[autoexec]

What do you think fascism is? What we have is a populist, nationalist, racist, far-right regime headed by a man that our highest court has ruled can't be held accountable for his "official" actions and who acts like a dictator (as further evidenced in this case by going to war without congress) who uses to the power of the government to attack/threaten/suppress his "enemies" here in the US. If this isn't textbook fascism you must admit that it at least checks a lot of the same boxes

[Saline9515]

Well this is not fascism, this is, as you said, a populist regime.

The far left loves to categorize everything at its right as "fascist". The infamous Berlin wall was the "antifascist protection wall". In Yugoslavia, you'd hear every day at the radio a rant about the "fascists", even though the country was communist.

There are many definitions of what "fascism" is. The best I think is to refer to the historical italian fascist government, to understand it.

Btw presidential immunity is not fascist, many countries have similar laws.

[dns_snek]

> The best I think is to refer to the historical italian fascist government, to understand it.

Sure, why don't we:

- leader with a cult of personality

- an idealized story of the prosperous past (make america great again)

- pinning blame for the nation's downfall on marginalized minorities and persecuting them (immigrants, socialists)

- aggressively anti-socialist/leftist, protection of capital and suppression of labor rights

- glorification of violence (ICE, hate crimes, "department of war")

- ramping up existing and starting new imperialistic conflicts (Venezuela, Cuba, now Iran)

- rolling back personal liberties (freedom of speech, right to due process, women's rights)

- suppression of the free press given unfavorable reporting (revocation of TV licenses, revocation of access to white house)

- clear desire with ongoing attempts to dismantle democracy (capitol attack, violating separation of powers by illegally withholding funding for programs and violating court orders)

- demands complete subservience rather than competence in all appointed roles

- all of this with full support of the elites (clear shift in the 2nd term)

If you want to argue that the US isn't fascist because Trump hasn't completely dismantled the judicial branch yet, be my guest.

But fascism isn't just a concrete political system where a dictator has absolute power, it's an ideology, and Trump and the Republican party are clearly fascist in that sense - that is their goal. It's just a question of whether they'll succeed in dismantling the judicial branch before his term is over.

The only people who benefit from this sort of language policing are the fascists themselves.

P.S. I probably shouldn't be saying this but the fact that you refer to people sounding the alarm as "the far left" really gives the game away.

[Saline9515]

Each point, aside from the cult of personality regarding Trump, is shallow.

For instance, the US didn't start a war against Venezuela or Cuba under Trump. America was much more aggressive in the 80´s, if you want to compare.

Immigration can totally be a problem, and voters in the western world increasingly ask their leaders to address it. It's not "democracy" when it suits your ideas and "fascism" when it doesn't.

Opposing socialism isn't "fascist" and afaik the Trump admin has done nothing significant about it: social expenses and the deficit are still growing faster than ever. What is mainly happening is that ressources are being redirected toward the retired, who are influencial voters and a growing demographic. It's the same everywhere in the western world.

Again, all of those measures are very superficial and nothing like what real fascism did in Italy or what Nazis did when they came to power. You can't reason just with outrage and headlines.

By the way, most of those points have their Democrat counterpart with a different style, it's mainly linked to the evolution of the governance style in the US. Democrats also had their DEI unsuited hires, censorships (Meta was censoring on the order of the White House), and so on.

[dns_snek]

> Immigration can totally be a problem, and voters in the western world increasingly ask their leaders to address it.

Stop equivocating. I didn't say that opposing immigration = fascism, I said that identifying marginalized groups, pinning all of the nation's problems on those groups and then persecuting, victimizing, terrorizing anyone who looks like they belong to one of those groups - that is fascist.

> Opposing socialism isn't "fascist"

Again, stop equivocating. I didn't say that opposing socialism is fascist, I said "aggressively anti-socialist", as in, violent anti-socialist rhetoric. Similar to the previous point.

> afaik the Trump admin has done nothing significant about it

That's wholly detached from reality. The only reason he hasn't dismantled all of the social programs yet is because the courts have stepped in and intervened when he tried. See: USAID, withholding SNAP funding, Medicaid, the whole DOGE disaster.

> Again, all of those measures are very superficial and nothing like what real fascism did in Italy or what Nazis did when they came to power. You can't reason just with outrage and headlines.

Those are the core qualities of fascism. I get it, you don't like being called a fascist so you sea-lion about the differences to distract from the overwhelming similarities.

Even when Trump dismantles the judicial branch, people like you will maintain that the US isn't fascist because people aren't speaking Italian like they did in fascist Italy, or German like they did in nazi Germany.

I feel comfortable saying this because we're not just disagreeing on whether the US is fascist right now and there's still room to have argue there, but we're disagreeing on whether Trump has a fascist agenda and whether he's actively working to transform the US into a totalitarian regime following the fascist playbook, which he absolutely is.

[Saline9515]

I'm not American, I'm not even Trumpist so your ad-hominem falls flat. I however live in a country where the soviet propaganda was crying "fascism" every single day of the year, for 60 years, so when I see people do the same I tend to be skeptical about it.

I still don't understand why "aggressively anti-socialist" policies are fascist. Fascism is itself a branch of socialism (Mussolini was one, in France the fascist leader Jacques Doriot was one as well, for instance). Being a totalitarism, it aims at engulfing every aspect of the daily life, which means supporting socialist policies (similar to communism, another totalitarism).

Authoritarian regimes in the 30´s that were "aggressively anti-socialist" weren't fascist. Franco or Salazar are relevant examples, even thought today they would be categorized as such, since you guys seem now to have only single word left to designate populist or authoritarian regimes then don't like.

Trump lacks deeply indeed the socialist aspect of fascism; it would likely be better defined as plutocratic cesarism, even though he did not make a coup (yet).

[dns_snek]

> I'm not American, I'm not even Trumpist so your ad-hominem falls flat.

You don't have to be American to be a fascist-sympathizer, which you clearly are, since you label opposition to totalitarian methods as "the far left", lie about matters of fact, and grossly misrepresent the events that happened in fascist Italy while trying to represent yourself as someone intimately familiar with the matter.

For example:

> Fascism is itself a branch of socialism (Mussolini was one)

> Authoritarian regimes in the 30´s that were "aggressively anti-socialist" weren't fascist.

> Trump lacks deeply indeed the socialist aspect of fascism

Fascism is not a branch of socialism, fascism frames socialists as enemies of the state and pledges to destroy socialism. Mussolini was clearly not a socialist ideologically, as he had them killed. That was the entire MO of the blackshirts.

> since you guys seem now to have only single word left to designate populist or authoritarian regimes then don't like.

No, we're just using the word appropriately and you hate it. You'd rather lie and make up a story about fascism being a branch of socialism than admit that Trump is a fascist.