Populism and Nazism

[FredKarno]

socialism = nazism

When did you last hear of international socialism? It was always a lie. I suppose it's refreshing that they don't harp on about it like they did but that does not make it any less horrible. All socialism in the end boils down to national socialism. The details are different, but the heart of it is the same - THE WORSHIP OF POWER.

[Wycoff]

Whaleboy,

My problem with your construction of national socialism is that it seems to have little value as a political "labeling" tool. I have a problem trying to think of a party/government that would not fit on that graph somewhere. Which government or party doesn't make some sort of appeal to the value of their culture? What party doesn't at least sponsor some sort of egalitarian spirit?

Maybe a Libertarian party would have coordinates (0,0) on that graph, and therefore not be nationalist and socialist at all. Maybe a truly Communist party would have a 0 value for nationalism and be something like (9,0) on the graph and therefore not national soclialst. However, certainly the British Labour party would have coordinates in both. The Democrats would as well, and so would the Republicans. In this sense, they would be "national socialist" to some extent, using your language.

To me, all this shows is that they have some nationalist elements and some socialist elements. That's no shocker because, as both of us know, almost every possible party/government contain both of those elements. If I understand you correctly, the mere fact that they're on the graph would mean that they're slighty Nazi. I think that that's only true in the broadest, most technical sense. Most people would take issue if you said that the Democrats or Labour were slightly Nazi, but its obvious that they do have nationalist and socialist elements. That's not very helpful, and calling them Nazi will be more confusing than helpful in almost all situations.

Another concern reaches back to my previous disagreement about Stalin's classification. You maintain that it would be appropriate to call him a Nazi, since he used both nationalism and socialism. By your definition he would be a nazi, since he could fit somehwhere on this graph. In that since, you're correct in calling him Nazi. However, I maintian that where he would fall on this graph and where the NSDAP would fall would be rather different. (I'll graphically depict what I'm talking about). He would not fall in the NSDAP range. Since I don't think that merely falling somewhere on the graph is sufficient to call a party a Nazi Party, I don't agree that he is rightfully called a Nazi. All this shows is that he was a socialist who also used nationalist appeals at times. That's 100% correct, but as I was saying, its not particularly useful for any kind of meaningful labeling.

Your main reason for writing this article (as it seems to me) was to justify calling the BNP a Nazi party. I think that, with your criteria, you can do that without ever having to mention Stalin. After visiting the BNP's website, I'd say you could give them a nationalist quotient of at least 7 or 8, which would be enough to justify at least calling them potential Fascists or potential Nazis. Again, I'll graph what I mean (this discussion would be much better if we weren't 3000 miles apart and conversing over the internet ) I think you can make your point of calling the BNP Nazis without having to extend your logic far enough to include Communist and Liberal parties as being slightly Nazi.

The other point of your article, that populist appeals by certain parties tend to be more nationalist and more socialist due to the very nature of populism, is, I believe, not very controversial. However, there are two obvious exceptions (populist style Communist appeals and populist style Libertarian appeal). I think that an important distinction is that, for the populist appeals to make something more nationalist and more socialist , that party would have had to have been somewhat nationalist and socialist oriented in the first place. Afterall, a libertarian party using populist appeals wouldn't logically become more nationalist and socialist. The theme of their populist appeals would likely focus on being over taxed and not having enough freedom from the government. That content would not inspire a nationalist and populist reaction in the people and thus the party would not become more nationalist and socialist as a result of turning to populist appeals. I think that this distinction is a distinction that you should think about incorporating into your view on this subject. The party's orginal ideological underpinnings helps to determine in which direction its populist appeals would take it.

Let's say that a party that was fundamentally nationalist and socialist (per your definitions) turned to populism as a way to recruit disaffected people into the party. You think that that party would most likely become more nationalist and more socialist after growing in membership through those appeals, because that's the nature of the populism to which that party would turn, and it would attract people into the party who found its nationalist and socialist themes enticing. I would agree, but I don't see how that's very useful in what you're trying to say. Just ensure that the economic conditions of the country make populist appeals less effective and parties (no matter their ideological underpinnings) will have less of a reason to try an use populist appeals for support. Then you won't have any reason to fear a nationalist socialist party with broad based popular support.

In the economically depressed areas that you're reffering to, I'd say that the best thing to do is for the government to enforce the laws and punish any thug that makes a racist attack (or any thug that makes any attack for any reason, really). That's what the police are for, and after a few thugs sit in jail for 10 years others will be less willing to beat up people. Otherwise, people in the BNP are entilted to their opinion; their opinions just won't be influential. If the BNP is an ultra-nationalist party attacking innocents on reasons of mere race, then call them Nazis (or Fascists). You don't need to write an article to justify that.

[Kidlicious]

Re: socialism = nazism

Originally posted by FredKarno
When did you last hear of international socialism? It was always a lie. I suppose it's refreshing that they don't harp on about it like they did but that does not make it any less horrible. All socialism in the end boils down to national socialism. The details are different, but the heart of it is the same - THE WORSHIP OF POWER.

Are you a bot? You always come around with the same post.

[Whoha]

My advice: don't resort to calling people nazis. it has been way overused. Point out the flaws in their arguments,reasoning,etc and leave it at that.

[Wycoff]

Whaleboy,

Here is my graphical interpretation of your argument, complete with parties/groups that I think are representative of each segment.

I have 7 as a democratic threshold, because I think that a party that gets a rating of 7 or above is, by the basic nature of its ideology, incompatable with liberal democracy.

A 7 on nationalism would be a party platform with racial supremacy as a plank. A 9 would be a party that supports genocide. I'd give the NSDAP at least a 9.5 on this scale, as I have a hard time imagining how a party could possibly get more racist than they were, with party ideology actually coming close to worshiping their racial ideal.

A 7 on socialism would be a country with a largely controlled economy. The higher the rating, the more the government controls the economy and the more it focuses on distributing wealth.

This is a rough sketch, obviously, and I'm sure people can argue over the specific party placements/ labels. I would only call a party a "Nazi" Party if, through its nationalism and socialism, it would rightly fit in that Nazi range of the graph.

[Kidlicious]

That thing's wacked.

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by Kidicious
That thing's wacked.

What's wrong with it from a Communist perspective? Remember, its using Whaleboy's conception of the term socialism, which is more inclusive than the term as its usually understood.

[Kidlicious]

First of all who are these national communists?

[FredKarno]

Kidicious - sure I preach the same

You point this out. What am I to do? Stop beleiving in what I think is reality? I take it you are a socialist. You don't like what I say, not surprisingly.
How am I supposed to say things differently? How equal is it of you to decry my typing? Are you telling me to stop believing that socialism is the greatest man-made disaster ever?
I am utterly horrified and disgusted that people still beleive in socialism when all the evidence shows how evil it is.
I will say again again that this religion is the worst ever and is the highest evolution of evil that we humans have attained.
I hate Rumsfeld by the way. Isn't it strange that you might agree with this?

[Kidlicious]

You're obviously someone's DL. No one would just lurk around like that.

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by Kidicious
First of all who are these national communists?

I not sure if they ever existed. Its simply a label that I put there in case a group could ever fit there on the graph. By definition it would be a party that's at least as nationalist/racist as a Fascist party, but one that's much more serious about the class struggle. Maybe its a party that has adopted everything in Marxism except for its internationalist spirit. I imagine that it would end up a totalitarian state that not only had race based pogroms, but also liquidation of the nation's clergy as well as the nation's capitalists and bourgeois, with the means of production taken over by these racist workers.

I put Ceausescu there with a question mark because he was as close to that idea as I could think of. I know he was far more nationalist in spirit and rhetoric than the other Communist leaders, and I know that he made multiple attempts to forcibly Romanianize the counrty's remaining Hungarians and Germans.

[Kidlicious]

I would define socialism as control over the economy maybe, not redistribution of wealth. That would put Nazis in the top right corner. Communists are not nationalist at all. They shouldn't be on there. I don't know about the rest. The whole thing just looks strange to me, but I haven't been following along completely, only a little.

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by Kidicious
I would define socialism as control over the economy maybe, not redistribution of wealth. That would put Nazis in the top right corner. Communists are not nationalist at all. They shouldn't be on there. I don't know about the rest. The whole thing just looks strange to me, but I haven't been following along completely, only a little.

I think that the concept that we're working with (that we're calling "socialism") is more of an idea of caring about the economic well-being of every member of the group. A rating of "1" would a group that supports some modest economic programs like an income tax that taxes the wealthy slightly more to help the poor or to help fund some modest public works type programs. A 10 would be a party or government that support radical wealth equalization and massive spending on public works projects and other social programs.

Again, this is my interpretation of Whaleboy's description of the concepts. I'm trying to graphically depict the difference between the Nazis, Stalin, and a Liberal party that has nationalist and socialist elements per his definition of them, to better show why I disagree with calling any group that has elements of nationalism and socialism "Nazi." Maybe I misinterpreted him, and I would probably use a different term for that measure than socialism. He'll probably give some input on this.

EDIT: As I said in the post previous to the post with the graph, I said that a true Communist (a Communist party that actually and strictly conforms with Marxist internationalism, using no appeals to the worker's nationalism. Unless I'm mistaken, there have been few Communist parties that have actually conformed to that standard. ) would register with a 0 on this graph for Nationalism, meaning that they would be from 7 to 10 on the "socialism" scale, actually located on the graph's x-axis.

[Kidlicious]

Ok, it makes more sense knowing the purpose of the graph.

[FredKarno]

Wycoff - you are wrong

You seem to be saying that socialism is a benign force, working for the good of the whole.
I think this is rubbish. People say things that sound nice but are the opposite. This sort of thing has been going on since....oh well since we humans have been around...and has evolved more and more.
These days, the falsness of it has reached fantastic heights, which is ironic considering the knowledge we have attained about genetics, the sexual imperitive.