HuffPo: No Fascism To See Here

In a revealing, though inadequate bit of analysis, R J Eskow at the Huffington Post writes:

IF (Eskow's quaint abbreviation for the Islamic Fascism he argues doesn't exist) is a propaganda creation in the classic sense of the term. Anyone with a grasp of history knows that "fascism" entails intense nationalism and collaboration with large corporations, both of which Islamists reject. They do practice intense control of individual behavior, which is hateful but not limited to fascist movements.

Eskow is flat out wrong. Perhaps he can't divorce the meaning of fascism from a typical Liberals distrust of both nationalism and big business. However, if one genuinely understands history and that it doesn't begin in the 1930's, one can then understand that apart from fascism being associated with the concept of the state, it is also a thing through which a state, or ever larger state, can emerge.

In a way, the difference is whether you want to see it only as a noun, or also understand it as an adverb. There are states that are fascist and there are acts that are fascist. Fascist states cannot maintain themselves without fascist acts. But fascist acts can certainly be separated from the concept of a state. We use the latter form of the word all the time.

The name comes from the Latin fasces – a bundle of rods with a projecting axe, which was the symbol of authority in ancient Rome. The term was applied by Mussolini to his movement after his rise to power in 1922. The Fascists were viciously anti-Communist and anti- liberal and, once in power, relied on an authoritarian state apparatus. They also used emotive slogans and old prejudices (for example, against the Jews) to bolster the leader's strongman appeal....

Rome came about as an empire through an expression of fascism. There was no Haliburton to get the contract for the Appian Way. Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy did the very same thing. The kernel or seed of a current or projected fascist state (how much geography or infrastructure it controls) is far less important than the fascist tactics and actions employed to establish, or grow such a state. It's only then that a fascist ideology will dominate and take on the form of a particular state. Fascists then assert control over industry, the population, the political machinery, etc..., because that's what fascists do.

Once a fascist ideology seizes control of something, it dominates it in whole, not in part. Currently, Islamo-fascists are struggling for control of Islam in its broader context. They are also fighting different types of wars for control within certain states, including Iraq.

Their fascism exists quite apart from any state, corporation, or Military Industrial Complex - the very concept of which likely keeps Eskow awake at night. Frankly, Eskow should be far more worried over a bunch of theocratic fascists who would like nothing better than to lop off his head.

Comments

[Chad Evans]

What an interesting version of fascism Eskow has. By writing "collaboration with large corporations," I assume he means placing restrictions upon how they can do business and being more of a nanny state. By writing fascists were "viciously anti-Communist and anti- liberal" I can only presume Eskow realizes fascism was a competitor to communism and the movement was anti-free society (Eskow uses the term anti-Liberal), but both were giant socialist states. The Italians also were not particularly against Jews, that would have been the Nazis, and while the Nazi Regime was fascist, the differences between fascism and nazism are huge.

That's why it's rather humorous for Eskow to write "anyone with a grasp of history" before getting everything wrong.

[Phoenix]

Fascism is a constant chameleon of history. Nothing wrong with heeding Santayana's words about history and how it repeats itself. Fascism changes its colors with a new surname for each new movement or ideology that pulls its tail. The tail falls off and a new one grows. It's still the same wicked lizard. The only thing that changes is the secular or religious nature of the beast; and unfortunately, the more deadly weaponry used to feed that beast.

Rome was actually a fairly democratic 'fascist' state. That's how it managed to be one of the most successful civilizations on the planet. Too bad Constantine lopped its tail off when he switched Rome's secular acceptance of all Romans to the ideology of Christianity and paved the way for one-thousand years of the Dark Ages. Catholic fascism.

One can play with words all day long and toy with meanings, but the beast remains no matter what. It just changes it colors and regenerates its rudder when the old one falls off.

How simple people become when they mouth the verse but miss the meaning between the lines. Scary, frightening stuff to read such banal sophistry and to know others will believe it. Depressing......