From the peanut gallery, aka me… Most business are run under a more fascist principle.
I’m not talking about how the business operates in the market, or whatever… I’m talking about internal organizational behaviour.
Things are often very “my way or the highway”, with management, owners, etc.
Of course, not all businesses, but most follow some fairly fascist ideologies. They’ll tell you where to be, what to bring, what to do, when to stop… And hey, where are your papers? … I mean… Where is your company issued identification card?
They’ll watch what you’re doing, monitor and surveil you as much as they are legally allowed, govern every moment that they can, of every day you’re working there.
Capitalism and the pursuit of profit is their objective, the governance is fascist.
Business leaders engage in fascism.
… Why are we surprised that this brain rot is leaking out into actual politics? Trump is literally known for running businesses… Mostly into the ground/bankruptcy, but still. His whole thing is him being the boss. The ruler and Lord dictator over his tiny island. How are we so surprised that he’s a fascist? Shocked picachu
The best move the Nazis made was convincing everyone that yeah, the Nazis lost and are gone forever… They’re literally hiding in plain sight.
It should be of little surprise (and much more widespread knowledge) that just about everyone with money in the 1930s financially supported the actual Nazi party, including but not limited to Henry Ford and George W Bush’s grandfather.
I actually disagree with the meme; capitalism is always fascism, just sometimes has a better PR team.
sometimes with a better PR team
Which is a big thing in The Boys. The company and The Seven™ are all about that PR.
Businesses use feudalism, with the monarch (CEO), court (board), and several levels of lords and vassals.
Wasn’t fascism modelled after early feudalism?
There were obvious differences, fascism has more nationalism and racism, IMO, but at the core, aren’t they extremely similar?
I’m no expert on either. I just know enough to get myself into (and hopefully out of) trouble in these discussions.
Fascism is a reactionary attempt to “turn back the clock” to the glory days of Capitalism before it decayed as much. Capitalism necessarily results in crisis, at which points occasionally the Bourgeoisie and Petite Bourgeoisie, the “middle class,” work together against the lower classes, ie the Proletariat and Lumpenproletariat. It usually rises as a response to climbing Socialism as the train of thought among the Proletariat.
It isn’t necessarily modeled after anything, history isn’t driven by ideas but Material Conditions and class conflict.
That’s not what fascism is. Fascism isn’t “when there are shitty strict rules”. In fact, classical fascism is a (failed) class collaborationist ideology where the state was supposed to mediate between interest groups of workers and bosses. protip: it didn’t. workers got screwed. (see corporatism, from the root word corpus, not corporation). Nazism didn’t do any of that but even they had their own garbage state-run labor front.
But the point being, those business are beyond even fascism. It’s straight-up pure raw capitalist dictatorship.
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I think it’s more that strong men leaders get backers when the majority want them. All kinds of leaders are out there at all times, people swap their support to whichever they feel like at any given time. So when times get tough, half the population will side with power concentration, primitive but simple leadership structures. The other half want power decentralized and consensus to be required, the agreement of the majority, not be left with obedience to authority, which eliminates the ability for consensus or agreement. Nobodies needs matter except the needs at the top.
It’s actually probably absolutely necessary that the GOP see Trump as sharing their interests. If you had to give up your power, you’d want to give it to whoever shares the most do your interests, so their exercise of power is more likely to benefit you. You wouldn’t willingly give to to someone whose interests were furthest from yours. And what an irony that Trump has convinced them their interests align. If we could break that assumption, people would find it much harder to hand over their power. But since Trump literally doesn’t care if he collapses America, he’s willing to give them things they want, regardless of the wisdom of it.
God the GOP are the fucking worst.
Also a result of the inevitable decline of Capitalism and Imperialism, which is what we are seeing in America, a desparate and incorrect ploy to “turn the clock back” to the “good old days.”
It can’t be beaten electorally, it will remain until it either succeeds or Capitalism itself is escaped and we transition to Socialism.
I don’t see a decline in US capitalism or (US-style) imperialism anytime soon. It seems extremely well positioned to continue to be the #1 world power and influencer, even if its regional political and economic influence wanes a bit. US foreign policy is that of a bully in the sandpit who breaks any toy denied to him. Domestically, from the outside it looks like an absolute shitshow, with the masses cheering with hysteric enthusiasm as they are thrown one by one to the lions.
US influence is waning, and the Global South is throwing off the shackles of the US. It won’t happen immediately, but with weakening Imperialism will come weakening domestic conditions until it cannot be sustained any longer.
Mate we’re extremely in debt trying to get Iraq and Iran to bend the knee like all the other countries we’ve imperialized and not only is it not working, it looks like its never going to work. In the 1950s we held 50% of the worlds wealth. Not only will there be a decline in the near future, the decline has been going on for 30 years
The world economy is huge, and the US economy is damn strong. It’s got a huge share of a growing world economy, and it absolutely owns the world as far as military power and power projection goes. The US would absolutely use its huge military and economic advantages to keep its position as top dog if necessary. It is OK that the world’s economy is growing, but it doesn’t mean the US is any weaker for it.
Dedollarization and constant US imperial overreach are the two factors which are most likely to break US imperialism in the mid to long term.
American economic dominance is propped up by the ubiquity of the dollar in general trade as well as the Petro dollar. In general trade, more and more countries are pivoting to trading in their own currencies or Euros and Yuan and Rubles because of the destruction of confidence in the US dollar as a neutral reserve currency due to recent sanctions against Russia. In terms of the Petro dollar, the trend of decarbonization means that oil will be a less critical commodity over time and even now we see the likes of Saudi Arabia agreeing to sell oil to China in Yuan. Without US dollar dominance, America will not be able to print as many dollars to service its debts, which will lead to either inflation or debt default.
America, like the UK and France before it, doesn’t have the ability to fight all of its repressed imperial subjects at once. The cracks are starting to show at the US giving up against the Houthis in Yemen. The US and EU has also pegged its military prestige to the war in Ukraine, which is also starting to turn. Not only are they taking a reputational hit with every picture of a burnt out Abrams or Leopard, but lesser US allies are also starting to see that full US support doesn’t guarantee victory. Even within US policy circles there is some acknowledgement that defeat in Ukrain could lead to some sort of Suez moment for the US and NATO.
There’s a lot of people pinning their hopes on the global south and the decline of the dollar. I just don’t see it, and it seems like wishful thinking. If there were a real risk to US supremecy, we’d see serious chaos unfold, setting them (edit: not the US) back significantly. The gloves are still on just now.
The US chooses when and how to intervene. With Israel vs Iran, it was clear. With NATO, it is clear. With Ukraine, it is still wishy washy - Ukraine can’t lose, but it doesn’t need to win for the US’ strategic goal of a weakened russia to be met. One can easily argue that it helps. Russia and its allies will continue to shit stir in “minor” ways elsewhere as a result, distracting but not really hurting the US.
Fascism is simply Capitalism when the Capitalists succeed enough
Not entirely.
Germany wasn’t having a very successful economy when Nazism started.
Nor did Italy or Spain.
That relies on the assumption that what’s good for the economy is good for the capitalists, they always make sure that capitalism occasionally goes up in flames to take advantage of social unrest.
Considering the capitalists have forced the world to arbitrarily measure the “economy” by measuring how willing rich people are to play in the rich man casio…
In fact, fascism often gains support from middle class desperation, with the blessing of the booj who prefer it over communism (which tends to rise from the lower classes during similar times of desperation)
That’s the point.
In Germany there was a battle between left and right back then. The economy boomed in the 20s and faltered in the 30s. Capitalists saw the threat of socialism looming just behind Poland and so they supported fascism.
The Nazis funneled billions into large businesses. It was unsustainable and morally multi-level wrong, but they skimmed a lot of profits from these agreements. They got rich, while the economy started to collapse - even before the war.
Even after the war, most of them got away. They kept much of their wealth.
One is a form of economy, the other is an ideology. Fascist governments have run capitalist, communist, and socialist economies.
This is just false. There’s no interpretation of ‘communist economies’ that applies to any fascist state ever. Two of the core characteristics of fascism are anti-liberalism and anti-Marxism, which covers basically all socialism. Fascist leaders (even the national-syndicalism types like Mussolini) have an odd relationship with capitalism, but ultimately I don’t believe they moved towards socialism either.
Historically, more fascist governments have developed from socialist nations than capitalist.
Apart from Francoist Spain, I can’t think of a single example of a fascist government which succeeded a socialist government.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fascist_movements_by_country
Fascism is inherently capitalist, the communist “version” is called national communism or national bolshevism
National bolshevism is not communist version of fascism, it’s neonazi ideology and it’s anticommunist too just trying to coopt the aesthetics.
Interesting. I think you have a point.
The post you replied to has serious issues, please see the other replies for more info.
Their point is literally fascist propaganda
How so? I understand the relationship of fascism and capitalism. But it stands to reason a similar social framework could arise from socialism, especially during the transition from capitalism to socialism. Think Khmer Rouge
Okay so everything after “I understand the thing” proves you don’t understand anything. You literally don’t have any functioning definition of fascism at all. Socialism is the transition state. And the Khmer Rouge weren’t socialist (you can tell because they were US funded during the cold war).
That’s not really accurate, fascism is specifically a reactionary attempt to “turn the clock back” to “the good old days,” it’s focused on class colaborationism and nationalism.
Fascism is wholly anticommunist.
There’s nothing specific about fascism. The term was coined during Mussolini’s reign, and has taken many forms since. Kershaw famously wrote that “trying to define ‘fascism’ is like trying to nail jelly to the wall.”
The only consistent components of fascism are an autocratic government and a dictatorial ruler, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition.
You’re leaving out the inherent focus on Corporatism and Class Colaborationism, which are key components of historically fascist countries like Italy under Mussolini or Nazi Germany. You’re also leaving out nationalism and xenophobia, the necessity of an “enemy,” and more. Fascism rarely shows all symptoms of fascism, but by your definition is just becomes “bad government.”
Fascism is a specific and flexible form of a bad government/economic structure with its own set of rising factors and characteristics, not every cruel act by a state is fascist.
Eco’s 14 points on fascism are not entirely complete, but do paint a far better picture than what you’re working with here.
I’m leaving them out because they are net requirements to be considered part of fascist ideology. While used by more famous fascist governments, they are not necessary to impart the general ideology of fascism through authoritarian control by a dictator.
What is the “general ideology of fascism?” You’ve stripped fascism of its defining characteristics and defined it as “bad,” which isn’t particularly useful for avoiding fascism or preventing it.
You’ve stripped it of historical context and now it’s just something that can happen, sometimes, for no reason.
Where did I write “fascism is bad?” It is a vague ideology that is centrally defined as I stated above.
For example, Oxford defines fascism as an extreme right-wing political system or attitude that is in favour of strong central government, aggressively promoting your own country or race above others, and that does not allow any opposition.
There is no specific economic system required for a government to be considered fascist. Historically, fascism has grown out of more socialist nations than capitalist. That doesn’t make fascism inherently socialist either.
Joseph Stalin stated in a speech in 1924: Fascism is not only a military-technical category. Fascism is the bourgeoisie’s fighting organisation that relies on the active support of Social-Democracy. Social-Democracy is objectively the moderate wing of fascism.
The definition skews depending on the source. The qualities change depending on the government. The policies vary depending on the leader. The only consistent factors are the ones I stated earlier.
The only consistent components of fascism are an autocratic government and a dictatorial ruler, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible nationalism through suppression of opposition.
This is authoritarian nationalism, not fascism. All fascism is nationalist and authoritarian, not all nationalism or authoritarianism is fascist. Bismarck, Churchill and Erdogan are/were authoritarian nationalists, but I wouldn’t call any of them fascist.
This is authoritarian nationalism, not fascism.
They’re not defining fascism, they’re listing the consistent components. Their post is completely agreeing with your statement: “All fascism is nationalist and authoritarian, not all nationalism or authoritarianism is fascist.”
ToUgH tImEs BrEeD ToUgH mEn
God I hate that so much! Yes Brady, you are the tough guy who will safe us all while being afraid of plant based food and pronouns.
One’s an economic school of thought, the other a political one, so obviously you can have both at the same time or even working together. Coincidentally corporate business is mostly anti-fascist right now because social diversity and progressiveness is where the money’s at
I can only guess you’ve used one of the words out of context. If it was fascism, I have nfi what the meme is trying to say by linking Superman to capitalism in the same way Homelander is easily linked with fascism.
If the joke instead about fascism, then maybe something positive and relatable to it would make sense. Patriotism is what I think of since Superman loves America, but shows little concern for anyone else and this sentiment could start festering domestically, especially if the love for country becomes ultra-nationalistic.
There is a saying, something along the lines of ‘politics is the shadow that economics casts over society’. Now obviously there is no one to one correlation between a country’s economic and political systems, but rich people often respond to calls for economic reform by trying to make the public fight among themselves. Fascism is one possibility, ‘culture war’ is another, bread and circuses a third, and so on.
Trying to think of that one time fascism was economically beneficial to capitalists… Nope. I can’t recall one.
Edit: Oh, wait. If you were supplying a side against fascism, it’s always been very beneficial. I know that’s in contrast to the meme, but supports your point in a “round peg; square hole” kinda way.
Trying to think of that one time fascism was economically beneficial to capitalists… Nope. I can’t recall one.
Almost all fascist politicians were supported by local elites who thought they could control them. Sometimes they could; sometimes the fascists got too strong to be controlled.
That’s the general recipe of ultra-nationalistic fascism, yes. You’re not making much of a point and you’re also disregarding all the other instances of fascism.
A common thread being control, some times that can be through a local economical channel. That’s not immediately “Capitalism” and actually quite unrelated.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_involved_in_the_Holocaust
Fascism has always been done by and for Capitalists.
You…literally just linked a list of suppliers to a regime. Which, of course, had to exist in order for the regime to be sustained. Which of course lost supply as the sustainability diminished.
Do you know how many companies were passive or against it? It’s a little more… Quite a bit more. Millions(?) more. You’ve essentially just tried to correlated registered businesses with the entire economic school of Capitalism. “If it’s a registered business, it’s Capitalism, huuur.”
Come on, I can think of better counter-points than that.
Wait, did you think people were saying that the Nazis were for every Capitalist on the planet? No, we were talking about Nazi Germany and some Western companies.
You’ve fundamentally misunderstood what everyone was talking about.
Superman, Homelander, and fascism on the rise in the leading capitalism nation?
What did you think it was about?
Fascism has always been beneficial for Capitalists, because it was always extremely profitable, the entire point of fascism. Simple.
That’s so accurate.
Russia has had a tough ride since 90ties of the last century which is pretty much explained by this.
More like since 1924
There was a drastic drop in life expectancy, housing rates, lots of starvation and excess deaths, and drops in literacy rates and so forth following the collapse of the USSR. The rise of the USSR was a drastic improvement upon Tsarism, and the fall of the USSR was a drastic decrease.
The USSR absolutely had its own set of issues, but the collapse of the USSR in the early 90s represented a massive setback that only recently the Russian Federation has begun to overtake, metric-wise.
1924 is when Stalin took power, not when the USSR was founded. Put I guess it’s true that he improved the situation in Russia with imperialism to it’s neighbors so technically for Russia itself it was a pretty good ride still.
I’m aware, I’m familiar with the history of the USSR. Life expectancy rose gradually throughout the history of the USSR as it industrialized, it didn’t just happen under Lenin and plummet under Stalin. Secondly, the USSR was not Imperialist in the sense of extraction, Russia didn’t have higher quality of life on the backs of other Soviet States, but was industrialized first and was a leading indicator overall.
That’s not to say Stalin was some hero or something, or that there weren’t issues, but this gradual improvement was due to industrialization above all else.
Yea, industrialization improved things in like every country that did it but saying the USSR was not imperialist is wild to me. Resources from the annexed territories were being shipped to Russia on a regular basis, literally one of the reasons that made the Holodomor so deadly in Ukraine while Russia itself was mostly spared. Smuggling was insanely common here in the Baltics to ensure the locals could keep what they make and not suffer from famines as well.
Bro, they’ve had a tough time since like…the entirety of their history.
I actually watches the first season of the boys recently. Killer show. Its stunning that any real person could have ever looked up to Homelander in any capacity.
The most recent season has a surprising amount of sexually assaulting Huey though. The first time they even play it for laughs.
Oh, believe it or not, that gets even worse! Some people are insane.
Dont forget the red scare whenever capitalism even thinks about faltering to remind us all of the evils of just giving hungry people food or letting them see a doctor.
superman would obliterate homelander
Yeah just pour a jug of milk out and homelander dies
But the times are not tougher by itself, they become tougher because of capitalism itself. So it was Homelander all along
Fascism is simply the conclusion of capitalism. Antifa is a bunch of socialists because socialism is the only cure. Anticomm and Fascism have so much overlap as movements because they’re the same movement. Even in the historical context of the first rise of fascism, who took the reins of power was people promising the capital holders they’d protect them from those scary laborers. And do you know what we don’t talk about enough in America? We don’t talk enough about why fascism didn’t take hold here. Its because in the 1920s the capital holders had seen what would happen in America if they tried to do a fascism: the coal miners rose up in violent revolt. We had what legitimately qualified as a civil war in West Virginia with the labor movement. It’s one of only two times american citizens on home soil have been bombed by an air force.
My concern is this: we don’t have enough people in this country right now who love their brethren enough to stand against fascism. I ask everyone to do this: look at the Black Lives Matter movement. Realize what the African American communities right next to you are doing to resist the police brutality they experience, the fascism they are already experiencing and resisting. Join them. Link arms with them. The reality is the antifascist movement in America is nothing new. How we prevent fascism from rising is we make sure the violent weirdos know we are many and they are few. Make sure they know they don’t have the man power to take over
“I’m the natural evolution of unchecked you.”
Even checked Capitalism results in fascism, as Capitalism is entirely unsustainable and eventually results in the crisis that enables the rise of fascism.
Maybe so. Maybe capitalism can never remain checked because the temptation to acquire more wealth will always end up winning. You’d like to think that people are better than that, buuuuut…
Which system IS stable? AFAICT every system ever has allowed some people more power than others and those people cleave more power to themselves over time. This appears to be how most empires fall
Good question! The oldest government still in operation appears to be San Marino, a tiny country near Italy, at around 415 years. Considering that even at a small size it’s only been around that long despite civilization being around 6000 years old, I think it’s safe to say we haven’t managed a system that has real staying power yet.
There’s hunter-gatherer tribes that have been more or less stable for over a thousand years. It’s said that the Nez Perce have lived on the Columbia River for 11,500 years.
Yeah, but for the purpose of looking at stable governments in cities, hunter-gather societies aren’t a helpful comparison.
Good points but my question is more about governments that work at the scale of a nation state.
Yep, and it’s also inherently unsustainable and will collapse.
That is an interesting argument, but where is the proof? Economics is a very murky “science” as it is, a broad statement such as “capitalism is inherently unstable” needs some healthy data backing it up.
The same argument could be made about communism, as an economic system it doesn’t have the best track record.
Socialism seems to have a pretty good track record. But even in socialism there are issues, especially around ensuring a steady supply of kids coming through, once population starts falling the cracks start appearing.
That is an interesting argument, but where is the proof? Economics is a very murky “science” as it is, a broad statement such as “capitalism is inherently unstable” needs some healthy data backing it up.
Marx makes his case for it in Capital, specifically Volume 3, Chapter 13, though it’s easier to digest Wage Labor and Capital and Value, Price and Profit. Essentially, competition forces prices lower, and automation and increased production lower the price floor. Automation is pursued because it temporarily allows you to outcompete, until other firms can produce at the same price, forcing prices to match at a new floor. This continues.
The same argument could be made about communism, as an economic system it doesn’t have the best track record.
It can’t, because Communism abolishes this system. Communism has a good track record when properly put into historical context and is definitely the correct goal to pursue.
Socialism seems to have a pretty good track record. But even in socialism there are issues, especially around ensuring a steady supply of kids coming through, once population starts falling the cracks start appearing.
Socialism is just the precursor to Communism. The USSR, Cuba, PRC, Vietnam, Laos, etc. are/were all Socialist, building towards Communism, I don’t see why you say Communism has a bad track record but Socialism has a good track record, that seems contradictory. Further still, I don’t see what birth rates have to do with anything.
I’d say that Marxism at least is fatally flawed. The idea that you start a Communist society by gathering all power to a central council is the issue. Once power is obtained it’s never willingly dispersed. This has been the fate of existing all communist governments
While I appreciate that Marx made a case, this is not data or evidence. It seems intuitively true, but that doesn’t really move you closer to real proof.
Essentially, competition forces prices lower, and automation and increased production lower the price floor. Automation is pursued because it temporarily allows you to outcompete, until other firms can produce at the same price, forcing prices to match at a new floor. This continues.
I’m not sure if you are trying to imply automation is a good or bad thing. Looking through history, the industrial revolution was bad for the workers of the time, but in the long run massively improved the living standards of everyone. Automation is a net good in my opinion. Competition is simply an accelerator, this is not really tied to the economic system being used. In capitalist or communist systems, firms that are protected from competition (by what ever means) do not innovate as fast or as effectively (see Intel as a great example of this).
Socialism is just the precursor to Communism.
While this can be true, it is not necessarily true.
I don’t see what birth rates have to do with anything.
As your population ages, the costs to care for them raise at an increasing rate. If you don’t have enough new workers to stabilize the economic base, the burden that an aging population places on the younger generation grows until it becomes untenable.
There are a lot of capitalist countries that haven’t collapsed yet. We’ll need longer than our lifetimes to see proof that it can never work.
But I suspect that people in power just aren’t good enough to keep it from going bad eventually.
There are a lot of capitalist countries that haven’t collapsed yet. We’ll need longer than our lifetimes to see proof that it can never work.
It’s more that it’s unsustainable. Collapse can be delayed, but not outright prevented as long as the Tendency for the Rate of Profit to Fall exists.
But I suspect that people in power just aren’t good enough to keep it from going bad eventually.
It’s already “bad,” just constantly decaying.
I mean we do have a pretty good indication of a quite large impending factor which may cause a lot of them to collapse in the coming years, and which could collectively be attributed to them pretty well, especially within the last 50 years.
Dam, i fully slept on The Boys. Thoughts its just a Watchmen ‘supers in real life’ rip off. First season on par with Breaking Bad for me
It doesn’t really hold it’s quality. Season 3 gets more about the shock humor than the story.
It’s brilliant IMO (I haven’t seen the latest season but the one before … season 3 did feel like it was losing its way a bit).
The thing with mainstream super hero stuff is that it seems to very much about supporting the status quo without really examining it. Generally, the MCU has been pretty guilty of this AFAICT. It’s also why Winter Soldier is probably the best MCU film IMO … Captain America becomes “the enemy” by standing up for his principles and destroys shield.
The Boys is about examining the status quo and so stands out massively compared to all of the other mainstream superhero stuff.
It’s just too fucking dark for me. I don’t dislike a gritty show necessarily but I couldn’t make it through more than the first few episodes. It seemed good, but damn I have plenty of problems and shittiness in my real life, I like my entertainment to make me feel better, not worse. 😀
Same. I like dark stories as much as the next person, but it hit way too close to home with real world politics for me.
Imo the second season gets even better, I’m obsessed rn
This applies to literally every form of government.
No, you stupid western swine. That’s just westoid propaganda!
However I, too, wasn’t aware China’s historic fascism problem was the result of capitalistic woes.
Everyday i learn new facts from .ml, like China invented capitalism (take THAT, Sumer!!1).
Surely it was a tough pick between using Superman or Captain America in the top panel.
