Random Politics & Religion #00

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2010-06-21
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Random Politics & Religion #00
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By fonewear 2015-04-22 11:23:02  
Leviathan.Chaosx said: »
Here's a good book I want to check out:

Quote:
“Fascists,” “Brownshirts,” “jackbooted stormtroopers”—such are the insults typically hurled at conservatives by their liberal opponents. Calling someone a fascist is the fastest way to shut them up, defining their views as beyond the political pale. But who are the real fascists in our midst?

Liberal Fascism offers a startling new perspective on the theories and practices that define fascist politics. Replacing conveniently manufactured myths with surprising and enlightening research, Jonah Goldberg reminds us that the original fascists were really on the left, and that liberals from Woodrow Wilson to FDR to Hillary Clinton have advocated policies and principles remarkably similar to those of Hitler's National Socialism and Mussolini's Fascism.

Contrary to what most people think, the Nazis were ardent socialists (hence the term “National socialism”). They believed in free health care and guaranteed jobs. They confiscated inherited wealth and spent vast sums on public education. They purged the church from public policy, promoted a new form of pagan spirituality, and inserted the authority of the state into every nook and cranny of daily life. The Nazis declared war on smoking, supported abortion, euthanasia, and gun control. They loathed the free market, provided generous pensions for the elderly, and maintained a strict racial quota system in their universities—where campus speech codes were all the rage. The Nazis led the world in organic farming and alternative medicine. Hitler was a strict vegetarian, and Himmler was an animal rights activist.

Do these striking parallels mean that today’s liberals are genocidal maniacs, intent on conquering the world and imposing a new racial order? Not at all. Yet it is hard to deny that modern progressivism and classical fascism shared the same intellectual roots. We often forget, for example, that Mussolini and Hitler had many admirers in the United States. W.E.B. Du Bois was inspired by Hitler's Germany, and Irving Berlin praised Mussolini in song. Many fascist tenets were espoused by American progressives like John Dewey and Woodrow Wilson, and FDR incorporated fascist policies in the New Deal.

Fascism was an international movement that appeared in different forms in different countries, depending on the vagaries of national culture and temperament. In Germany, fascism appeared as genocidal racist nationalism. In America, it took a “friendlier,” more liberal form. The modern heirs of this “friendly fascist” tradition include the New York Times, the Democratic Party, the Ivy League professoriate, and the liberals of Hollywood. The quintessential Liberal Fascist isn't an SS storm trooper; it is a female grade school teacher with an education degree from Brown or Swarthmore.

These assertions may sound strange to modern ears, but that is because we have forgotten what fascism is. In this angry, funny, smart, contentious book, Jonah Goldberg turns our preconceptions inside out and shows us the true meaning of Liberal Fascism.
Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Change

I got this book for my mom actually ! I haven't read it though.
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 Seraph.Ramyrez
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By Seraph.Ramyrez 2015-04-22 11:23:03  
fonewear said: »

I got giant squid.
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 Lakshmi.Sparthosx
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By Lakshmi.Sparthosx 2015-04-22 11:35:47  
fonewear said: »
Happy Earth day everyone ! I look forward to feeling guilty about destroying the Earth.

Fear not, God will destroy the American economy and banish her people to low tier service jobs in turn.

THE EQUATION MUST BALANCE.
 Caitsith.Zahrah
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By Caitsith.Zahrah 2015-04-22 12:12:18  
Seraph.Ramyrez said: »
fonewear said: »

I got giant squid.



I'm a pretty, little ***, apparently.
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 Seraph.Ramyrez
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By Seraph.Ramyrez 2015-04-22 12:24:41  
Is that a mantis shrimp?

Are you a *** mantis shrimp!?

GET THE *** AWAY.
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 Asura.Kingnobody
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By Asura.Kingnobody 2015-04-22 12:48:50  
Seraph.Ramyrez said: »
fonewear said: »

I got giant squid.
Apparently, I'm a Komodo Dragon

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 Shiva.Onorgul
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By Shiva.Onorgul 2015-04-22 12:51:34  
Leviathan.Chaosx said: »
Here's a good book I want to check out:

Quote:
“Fascists,” “Brownshirts,” “jackbooted stormtroopers”—such are the insults typically hurled at conservatives by their liberal opponents. Calling someone a fascist is the fastest way to shut them up, defining their views as beyond the political pale. But who are the real fascists in our midst?

Liberal Fascism offers a startling new perspective on the theories and practices that define fascist politics. Replacing conveniently manufactured myths with surprising and enlightening research, Jonah Goldberg reminds us that the original fascists were really on the left, and that liberals from Woodrow Wilson to FDR to Hillary Clinton have advocated policies and principles remarkably similar to those of Hitler's National Socialism and Mussolini's Fascism.

Contrary to what most people think, the Nazis were ardent socialists (hence the term “National socialism”). They believed in free health care and guaranteed jobs. They confiscated inherited wealth and spent vast sums on public education. They purged the church from public policy, promoted a new form of pagan spirituality, and inserted the authority of the state into every nook and cranny of daily life. The Nazis declared war on smoking, supported abortion, euthanasia, and gun control. They loathed the free market, provided generous pensions for the elderly, and maintained a strict racial quota system in their universities—where campus speech codes were all the rage. The Nazis led the world in organic farming and alternative medicine. Hitler was a strict vegetarian, and Himmler was an animal rights activist.

Do these striking parallels mean that today’s liberals are genocidal maniacs, intent on conquering the world and imposing a new racial order? Not at all. Yet it is hard to deny that modern progressivism and classical fascism shared the same intellectual roots. We often forget, for example, that Mussolini and Hitler had many admirers in the United States. W.E.B. Du Bois was inspired by Hitler's Germany, and Irving Berlin praised Mussolini in song. Many fascist tenets were espoused by American progressives like John Dewey and Woodrow Wilson, and FDR incorporated fascist policies in the New Deal.

Fascism was an international movement that appeared in different forms in different countries, depending on the vagaries of national culture and temperament. In Germany, fascism appeared as genocidal racist nationalism. In America, it took a “friendlier,” more liberal form. The modern heirs of this “friendly fascist” tradition include the New York Times, the Democratic Party, the Ivy League professoriate, and the liberals of Hollywood. The quintessential Liberal Fascist isn't an SS storm trooper; it is a female grade school teacher with an education degree from Brown or Swarthmore.

These assertions may sound strange to modern ears, but that is because we have forgotten what fascism is. In this angry, funny, smart, contentious book, Jonah Goldberg turns our preconceptions inside out and shows us the true meaning of Liberal Fascism.
Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Change
Granted, this is only first impressions from a blurb rather than reading the book itself, but the blurb at least seems to have a weird idea of what fascism is or isn't.

In fairness, this is a common argument among both political scientists and armchair pundits.

There's a habit of calling fascism "right-wing" even when that's historically very muddled. It borrows policies from both conservative and liberal ideologies, but it's more centrist... sort of. It's more like the political spectrum gets bent into a loop and fascism meets the center on the opposite side of people like Barack Obama or George W. Bush, Jr., that is, it's somewhere directly between far-left and far-right. Lots of crazy shows up in that particular area. It's where most anti-vaxxers hang out, for instance, as well as *** like PETA and Greenpeace.

But, really, fascism is less concerned with left or right ideology and more with nationalism. Students of history and politics, of which I'll assume there are none here, should recognize fascism as the nearly inevitable consequence of the growth of states and nationalism from the Age of Exploration through the late Industrial Revolution (for what it's worth, nationalism as a concept has been eroding strongly in our lifetime, due in large part to television and the internet). It's less an ideology of politics as it is a methodology of governance. One doesn't classify dictatorships as inherently right-wing or left-wing (although there's a definite trend to claim they're all the former), nor other systems of government.

Fascism is about strong authoritarian control by the state reinforced by xenophobia, nationalism, and populism (or the appearance thereof, anyhow), and characterized by a tendency towards war. And, let's be honest, that list encompasses a very weird mix of our current Republican and Democratic parties. The authoritarianism is nominally Democratic, but you'd never know with how the Republican Party has been acting since the Nixon administration. Nationalism is emphatically Republican, along with its sister xenophobia. Feigned populism runs both ways, though the Democrats tend to shout it louder historically. I won't classify use of force to either side as both can and will use it (our liberal President sure loves his drones, after all).

This blurb makes it sound like the author really wants to call out the American left for being fascists. Which is ridiculous. If we want to point at fascism in 2015, look at ISIL. They've literally attempted to found a state (the phoenix myth is a common factor in fascist systems) on the basis of strict control and a pathological hatred of anything different backed up with swift and deadly force.
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 Shiva.Onorgul
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By Shiva.Onorgul 2015-04-22 12:53:30  
Oh, and I got mantis shrimp, too.
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 Asura.Kingnobody
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By Asura.Kingnobody 2015-04-22 12:55:24  
Nice thing about being a Komodo Dragon?

I can eat all you shrimps and squids!

...that didn't sound right....
 Shiva.Onorgul
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By Shiva.Onorgul 2015-04-22 12:58:05  
If you haven't, you should look up a video of a mantis shrimp attacking with its claws. It punches so fast underwater that it literally boils the surrounding liquid. It can get through glass in spite of being about the size of a grapefruit.

A komodo might try to eat that, but it could literally wind up have its jaw broken in the process.
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 Lakshmi.Sparthosx
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By Lakshmi.Sparthosx 2015-04-22 12:58:53  


lol, no.
I cannot dance for ***.
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 Cerberus.Pleebo
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By Cerberus.Pleebo 2015-04-22 12:59:21  
Quote:
You're a red capped manakin!
Yay?
Lakshmi.Sparthosx said: »
lol, no.
I cannot dance for ***.
Me neither haha.
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 Asura.Kingnobody
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By Asura.Kingnobody 2015-04-22 12:59:45  
That's what the tail is for. Shake that ***!

...seriously, what's up with all the gay puns today?
 Caitsith.Zahrah
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By Caitsith.Zahrah 2015-04-22 13:02:36  
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 Caitsith.Zahrah
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By Caitsith.Zahrah 2015-04-22 13:31:37  
Sorry for the derail. Had to go find this, though, to add to Ono's contribution.

Okay, done now.
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 Leviathan.Chaosx
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By Leviathan.Chaosx 2015-04-22 13:34:30  
fonewear said: »
I got this book for my mom actually ! I haven't read it though.
Ask her if it's any good.
 Leviathan.Chaosx
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By Leviathan.Chaosx 2015-04-22 13:35:57  
Shiva.Onorgul said: »
And, let's be honest, that list encompasses a very weird mix of our current Republican and Democratic parties. The authoritarianism is nominally Democratic, but you'd never know with how the Republican Party has been acting since the Nixon administration. Nationalism is emphatically Republican, along with its sister xenophobia. Feigned populism runs both ways, though the Democrats tend to shout it louder historically. I won't classify use of force to either side as both can and will use it (our liberal President sure loves his drones, after all).
I'll definitely agree with this part.
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By fonewear 2015-04-22 13:36:27  
Leviathan.Chaosx said: »
fonewear said: »
I got this book for my mom actually ! I haven't read it though.
Ask her if it's any good.

I've read a small bit of it. It is basically a history lesson from Mussolini on.
 Fenrir.Atheryn
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By Fenrir.Atheryn 2015-04-22 13:45:10  
Not quite what I was expecting...

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By fonewear 2015-04-22 13:46:01  
Coral...vaginas of the sea ! Filled with sand and emotions !
 Leviathan.Chaosx
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By Leviathan.Chaosx 2015-04-22 13:47:34  
I got the Komodo Dragon.
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 Asura.Kingnobody
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By Asura.Kingnobody 2015-04-22 13:49:08  
Leviathan.Chaosx said: »
I got the Komodo Dragon.
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By fonewear 2015-04-22 13:51:27  
That is all I see when I go out bros ! It is an epidemic backwards hats bro talk. It's a nightmare !
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 Leviathan.Chaosx
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By Leviathan.Chaosx 2015-04-22 13:54:38  
I was never a fan of going out.
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By fonewear 2015-04-22 13:57:19  
Leviathan.Chaosx said: »
I was never a fan of going out.

If I don't get out once a week I get cabin fever.
 Siren.Mosin
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By Siren.Mosin 2015-04-22 13:58:38  
whooping crane.

booo. I new I'd get screwed with a bad spirit animal.
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 Fenrir.Atheryn
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By Fenrir.Atheryn 2015-04-22 14:00:49  
I suppose my spirit animal isn't that bad. At least I can say:

"Bring it ***. I'll cut you."
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