Posted on 02/04/2017 1:44:49 PM PST by calenel
Mussolini had become a member of the Socialist Party in 1900 and had begun to attract wide admiration. In speeches and articles he was extreme and violent, urging revolution at any cost, but he was also well spoken. Mussolini held several posts as editor and labor leader until he emerged in the 1912 Socialist Party Congress. He became editor of the party's daily paper, Avanti, at the age of twenty-nine. His powerful writing injected excitement into the Socialist ranks. In a party that had accomplished little in recent years, his youth and his intense nature was an advantage. He called for revolution at a time when revolutionary feelings were sweeping the country.
(Excerpt) Read more at notablebiographies.com ...
Well right off the bat I’d say I’ve been sold a bill of goods. If you had any public education in European history, you might have been too.
When I went to school, the far left was communism and the far right was fascism. This construct is TOTALLY off. First of all although we say right and left, it is based on where people sat in parliament and to a Brit a conservative isn’t what it is here. It is like Red State Blue State. If anything the libs should be RED. But what does matter is degree of totalitarianism.
At one end you have people who believe in no rules at all. This is anarchy. Pure democracy is pretty close because it is mob rule.
Then you have people who believe in limited government. This is representative government. This laissez-faire approach which came from France influenced Adam Smith “The Father of Economics” who wrote the “Wealth of Nations” in 1776.
Then you have degrees of more and more government. Remember NAZI stood for National SOCIALISTS so they are exactly the same as Communists which a ethnic group ruling the world vs. a political party ruling everyone. The idea that Nazi’s are somehow right wing or associated with conservatism is totally a lie, sort of like Schumer’s and Pelosi’s tears.
>>It is like Red State Blue State. If anything the libs should be RED.
Red was the color of the Left for 150 years before the election of 2000. Think the USSR and PRC flags, even the red in the Nazi flag was there to attract Communists according to some.
Here in the US, red was the traditional color of the Left/Democrats, and blue, that of Republicans. For example, here is a 1988 election map with that color scheme:
http://presidentelect.org/images/e1988_ecmap.GIF
In 2000, the press flipped that on it’s head. The Left’s association with the red of Communism had become too toxic, I suppose, but there is no doubt the press operated in unison to make this happen in 2000.
Really, the name of Hitler’s party says it all: “NATIONAL Socialists”, as opposed to the Soviet-led bloc, who were “INTERNATIONAL Socialists”.
The International Socialists dreamed of socialism without borders, or rather with borders that were no more than formalities to define administrative districts, while the Communist International ruled them all. The National Socialists wanted to implement socialism within their own countries (and those they conquered), free from interference by such an international body.
There are some other differences between them but I believe many of those were simply because the National Socialists did not survive long enough to evolve into their final form, while the International Socialists did.
“and how the term ‘fascist’ came to be considered “right-wing?””
You can thank Committed Socialist William Shirer, and his book “History of the Third Reich” for that. National Socialism and Communism were two competing ideologies sharing the same space.
Shirer and other true-believer Socialist Journalists of the era couldn’t allow Communism to be compared to Nazism. In fact, US Journalists like Shirer were vehemently Anti-War. Right up until they got news of the Invasion of the Soviet Union, then they became the biggest war hawks in America.
The International Socialists (Communists) won however. Art least the NAZIs and the Cult of Emperor Worship in Japan - did not murder as many people as the winners.
‘Moral’ is - he murders most wins, I guess.
Muslims have murdered almost as many as the The International Socialists, but it has taken the muslims over a thousand years and they still aren’t there yet.
“Fascism” was quite a popular political philosophy prior to WWII, having been defined by Mussolini decades before. There were a great many advocates of it even in the US in that era. The term comes from the fasces, the symbol of Roman Imperial authority, a bundle of sticks tied together. This ancient symbol even appears in the chambers of our Supreme Court, and a modified version still appears on the obverse of our dime coins, as it was a symbol for the authority of government, even before Mussolini appropriated it.
The fascists adopted it because their primary principle was to give more and more power to a centralized government, believing, like the “progressives”, that only a strong central government could solve social and economic problems. Such a philosophy is intrinsically opposed to ideas like free market capitalism, but naturally complements ideas like the command economy of socialism or communism, so fascists always lean to the left of the spectrum of economic policy.
The reason they became known as “right wing” was simply propaganda from the Soviets after the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact broke down and Hitler invaded Russia. Technically, they were to the “right” of the Soviets, even though they are always to the “left” of capitalist, democratic countries. Yet, if you repeat propaganda loud enough and long enough, it becomes accepted as truth by most people too lazy to do their own research.
Excerpt:
‘Taking Communism Seriously’
http://www.balintvazsonyi.org/washtimes/wt012098.html
Mussolini was a socialist who, thrown out by fellow-socialists, formed his own socialist party named “fascist” after a symbol from ancient Rome. Reality is that Hitler’s outfit was called the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, with a manifesto copied from Marx. Reality is that Lenin’s Bolshevik Party was based on German books. Differences merely reflected local conditions. Jiang Zemin, China’s current president speaks of “Socialism with Chinese characteristics.”
Might some people be working on socialism with American characteristics?
If you read The Road to Serfdom (Reader’s Digest Condensed Version here), you will see that FA Hayek used the term “liberal” to denote people who today would be called “conservatives” in America. That is because Hayek, an Austrian, learned English in America before the meaning of “liberal” was essentially inverted, according to Safire's New Political Dictionary, in the 1920s. And the meaning of “liberal” was not changed in Britain, where Hayek wrote Serfdom during WWII.
There’s no doubt that a “liberal of the old type” would mean a conservative today. He then goes on to talk about “those who really believe in individual freedom”, which is clearly not our modern liberals.
The Left switches terms often as their ideas are found out.
Calling fascism right-wing is a Big Lie used to confuse and divide.
Leftism is leftism; totalitarianism is totalitarianism.
Extreme rightism produces libertarianism, then anarchism.
Communists and fascists are not opposites or opponents; they are erstwhile kissin’ cousin competitors.
Oh, and then there’s always the cartoon version:
https://mises.org/system/tdf/Road%20to%20Serfdom%20in%20Cartoons.pdf?file=1&type=document
But for the pure and simple answers to your questions I would think a nice dig into Google might produce some decent info and possibly historic resources. As mentioned most everything now is tainted with liberalism. So be wary there.
Oops. Forgot to mention the HE I recommended was Bruno Bettleheim.
If you want to read a modern re-interpretation of Fascism go to www.oswaldmosley.com .
Yeah? Well, my PDF is bigger than your PDF - and it does so have the cartoon version of Serfdom! So there!:-)
“Yeah? Well, my PDF is bigger than your PDF “
Whoa,should the children leave the room?:-)
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Worthy of some contemplation.
Bfl
Fascism is the softer sell of totalitarian systems because it gives the pretense of private ownership. Yes you can own your own business but we(the sate) will control the producion process. Yes you can own your own home but we are going to tell you how you’re going to live in it. Socailsim and communism make no pretense about any of that.
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