Fascism is back. It never left.
We think of Hitler and the Nazis but forget about all the other nations that entertained the idea. We shouldn't. They're just like us.
The terms ‘fascist’ and ‘fascism’ get bandied about with considerable frequency during politically traumatic times. Political figures in the limelight and otherwise utter words loaded with terminology that indirectly or directly links with attitudes and objectives of the extreme right. That’s where fascism lives.
A extreme righty isn’t necessarily a fascist, but a fascist is always an extreme right winger.
Usually people shrink from tagging a public figure with the Nazi or fascist label as being ‘just a bit over the top’ and an ‘exaggeration’. Suddenly that doesn’t seem like such a stretch.
Populist figures gain attention and build followings on the shoulders of inflammatory statements that play to emotional worries. Moths to a flame. And a standard part of the fascist gamebook.
The promise is always a strong man (rarely a woman) who is the only one capable of ‘fixing’ all these issues. But in essence the fascist dictator is simply a charismatic lightning rod or conduit for establishing an ultranationalist, corporatist, militaristic organization that governs using force and interventionist policy to establish the authoritarian state. Sometimes there’s the trappings of moral superiority bolstered by religious zealots who are on the power-sharing bandwagon for the control it will allow them to exert. There’s nothing a devout religious person wants more than to flex on the heathens. Sorry, normal religious people, but you know who I’m talking about.
In general terms, people don’t vote for fascism. They vote for something, maybe something they haven’t considered before but what they get is something different. They get the thing that’s been lurking there probably all their lives. Waiting for the deterioration of order to set in. And, honestly, is there anything as vulnerable to deterioration as a fair and democratic political system?
Look at all the countries that have danced with fascism: Italy (the OG), Spain (it took them decades to shake Franco; he had to die first), Portugal (lusotropicalism!), South Africa, Germany, of course and all their World War II puppet governments: Croatia, Hungary, Greece, and more. And then there’s Japan, Brazil, Mexico, Lebanon. It’s always a point of political impasse or some other dilemma where some half-baked despot secures power and then makes it as difficult as possible to reverse the order.
When fascist politicians consider the electoral process,
they’re just lookig for a leg up. They’re not the least bit interested in functioning within a democratic or republican framework featuring bi-cameral assemblies, and supreme courts and presidential executive orders. They’re looking to exploit weakness and consolidate power for the single reason of perpetual dominance.
The weakness in the case of the United States, as I’ve detailed before, is the alienation and marginalization of a large group of people who feel shortchanged by the system that promised the American Dream and are prepared to vote for anyone who will punish the imagined and real architects of their multigenerational misery. They, in fact, do want to burn it all down.
Currently, in the United States, fascists in many guises are hiding in the political wings. Having assumed most of the Republican party’s function,
they wait to be ushered in behind a puppet. They are lined up, funneling their cash to what they hope will be a prime environment for corporatism not seen since the 19th century. And, of course, with that comes restriction and oppression of groups who may find themselves ‘enemies of the state’. The state being (fill in the company of your choice).
As the current popular meme intones: “You can’t say, ‘We’ll fight them next time’. There is no next time. It has to be this time”
