Italy investigates Placebo singer for calling far-right PM ‘racist’ and ‘fascist’
Italy investigates Placebo singer for calling far-right PM ‘racist’ and ‘fascist’
Brian Molko criticised Giorgia Meloni during a concert at the Sonic Park festival
Meloni heads Italy’s most rightwing government since the second world war. Italy’s criminal code punishes with a fine ranging from €1,000 to €5,000 anyone who “publicly defames the republic”, which includes the government, parliament, the courts and the army.
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Proving them right, I see
Person: "You're a fascist"
Government: "That's wrong; we're gonna use the power of the state to investigate and punish you for something you said"
Person: "Oh well I stand corrected. Totally not fascist at all...."
Thats the fascist paradox.
Call someone a fascist, if they want to oppress you because you lied, then you are right, so they can oppress you, but if they dont oppress you, then you are wrong and you are to be oppressed, but then you will be right.
The USSR would also persecute people for criticizing the Soviet state or its leaders, but they weren't fascist. Authoritarianism is something people on the left and right both get up to.
I mean we are kind of splitting hairs a bit then. The worst thing about fascism is mostly the autocracy and the "ends justify lots of murder" attitude. When people talk about the evils of fascism that's what they're talking about.
Likewise, when people criticize Stalinism, they aren't talking about the high minded ideals or even the questionable fashion choices. They are talking about the autocracy, and the "ends justify lots of murder" attitude.
If left-wing authoritarianism isn't an oxymoron, then what the heck does left-wing mean?
I agree that authoritarianism does not equal fascism, but the only meaningful definition of left-right politics (in my opinion) is a measure of belief in and adherence to social hierarchies. And the USSR was definitely heavily into hierarchy.
Why would it be an oxymoron? There is nothing on the political chart or inherent to it to forbid the left wing to be authoritarian.
This is my thinking, let me know if you see any issues with my interpretation:
First line of Wikipedia Left-wing politics: Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy as a whole.
First list of Wikiepdia Authoritarianism: Authoritarianism is a political system characterized by the rejection of political plurality, the use of strong central power to preserve the political status quo, and reductions in the rule of law, separation of powers, and democratic voting.
By these definitions, Left-wing politics should want to evenly distribute power democratically, whereas authoritarianism wants to centralise power in a single entity such as a the military or a dictator.
The perpetual dictatorship of the proletariat in Marxist-Leninism is functionally indifferent from the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie. The authoritarian leadership just becomes the new bourgeoisie.
All good with the definitions, please share them as much as you want.
My claim is extremely simple, nothing is gonna stop you as a left wing representative to reach those objectives through authoritarian means.
I don't see how is that hard to understand unless you claim some kind of special position for either side.
In which case, this is not a conversation I'm interested in.
Yeah, that's where the left-right concept kinda breaks down.
It feels wrong to say the USSR wasn't left when you consider the many left policies they had and of course their origin.
I also agree with your idea of what left-wing should mean. I guess there's no way to avoid complexity with topics like this.
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Oh, Mellonhead is definitely a fascist, I'm just pointing out that you get the same kinda of oppression at the other end of the lef-right spectrum, too.
There’s plenty of oppression and violence smack dab in the center of the left right spectrum too. I’m not sure why horseshoe theory is so keen to equate Stalin, Mao, etc. with the violence of Hitler, Pinochet, etc. while ignoring the genocides of the Dutch East India Co. (and competitors), imperialism, the slave trade, settler colonialism, etc.
Absolutely! This is why, even though the political compass is a memey oversimplification at this point, it does get a the inadequacy of a single dimension view of political ideology. The authoritarian mindset is a human trait, and while some ideologies seem more prone to attracting people with that particular trait, by no means does it only occur in those cases.
Some people just want to rule over others.
I'd argue the USSR was fascist the same way the DPRK is fascist. You aren't necessarily left-wing just because you say you are.
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I can see the parallels but this really conflicts with the historical definition of fascist. Then again, practically everyone is a fascist these days at least according to someone, so maybe the historical definition doesn’t matter anymore. Guess that’s the downside of it being the universally despised bogeyman term in politics.
Thought it might be helpful to compare the USSR to Wikipedia's definitions of fascism and communism. These definitions can be wrong or could be different than what they were at the height of the USSR, but perhaps it'll help with finding common definitions. I'll admit that my knowledge of USSR culture/governance is limited, so feel free to critique/refute any of my interpretations.
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultranationalist political ideology and movement,characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy, subordination of individual interests for the perceived good of the nation and race, and strong regimentation of society and the economy.
Checklist (hidden for brevity)
- +Dictatorial leader: Stalin wasn't exactly a democratic ruler. Check.
- ?Centralized autocracy: AKA: One person has final say over any government decision. Probably, but maybe not depending on your definition?
- +Militarism: Definitely had a significant military focus. Check.
- +Forcible suppression of opposition: Yeah, that sounds par for the course for modern Russian government.
- ?Belief in natural social hierarchy: Does semi-deliberate wealth disparity and nationalistic superiority complex count?
- ?Subordination of individual interests for the perceived good of the nation and race: Sounds likely, but not 100% sure.
- +Strong regimentation of society and the economy: Pretty sure the USSR had a planned centralized economy.
It hits 4/7 pretty firmly and the remaining 3 are plausible.
is a left-wing to far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology... whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered around common ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange that allocates products to everyone in the society based on need. A communist society would entail the absence of private property and social classes, and ultimately money and the state.
Checklist (hidden for brevity)
- XCommon ownership of the means of production of goods/services: Weren't these state-owned?
- XCommon ownership of the means of distribution of goods/services: ^
- XCommon ownership of the means of exchange of goods/services: ^^
- ?Allocates products to everyone in the society based on need: Wasn't there significant poverty while others' were well-fed? If distribution wasn't tied to labor, then it could be argued this fits, if somewhat imperfectly.
- XAbsence of private property: Oligarchs don't exactly scream "lack of private property"
- XAbsence of social classes: Again, oligarchs and poverty
- ?Absence of money: Can't comment on this one
- XAbsence of the state: There was 100% an overarching state
Hits 2/8 at best, but I would be surprised to learn there wasn't money in the USSR.
Yes, but that is a different conversation. Now we are talking about Meloni and her ties to the far right 🙂
Stalin was absolutely a fascist.
He really wasn't, though.
All fascists are authoritarians, not all authoritarians are fascist.
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Read about Red Fascism in history...
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As Italian is worth mentioning that these nationalist dimwits we have now in charge have being elected with a genius grade new electoral law pushed by the centre left coalition and especially devised in a bipartisan accord between the centre left and the centre right coalition to counter the rise of Movimento 5 Stelle (or any new "small" party) which would then interfere, as indeed it did in the previous election, with the well established bi-partitism which had been instated from Berlusconi since the late 90's (as per P2 Masonry Group Manifest bullet point, https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano_di_rinascita_democratica and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_Due).
As result of this new electoral law Meloni is holding Italian government by the balls with a mere actual 16,4% of votes on the voters total.
Let's go into numbers, indeed Meloni coalition ("centre" right, lol) got 43,79% of the total valid votes, of which 26% for Meloni's own Fratelli d'Italia party, but you must consider that these percentages do not include the 36,91% of citizens holding voting rights which didn't actually vote at all, which means this non-group missed to be the largest non-coalition by little and de-facto resulted in non-being the most non-representative non-party.
So accounting for the 36.91% of non-voters Meloni is acting like an empress embodying the second coming of Mussolini with a scant 16.4% of actual voting preference. For this don't forget to thank the center-left for pushing the afore mentioned new electoral law, because this only is what enabled her to act like she's doing.BONUS: article on some buried past of Meloni as failed nerd wannabe career using public money
https://kotaku.com/georgia-meloni-italian-pm-fps-shooter-game-pope-unreal-1850163072We have an old saying in Germany, from the times of the Weimar Republic's communists, which roughly translates to:
"Who has betrayed us? The Social Democrats"
It rhymes in German.
Wasn't the Weimar communist party also the one who said "after Hitler, us", and formed a coalition? I may be completely mistaken and misremembering. My impression was always that it wasn't the center left nor the left at fault, it was their feuding with each other that allowed Hitler to rise.
Had the two groups seen each other as rivals and not enemies, I think things would be way different.