Political Quiz: Are you a fascist?

I don't need to rethink my response, my example still works perfectly fine. You can change the wording but the point remains the same.

With respect to an existential issue, someone wanting a leader (head of government or othereide) who is strongly religious (or divinely guided, however you wish to word it) doesn't mean that they are a theocrat. The reason is because it ignores all other opinions that person has on how government should work. This is the issue when classifying political opinions on the basis of one single issue, it ignores everything else.

I'll give an example. Suppose someone is deluded enough to think that gay marriage will cause the end of the world. To them it would be the external threat. They would want someone religious, particularly a religious conservative, in charge of marriage (either as the head of governmenf or as a member of government responsible for marriage, e.g. the Home Office).According to you that would make them a theocrat, but it ignores all other aspects of government and what that individual thinks about them. They could have a strictly 'theocratic' view on how government should address marriage, but otherwise be a complete anarchist who thinks that the government should be as small as possible. Or they could be a hardcore theocrat and want religion to take charge of every government function to curtail all civil liberties, or they could be somewhere in between. And that doesn't even cover what this individual might think about taxation, democracy, public ownership, wealth distribution, etc.What use is it describing them as a "theocrat" when it ignores all other aspects of government and public life?

Your example works perfectly fine? I think you either didn't read what I wrote or didn't read what you wrote. Here's yours for example:


So you don't need to rethink that, I want you to answer:

For someone who believes in an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent deity, in what circumstances do you envision that they would think that a corruptible and fallible human would be a better choice for ruling than either said omnipotent, omnibenevolent and omniscient being or the person who speaks directly to them? I really, really am interested in where you see that occurring.

Like, for instance, where would you imagine someone saying "Yeah, Jesus is Lord and all, but do I really want him in charge when I can have Boris Johnson?"

Help me understand here.

That happens all the time. For example take the many thousands of conservative, God-fearing Christians who campaigned and voted for Trump (a man who represents the opposite of what their teachings tell them).

You seem to be under the belief that if someone believes in an omnipotent, omnibenevolent, etc, God that they therefore must want that God (or someone to speaks to them) to be in charge of government. The reality is the opposite. There are certainly people out there who do think that way, but there are also people who don't. I myself was once Christian, held the view that there is an omnibenevolent God, etc, but at no point thought we should live under a Christian theocracy.

I think, if anything, all this conversation has highlighted is the simplicity through which you view politics and the world. To you everything is generalised and binary. You seem to have enough experience with philosophy yet you have completely missed the fact that any one individual will hold diverse, nuanced opinions that can't solely be categorised as one thing or another. It's very strange to hear someone essentially admit that they think that.

When you were Christian, you didn't want Jesus himself to show up in all His glory and rule on earth as He promised?

I'd suggest your answer to the question, "Is 'Your Guy' a God or Prophet?" would be 'No', then. If you were a Christian who didn't believe in Christ's promise, you weren't very good at it. Similar to if you were a Confucian who wouldn't want Confucius running things, then you weren't a very good Confucian. And if you're Islamic and don't want Imam Mahdi showing up, you probably aren't a very good Muslim and you probably didn't answer that question with a 'Yes'.

No, that was not how I interpreted Christianity. That I didn't fit into your overly generalised understanding of what Christians (or religious people in general) think and feel doesn't mean I 'wasn't good' at being a Christian.

All this demonstrates is your worldview is simplistic. Which returns us back to the start: your system of classifying people is simplistic and doesn't reflect the diversity of opinions that people have.

So why should we accept this method of classification? That is something you have been unable to answer. It seems more like you are just desperate to find a way to label people as fascists, or some other term.

It seems like your 'Simplistic view' is the axiomatic view that there are no axioms when, in point of fact, there are plenty of axioms. Like the one you're committing that there are no simple views.

If you believe in centralizing power to the state in any form, you are not an Anarchist. That is not simplistic. It's simple truth. If you don't believe in Christ and His words, rejoice in Christ and have faith in Christ, you aren't a good Christian. That isn't simplistic. It's simple truth. If you said, "I'm a Monarchist, but I don't believe in the monarch or the people with the monarchy." then you are not a monarchist.

If I said, "2+2 is 4." and someone else said, "2+2 is 6." and you said that there are a diverse number of opinions and that "Some might say that 2+2 is 6, or 5 or any one of a rainbow number of opinions" then that would make you(And everyone who agrees with you) wrong.

In fact, I would suggest that you would laugh at anyone making much of the same arguments you did, that Anarchists can believe in centralizing authority to the state and Christians don't need to believe the words of Christ. I suspect you simply don't want to acknowledge anything in case it proves your point wrong. That just makes you truculent, not enlightened.

Indeed. If we want to start defining what "fascism" means then it is best to lay out a fully definition with examples to give it context (not just vague criteria like 'big government'). Or we could look at historic examples, which are largely considered to be fascist, and work from there.

Fair enough.

So the biggest fascists of the 20th century were(And I propose we use these. Feel free to tell me if you disagree with any of these):

Benito Mussolini was a Fascist - The first one to take over his government, and who worked with Giovanni Gentile(The 'Philosopher of Fascism') and Alfredo Rocco - The one who set down the economic philosophy of Fascism.

Oswald Mosley, the head of the British Union of Fascists.

Adolf Hitler.

Francisco Franco.

Franco wrote his war diary, but didn't really set down any 'rules' for fascism and didn't really discuss the philosophy of it. The ones who did were Mosley, Mussolini, Gentile and Rocco. I propose we use their examples if we're going to have this discussion.

We could use Hitler, but that would require everybody read Mein Kampf, and I'm pretty sure that would end up putting us on some kind of list.

Do you agree with this list?

Sure, those are historic leaders most commonly referred to as fascist.

Right, so let's first identify what Fascism is not:

Benito Mussolini - Jewish mistress, Margherita Sarfatti. Jewish members in high standing in his party included people like Ettore Ovazza, who financed Mussolini. Mussolini also said, in his seminal work 'The Doctrine of Fascism', that he didn't think there were any pure anythings left in the world and that interbreeding had occurred everywhere. He said that a nation was 'Not a race, nor a geographically defined region, but a people, historically perpetuating itself; a multitude unified by an idea and imbued with the will to live, the will to power, self-consciousness, personality.' and he was agreed with by Giovanni Gentile, the 'Philosopher of Fascism'.

Oswald Mosley, an admitted racist, said “Naturally we believe in our own race. Any man or woman worth anything believes in his own race as he believes in his own family. But because you believe in your own race or in your own family doesn't mean you want to injure other races or other families.” and had Jewish members in his group up until 1932, when he became openly anti-semitic.

Based on these two, would you agree that Fascism isn't necessarily about Race(Although it can enter in to it, as can easily be seen by Hitler and Franco). Mosley was also staunchly anti-war and the BUF were considered a pacifist movement. Mosley moved towards a Pan-European nationalism where Europe would not be federalists, but would be completely integrated and this thought influenced the post-war Far Right. Franco, Hitler and Mussolini were pro-war, however, but these fascists didn't believe in it.

So since one of the main fascist movements was anti-war and anti-nationalism(To the point that Mosley suggested abolishing individual states for his pan-European utopianism), we know that Fascism isn't necessarily militaristic or even nationalistic(Though admittedly, Mussolini, Hitler and Franco were incredibly nationalistic).

No, to start I wouldn't conclude that fascism (by those examples) isn't about race. Franco and Hitler are infamous for their racism, Hitler particularly. You can't ignore their cases for convinience. Mussolini was responsible for the racist segregation of Italian Jews and Africans. Mosley, as you said, was anti-semitic and was directly associated with the other three.

These actions and policies aren't undone just because, say, someone like Mussolini had a jewish mistress.

Mussolini's antisemitism came about in 1938 due to his associations with Hitler when he was required to, but it wasn't central to his doctrine and was, in fact, counter to what he wrote in 'The Doctrine of Fascism.'

You'll also note that it wasn't just his Jewish mistress - The person who bankrolled the Fascisti was Jewish and he was one of the most important members. In fact, Mussolini's antisemitism only came about in 1938 when he was forced by Hitler.

Gino Arias, Guido Jung, Elisa Majer-Rizzioli were major members. In fact, Jewish members were 3 times more likely to be in the Partito Nazionale Fascista per capita in Italy.

As an example, a phone can be cordless or not. The most popular phones now are cordless and mobile. That does not invalidate the fact that phones do not necessarily have to have a cord and if you claimed "Phones do have to have a cord. You can't just ignore the fact that these other phones have cords and those phones are not undone just because, say, a phone doesn't have a cord somewhere.' then, while that would be true, it would not suggest that all phones had cords nor that cords were a defining characteristic of phones. Would you agree?

You chose to go down the route of defining fascism by what fascist governments did in the past. That includes the racism of Mussolini's government, whether he was "forced" to do it or not.

As for Jews supporting his fascism, that's merely turkeys voting for Christmas. People are fallible, they vote against their best interests all the time.

Nobody is 'defending' fascism. If you hate fascism, you have to understand it. Mussolini was a terrible person, but not because of his racism.

So you recognize that fascism, despite Hitler and Franco, doesn't -have- to be racist, right?

The vast majority of the West have left behind traditional values, with everything from Free Speech being derided as Fascist, Capitalism and Democracy being called 'Tyrannical' and numerous existential crises occurring that people feel the government should be doing more about. The following is a quiz to see what government-type you are most comfortable with.

Before we start, I want you to think about the most important existential threat your country faces: Maybe it's climate change, racism, the far right, socialism, crime, immigration or declining birth rates. It doesn't matter what it is, but it is important that you recognize the critical problem with it and know that it's important to you.

Then, think of those people who refuse to believe that your problem is an issue. Firmly fix in your mind the person you want running your government, their ideals and their purpose and what they would need to fix your problem.

Once you've done that, answer the following questions:

1) Does your government require more powers to sidestep the retrograde, backwards thinking people who oppose your clear issue that very obviously represents an existential threat and should they courageously use their powers despite the opposition?

If the answer is 'Yes, they do require more powers', then you are neither an Anarchist nor a Classical Liberal. If it was 'No', then you fall in to one of those areas.

2) Now think of the person you hate more than anything having the powers you're proposing your perfect government have. Maybe it's Boris Johnson. Maybe it's Jeremy Corbyn. Do you want that person to lead your party, having the powers you propose the government needs to solve your problem?

If the answer is 'No', then you aren't a Socialist or a Communist. Both those governments require that the government centralizes power and that it is all right for both Trotsky, Stalin, Mao or the like to lead. If you do not believe that every government has the moral fortitude to have the powers you propose, then you do not believe in those.

If it was 'Yes', then you fall under those government types with faith in the government to be morally strong, intelligent, competent and driven enough to solve your problems.

3) Is your ideal leader a God or Prophet?

If the answer is 'Yes', then you're a Theocrat. You want Jesus to take the wheel? Theocrat. You want your Mohammed or Confucius running things? Theocrat.

If the answer is "No", and you haven't fallen under a previous government, and "Your Guy" is the only one morally, intellectually, and competent enough to use your powers to save the country or world, then you're a Fascist.

Fascism isn't necessarily antisemitic: Mussolini's girlfriend was Jewish and he had several very prominent members in his party, even post 1938.

Fascism isn't necessarily pro-war: Oswald Mosley was the head of the British Union of Fascists for years and he was not pro-war.

Fascism is the firm belief that 'Your Guy' is the only one strong enough to run things, that the State should be capable of overturning individual rights(Like saying that there should be no such thing as a Billionaire and forcibly redistributing their wealth, or that the government needs more centralized powers to fight hate-speech) for the good of the many.

If you believe that both Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn, if elected, should have the right to determine what speech should be allowed and what should not, then you are probably a socialist. If only 'Your guy' has the moral wherewithal to do that without corruption, then you're a fascist.

Nobody is 'defending' fascism. If you hate fascism, you have to understand it. Mussolini was a terrible person, but not because of his racism.

So you recognize that fascism, despite Hitler and Franco, doesn't -have- to be racist, right?