It’s heartening to see the landslide victory of the
Conservatives in the UK with support across different socio-demographics. It
shows amongst other things what voters disenchanted by the frequent failure of
left-wing parties can do when there are viable alternatives. May we see
something similar in New Zealand in 2020.
And it’s fascinating to observe the reactions—especially of vociferous
left-wingers—to resounding defeats like this. It reveals their political
integrity or lack thereof.
Street protesters tend to come across as less
rational, less adult, in their reduction of everything to accusations. Granted
that duplicity is no one’s preserve, and everyone occasionally wears the hypocrite
label. Yet the political left at the street level take the cake, because while
their banners display moralist statements like “Say no to racism”, they are
quite OK with lying, smearing, slandering, misrepresenting, inferring evil
intent, hating, threatening, and cursing anyone considered too “right” or conservative.
…but please “Say no to racism!”.
If you rail at perceived “racism, discrimination, fascism, etc.”, there are certain
things no thinking person will argue with. You may however be moralising out of
thin air, with no foundation apart from a vague sense of your need to be fair
and nice. And while that’s well and good, it hardly goes beyond schoolyard
reasoning.
However, there’s little to no rational basis for the left calling
anything right or wrong because certain essential principles are missing from
their worldview. And those carrying placards may care little about what’s on
the sign, it being code language for something more agenda based.
Where they really
come off the rails though is in their boringly constant portrayal of characters
like Donald Trump or Boris Johnson or anyone they don’t like as “fascists”. Here’s
where the plot completely eludes them. And it’s unlikely that they really know what
they are opposing.
George Orwell once stated that the emotive term “fascism” was
used to refer to any group, perhaps perceived as authoritarian, that people simply
wish to dislike.[i]
In fact, in its political manifestation there was a double
identity to its face. The word, adopted by the Italian dictator Benito
Mussolini who founded the first “Fascio di combattimento” (Fascist Fighting Unit)
on 23 March 1919, comes from the Italian fascio
which meant a bundle of sticks (i.e., a nation as a unified bundle) which,
along with an axe, was a symbol of ancient Roman authority. Of course, it was
nationalist and imperialist, both however being convenient cloaks for gaining support.
Its roots were socialist, from a conflict between pacifist and violent
socialist ideals.
Before leaving the Socialist Party and prior to the First
World War, Mussolini was one of the most skilful socialist leaders in Italy. So
initially, Italian Fascism had “a left-wing tendency”, standing “as a left-wing
movement, almost a rival of the Socialist Party”[ii].
Mussolini’s goal was in some way to
establish Italy as a world power like the Roman Empire. He would say things
like “Socialism is war”, and “Who has iron, has bread” (akin to Napoleon’s “The
revolution is an idea plus bayonets.”), catchwords of the Socialist daily which
he helped publish after his break from pacifist socialism. His tactic throughout
was to use a combination of “strength and sweetness”.
Fascism eventually developed into a movement without any
clear doctrine or plan, centred around “nationalism” but opposing both socialism
and capitalism depending on which suited it as the most convenient enemy. When
it reached its height, its only notion was that power was supreme—the power of
one state, one party, one leader, enforced by la polizia. In other words, a police state. In fascism, individual
responsibility (never up for grabs with conservatives) had to be surrendered to
the state. So, at its extremity it was akin to Bolshevism because it was all about
power, despite the nationalist rhetoric. It was totalitarian, repressive of
freedom, neither democratic nor pro free enterprise nor pro free speech and had
no consideration of human rights. Mussolini himself had little respect for others.
One difference was that while socialists talked about
equality and the rights of the workers, fascism in its heyday was hierarchical,
imperialistic, favouring of wealthy landowners, and willing to take advantage
of inequality. But over time the fascist trade unions became anti-capitalist. And
during the Ethiopian war, “Every class in Italy…proudly felt both proletarian
and fascist.” (Carocci, 1975, p. 105) According to one website, socialists and
fascists have always been “kissing cousins”,[iii]
both violent and both seeking to export their ideas by force of arms. One of
Mussolini’s sayings was “War is to man what maternity is to women”.
It all finally collapsed due to disorganization and
dishonesty, going nowhere except to its own destruction. Il Duce (the leader) became
“a prisoner of his own propaganda”. By the early 1940s the originator of
fascism, Mussolini, had turned his contempt for other people into complete resentment—against
the bourgeois, the monarchy, and the clergy.
“There is no doubt that the resentment he felt aroused his
old socialist, or socialist inclined, spirit…” (Ibid, p. 133) In other words, at
heart he was still socialist.
To oppose “fascism” then is to oppose a movement whose own
roots were in anarchism and socialist revolutionary violence, the state ending
up ruling over rather than serving the people.
FOOTNOTES:
[i] Orwell,
G, What is Fascism, 1944, http://www.orwell.ru/library/articles/As_I_Please/english/efasc
accessed 15/12/19
[ii]
Carocci, G. Italian Fascism, transl. Isabel Quigly, 1975, pp. 18,.22,
[iii] https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/precursors-origins-italian-fascism
and https://www.theepochtimes.com/nazism-fascism-and-socialism-are-all-rooted-in-communism_2549205.html
and https://www.hoover.org/research/surprising-roots-facism,
and https://www.theamericanconservative.com/birzer/socialists-and-fascists-have-always-been-kissing-cousins/
accessed 15/12/19
Guy Steward is a teacher, musician, and writer.
1 comment:
What is "...totalitarian, repressive of freedom, neither democratic nor pro free enterprise nor pro free speech"? Answer: Political Correctness. Hence my use of the term 'marxofascist' to describe the overbearing influence of this nefarious ideology in the West.
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