Ur-Fascism | Hacker News Reader

Ur-Fascism

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14 pointsAnon847 comments

The 14 properties of ur-facism identified by Umberto Eco are: * The cult of tradition * The rejection of modernism * The cult of action for action’s sake * Disagreement is treason * Fear of difference * Appeal to social frustration * Obsession with a plot * The enemy is both strong and weak * Pacifism is trafficking with the enemy * Contempt for the weak * Everybody is educated to become a hero * Machismo and weapon-fetishism * Selective populism * Ur-Fascism speaks Newspeak

Probably one can easily make some check boxes for various right-leaning populist governments around the globe. Eco predicts that ur-facism eventually erodes democracy and will lead to a state of constant war. Not so good prospects, at all.

There's one good thing about it and it is the cult of action over reflection and hesitation.

We in the West tend to hesitate too much vs just getting shit done. Especially in Europe. Perhaps we need a healthy dose of "moving fast and breaking things", since this is a tech industry motto i can see why so many of them turned far right. Because this is a part of far right that actually makes sense. If we only act when we are confident that our actions won't harm or upset anyone, everyone else will be making circles around us, which they do.

The whole point of "moving fast and breaking things" is to produce fast feedback based on real outcomes, with the expectation of learning from that feedback. FAFO is similar - and, again, the "find out" part is the desired outcome.

But fascism is different - its "cult of action for action's sake" is explicitly anti-intellectual. It doesn't bother to find out, it actively resists learning. It isn't productive because productivity implies progress - instead it's a way of soaking up excess energy, dissipating the forces of change, and ensuring that society is kept essentially static.

"cult of action for action's sake" is the way it can be explained to the plebs. There is no way to explain things to the plebs without somewhat cartoonish simplification.

But there really isn't any sort of hidden core of introspection within fascism, even amongst the elite. The lack of it is the point!

Read Eco on the subject or even D'Annunzio, for that matter. Think also of Andresseen's recent "zero introspection" comments, and consider how closely it tracks with the fascists' version of the same.

No, there are no “good” things about Fascism. None.

If alternative is liberal democracy, than yes. But this has almost never been the case. Usually alternative was communism, or other kind of far-left regime. Of course, even quite literal, Hitleresque fascism is better than that.

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