[Herring]

Reminder that the most reliable way to prevent the rise of the far right is to implement robust safety nets and low inequality, to reduce status anxiety and grievance.

Support for such measures (welfare, healthcare, unionization, high taxes etc) is usually low among Americans.

https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2025/10/welfare-cuts...

[Terr_]

I think a lot of the people behind the rise of fascism are ones who experience "status anxiety" as a constant baseline. Actual safety through a government of laws will never appease them.

[parineum]

The right is rising all across European countries that have all of these things.

[gzread]

You think they have these things, but they don't.

I am theoretically eligible to get 60% of my income for 3 months after losing my job, while I look for my new job. But if I actually try to claim that, they demand so many documents and meetings that it's not actually practical to receive that benefit. The only people who can receive benefits are the people who are experts at navigating the benefit system.

For instance, if you do not file a certain form on a certain exact day, then your benefits will not start until 3 months after you became unemployed. That is exactly the same time period this unemployment insurance benefit normally covers. By that time you should already have a job anyway and they will ask you to explain why you couldn't get a job in 3 months, since the benefit normally only covers 3 months.

Nobody will tell you how to navigate this. Nobody will tell you the correct form to fill out on the correct day. If you don't already know the arcane rules, you don't get the money. This is how most European social benefits work. They aren't actually provided to normal people.

[BoingBoomTschak]

That's perfect, actually! We should do that in France, so only people who actually need the money will make the effort.

As is, we have some middle class "hippies" finding ways to backpack travel across the world on the taxpayers' dime.

[justin66]

The main thing I’m getting from this comment is that Fox News must exist in France.

[genxy]

Sounds like a startup opportunity.

[ljf]

There is lot of investment going in to fanning those flames - just look at the way the edges of this are discussed in the Epstein files.

Here in the UK, it is amazing to follow just how much money has been pumped into the various 'right of the Conservatives' parties for the last 15 years, while it might seem like a grass roots movement, the majority of the cash has been coming from those with vast wealth inside and outside the UK.

[jeffbee]

I thought it was to simply throw fascists into the sea.

   Simple
   Effective
   Affordable
   Ethical

[torginus]

I'm sorry this the this kind of (far-left) political comment that usually starts the argument from 'basic human decency' and gets to calls for mass murder in the span of a sentece or two is as hilarious as it is sad :(.

And unfortunately very common. I'm not sure what you think when posting this, but this wont endear people to your ideas.

I'm sure there are communities where this is a standard stance that gets cheered, which I'm sure a lot of people would find quite concerning.

[gruez]

>Effective

The problem with political violence is that the other side will do the same thing, and you end up with an IRA situation where the country descends into sectarian violence.

[dragonwriter]

The problem with refraining from political violence where it is warranted is that the other side will do it anyway and you end up dead.

[gruez]

>is that the other side will do it anyway and you end up dead.

Preemptive first strike logic[1] aside. This logic doesn't work because political violence never gets out of hand so fast that an entire political movement can be wiped out. On the other hand by starting/advocating for political violence you're almost certainly going to get the descent into sectarian violence before you can wipe out all the "fascists".

[1] Iran, anyone?

[girvo]

> This logic doesn't work because political violence never gets out of hand so fast that an entire political movement can be wiped out

Tell that to the German left during the rise of Nazism.

[gruez]

That just leads to the second problem. Do you think a few car bombs would have stopped Nazis in their tracks? Or it would just create even more antipathy towards Jews?

[pjc50]

The IRA situation was really an unresolved conflict from much longer ago, either Irish independence or the Cromwell era.

The US has a problem with right-wing political violence; it's a long way off having a Baader-Meinhof.

[ceejayoz]

The IRA situation had a slightly lower bodycount than the not-throwing-1930s-fascists-into-the-sea one, did it not?

[pjc50]

The Troubles had a lower per capita body count than Detroit during the 80s. Part of their doctrine was "bomb with warning", usually to maximize property damage without random civilian casualties.

(Still quite a bit of murder of informers, soldiers, lawyers, and a teenager who happened to be in the wrong car. As well as government snipers firing into a crowd, planting a bomb on a band, and so on)

[gruez]

How many people died under the Bolsheviks, or the Communists in China?

[tomrod]

More than one or two, if memory serves correct.

How many people died under the totalitarian regimes that preceded them? These oppressive regimes did not start in a vacuum.

[gruez]

>How many people died under the totalitarian regimes that preceded them? These oppressive regimes did not start in a vacuum.

You're proving my point. Political violence just leads to a cycle of more political violence and/or totalitarianism. The Chinese Communists, if you recall, were violently put down by the Nationalists in the civil war. Starting political violence to stop the "fascists", just condemns your society to that fate. Not to mention that people who engage in political violence aren't exactly the most sane people. What makes you think they'll stop at "fascists"? The Bolsheviks eventually turned against the Kulaks, once their allies, and Mao launched the Cultural Revolution to consolidate power and push out rivals.

[nine_k]

"Why won't all good people rally together and kill all bad people?"

[SV_BubbleTime]

It’s so strange because obviously my people are the good ones and everyone knows that!

[tayo42]

Confusing, the right are the ones advocating for cutting these things?

[greedo]

Yes? At least in the US, the GOP has been working relentlessly for most of my life to reduce welfare, to reduce Medicaid, to make unionization difficult and to neuter existing unions, and most of all, cut taxes on the rich.

[tayo42]

Right, so the idea is that right wing policy of cutting support systems is fueling right wing growth. People are dumb, or this is what they want? Both? Lol Seems weird though

[watersb]

The playbook has been to manipulate "low-information voters" by promising that you will attack a marginalized group of people. Get the voters to believe that you are on their side by echoing the fear and hatred they have for The Enemy.

Action against The Enemy replaces any action to directly address economic and social marginalization.

It's how we process information. Avoiding this cognitive glitch takes practice.

[georgemcbay]

> Confusing, the right are the ones advocating for cutting these things?

This is where the racism comes in. As long as you believe that the social safety net cuts are disproportionally hurting the "other" more than you, you have plenty of space for the cognitive dissonance required to support the cuts even when they are negatively impacting your own situation.

Combine this with the fact that the right has two tiers, one of them made up of wealthy asset owners who politically push for the changes (and benefit from them in the form of extremely low taxes) and the second made up of working class people who can be convinced the changes are good as long it allows them to think those they see as below them will suffer more than they will.

Get yourself a nice feedback loop going in the form of hurting the poor, convincing them the source of their oppression is the "other" to get them to support even more austerity, repeat and you can explain a lot about the politics of much of rural America.

[Herring]

Ask a lot of software engineers what they think about European-style salaries and taxes to pay for a welfare state.

[andrewjf]

I would be very happy to do so if we had working infrastructure, education, and health care not coupled to the generosity of your employer.

Isn’t it the case anyway that if you add state, federal, local, property, capital gains, and sales taxes, add the money that you and your employer pays for healthcare, that you’re basically paying slightly more in taxes all-in?

[tomrod]

Huh. Most software engineers I come across am at worst ambivalent and at best highly desiring of unions.

[jmye]

What do you think “welfare state” means? Do you think “European-style” salaries solely occur because “European-style” people, for instance, have a different healthcare system?