Fascism shouldn’t be thought of as a static “thing” or an object of ideology. Peoples beliefs come from their environment. We are so individualized as a society that often we as progressives take “personal responsibility” too far, we buy the premise implicitly without realizing there are flaws with thinking in this way. Every logical system has flaws and contradictions, its proven mathematically though I think some systems are more rigorous and based on evidence.

GWF Hegel’s philosophy of Right was written in 1820, and influenced political thought ever since. Liberalism was still in it’s revolutionary phase and theories about it were still fairly new, the Wealth of Nations was written just 50 years before, and Karl Marx was like two when it was released, although it would serve as the basis for much of his work analyzing the hidden relationships of Capital, and ethical political philosophy on the whole.

The book is the closest I think someone can honestly get to an actual “horseshoe theory” because not only did it influence the left but it also influenced the far right. Hegel, using the works of other great liberal philosophers such as Locke and Kant, who Hegel was always working to surpass, applied his dialectical philosophical methods to the writings of liberalism.

What he discovered was a natural tendency toward what we would calll fascism. Like he prefigured fascism by 100 years. He wasn’t a fascist, there was no such thing. He was just exploring the ideas of this revolutionary philosophy, one that purported to liberate the mind, body and spirit, and discovered the oppressive seeds which might grow into something quite different.

This isn’t to call liberals fascists, I’m a communist and 20th century communism had a lot of problems, to put it mildly. I would say confidently that progressive liberals are not crypto fash, in fact the term “progressive” is a typically left-Hegelian ideal, in that it describes human progress and development as the subject of history. Instead it challenges the idea of the liberatory nature of private property, a key component of liberal thought. Of course this is all depending how you look at it, right-Hegelians see this same formulation as proof of the inevitability of their ideas and justification for their actions.

You’re getting a lot of different opinions about this stuff so I’m trying to make sort of a different point about philosophy, history and action. Other reading for a deep dive on fascism is the essay Ur Fascism by Umberto Eco (great empirical analysis, but the least scientific IMO), Trotsky’s pamphlet Fascism: What it is and How to Fight It, and HA Roy’s Fasism, Its Philosophy, Professions and Practice.

In a way, fascism has always been there below the surface, informally shifting the sands of history until it was formalized in the early 20th century. I don’t think you can have a society based on private property without some elements of fascism somewhere. Mostly “western democracies” will outsource their extreme cruelty to other countries where it doesn’t affect their citizens.

But in summary, Fascism is the realization of the contradictions inherent in liberal ideology, its liberalism turned inside-out, with all its appearances of justice and freedom cut away, leaving only the logic of expansion and domination that most liberal democracies do their best to hide. This is how fascists are able to hide in our society, their individual beliefs are not completely unpalatable to centrists and conservatives who have also started to dispense with justice and freedom in the interest of national greatness. Its what makes their beliefs so malleable, and its also why liberals have such a hard time defining it. But fascism isn’t an individual’s beliefs, if it was it would be just regular bog-standard chauvinism. Fascism is a mass movement which will use charismatic leaders amenable to their politics to rally the masses.

In our society, the middle classes are the “battery” for fascism. Middle classes are constantly under attack under capitalism and the individuals often feel this and become paranoid (doomsday prepping, etc.,) and this paranoia and real social pressure to produce or be wiped out, the fear from the constant threat of precarity and uncertainty fits hand in glove with the aims and means of fascists.

My favorite song by the Dead Kennedys is “Nazi Punks Will Go Away on Their Own So Don’t Make a Big Deal About It”

If you don’t have anything to contribute to the discussion, then you could just not comment.

When my facts contradict your narrative im a 15 year old antisemitic conspiracy theorist, meanwhile, you throw away all those facts to protect your narrative in the name of truth. Its a little disingenuous.

I admit I’m coming in hot and heavy with a particular view and i believe these dynamicx are real and important to understand. but these were just a few particularly nasty threads in a long, complex and difficult war. Treating these topics fairly and honestly is the work of books, stacks of volumes even, and unlike you, I won’t say that my view, which merely corroborates the perspective of the other commenter, is the comprehensive final word on WW2 history. That’s all I was doing was corroborating, giving some facts to support their perspective which you arrogantly dismissed without a squeaky fart of evidence. Again, disingenuous.

I assure you that I’m not 15 (multiply that by 3) nor a casual internet theorist, so dont bother trying to rattle me the way you might be able to with someone from one of those groups of people. In any case, whatever box you have to put me in to make yourself feel better than me is fine, but it doesn’t make you right or even like a good faith participant in this discussion. I hope you get a lot of mileage out of that little insult, I hope it makes you feel special and very smart. From my limited experience, those feelings of fake superiority might be one of the only things you have going for you. But feel free to prove me wrong with something like an intelligent comment. It doesn’t take much to impress me, being a dumb, childish, hateful oaf that you want to paint me as.

Its not that they wanted the Nazis, but the US will choose a dumptruck of fascism over a thimblefull of socialism every time. The US wasn’t officially aligned with Germany, there were forces in the US that wanted to see them defeated, and protect allies like GB. However many powerful american businesses were closely aligned with the nazis anc they wield a lot of political clout. IBM’s second biggest customer was Nazi Germany. So don’t act like there was zero conflict of interest. But as I said the incentives weren’t pro-nazi, they were pro-US superpower and anti soviet. There certainly were powerful forces within the US that explicitly wanted fascism here though, the Ultra podcast covers this well in 2 seasons.

Your version of history where there are good guys and bad guys that clearly demarcate the winners and losers in a completely justified in every way war, is the ahistorical garbo. People just can’t fathom that the US would act underhandedly to give itself an advantage despite every second of this country’s foul imperialist history. As if these things are decided by your personal morals rather than by politics and power. God what naive idealism.

In the war room, when it looks like the worlds greatest enemy are going to defeat your greatest enemy, should you intervene on behalf of your greatest enemy? No you wait and see how things shake out. Its always surprising when people just refuse to think about political economy and instead believe the “stars and stripes forever, super patriot, the US is the greatest country in the world” delusion.

No, the US stayed out of the war until after the Nazis had been defeated at Stalingrad and were getting pushed out of Russia. The reason the US didn’t enter the war earlier was 1. Forces in the US wanted Europe destroyed since all it would take is a push to over industrialize our economy and we could emerge as the worlds leading superpower (which happened) and 2. The powerful forces in the US were really hoping the Nazis would defeat the Soviets.

The other poster is more correct, we entered the war to clean up the western front and prevent the USSR from taking the credit for “winning”, and prevent expansion or even diplomatic leverage.

I know lots of guys who got divorced and started thriving. Its not “divorced guys” its who they are, and have been for a long time at least