochet Chile is a first world nation and Cuba totally blows

You can talk all you want, and you still have refuted nothing I’ve actually said.

 

[Deuce]

Yes. I know that, as a liberal, you don't understand the concept of freedom of association.

Your freedom of association does not include stopping someone else from living somewhere.

 

[Idiometer]

Your powers of interpretive reading are really something else.



Yes. I know that, as a liberal, you don't understand the concept of freedom of association.



The Bolshevik Revolution began in 1918. People knew good and well what communism meant by the time Mussolini came to power.

And fascism started a couple of years before that.

"According to Mussolini's own account, the Fascist Revolutionary Party (Partito Fascista Rivoluzionario or PFR) was founded in Italy in 1915."

 

[Craig234]

Yes. I know that, as a liberal, you don't understand the concept of freedom of association.

Actually, as a racist segregationist, you're the one who doesn't understand the concept. Liberals do.

Liberals understand that freedom of association means they have the right to decide who to invite to their home as gusts, whose homes to go to as guests; not to decide which races are allowed to buy houses in their neighborhoods.

Liberals understand that freedom of association means they have the right to decide who they invite to go to the movies with them; not to decide what races are allowed to enter the theater or sit in other seats near them.

Liberals understand that freedom of association means they have the right to meet with others they want to for a talk on either side of the segregation issue; not to decide what races their business can serve or can enter the park.

You did not respond to my post about your policy of "separate but equal".

 

[Craig234]

Just like after Pinochet Chile is a first world nation and Cuba totally blows

More disgusting right-wing re-writing of history. Put aside the harm to the Cuban economy of the US Boycott - the issue here is Chile, who was not 'Cuba'.

Chile's main industry before Pinochet was copper mines. In typical fashion, foreign companies came in and exploited the country, building mines and basically taking all the wealth from the mining giving almost nothing in return to the country.

The exploitation was bad enough that in the election. there were three candidates - left, center, right - and all said that the mining needed to be nationalized to keep its wealth for the country. The left candidate, Allende, won.

The country had a thriving democracy under Allende. Plenty of freedom, art, etc. It was Nixon that decided, Allende had to be kept from becoming president before Allende's election. That good old 'US champion of democracy' again. He ordered the CIA to keep Allende from getting elected, but their efforts failed and Allende won.

Then the policy became overthrowing Allende. The CIA again was ordered to do that. They organized a coup attempt, which tried to recruit the head of the military. That leader was a patriot and said he supported the constitution and democracy for Chile and would not join, so they made kidnapping him part of the coup plan.

They went to kidnap him, and he pulled his pistol and the coup plotters killed him. Finally, a military revolt was orchestrated by the CIA which resulted in Allende being killed.

A right-wing puppet who would let the foreign companies have the mining industry again took over, Pinochet. A far-right (but Nobel-winning) economist, Milton Friedman, was given carte blanche to use Chile as an 'experiment' to test and prove his right-wing economic policies using a nation. The results were largely quite bad, as documented in Naomi Klein's book, "The Shock Doctrine".

(This is the same Milton Friedman who, for example, after Hurricane Katrina, advocated using the shock of the event to get rid of public education in the area.

"Friedman’s suggestions were indeed radical: abandon the public school system and instead provide families with vouchers to offset the costs of for-profit schools. It seems like a blatant cash-grab, a hard sell under normal circumstances, but Friedman knew that the shock and disorientation produced by disaster is the perfect time to push through otherwise inconceivable changes…"

"At the behest of his economic adviser, Milton Friedman, Pinochet privatized publicly-owned companies, deregulated the financial sector, and slashed government spending on social programs while expanding his military. It did not go well:

In 1974, inflation reached 375 percent—the highest rate in the world and almost twice the top level under Allende… At the same time, Chileans were being thrown out of work because Pinochet’s experiment with “free trade” was flooding the country with cheap imports. Local businesses were closing, unable to compete, unemployment hit record levels and hunger became rampant."

When Pinochet wrote Friedman about the situation, the high priest of laissez-faire economics suggested “shock treatment”—deeper cuts to government, more privatization:

Pinochet and [Chilean finance minister Sergio] de Castro got to work stripping away the welfare state to arrive at their pure capitalist utopia. In 1975, they cut public spending by 27 percent in one blow—and they kept cutting until, by 1980, it was half of what it had been under Allende. Health and education took the heaviest hits. Even The Economist, a free-market cheerleader, called it “an orgy of self-mutilation.” De Castro privatized almost almost five hundred state-owned companies and banks, practically giving them away, since the point was to get them as quickly as possible into their rightful place in the economic order. He took no pity on local companies and removed even more trade barriers the result was a loss of 177,000 industrial jobs between 1973 and 1983.

"

To rule with these bad policies and keep power, a reign of terror was committed, with US help. The CIA helped Pinochet have a secret police force to commit terror against the people, and to identify people like labor leaders or left-wing professors, who the government would kidnap, torture, murder.

1/2

 

[Craig234]

Take one anecdote - there was a Ford factory - and security forces came and hauled one of the workers outside the factory. They then tortured him to death, his screams heard in the factory. This terrorized the factory workers.

Numerically, that was one of the thousands of people killed by the regime - many more were tortured - but far more were terrorized.

All that mattered was, keep giving the country's wealth to the foreign companies, and keep the puppet in power who would do so.

In 2013, a poll was done of Chileans about Pinochet.

"While three-quarters of those polled said Gen Pinochet was a dictator, 9% said he would go down as one of the greatest leaders in Chilean history.

According to the poll, 55% of Chileans regarded the 17 years of the dictatorship as either bad or very bad, while 9% said they were good or very good."

The poster above tries to give credit for the prosperity now to Pinochet - the understated BBC says, not so fast: "Just how much of Chile's prosperity is down to the policies of the Pinochet regime, and how much is to do with the policies of later centre-left governments and the country's vast mineral wealth, is still a matter of debate."

2/2

 

[Craig234]

Your freedom of association does not include stopping someone else from living somewhere.

He clearly thinks it does, and would vote for that to be done to black people, to take their equal rights. What we can do is to point out his whitewashing of his statements to say he's 'for freedom' are false and how they're actually against freedom for people he cares nothing about - they're for the freedom to take others' rights.

 

[jonny5]

What you said is fine; it was rather limited to violence and 'consent of the governed' which I'm not sure is the main issue. I like the title of Chomsky's book, "Manufacturing Consent", which suggests there's more to the idealistic 'consent' issue. It's a larger topic - I was just asking for opinions mainly. So, you'd be fine with fascism if it asks for consent? What about those in the minority? A question democracies have to answer as well.

I think that is the main issue. If fascism asked for consent it wouldnt be fascism. It would be democracy, and if everyone agreed to nationalism, economic regulation, etc then I would be fine it with. That sounds like many modern day countries.

 

[YouveBeenTrumpd]

There are problems with 'Republicans', 'trumpistas', and 'conservatives', so hopefully 'righties' is ok.

There are bad things about fascism (fascism, not the phony right-wing propaganda abuse of the word like 'Democratic fascists), other than the Holocaust. Franco invented 'Fascism' in Italy; Franco was fascists in Spain as well. Arguably Pinochet in Chile.

Question is, can you say why fascism was bad other than the holocaust? In other words, what was wrong with Franco and Mussolini? Was Hitler all that bad other than the Holocaust, providing 'strong leadership' and economic recovery and 'making Germany great again'?

We Americans with other views assume it's broadly known fascism is bad, and not only because one fascist country committed the holocaust. I'm curious to confirm whether that's correct.

So, righties, do you have good things to say about Mussolini and Franco? Mixed feelings? Or criticisms, and if so, what are they regarding fascism, authoritarianism?

This whole post is based on a giant lie and is therefore null and void.

If there is anybody who "behaves" like fascists its Democrats, not Republicans.

 

[jonny5]

It's not something that happens overnight. It creeps its way in and decades later people ask how it went so far.

We have thousands of children in literal concentration camps, right now, in the land of the free. And it's not the first time we've done it.

More hyperbole. Neither the Japanese americans, nor illegal alien children are in literal concentration camps. They are not political prisoners starved and forced to do labor, until they are executed. They arent even held there very long.

No one is 'happily marching down the road of fascism', even as bad as democrats are infringing on fundamental natural and constitutional rights.

 

[Craig234]

More hyperbole. Neither the Japanese americans, nor illegal alien children are in literal concentration camps. They are not political prisoners starved and forced to do labor, until they are executed. They arent even held there very long.

No one is 'happily marching down the road of fascism', even as bad as democrats are infringing on fundamental natural and constitutional rights.

You get the irony of the day award for your complaint about hyperbole in one line 1, and your hyperbole in line 2. 'starved' and 'executed' are not requirements for concentration camps - it's your definition that's wrong. The Britannica even lists the Japanese-American camps as an example. But temporary refugee camps don't literally qualify; the point being made is the resemblance.

concentration camp | Facts, History, & Definition | Britannica.com

 

[Craig234]

This whole post is based on a giant lie and is therefore null and void.

Actually, it was your post that's a 'lie'. My post asked a question.

 

[Craig234]

I think that is the main issue. If fascism asked for consent it wouldnt be fascism. It would be democracy, and if everyone agreed to nationalism, economic regulation, etc then I would be fine it with. That sounds like many modern day countries.

Well, you didn't really address my point, what about the minority who does not consent? In democracies, that's usually addressed by whatever rights the majority chooses to give the minority, and call that freedom for them. In the US that includes the right to 'free speech' to complain and the right to vote for change each election (though our black minority would have something to say about those rights our fist 200 years). How often do elections need to be held for you? Is one time ok?

But the definition of fascism is bigger than just that consent for the majority.

" a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition
2 : a tendency toward or actual exercise of strong autocratic or dictatorial control"

What if the majority consent to having a dictator they worship? That's still fascism as a form of government. What if Hitler had held an election and been elected leader for life in 1942? That's still fascism. That 'forcible suppression' of opposition is particularly relevant to us as a potential thing; the press as the 'enemy of the people', calls for treason convictions for law enforcement, we've had laws criminalizing dissent upheld by the Supreme Court that could happen again.

 

[jonny5]

You get the irony of the day award for your complaint about hyperbole in one line 1, and your hyperbole in line 2. 'starved' and 'executed' are not requirements for concentration camps - it's your definition that's wrong. The Britannica even lists the Japanese-American camps as an example. But temporary refugee camps don't literally qualify; the point being made is the resemblance.

concentration camp | Facts, History, & Definition | Britannica.com

You dont know that jews were starved, forced to do harbor labor in concentration camps? YOURE the one who compared detaining illegals to concentration camps. I think its obvious where the hyperbole is.

 

[jonny5]

Well, you didn't really address my point, what about the minority who does not consent? In democracies, that's usually addressed by whatever rights the majority chooses to give the minority, and call that freedom for them. In the US that includes the right to 'free speech' to complain and the right to vote for change each election (though our black minority would have something to say about those rights our fist 200 years). How often do elections need to be held for you? Is one time ok?

But the definition of fascism is bigger than just that consent for the majority.

" a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition
2 : a tendency toward or actual exercise of strong autocratic or dictatorial control"

What if the majority consent to having a dictator they worship? That's still fascism as a form of government. What if Hitler had held an election and been elected leader for life in 1942? That's still fascism. That 'forcible suppression' of opposition is particularly relevant to us as a potential thing; the press as the 'enemy of the people', calls for treason convictions for law enforcement, we've had laws criminalizing dissent upheld by the Supreme Court that could happen again.

Participation in governance, ie voting or voluntary presence with in a group, even you lose, IS consent.

Also, there is no factual definition of fascism. Since the OP, we've loosly been talking about authoritarianism in general. A political system defined by force.

 

[Good4Nothin]

There are problems with 'Republicans', 'trumpistas', and 'conservatives', so hopefully 'righties' is ok.

There are bad things about fascism (fascism, not the phony right-wing propaganda abuse of the word like 'Democratic fascists), other than the Holocaust. Franco invented 'Fascism' in Italy; Franco was fascists in Spain as well. Arguably Pinochet in Chile.

Question is, can you say why fascism was bad other than the holocaust? In other words, what was wrong with Franco and Mussolini? Was Hitler all that bad other than the Holocaust, providing 'strong leadership' and economic recovery and 'making Germany great again'?

We Americans with other views assume it's broadly known fascism is bad, and not only because one fascist country committed the holocaust. I'm curious to confirm whether that's correct.

So, righties, do you have good things to say about Mussolini and Franco? Mixed feelings? Or criticisms, and if so, what are they regarding fascism, authoritarianism?

There is always tension between the rights and freedom of individuals vs the society as a whole. With fascism, and with communism and socialism, the society is preferred over individuals. If you happen to have a good fascist dictator, the government can run smoothly because no opposition is tolerated. But power corrupts, so even good dictators turn bad, or their successors are bad.

American conservatives generally want to protect individual freedom as much as possible. So they don't have very much in common with fascists.

 

[Craig234]

You dont know that jews were starved, forced to do harbor labor in concentration camps? YOURE the one who compared detaining illegals to concentration camps. I think its obvious where the hyperbole is.

Sorry you can't follow a thread, but Deuce equated the refugee camps with concentration camps, you disagreed and also posted hyperbole, and I responded. The worst hyperbole was in your post about Democrats.