I was reading an online blog the other day and Hitler was mentioned.
Now I am over fifty years old and this was a first for me. This guy referred to Hitler as if he was from the left, politically speaking. I think the blogger was American, but I am not positive.
It amazes me that there are people that do not know that extreme right is Fascism and extreme left is communism.
Has anyone here ever heard anyone try to claim that Hitler was anything but extreme right?
Well, a few things on this...
First, the notions of Liberal and Conservative from an American perspective, in terms of how they're colloquially used when discussing modern politics, doesn’t always match up with the world or even with the historic definitions.
Second, at least in most American discussions I’ve seen, “conservative” and “liberal” define policy views as much as it describes a way of thinking or political ideology of sorts. For many, being pro-life is “Conservative” and being pro-drug legalization is “liberal” because the POLICIES that represent those views typically come from one “side” or the other in the US. But it’s entirely possible ideologically for a liberal to come upon a pro-life stance, or a conservative to come upon a pro-legalization stance.
Third, thinking of the political spectrum as a linear line is a bit misguided imho. And even when you’re looking at a singular line rather than a XY type of plain, I’d still say it’s a line that’s connected on both ends forming an ellipse. Go too far either direction and you tend to come out the other end.
Fourth, one has to understand that when you’re dealing with American politics things are said typically for political reasons and not legitimate discourse. Both sides have a great history of attempting to tie anything and everything about the other side to “Hitler” or “Nazi’s” in some fashion, because the assumption is it’ll prove detrimental to their political “enemies”. There is a highly understandable emotional attachment to both of those terms that is invoked in people upon hearing them. Both sides at times try to utilize this emotional attachment by trying to tie the other side to it, so that when you think of [x] you experience a similar subconscious emotional reaction as you do when you hear Hitler. There is almost
zero situations where Hitler and/or Nazi’s are literally the
only comparison that’s available. The choice to use them instead of a more benign comparison generally has no legitimate reason OTHER than to attempt to tie that emotional connection to the target.
Despite their technical difference, often “Conservative” and “Liberal” is simply a different way of saying “republican” and “democrat”. Comparing modern Democrats or Republicans, by and large, in the US to Nazi’s in some factor is hyperbole aimed at stirring an emotional response and does a disservice to those ideologies, to the people in this country, and even to the history surrounding Nazism. It’s akin to those who try to compare people against Gay Marriage to people who KILL homosexuals threw stoning simply for being homosexuals…or people who try to compare welfare payments as colonial style slavery.
Because both sides wantonly attempt to connect contemporary, modern, mainstream political sides to Nazi’s, both sides also have people who seem to go out of their way to point the finger back at the other side trying to change up the conversation. Altogether, it’s kind of sad.
Fifth, the realities is that the Nazi Regime has certain aspects to it that can correlate in various ways to both the Republicans and Democrats here in America, but are a poor direct comparison to either. Attempting to talk about the Nazi regime from an American perspective, and using the term “right” or “left” without giving clear and obvious deference to the fact that it’s a far cry from what either side is in America today, is nothing but pure hyperbolic hackery.
