Comparing Nazism and Communism as ideologies is perhaps a category error, because they are not strictly comparable.
Communism is a universalist, evangelical religion like Christianity or Islam. The upside of that is inclusivity: anyone can belong if they convert to the faith. The downside is violence: if you don’t convert, you are fair game for destruction.
Ethno-fascism is an identity based religion like Hinduism or some of the Middle Eastern sects like the Druze. There is an in group and an out group. The upside could be that they leave you alone if you leave them alone (though the Nazis clearly didn’t do that). The downside is that if you’re not in the in group you’re sub-human and therefore fair game for destruction.
I prefer centrist dada-ism myself.
And one is a perversion of political economy, whereas one is a perversion of science.
What are you driving at here, Lucky?
I wondered the same, but then assumed Communism is the perversion of economics and Fascism is a perversion of science. Am I correct @Luckyguy1983 ?
Comparing Communism to Fascism as ideologies is not quite the same as whether somebody identifying as a Communist is likely to be as unsavoury and dangerous a person as somebody identifying as a Fascist. You can make a strong case for the ideologies being equally antithetical to human freedom and happiness but faced with two lifts, one occupied by a bloke wearing a swastika and the other by one sporting a hammer and sickle, ok you'd take the stairs, but if you couldn't, if you had to get in one of these lifts, you'd surely join the commie. Anybody says otherwise I'm not believing them.
That says nothing about the ideologies though, it's just a circular argument based on their relative social acceptability. Nazism is unconscionable, therefore someone in today's society covered in swastika tattoos is repudiating accepted social norms publicly in a way that someone who is covered in communist tattoos is not. Of course you would take your chances with the latter.
If we lived in a society (say the early 30s), where communism was a threat to all we hold dear, and Nazis were good chaps really, just don't start them on the Sudetenland, the lift situation would be reversed (and was).
Yes, but I'm deliberately addressing the here and now and it's not a circular argument. I'm talking about *why* a person (in the UK today) might be attracted to communism or fascism and what that is saying about them.
Comparing Communism to Fascism as ideologies is not quite the same as whether somebody identifying as a Communist is likely to be as unsavoury and dangerous a person as somebody identifying as a Fascist. You can make a strong case for the ideologies being equally antithetical to human freedom and happiness but faced with two lifts, one occupied by a bloke wearing a swastika and the other by one sporting a hammer and sickle, ok you'd take the stairs, but if you couldn't, if you had to get in one of these lifts, you'd surely join the commie. Anybody says otherwise I'm not believing them.
That says nothing about the ideologies though, it's just a circular argument based on their relative social acceptability. Nazism is unconscionable, therefore someone in today's society covered in swastika tattoos is repudiating accepted social norms publicly in a way that someone who is covered in communist tattoos is not. Of course you would take your chances with the latter.
If we lived in a society (say the early 30s), where communism was a threat to all we hold dear, and Nazis were good chaps really, just don't start them on the Sudetenland, the lift situation would be reversed (and was).
Yes, but I'm deliberately addressing the here and now and it's not a circular argument. I'm talking about *why* a person (in the UK today) might be attracted to communism or fascism and what that is saying about them.
They might be attracted to fascism because they are fed up with their train being late, or because they like dressing up in uniform. That’s rather missing the point.
And I think the 'issue' is that Communism is seen mostly as a set of economic beliefs...
Well, yes. But those economic beliefs govern what you can own, how you are medicated, surgeried, fed, watered, housed and employed, how your children are schooled, and specifically prevents you from trying something better on your own initiative. It sounds good but it's stupid at best and murderous at worst.
Indeed: it's why communism is doomed to fail.
And also - of course - why little experiments at communism are perfectly allowable within capitalist systems. If you want to join a communist kibbutz, you could.
Communism in its original form is the ideal economic system for the context in which humans evolved: small kinship groups of hunter gatherers. Any other system in that situation tends to lead to conflict and social breakdown. Communism doesn’t however work in any other economic setting, not even subsistence cultivation or livestock grazing.
Perhaps this is why many are instinctively drawn to the ideal of communism. It represents some deep evolutionary vestige in the human brain.
But Marxist theory is predicated on an, and requires an industrial society. Lenin and Stalin* starved millions of agricultural peasants to develop one (built by Americans) so that they could have communism.
IOW, it was bollocks from the very start.
(And what China has now isn't communism in any sense, apart from the label they still insist upon.)
*Trotsky was more of your straightforward mass murderer.
What's your take on Castro?
Also a murderer, wasn't he? Anf mass-imprisoner? Also impoverished Cuba. I may be way off beam here, but my understanding is that Cuba and Puerto Rico were roughly equal in 1958. Not now. And you never got people risking death to flee Pherto Rico.
He may have looked good on a t-shirt but he the oboy reason he isn't considered one of tge twentietg centiry's greatest villains is that there was so much competition.
Comparing Communism to Fascism as ideologies is not quite the same as whether somebody identifying as a Communist is likely to be as unsavoury and dangerous a person as somebody identifying as a Fascist. You can make a strong case for the ideologies being equally antithetical to human freedom and happiness but faced with two lifts, one occupied by a bloke wearing a swastika and the other by one sporting a hammer and sickle, ok you'd take the stairs, but if you couldn't, if you had to get in one of these lifts, you'd surely join the commie. Anybody says otherwise I'm not believing them.
That says nothing about the ideologies though, it's just a circular argument based on their relative social acceptability. Nazism is unconscionable, therefore someone in today's society covered in swastika tattoos is repudiating accepted social norms publicly in a way that someone who is covered in communist tattoos is not. Of course you would take your chances with the latter.
If we lived in a society (say the early 30s), where communism was a threat to all we hold dear, and Nazis were good chaps really, just don't start them on the Sudetenland, the lift situation would be reversed (and was).
Yes, but I'm deliberately addressing the here and now and it's not a circular argument. I'm talking about *why* a person (in the UK today) might be attracted to communism or fascism and what that is saying about them.
They might be attracted to fascism because they are fed up with their train being late, or because they like dressing up in uniform. That’s rather missing the point.
I dont think that we have true fascists in the UK. There are those with some sympathy for it, but not the full Monty.
Real fascism requires paramilitary uniforms, a cult of leadership, milotarism and advocating political violence against internal and external enemies. A bunch of coked up fifty-somethings chucking beer cans at the police is just robbery, not fascism.
Comparing Communism to Fascism as ideologies is not quite the same as whether somebody identifying as a Communist is likely to be as unsavoury and dangerous a person as somebody identifying as a Fascist. You can make a strong case for the ideologies being equally antithetical to human freedom and happiness but faced with two lifts, one occupied by a bloke wearing a swastika and the other by one sporting a hammer and sickle, ok you'd take the stairs, but if you couldn't, if you had to get in one of these lifts, you'd surely join the commie. Anybody says otherwise I'm not believing them.
That says nothing about the ideologies though, it's just a circular argument based on their relative social acceptability. Nazism is unconscionable, therefore someone in today's society covered in swastika tattoos is repudiating accepted social norms publicly in a way that someone who is covered in communist tattoos is not. Of course you would take your chances with the latter.
If we lived in a society (say the early 30s), where communism was a threat to all we hold dear, and Nazis were good chaps really, just don't start them on the Sudetenland, the lift situation would be reversed (and was).
Yes, but I'm deliberately addressing the here and now and it's not a circular argument. I'm talking about *why* a person (in the UK today) might be attracted to communism or fascism and what that is saying about them.
They might be attracted to fascism because they are fed up with their train being late, or because they like dressing up in uniform. That’s rather missing the point.
And I think the 'issue' is that Communism is seen mostly as a set of economic beliefs...
Well, yes. But those economic beliefs govern what you can own, how you are medicated, surgeried, fed, watered, housed and employed, how your children are schooled, and specifically prevents you from trying something better on your own initiative. It sounds good but it's stupid at best and murderous at worst.
Indeed: it's why communism is doomed to fail.
And also - of course - why little experiments at communism are perfectly allowable within capitalist systems. If you want to join a communist kibbutz, you could.
Communism in its original form is the ideal economic system for the context in which humans evolved: small kinship groups of hunter gatherers. Any other system in that situation tends to lead to conflict and social breakdown. Communism doesn’t however work in any other economic setting, not even subsistence cultivation or livestock grazing.
Perhaps this is why many are instinctively drawn to the ideal of communism. It represents some deep evolutionary vestige in the human brain.
But Marxist theory is predicated on an, and requires an industrial society. Lenin and Stalin* starved millions of agricultural peasants to develop one (built by Americans) so that they could have communism.
IOW, it was bollocks from the very start.
When did the Isle of Wight go Communist? I must have missed that.
I rocked up to the last seat selection hustings I went to completely without notes. Knew my opening and closing comments verbatim and my key points. Completely flummoxed one of the other candidates who had reams of notes and even then kept forgetting her point.
It's much better if you can. I gave my maiden speech in Parliament entirely from notes, as I was nervous. It was a bit rubbish, whereas later speeches without notes were better (though I'll never sway the millions).
I’ve taught myself to play an extrovert and to be able to speak in public over the years, with bullet points and cue cards for a familiar subject - but a maiden speech in Parliament is one of those you’re going to want in front of you written out in full!
As somebody who regularly gives speeches to large meetings I've learned it is best to write bullet points down (and key gags) down rather than the whole speech.
I once used a teleprompter and it was a bigger disaster than the Liz Truss premiership, I kept on looking at that and completely losing my focus.
Had I become an MP my first speech to Parliament would have begun like this
'Hello, my name is Mr Eagles, and I'm an alcoholic, oh wait, wrong speech.'
Yes, with a couple of key points which act as waypoints within the speech.
Same when I am presenting sales stuff to clients. Slides are few in number and literally there as visual aides. And often not used at all much to the annoyance of colleagues who think 704 slides are best.
The most tedious presentations are those where the presenter reads the slides verbatim.
Generally the fewer the words on the slide the better. I had a lecturer in my UG days who had a roll of handwritten OHP acetate which he read off word for word and scrolled ever upwards. (Pre powerpoint, obs). It was terrible.
We had a biology teacher who was even worse. He read word for word and had us write it all down verbatim. Only O Level I failed.
We had a physics teacher like that. It was extremely boring but weirdly, it worked for me - through writing it down, the words passed from his mouth to my memory without at any point lodging in my conscious brain.
Yes, same. Chemistry in my case. An ultra trad teacher who dictated copious notes and told us to learn them. I did, and cruised to a top grade. We didn't get percentages, just the letter, but it would have been my highest, I think.
One under recognised point of school is to allow people to thrive on boredom. A lot of work is boring grind, and building ability to cope with that is a key life skill. If students are required to be constantly stimulated by noise, sound and movement, then it's no wonder that they struggle to knuckle down at work. We have trained them into ADHD, even before we gave them smartphones and Social Media.
Pretty much everything with doing requires effort, concentration and persistence. Students should be taught this, by means of dull teaching.
I almost flagged this. I mean, it's probably true but my whole heart wants it not to be.
Anyone who has singled turnip seedlings on a farm all day knows it's true. I've done it for a living - very fortunately only as a student in vacation. The worst job I ever did, and I did some pretty heavy and mucky stuff.
I grew up on Medicaid and food stamps. Stripped tobacco at the age of 7. Lived in the back of a Dodge Caravan in HS. Married a teacher. Served my country.
Now, I’m running for Senate because KY families deserve better than cuts to Medicaid, SNAP & vets’ services.
If you're pissed off like me, join our campaign today.
I rocked up to the last seat selection hustings I went to completely without notes. Knew my opening and closing comments verbatim and my key points. Completely flummoxed one of the other candidates who had reams of notes and even then kept forgetting her point.
It's much better if you can. I gave my maiden speech in Parliament entirely from notes, as I was nervous. It was a bit rubbish, whereas later speeches without notes were better (though I'll never sway the millions).
I’ve taught myself to play an extrovert and to be able to speak in public over the years, with bullet points and cue cards for a familiar subject - but a maiden speech in Parliament is one of those you’re going to want in front of you written out in full!
As somebody who regularly gives speeches to large meetings I've learned it is best to write bullet points down (and key gags) down rather than the whole speech.
I once used a teleprompter and it was a bigger disaster than the Liz Truss premiership, I kept on looking at that and completely losing my focus.
Had I become an MP my first speech to Parliament would have begun like this
'Hello, my name is Mr Eagles, and I'm an alcoholic, oh wait, wrong speech.'
Yes, with a couple of key points which act as waypoints within the speech.
Same when I am presenting sales stuff to clients. Slides are few in number and literally there as visual aides. And often not used at all much to the annoyance of colleagues who think 704 slides are best.
The most tedious presentations are those where the presenter reads the slides verbatim.
Generally the fewer the words on the slide the better. I had a lecturer in my UG days who had a roll of handwritten OHP acetate which he read off word for word and scrolled ever upwards. (Pre powerpoint, obs). It was terrible.
We had a biology teacher who was even worse. He read word for word and had us write it all down verbatim. Only O Level I failed.
We had a physics teacher like that. It was extremely boring but weirdly, it worked for me - through writing it down, the words passed from his mouth to my memory without at any point lodging in my conscious brain.
Yes, same. Chemistry in my case. An ultra trad teacher who dictated copious notes and told us to learn them. I did, and cruised to a top grade. We didn't get percentages, just the letter, but it would have been my highest, I think.
One under recognised point of school is to allow people to thrive on boredom. A lot of work is boring grind, and building ability to cope with that is a key life skill. If students are required to be constantly stimulated by noise, sound and movement, then it's no wonder that they struggle to knuckle down at work. We have trained them into ADHD, even before we gave them smartphones and Social Media.
Pretty much everything with doing requires effort, concentration and persistence. Students should be taught this, by means of dull teaching.
I almost flagged this. I mean, it's probably true but my whole heart wants it not to be.
Anyone who has singled turnip seedlings on a farm all day knows it's true. I've done it for a living - very fortunately only as a student in vacation. The worst job I ever did, and I did some pretty heavy and mucky stuff.
I did a couple of weeks roguing for oats (cleaning oats out of wheat and barley that will go onto be seed). Usually with a couple of other farm lads, but one day on my own. That was a fun day.
I rocked up to the last seat selection hustings I went to completely without notes. Knew my opening and closing comments verbatim and my key points. Completely flummoxed one of the other candidates who had reams of notes and even then kept forgetting her point.
It's much better if you can. I gave my maiden speech in Parliament entirely from notes, as I was nervous. It was a bit rubbish, whereas later speeches without notes were better (though I'll never sway the millions).
I’ve taught myself to play an extrovert and to be able to speak in public over the years, with bullet points and cue cards for a familiar subject - but a maiden speech in Parliament is one of those you’re going to want in front of you written out in full!
As somebody who regularly gives speeches to large meetings I've learned it is best to write bullet points down (and key gags) down rather than the whole speech.
I once used a teleprompter and it was a bigger disaster than the Liz Truss premiership, I kept on looking at that and completely losing my focus.
Had I become an MP my first speech to Parliament would have begun like this
'Hello, my name is Mr Eagles, and I'm an alcoholic, oh wait, wrong speech.'
Yes, with a couple of key points which act as waypoints within the speech.
Same when I am presenting sales stuff to clients. Slides are few in number and literally there as visual aides. And often not used at all much to the annoyance of colleagues who think 704 slides are best.
The most tedious presentations are those where the presenter reads the slides verbatim.
Generally the fewer the words on the slide the better. I had a lecturer in my UG days who had a roll of handwritten OHP acetate which he read off word for word and scrolled ever upwards. (Pre powerpoint, obs). It was terrible.
We had a biology teacher who was even worse. He read word for word and had us write it all down verbatim. Only O Level I failed.
We had a physics teacher like that. It was extremely boring but weirdly, it worked for me - through writing it down, the words passed from his mouth to my memory without at any point lodging in my conscious brain.
Yes, same. Chemistry in my case. An ultra trad teacher who dictated copious notes and told us to learn them. I did, and cruised to a top grade. We didn't get percentages, just the letter, but it would have been my highest, I think.
I think this is interesting. Current ‘best’ practice for us involves using PowerPoint so the darlings don’t need to write anything down. And in advance too, please. And lectures being recorded.
And I still think having to listen and make notes as you go was best.
Well speaking personally I find exactly that. Writing things out drums it into me. Even now when I want to get something properly in the bank that's what I do.
The latest one trillion in and none out flight has been grounded. Again
What a pitiful circus
Legally, they're doing it be the book.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
Thing is, they've got no choice.
Partly, the law os what the law is. Even the previous governments got that, for all their huffing and puffing. Partly, a government that feels it can ignore the law would be blooming scary, even if it was doing what I wanted.
Ultimately, if this turns out to be fine, the early excitement will be forgotten. If it doesn't, then the government does have a problem. But not yet.
Comparing Communism to Fascism as ideologies is not quite the same as whether somebody identifying as a Communist is likely to be as unsavoury and dangerous a person as somebody identifying as a Fascist. You can make a strong case for the ideologies being equally antithetical to human freedom and happiness but faced with two lifts, one occupied by a bloke wearing a swastika and the other by one sporting a hammer and sickle, ok you'd take the stairs, but if you couldn't, if you had to get in one of these lifts, you'd surely join the commie. Anybody says otherwise I'm not believing them.
Are you postulating an actual hammer and an actual sickle? Because, if so, I prefer the lift with the unarmed guy.
Comparing Nazism and Communism as ideologies is perhaps a category error, because they are not strictly comparable.
Communism is a universalist, evangelical religion like Christianity or Islam. The upside of that is inclusivity: anyone can belong if they convert to the faith. The downside is violence: if you don’t convert, you are fair game for destruction.
Ethno-fascism is an identity based religion like Hinduism or some of the Middle Eastern sects like the Druze. There is an in group and an out group. The upside could be that they leave you alone if you leave them alone (though the Nazis clearly didn’t do that). The downside is that if you’re not in the in group you’re sub-human and therefore fair game for destruction.
I prefer centrist dada-ism myself.
And one is a perversion of political economy, whereas one is a perversion of science.
What are you driving at here, Lucky?
I wondered the same, but then assumed Communism is the perversion of economics and Fascism is a perversion of science. Am I correct @Luckyguy1983 ?
And I think the 'issue' is that Communism is seen mostly as a set of economic beliefs...
Well, yes. But those economic beliefs govern what you can own, how you are medicated, surgeried, fed, watered, housed and employed, how your children are schooled, and specifically prevents you from trying something better on your own initiative. It sounds good but it's stupid at best and murderous at worst.
Indeed: it's why communism is doomed to fail.
And also - of course - why little experiments at communism are perfectly allowable within capitalist systems. If you want to join a communist kibbutz, you could.
Communism in its original form is the ideal economic system for the context in which humans evolved: small kinship groups of hunter gatherers. Any other system in that situation tends to lead to conflict and social breakdown. Communism doesn’t however work in any other economic setting, not even subsistence cultivation or livestock grazing.
Perhaps this is why many are instinctively drawn to the ideal of communism. It represents some deep evolutionary vestige in the human brain.
But Marxist theory is predicated on an, and requires an industrial society. Lenin and Stalin* starved millions of agricultural peasants to develop one (built by Americans) so that they could have communism.
IOW, it was bollocks from the very start.
(And what China has now isn't communism in any sense, apart from the label they still insist upon.)
*Trotsky was more of your straightforward mass murderer.
What's your take on Castro?
Also a murderer, wasn't he? Anf mass-imprisoner? Also impoverished Cuba. I may be way off beam here, but my understanding is that Cuba and Puerto Rico were roughly equal in 1958. Not now. And you never got people risking death to flee Pherto Rico.
He may have looked good on a t-shirt but he the oboy reason he isn't considered one of tge twentietg centiry's greatest villains is that there was so much competition.
Lots of debits for sure. But it's more of a mixed picture than many other communist horror shows, I'd say. Certain things improved, at least for a while. There's a good BBC iplayer doc on him that I watched recently.
I dont think that we have true fascists in the UK. There are those with some sympathy for it, but not the full Monty.
Real fascism requires paramilitary uniforms, a cult of leadership, milotarism and advocating political violence against internal and external enemies. A bunch of coked up fifty-somethings chucking beer cans at the police is just robbery, not fascism.
And let's not forget that Fascism is only now considered 'right wing' because of Soviet post-war revisionism.
Contemporaneous accounts of the 1930s and 1940s used a lot of terms to describe the Hitler and Mussolini regimes. 'Totalitarian', 'Despotic', plain old 'Evil'. You might've got a 'hardline Nationalist' in there when referring to Moseley.
But these movements weren't really presented as 'right wing' until after WWII, when the 'victorious' Soviets wanted to differentiate their own brand of wrongheaded Authoritarianism and state-sanctioned death cultury, as if they were polar opposites, when of course they weren't.
Horseshoe theory - which it didn't take long for most to twig - gets it semi-correct, but still allows the Octogenarian Strawman to remain standing.
'Far Right' *should* mean extreme Libertarianism/anarcho-capitalism. If being on the right is being pro-individual, small state, limited government then being far-right should mean being strongly in favour of such things.
Broken, sleazy Labour, Tories AND LibDems on the slide!
Labour at 14% in Wales is extraordinary but I am not the least bit surprised
As I have said previously, Starmer's red flag will be May 26 if this continues
It is not impossible that Labour come 5th in Holyrood. Given both Starmer and Sarwar’s utter incompetence, such a result would be well deserved.
Lewis Goodall @lewis_goodall Catastrophic @ITVWales polling from @YouGov showing Labour cratering in Wales in a distant third for the Senedd. Straight Plaid/Reform battle.
* Plaid 30% (n/c) * Reform 29% (+4) * Labour 14% (-4) * Conservatives 11% (-2) * Lib Dem 6% (-1) * Green 6% (+1)
If realised could well be terminal for Starmer. It’s Wales, not Scotland which could finish him next year.
Comparing Nazism and Communism as ideologies is perhaps a category error, because they are not strictly comparable.
Communism is a universalist, evangelical religion like Christianity or Islam. The upside of that is inclusivity: anyone can belong if they convert to the faith. The downside is violence: if you don’t convert, you are fair game for destruction.
Ethno-fascism is an identity based religion like Hinduism or some of the Middle Eastern sects like the Druze. There is an in group and an out group. The upside could be that they leave you alone if you leave them alone (though the Nazis clearly didn’t do that). The downside is that if you’re not in the in group you’re sub-human and therefore fair game for destruction.
I prefer centrist dada-ism myself.
And one is a perversion of political economy, whereas one is a perversion of science.
What are you driving at here, Lucky?
“I think you're some kind of deviated prevert. I think …. found out about your preversion, and that you were organizing some kind of mutiny of preverts.”
I rocked up to the last seat selection hustings I went to completely without notes. Knew my opening and closing comments verbatim and my key points. Completely flummoxed one of the other candidates who had reams of notes and even then kept forgetting her point.
It's much better if you can. I gave my maiden speech in Parliament entirely from notes, as I was nervous. It was a bit rubbish, whereas later speeches without notes were better (though I'll never sway the millions).
I’ve taught myself to play an extrovert and to be able to speak in public over the years, with bullet points and cue cards for a familiar subject - but a maiden speech in Parliament is one of those you’re going to want in front of you written out in full!
As somebody who regularly gives speeches to large meetings I've learned it is best to write bullet points down (and key gags) down rather than the whole speech.
I once used a teleprompter and it was a bigger disaster than the Liz Truss premiership, I kept on looking at that and completely losing my focus.
Had I become an MP my first speech to Parliament would have begun like this
'Hello, my name is Mr Eagles, and I'm an alcoholic, oh wait, wrong speech.'
Yes, with a couple of key points which act as waypoints within the speech.
Same when I am presenting sales stuff to clients. Slides are few in number and literally there as visual aides. And often not used at all much to the annoyance of colleagues who think 704 slides are best.
The most tedious presentations are those where the presenter reads the slides verbatim.
Generally the fewer the words on the slide the better. I had a lecturer in my UG days who had a roll of handwritten OHP acetate which he read off word for word and scrolled ever upwards. (Pre powerpoint, obs). It was terrible.
We had a biology teacher who was even worse. He read word for word and had us write it all down verbatim. Only O Level I failed.
We had a physics teacher like that. It was extremely boring but weirdly, it worked for me - through writing it down, the words passed from his mouth to my memory without at any point lodging in my conscious brain.
Yes, same. Chemistry in my case. An ultra trad teacher who dictated copious notes and told us to learn them. I did, and cruised to a top grade. We didn't get percentages, just the letter, but it would have been my highest, I think.
I think this is interesting. Current ‘best’ practice for us involves using PowerPoint so the darlings don’t need to write anything down. And in advance too, please. And lectures being recorded.
And I still think having to listen and make notes as you go was best.
Yes, I agree. I found if I didn't HAVE to take notes, my attention drifted and nothing went in. If I did, I somehow managed to gain all the knowledge effortlessly, apart from a slightly tired writing hand.
Comparing Communism to Fascism as ideologies is not quite the same as whether somebody identifying as a Communist is likely to be as unsavoury and dangerous a person as somebody identifying as a Fascist. You can make a strong case for the ideologies being equally antithetical to human freedom and happiness but faced with two lifts, one occupied by a bloke wearing a swastika and the other by one sporting a hammer and sickle, ok you'd take the stairs, but if you couldn't, if you had to get in one of these lifts, you'd surely join the commie. Anybody says otherwise I'm not believing them.
That’s cultural conditioning, though. Most of us of a certain age grew up on films depicting the evil Germans at war and with the holocaust front and centre as exhibit A of their evil. The gulag archipelago wasn’t even widely known in the west until our adulthood, and how many top billing films are there about it?
There certainly is some of that. But it's also the point about fascism having violence and hatred in its dna whereas communism to the naive or unwary can be an idealistic set of ideas centred on equality and the emancipation of the poor. The only ideal in fascism is the supremacy of a race or people or nation. And 'strongman' is a feature not a bug, ie it celebrates in concept authoritarian rule. So I'm going to cut less slack to somebody signing up for that compared to somebody saying they believe in communism. Not much, don't get me wrong, but to my mind there is a clear difference when boiled down to the individual believer in this way.
There’s also the motivations of the mass movements that both ideologies required. It’s understandable, rational and even admirable that a barely emancipated Russian peasant who can hardly feed his children would want a fairer redistribution of wealth, even if the ultimate consequences were terrible. You can fathom the motives of a comparatively privileged German bouncing off defeat in one imperial war wanting to make Germany great again by stealing from and destroying its own minorities and subjugating other nations, but it’s not close to admirable even if the end result was similarly awful for them.
The judges decision looks strange and will just open up more appeals . The Eritrean man admitted earlier he was not the subject of exploitation and was paid for his work in Libya . That should have been the end of it .
It's about time we had an MRP to see how things are going in the constituencies. Standard opinion polls only tell us so much.
Likely we will get MiC or YG updates or both during ir at the end of conference season. JLP might get round to doing a Polaris its been nearly 6 months
I rocked up to the last seat selection hustings I went to completely without notes. Knew my opening and closing comments verbatim and my key points. Completely flummoxed one of the other candidates who had reams of notes and even then kept forgetting her point.
It's much better if you can. I gave my maiden speech in Parliament entirely from notes, as I was nervous. It was a bit rubbish, whereas later speeches without notes were better (though I'll never sway the millions).
I’ve taught myself to play an extrovert and to be able to speak in public over the years, with bullet points and cue cards for a familiar subject - but a maiden speech in Parliament is one of those you’re going to want in front of you written out in full!
As somebody who regularly gives speeches to large meetings I've learned it is best to write bullet points down (and key gags) down rather than the whole speech.
I once used a teleprompter and it was a bigger disaster than the Liz Truss premiership, I kept on looking at that and completely losing my focus.
Had I become an MP my first speech to Parliament would have begun like this
'Hello, my name is Mr Eagles, and I'm an alcoholic, oh wait, wrong speech.'
Yes, with a couple of key points which act as waypoints within the speech.
Same when I am presenting sales stuff to clients. Slides are few in number and literally there as visual aides. And often not used at all much to the annoyance of colleagues who think 704 slides are best.
The most tedious presentations are those where the presenter reads the slides verbatim.
Generally the fewer the words on the slide the better. I had a lecturer in my UG days who had a roll of handwritten OHP acetate which he read off word for word and scrolled ever upwards. (Pre powerpoint, obs). It was terrible.
We had a biology teacher who was even worse. He read word for word and had us write it all down verbatim. Only O Level I failed.
We had a physics teacher like that. It was extremely boring but weirdly, it worked for me - through writing it down, the words passed from his mouth to my memory without at any point lodging in my conscious brain.
Yes, same. Chemistry in my case. An ultra trad teacher who dictated copious notes and told us to learn them. I did, and cruised to a top grade. We didn't get percentages, just the letter, but it would have been my highest, I think.
One under recognised point of school is to allow people to thrive on boredom. A lot of work is boring grind, and building ability to cope with that is a key life skill. If students are required to be constantly stimulated by noise, sound and movement, then it's no wonder that they struggle to knuckle down at work. We have trained them into ADHD, even before we gave them smartphones and Social Media.
Pretty much everything with doing requires effort, concentration and persistence. Students should be taught this, by means of dull teaching.
I almost flagged this. I mean, it's probably true but my whole heart wants it not to be.
Anyone who has singled turnip seedlings on a farm all day knows it's true. I've done it for a living - very fortunately only as a student in vacation. The worst job I ever did, and I did some pretty heavy and mucky stuff.
One summer vac, I cleaned out between the rails at Temple Meads railway station. That was mucky stuff.
Comparing Communism to Fascism as ideologies is not quite the same as whether somebody identifying as a Communist is likely to be as unsavoury and dangerous a person as somebody identifying as a Fascist. You can make a strong case for the ideologies being equally antithetical to human freedom and happiness but faced with two lifts, one occupied by a bloke wearing a swastika and the other by one sporting a hammer and sickle, ok you'd take the stairs, but if you couldn't, if you had to get in one of these lifts, you'd surely join the commie. Anybody says otherwise I'm not believing them.
Are you postulating an actual hammer and an actual sickle? Because, if so, I prefer the lift with the unarmed guy.
Comparing Nazism and Communism as ideologies is perhaps a category error, because they are not strictly comparable.
Communism is a universalist, evangelical religion like Christianity or Islam. The upside of that is inclusivity: anyone can belong if they convert to the faith. The downside is violence: if you don’t convert, you are fair game for destruction.
Ethno-fascism is an identity based religion like Hinduism or some of the Middle Eastern sects like the Druze. There is an in group and an out group. The upside could be that they leave you alone if you leave them alone (though the Nazis clearly didn’t do that). The downside is that if you’re not in the in group you’re sub-human and therefore fair game for destruction.
I prefer centrist dada-ism myself.
And one is a perversion of political economy, whereas one is a perversion of science.
What are you driving at here, Lucky?
I wondered the same, but then assumed Communism is the perversion of economics and Fascism is a perversion of science. Am I correct @Luckyguy1983 ?
Yes.
How is fascism a perversion of science? I sense I'm going to like the answer but what is it?
I rocked up to the last seat selection hustings I went to completely without notes. Knew my opening and closing comments verbatim and my key points. Completely flummoxed one of the other candidates who had reams of notes and even then kept forgetting her point.
It's much better if you can. I gave my maiden speech in Parliament entirely from notes, as I was nervous. It was a bit rubbish, whereas later speeches without notes were better (though I'll never sway the millions).
I’ve taught myself to play an extrovert and to be able to speak in public over the years, with bullet points and cue cards for a familiar subject - but a maiden speech in Parliament is one of those you’re going to want in front of you written out in full!
As somebody who regularly gives speeches to large meetings I've learned it is best to write bullet points down (and key gags) down rather than the whole speech.
I once used a teleprompter and it was a bigger disaster than the Liz Truss premiership, I kept on looking at that and completely losing my focus.
Had I become an MP my first speech to Parliament would have begun like this
'Hello, my name is Mr Eagles, and I'm an alcoholic, oh wait, wrong speech.'
Yes, with a couple of key points which act as waypoints within the speech.
Same when I am presenting sales stuff to clients. Slides are few in number and literally there as visual aides. And often not used at all much to the annoyance of colleagues who think 704 slides are best.
The most tedious presentations are those where the presenter reads the slides verbatim.
Generally the fewer the words on the slide the better. I had a lecturer in my UG days who had a roll of handwritten OHP acetate which he read off word for word and scrolled ever upwards. (Pre powerpoint, obs). It was terrible.
We had a biology teacher who was even worse. He read word for word and had us write it all down verbatim. Only O Level I failed.
We had a physics teacher like that. It was extremely boring but weirdly, it worked for me - through writing it down, the words passed from his mouth to my memory without at any point lodging in my conscious brain.
Yes, same. Chemistry in my case. An ultra trad teacher who dictated copious notes and told us to learn them. I did, and cruised to a top grade. We didn't get percentages, just the letter, but it would have been my highest, I think.
One under recognised point of school is to allow people to thrive on boredom. A lot of work is boring grind, and building ability to cope with that is a key life skill. If students are required to be constantly stimulated by noise, sound and movement, then it's no wonder that they struggle to knuckle down at work. We have trained them into ADHD, even before we gave them smartphones and Social Media.
Pretty much everything with doing requires effort, concentration and persistence. Students should be taught this, by means of dull teaching.
I almost flagged this. I mean, it's probably true but my whole heart wants it not to be.
Anyone who has singled turnip seedlings on a farm all day knows it's true. I've done it for a living - very fortunately only as a student in vacation. The worst job I ever did, and I did some pretty heavy and mucky stuff.
One summer vac, I cleaned out between the rails at Temple Meads railway station. That was mucky stuff.
The judges decision looks strange and will just open up more appeals . The Eritrean man admitted earlier he was not the subject of exploitation and was paid for his work in Libya . That should have been the end of it .
Comparing Nazism and Communism as ideologies is perhaps a category error, because they are not strictly comparable.
Communism is a universalist, evangelical religion like Christianity or Islam. The upside of that is inclusivity: anyone can belong if they convert to the faith. The downside is violence: if you don’t convert, you are fair game for destruction.
Ethno-fascism is an identity based religion like Hinduism or some of the Middle Eastern sects like the Druze. There is an in group and an out group. The upside could be that they leave you alone if you leave them alone (though the Nazis clearly didn’t do that). The downside is that if you’re not in the in group you’re sub-human and therefore fair game for destruction.
I prefer centrist dada-ism myself.
And one is a perversion of political economy, whereas one is a perversion of science.
What are you driving at here, Lucky?
“I think you're some kind of deviated prevert. I think …. found out about your preversion, and that you were organizing some kind of mutiny of preverts.”
I dont think that we have true fascists in the UK. There are those with some sympathy for it, but not the full Monty.
Real fascism requires paramilitary uniforms, a cult of leadership, milotarism and advocating political violence against internal and external enemies. A bunch of coked up fifty-somethings chucking beer cans at the police is just robbery, not fascism.
And let's not forget that Fascism is only now considered 'right wing' because of Soviet post-war revisionism.
Contemporaneous accounts of the 1930s and 1940s used a lot of terms to describe the Hitler and Mussolini regimes. 'Totalitarian', 'Despotic', plain old 'Evil'. You might've got a 'hardline Nationalist' in there when referring to Moseley.
But these movements weren't really presented as 'right wing' until after WWII, when the 'victorious' Soviets wanted to differentiate their own brand of wrongheaded Authoritarianism and state-sanctioned death cultury, as if they were polar opposites, when of course they weren't.
Horseshoe theory - which it didn't take long for most to twig - gets it semi-correct, but still allows the Octogenarian Strawman to remain standing.
'Far Right' *should* mean extreme Libertarianism/anarcho-capitalism. If being on the right is being pro-individual, small state, limited government then being far-right should mean being strongly in favour of such things.
I'd like to see a movement to Reclaim the term.
That doesn’t really make sense, though. That the Conservatives are a right of centre party isn’t in dispute. That they’ve become more right wing since they abandoned their pragmatism for Brexit, under Johnson and Truss, and having toyed with Patel, Braverman and Jenrick also isn’t in dispute. That Reform represents a further step to the right is hard to contest, that Trump is a step further appears clear, and if you project forward it isn’t that long before you arrive at a Mussolini type dictatorship.
The judges decision looks strange and will just open up more appeals . The Eritrean man admitted earlier he was not the subject of exploitation and was paid for his work in Libya . That should have been the end of it .
Nobody is shocked by these decisions anymore.
Everyone knows I’m very liberal but the decision looks ridiculous. The judge has now given a green light to others to do the same .
I rocked up to the last seat selection hustings I went to completely without notes. Knew my opening and closing comments verbatim and my key points. Completely flummoxed one of the other candidates who had reams of notes and even then kept forgetting her point.
It's much better if you can. I gave my maiden speech in Parliament entirely from notes, as I was nervous. It was a bit rubbish, whereas later speeches without notes were better (though I'll never sway the millions).
I’ve taught myself to play an extrovert and to be able to speak in public over the years, with bullet points and cue cards for a familiar subject - but a maiden speech in Parliament is one of those you’re going to want in front of you written out in full!
As somebody who regularly gives speeches to large meetings I've learned it is best to write bullet points down (and key gags) down rather than the whole speech.
I once used a teleprompter and it was a bigger disaster than the Liz Truss premiership, I kept on looking at that and completely losing my focus.
Had I become an MP my first speech to Parliament would have begun like this
'Hello, my name is Mr Eagles, and I'm an alcoholic, oh wait, wrong speech.'
Yes, with a couple of key points which act as waypoints within the speech.
Same when I am presenting sales stuff to clients. Slides are few in number and literally there as visual aides. And often not used at all much to the annoyance of colleagues who think 704 slides are best.
The most tedious presentations are those where the presenter reads the slides verbatim.
Generally the fewer the words on the slide the better. I had a lecturer in my UG days who had a roll of handwritten OHP acetate which he read off word for word and scrolled ever upwards. (Pre powerpoint, obs). It was terrible.
We had a biology teacher who was even worse. He read word for word and had us write it all down verbatim. Only O Level I failed.
We had a physics teacher like that. It was extremely boring but weirdly, it worked for me - through writing it down, the words passed from his mouth to my memory without at any point lodging in my conscious brain.
Yes, same. Chemistry in my case. An ultra trad teacher who dictated copious notes and told us to learn them. I did, and cruised to a top grade. We didn't get percentages, just the letter, but it would have been my highest, I think.
One under recognised point of school is to allow people to thrive on boredom. A lot of work is boring grind, and building ability to cope with that is a key life skill. If students are required to be constantly stimulated by noise, sound and movement, then it's no wonder that they struggle to knuckle down at work. We have trained them into ADHD, even before we gave them smartphones and Social Media.
Pretty much everything with doing requires effort, concentration and persistence. Students should be taught this, by means of dull teaching.
I almost flagged this. I mean, it's probably true but my whole heart wants it not to be.
Anyone who has singled turnip seedlings on a farm all day knows it's true. I've done it for a living - very fortunately only as a student in vacation. The worst job I ever did, and I did some pretty heavy and mucky stuff.
One summer vac, I cleaned out between the rails at Temple Meads railway station. That was mucky stuff.
Did you curse those that ignored the signs about not flushing while in the station?
A flattering portrayal of Nick Lowles, the chief dude at Hope Not Hate, focused on the risk of political violence from the extreme right
It casually mentions half way through that he was a student Trotskyist, like it’s no problem, because of course political violence of the extreme LEFT is just fine
The double standards are so howlingly blatant I can only presume the Guardian doesn’t even see them
Is that so ? It acknowledges it, but does it condone ? .. “When I first got involved in anti-fascism – this was late 80s – it was all about the street. I’m not saying it was right, but that’s how it was. You didn’t have cameras.” So, wait, he doesn’t mean handing out leaflets in the street? “No, you would have groups of Nazis and groups of anti-fascists, and they would battle it out, down sidestreets, and sometimes it got quite violent. I mean, look at me, I’m not built for that. I never got involved in that. But that was the world it was.”..
Oh give over. What if someone said “yes I was in the national front as a teenager” - would she simply have passed by that without mention and interrogation? Of course not. And the NF didn’t want to overthrow liberal capitalism - unlike the Trots
It’s fuxking ludicrous. This guy is held up an an exemplary opponent of right wing political violence yet it turns out he was a revolutionary activist in his youth, desiring to end parliamentary democracy, and she doesn’t even note that this is somewhat jarring
I don't get why we give communism such a free pass. Most of the most horrible regimes of modern history have been communist. Saying "I'm a communist" is tantamount to saying "I favour overthrowing liberal democracy and replacing it with a totalitarian system (which whenever it has been tried has led to tyranny)". Yet apparently we are unconcerned about having people who are members of the communist party as advisors to government (I'm thinking in particular of Susan Michie, during Covid). I'm content to allow people to take their own view on what society should be, but surely being a member of the communist party should ring some alarm bells? I'm pretty sure being a member of the National Front or whatever its equivalent is this year would raise the odd eyebrow.
The right-wing press and right-wong commentators are always going on about people with connections to the Communist party (or -ies). Where does this "apparently we are unconcerned" come from?
Easy. If you went to most parties and said: "I am a Nazi" or "I am a fascist", you will get thrown out, or worse. If you say "I am a Communist", you might get a roll of the eyes, but little else.
Communism is *much* more acceptable, despite its blood-drenched history.
They were both terrible ideologies.
They were, and indeed still are, both terrible ideologies.
Fascism says it wants to spill blood. Communism says it doesn't want to spill blood... but has often ended up there. That's the difference. I share your criticisms of communism and I think those who support communism should be strongly pressed on what they think was happening in the Soviet Union, Cambodia, Albania etc., but they're not actively calling for violence in quite the same way as fascists.
Tht is not true. Communism is predicated on the idea that to take power it will have to be seized by force from the elites, using extreme violence. The difference between Lenin and Martov* was merely that Lenin short-circuited things.
Yes. It's surprising that Ref'/Con are so close to a majority given they're only projected to get 40% of the vote between them and this is supposedly a very proportional voting system.
A flattering portrayal of Nick Lowles, the chief dude at Hope Not Hate, focused on the risk of political violence from the extreme right
It casually mentions half way through that he was a student Trotskyist, like it’s no problem, because of course political violence of the extreme LEFT is just fine
The double standards are so howlingly blatant I can only presume the Guardian doesn’t even see them
Peter Hitchens was a student Trotskyist, too. And many other 1980's conservatives.
Of course the millions who died under Stalin used their last breath to mutter "At least I'm dying for a noble cause - how bad would it be to be killed by a Nazi?"
A lot of them - e.g, Bukharin - did.
Why? Because they thought that repudiating him would damage Communism.
That's actually the scariest thing about the whole shebang - the religious fervour it inspired.
I rocked up to the last seat selection hustings I went to completely without notes. Knew my opening and closing comments verbatim and my key points. Completely flummoxed one of the other candidates who had reams of notes and even then kept forgetting her point.
It's much better if you can. I gave my maiden speech in Parliament entirely from notes, as I was nervous. It was a bit rubbish, whereas later speeches without notes were better (though I'll never sway the millions).
I’ve taught myself to play an extrovert and to be able to speak in public over the years, with bullet points and cue cards for a familiar subject - but a maiden speech in Parliament is one of those you’re going to want in front of you written out in full!
As somebody who regularly gives speeches to large meetings I've learned it is best to write bullet points down (and key gags) down rather than the whole speech.
I once used a teleprompter and it was a bigger disaster than the Liz Truss premiership, I kept on looking at that and completely losing my focus.
Had I become an MP my first speech to Parliament would have begun like this
'Hello, my name is Mr Eagles, and I'm an alcoholic, oh wait, wrong speech.'
Yes, with a couple of key points which act as waypoints within the speech.
Same when I am presenting sales stuff to clients. Slides are few in number and literally there as visual aides. And often not used at all much to the annoyance of colleagues who think 704 slides are best.
The most tedious presentations are those where the presenter reads the slides verbatim.
Generally the fewer the words on the slide the better. I had a lecturer in my UG days who had a roll of handwritten OHP acetate which he read off word for word and scrolled ever upwards. (Pre powerpoint, obs). It was terrible.
We had a biology teacher who was even worse. He read word for word and had us write it all down verbatim. Only O Level I failed.
We had a physics teacher like that. It was extremely boring but weirdly, it worked for me - through writing it down, the words passed from his mouth to my memory without at any point lodging in my conscious brain.
Yes, same. Chemistry in my case. An ultra trad teacher who dictated copious notes and told us to learn them. I did, and cruised to a top grade. We didn't get percentages, just the letter, but it would have been my highest, I think.
One under recognised point of school is to allow people to thrive on boredom. A lot of work is boring grind, and building ability to cope with that is a key life skill. If students are required to be constantly stimulated by noise, sound and movement, then it's no wonder that they struggle to knuckle down at work. We have trained them into ADHD, even before we gave them smartphones and Social Media.
Pretty much everything with doing requires effort, concentration and persistence. Students should be taught this, by means of dull teaching.
I almost flagged this. I mean, it's probably true but my whole heart wants it not to be.
Anyone who has singled turnip seedlings on a farm all day knows it's true. I've done it for a living - very fortunately only as a student in vacation. The worst job I ever did, and I did some pretty heavy and mucky stuff.
One summer vac, I cleaned out between the rails at Temple Meads railway station. That was mucky stuff.
Did you curse those that ignored the signs about not flushing while in the station?
Don’t you miss the days when you could sit on the train bog and look down and see the sleepers whizzing by below?
I dont think that we have true fascists in the UK. There are those with some sympathy for it, but not the full Monty.
Real fascism requires paramilitary uniforms, a cult of leadership, milotarism and advocating political violence against internal and external enemies. A bunch of coked up fifty-somethings chucking beer cans at the police is just robbery, not fascism.
And let's not forget that Fascism is only now considered 'right wing' because of Soviet post-war revisionism.
Contemporaneous accounts of the 1930s and 1940s used a lot of terms to describe the Hitler and Mussolini regimes. 'Totalitarian', 'Despotic', plain old 'Evil'. You might've got a 'hardline Nationalist' in there when referring to Moseley.
But these movements weren't really presented as 'right wing' until after WWII, when the 'victorious' Soviets wanted to differentiate their own brand of wrongheaded Authoritarianism and state-sanctioned death cultury, as if they were polar opposites, when of course they weren't.
Horseshoe theory - which it didn't take long for most to twig - gets it semi-correct, but still allows the Octogenarian Strawman to remain standing.
'Far Right' *should* mean extreme Libertarianism/anarcho-capitalism. If being on the right is being pro-individual, small state, limited government then being far-right should mean being strongly in favour of such things.
I'd like to see a movement to Reclaim the term.
That doesn’t really make sense, though. That the Conservatives are a right of centre party isn’t in dispute. That they’ve become more right wing since they abandoned their pragmatism for Brexit, under Johnson and Truss, and having toyed with Patel, Braverman and Jenrick also isn’t in dispute. That Reform represents a further step to the right is hard to contest, that Trump is a step further appears clear, and if you project forward it isn’t that long before you arrive at a Mussolini type dictatorship.
It doesn't make sense because it's radical right bollocks.
The judges decision looks strange and will just open up more appeals . The Eritrean man admitted earlier he was not the subject of exploitation and was paid for his work in Libya . That should have been the end of it .
Nobody is shocked by these decisions anymore.
Everyone knows I’m very liberal but the decision looks ridiculous. The judge has now given a green light to others to do the same .
The potenitally saving grace is that it's a temporary thing for this individual, not a failure of the entire concept.
Mr Justice Sheldon said the man's lawyers must do all that is possible to make further representations within 14 days, so that his case can be finalised at a future hearing.
Yes. It's surprising that Ref'/Con are so close to a majority given they're only projected to get 40% of the vote between them and this is supposedly a very proportional voting system.
46% of the seats in 40% of the vote but LD/Green because they are close to missing out everywhere on small share are at 3% seats in 12% vote. Its fairly proportional, parties getting 4 to 7% throw it slightly out depending on their geographic spread
Comparing Nazism and Communism as ideologies is perhaps a category error, because they are not strictly comparable.
Communism is a universalist, evangelical religion like Christianity or Islam. The upside of that is inclusivity: anyone can belong if they convert to the faith. The downside is violence: if you don’t convert, you are fair game for destruction.
Ethno-fascism is an identity based religion like Hinduism or some of the Middle Eastern sects like the Druze. There is an in group and an out group. The upside could be that they leave you alone if you leave them alone (though the Nazis clearly didn’t do that). The downside is that if you’re not in the in group you’re sub-human and therefore fair game for destruction.
I prefer centrist dada-ism myself.
And one is a perversion of political economy, whereas one is a perversion of science.
What are you driving at here, Lucky?
I wondered the same, but then assumed Communism is the perversion of economics and Fascism is a perversion of science. Am I correct @Luckyguy1983 ?
Yes.
How is fascism a perversion of science? I sense I'm going to like the answer but what is it?
Comparing Nazism and Communism as ideologies is perhaps a category error, because they are not strictly comparable.
Communism is a universalist, evangelical religion like Christianity or Islam. The upside of that is inclusivity: anyone can belong if they convert to the faith. The downside is violence: if you don’t convert, you are fair game for destruction.
Ethno-fascism is an identity based religion like Hinduism or some of the Middle Eastern sects like the Druze. There is an in group and an out group. The upside could be that they leave you alone if you leave them alone (though the Nazis clearly didn’t do that). The downside is that if you’re not in the in group you’re sub-human and therefore fair game for destruction.
I prefer centrist dada-ism myself.
And one is a perversion of political economy, whereas one is a perversion of science.
What are you driving at here, Lucky?
I wondered the same, but then assumed Communism is the perversion of economics and Fascism is a perversion of science. Am I correct @Luckyguy1983 ?
Yes.
How is fascism a perversion of science? I sense I'm going to like the answer but what is it?
Fascism isn't really (to my knowledge), but Tim was talking about Nazism and that of course definitely is, with its deeply damaging and wrong-headed take on Darwin. The theory of 'master' and 'slave' races, or even stupider, of 'good' and 'bad' races, badly misreads Darwin because it suggests that evolution can 'get it wrong'. It's also against the theory of creation, because it suggests that God can get it wrong.
1.5% approx swing Lab to Con delivers a possible RefCon govt
I would suggest that Yougov is probably overestimating Labour and underestimating the Tories due to their new past vote weighting, so we could be in that situation already.
I think that communism and fascism are both at the same extreme end of the authoritarian/liberal axis, but opposite ends of the left/right economic axis.
On the authoritarian axis in the UK, I place the parties as Authoritarian Reform, Green, Labour, Conservative, Lib Dem. Liberal
On the economic axis, I place the parties as Right Conservative, Labour, Lib Dem, Reform, Green Left
The latest one trillion in and none out flight has been grounded. Again
What a pitiful circus
Legally, they're doing it be the book.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
So the man is from Eritrea which is undoubtedly a shithole. He made it to Libya where he worked and got paid for it and appears to have no complaints. He made it to France but didn't like the fact that refugees there seem to be sleeping rough so, with considerable financial help from his family he got a boat to the UK. Now, it is being alleged that he was being trafficked. Paying 1400 euros for a boar ride is a new definition of trafficked to me. At what point is he supposed to have been trafficked?
This is so ridiculous I really cannot think what the Judge is thinking. If he wanted to pursue this nonsense he could do so from France. He certainly does not need to be here.
The latest one trillion in and none out flight has been grounded. Again
What a pitiful circus
Legally, they're doing it be the book.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
So the man is from Eritrea which is undoubtedly a shithole. He made it to Libya where he worked and got paid for it and appears to have no complaints. He made it to France but didn't like the fact that refugees there seem to be sleeping rough so, with considerable financial help from his family he got a boat to the UK. Now, it is being alleged that he was being trafficked. Paying 1400 euros for a boar ride is a new definition of trafficked to me. At what point is he supposed to have been trafficked?
This is so ridiculous I really cannot think what the Judge is thinking. If he wanted to pursue this nonsense he could do so from France. He certainly does not need to be here.
Sending the judge to France instead is certainly thinking out of the box.
Comparing Nazism and Communism as ideologies is perhaps a category error, because they are not strictly comparable.
Communism is a universalist, evangelical religion like Christianity or Islam. The upside of that is inclusivity: anyone can belong if they convert to the faith. The downside is violence: if you don’t convert, you are fair game for destruction.
Ethno-fascism is an identity based religion like Hinduism or some of the Middle Eastern sects like the Druze. There is an in group and an out group. The upside could be that they leave you alone if you leave them alone (though the Nazis clearly didn’t do that). The downside is that if you’re not in the in group you’re sub-human and therefore fair game for destruction.
I prefer centrist dada-ism myself.
And one is a perversion of political economy, whereas one is a perversion of science.
What are you driving at here, Lucky?
I wondered the same, but then assumed Communism is the perversion of economics and Fascism is a perversion of science. Am I correct @Luckyguy1983 ?
Yes.
How is fascism a perversion of science? I sense I'm going to like the answer but what is it?
Anything based on races being superior lacks rigour.
The judges decision looks strange and will just open up more appeals . The Eritrean man admitted earlier he was not the subject of exploitation and was paid for his work in Libya . That should have been the end of it .
Nobody is shocked by these decisions anymore.
Everyone knows I’m very liberal but the decision looks ridiculous. The judge has now given a green light to others to do the same .
The potenitally saving grace is that it's a temporary thing for this individual, not a failure of the entire concept.
Mr Justice Sheldon said the man's lawyers must do all that is possible to make further representations within 14 days, so that his case can be finalised at a future hearing.
A flattering portrayal of Nick Lowles, the chief dude at Hope Not Hate, focused on the risk of political violence from the extreme right
It casually mentions half way through that he was a student Trotskyist, like it’s no problem, because of course political violence of the extreme LEFT is just fine
The double standards are so howlingly blatant I can only presume the Guardian doesn’t even see them
Peter Hitchens was a student Trotskyist, too. And many other 1980's conservatives.
Of course the millions who died under Stalin used their last breath to mutter "At least I'm dying for a noble cause - how bad would it be to be killed by a Nazi?"
A lot of them - e.g, Bukharin - did.
Why? Because they thought that repudiating him would damage Communism.
That's actually the scariest thing about the whole shebang - the religious fervour it inspired.
Well that and an (often vain) attempt to save family members.
1.5% approx swing Lab to Con delivers a possible RefCon govt
I would suggest that Yougov is probably overestimating Labour and underestimating the Tories due to their new past vote weighting, so we could be in that situation already.
Lab are certainly falling close to Con generally who are falling close to LD who are close to Green. Multiple crossovers possible. Lab fourth behind Tories in Wales would be a game over moment Lab fourth in Wales, fifth in Scotland and not first on popular vote in London in May is the Lotto jackpot result
The latest one trillion in and none out flight has been grounded. Again
What a pitiful circus
Legally, they're doing it be the book.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
So the man is from Eritrea which is undoubtedly a shithole. He made it to Libya where he worked and got paid for it and appears to have no complaints. He made it to France but didn't like the fact that refugees there seem to be sleeping rough so, with considerable financial help from his family he got a boat to the UK. Now, it is being alleged that he was being trafficked. Paying 1400 euros for a boar ride is a new definition of trafficked to me. At what point is he supposed to have been trafficked?
This is so ridiculous I really cannot think what the Judge is thinking. If he wanted to pursue this nonsense he could do so from France. He certainly does not need to be here.
I assume it’s a typo but I love the idea of 1400 Euros worth of riding on a boar…
The judges decision looks strange and will just open up more appeals . The Eritrean man admitted earlier he was not the subject of exploitation and was paid for his work in Libya . That should have been the end of it .
Nobody is shocked by these decisions anymore.
Everyone knows I’m very liberal but the decision looks ridiculous. The judge has now given a green light to others to do the same .
The latest one trillion in and none out flight has been grounded. Again
What a pitiful circus
Legally, they're doing it be the book.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
So the man is from Eritrea which is undoubtedly a shithole. He made it to Libya where he worked and got paid for it and appears to have no complaints. He made it to France but didn't like the fact that refugees there seem to be sleeping rough so, with considerable financial help from his family he got a boat to the UK. Now, it is being alleged that he was being trafficked. Paying 1400 euros for a boar ride is a new definition of trafficked to me. At what point is he supposed to have been trafficked?
This is so ridiculous I really cannot think what the Judge is thinking. If he wanted to pursue this nonsense he could do so from France. He certainly does not need to be here.
Someone being brought to the UK and forced into unpaid work, their passport stolen, their family threatened, is trafficked.
Someone borrowing £10k to be smuggled in, their passport stolen, their family threatened is half-trafficked.
Someone paying 1400 euro for a boat ride is not being trafficked.
Is this T May's botched obsession with Modern Slavery again?
The latest one trillion in and none out flight has been grounded. Again
What a pitiful circus
Legally, they're doing it be the book.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
So the man is from Eritrea which is undoubtedly a shithole. He made it to Libya where he worked and got paid for it and appears to have no complaints. He made it to France but didn't like the fact that refugees there seem to be sleeping rough so, with considerable financial help from his family he got a boat to the UK. Now, it is being alleged that he was being trafficked. Paying 1400 euros for a boar ride is a new definition of trafficked to me. At what point is he supposed to have been trafficked?
This is so ridiculous I really cannot think what the Judge is thinking. If he wanted to pursue this nonsense he could do so from France. He certainly does not need to be here.
Sending the judge to France instead is certainly thinking out of the box.
He probably has a house there, despite it being a dangerous hellhole to which people should not be returned.
The latest one trillion in and none out flight has been grounded. Again
What a pitiful circus
Legally, they're doing it be the book.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
So the man is from Eritrea which is undoubtedly a shithole. He made it to Libya where he worked and got paid for it and appears to have no complaints. He made it to France but didn't like the fact that refugees there seem to be sleeping rough so, with considerable financial help from his family he got a boat to the UK. Now, it is being alleged that he was being trafficked. Paying 1400 euros for a boar ride is a new definition of trafficked to me. At what point is he supposed to have been trafficked?
This is so ridiculous I really cannot think what the Judge is thinking. If he wanted to pursue this nonsense he could do so from France. He certainly does not need to be here.
I assume it’s a typo but I love the idea of 1400 Euros worth of riding on a boar…
I don’t believe that it’s good for any party to be top dog for so long as Labour have been in Wales. I think the same thing about those councils that have been firmly Labour/Tory for so long. The complacency that comes from never losing power doesn’t breed good government, IMHO.
The latest one trillion in and none out flight has been grounded. Again
What a pitiful circus
Legally, they're doing it be the book.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
So the man is from Eritrea which is undoubtedly a shithole. He made it to Libya where he worked and got paid for it and appears to have no complaints. He made it to France but didn't like the fact that refugees there seem to be sleeping rough so, with considerable financial help from his family he got a boat to the UK. Now, it is being alleged that he was being trafficked. Paying 1400 euros for a boar ride is a new definition of trafficked to me. At what point is he supposed to have been trafficked?
This is so ridiculous I really cannot think what the Judge is thinking. If he wanted to pursue this nonsense he could do so from France. He certainly does not need to be here.
Of course you are right but we need to have a reasonable degree of respect for due process and give people the chance to make their case even if somewhat flimsy. Otherwise we will end up like the USA deporting innocent people in shackles. There has to be a way that our grear country can behave in a decent way without being a soft touch. I sincerely hope and believe that.
"The 71-year-old audience member who was arrested at Charlie Kirk’s UVU event says he told cops he shot Kirk to distract police so the real shooter could escape.
“I shot him, now shoot me,” George Zinn allegedly said immediately after Kirk was shot.
While speaking to investigators, Zinn said he was trying to “draw attention from the real shooter.”
Zinn was charged with obstruction of justice, a second-degree felony."
Or in Donald Trump's case, the key qualification for a Cabinet post.
A flattering portrayal of Nick Lowles, the chief dude at Hope Not Hate, focused on the risk of political violence from the extreme right
It casually mentions half way through that he was a student Trotskyist, like it’s no problem, because of course political violence of the extreme LEFT is just fine
The double standards are so howlingly blatant I can only presume the Guardian doesn’t even see them
Peter Hitchens was a student Trotskyist, too. And many other 1980's conservatives.
Of course the millions who died under Stalin used their last breath to mutter "At least I'm dying for a noble cause - how bad would it be to be killed by a Nazi?"
A lot of them - e.g, Bukharin - did.
Why? Because they thought that repudiating him would damage Communism.
That's actually the scariest thing about the whole shebang - the religious fervour it inspired.
The judicial system is broken when it comes to asylum and immigration, because politicians have put in place competing laws. You are inviting judges to opine on time-sensitive matters that are contrary to a whole acquis of human rights/ECHR legal opinion, it is hardly surprising that we get decisions like this.
MPs need to grow a spine and fix the contradictions that they helped create. The only way of doing so it asserting sovereignty and overriding the courts. I get that Parliament is queasy about the precedent this sets, but they’ve helped create the problem and they’re the only ones with the power to fix it.
The latest one trillion in and none out flight has been grounded. Again
What a pitiful circus
Legally, they're doing it be the book.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
So the man is from Eritrea which is undoubtedly a shithole. He made it to Libya where he worked and got paid for it and appears to have no complaints. He made it to France but didn't like the fact that refugees there seem to be sleeping rough so, with considerable financial help from his family he got a boat to the UK. Now, it is being alleged that he was being trafficked. Paying 1400 euros for a boar ride is a new definition of trafficked to me. At what point is he supposed to have been trafficked?
This is so ridiculous I really cannot think what the Judge is thinking. If he wanted to pursue this nonsense he could do so from France. He certainly does not need to be here.
Sending the judge to France instead is certainly thinking out of the box.
He probably has a house there, despite it being a dangerous hellhole to which people should not be returned.
The latest one trillion in and none out flight has been grounded. Again
What a pitiful circus
Legally, they're doing it be the book.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
So the man is from Eritrea which is undoubtedly a shithole. He made it to Libya where he worked and got paid for it and appears to have no complaints. He made it to France but didn't like the fact that refugees there seem to be sleeping rough so, with considerable financial help from his family he got a boat to the UK. Now, it is being alleged that he was being trafficked. Paying 1400 euros for a boar ride is a new definition of trafficked to me. At what point is he supposed to have been trafficked?
This is so ridiculous I really cannot think what the Judge is thinking. If he wanted to pursue this nonsense he could do so from France. He certainly does not need to be here.
I assume it’s a typo but I love the idea of 1400 Euros worth of riding on a boar…
I think that communism and fascism are both at the same extreme end of the authoritarian/liberal axis, but opposite ends of the left/right economic axis.
On the authoritarian axis in the UK, I place the parties as Authoritarian Reform, Green, Labour, Conservative, Lib Dem. Liberal
On the economic axis, I place the parties as Right Conservative, Labour, Lib Dem, Reform, Green Left
Perhaps there is also a cultural axis?
Labour are left economically given all their tax rises and bungs to GPs and train drivers, the Greens are liberal socially on the whole but statist nationally, probably most socially liberal after the LDs. Reform are also certainly economically right of Labour and the LDs, maybe even many Tories too (albeit not Kemi)
“ Sir Keir Starmer has said there would be “no flights, no Rwanda scheme” if Labour wins power.”
Well he wasn’t lying so that’s good.
But the thing is, he is doing all he can.
Now that might not be very much, and that not very much that he is doing might not be very much use to anyone, but it's probably better than what any of the other choices we have as PM would be doing
“ Sir Keir Starmer has said there would be “no flights, no Rwanda scheme” if Labour wins power.”
Well he wasn’t lying so that’s good.
But the thing is, he is doing all he can.
Now that might not be very much, and that not very much that he is doing might not be very much use to anyone, but it's probably better than what any of the other choices we have as PM would be doing
I don’t believe that it’s good for any party to be top dog for so long as Labour have been in Wales. I think the same thing about those councils that have been firmly Labour/Tory for so long. The complacency that comes from never losing power doesn’t breed good government, IMHO.
Very close to Labours worst ever national level poll. They had 12% constituency and 11% list for Holyrood at their nadir in 2019
The latest one trillion in and none out flight has been grounded. Again
What a pitiful circus
Legally, they're doing it be the book.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
So the man is from Eritrea which is undoubtedly a shithole. He made it to Libya where he worked and got paid for it and appears to have no complaints. He made it to France but didn't like the fact that refugees there seem to be sleeping rough so, with considerable financial help from his family he got a boat to the UK. Now, it is being alleged that he was being trafficked. Paying 1400 euros for a boar ride is a new definition of trafficked to me. At what point is he supposed to have been trafficked?
This is so ridiculous I really cannot think what the Judge is thinking. If he wanted to pursue this nonsense he could do so from France. He certainly does not need to be here.
Of course you are right but we need to have a reasonable degree of respect for due process and give people the chance to make their case even if somewhat flimsy. Otherwise we will end up like the USA deporting innocent people in shackles. There has to be a way that our grear country can behave in a decent way without being a soft touch. I sincerely hope and believe that.
I'm sorry but there is all the difference in the world between sending people to dangerous prisons in El Salvador without any process whatsoever and returning someone back to France where he was a few weeks ago. I am not saying we might never have a case that needs a closer look under this scheme but it was not this case.
This sort of madness threatens the very principles we both hold dear because the risk is that they will simply be swept away in exasperation.
Comparing Nazism and Communism as ideologies is perhaps a category error, because they are not strictly comparable.
Communism is a universalist, evangelical religion like Christianity or Islam. The upside of that is inclusivity: anyone can belong if they convert to the faith. The downside is violence: if you don’t convert, you are fair game for destruction.
Ethno-fascism is an identity based religion like Hinduism or some of the Middle Eastern sects like the Druze. There is an in group and an out group. The upside could be that they leave you alone if you leave them alone (though the Nazis clearly didn’t do that). The downside is that if you’re not in the in group you’re sub-human and therefore fair game for destruction.
I prefer centrist dada-ism myself.
And one is a perversion of political economy, whereas one is a perversion of science.
What are you driving at here, Lucky?
I wondered the same, but then assumed Communism is the perversion of economics and Fascism is a perversion of science. Am I correct @Luckyguy1983 ?
Yes.
How is fascism a perversion of science? I sense I'm going to like the answer but what is it?
Racial theory I assume.
Yes, now confirmed. Just thought I'd check, it being Lucky.
I dont think that we have true fascists in the UK. There are those with some sympathy for it, but not the full Monty.
Real fascism requires paramilitary uniforms, a cult of leadership, milotarism and advocating political violence against internal and external enemies. A bunch of coked up fifty-somethings chucking beer cans at the police is just robbery, not fascism.
And let's not forget that Fascism is only now considered 'right wing' because of Soviet post-war revisionism.
Contemporaneous accounts of the 1930s and 1940s used a lot of terms to describe the Hitler and Mussolini regimes. 'Totalitarian', 'Despotic', plain old 'Evil'. You might've got a 'hardline Nationalist' in there when referring to Moseley.
But these movements weren't really presented as 'right wing' until after WWII, when the 'victorious' Soviets wanted to differentiate their own brand of wrongheaded Authoritarianism and state-sanctioned death cultury, as if they were polar opposites, when of course they weren't.
Horseshoe theory - which it didn't take long for most to twig - gets it semi-correct, but still allows the Octogenarian Strawman to remain standing.
'Far Right' *should* mean extreme Libertarianism/anarcho-capitalism. If being on the right is being pro-individual, small state, limited government then being far-right should mean being strongly in favour of such things.
I'd like to see a movement to Reclaim the term.
That doesn’t really make sense, though. That the Conservatives are a right of centre party isn’t in dispute. That they’ve become more right wing since they abandoned their pragmatism for Brexit, under Johnson and Truss, and having toyed with Patel, Braverman and Jenrick also isn’t in dispute. That Reform represents a further step to the right is hard to contest, that Trump is a step further appears clear, and if you project forward it isn’t that long before you arrive at a Mussolini type dictatorship.
It doesn't make sense because it's radical right bollocks.
If the emotions are appropriately engaged and blind (to whatever degree trust created, it doesn't need to make sense.
We can get that from either 20C political history, or eg Jonestown - "1 2 3 Quaff" (thud).
Comparing Nazism and Communism as ideologies is perhaps a category error, because they are not strictly comparable.
Communism is a universalist, evangelical religion like Christianity or Islam. The upside of that is inclusivity: anyone can belong if they convert to the faith. The downside is violence: if you don’t convert, you are fair game for destruction.
Ethno-fascism is an identity based religion like Hinduism or some of the Middle Eastern sects like the Druze. There is an in group and an out group. The upside could be that they leave you alone if you leave them alone (though the Nazis clearly didn’t do that). The downside is that if you’re not in the in group you’re sub-human and therefore fair game for destruction.
I prefer centrist dada-ism myself.
And one is a perversion of political economy, whereas one is a perversion of science.
What are you driving at here, Lucky?
I wondered the same, but then assumed Communism is the perversion of economics and Fascism is a perversion of science. Am I correct @Luckyguy1983 ?
Yes.
How is fascism a perversion of science? I sense I'm going to like the answer but what is it?
Anything based on races being superior lacks rigour.
I would be amazed if the libdems or greens score at all. This electoral system is not conducive to proportionality. The 5th or 6th party is unlikely to get anything under the dhondt system.
I would be amazed if the libdems or greens score at all. This electoral system is not conducive to proportionality. The 5th or 6th party is unlikely to get anything under the dhondt system.
They're abolishing the D'Hondt system and going with List PR.
The judicial system is broken when it comes to asylum and immigration, because politicians have put in place competing laws. You are inviting judges to opine on time-sensitive matters that are contrary to a whole acquis of human rights/ECHR legal opinion, it is hardly surprising that we get decisions like this.
MPs need to grow a spine and fix the contradictions that they helped create. The only way of doing so it asserting sovereignty and overriding the courts. I get that Parliament is queasy about the precedent this sets, but they’ve helped create the problem and they’re the only ones with the power to fix it.
How does the court/legal system in the UK work with regards to immigration?
Do cases just get randomly assigned to a judge?
How do they decide which court (town/county) the case is heard - are there just a few courts bearing the bulk and the same few judges in areas where there is a large concentration of asylum seekers?
If there aren’t, would it be a workable/good idea to have special immigration courts specifically to deal with a set group of selected judges who are well acquainted with immigration and human rights law?
If there are already immigration specialist courts how are the judges appointed?
Romanian far-right former presidential candidate Calin Georgescu has been charged with attempting to stage a coup after the first round of the presidential election was annulled last December.
Horatiu Potra, a former French legionnaire and militia chief in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and 20 other people were also charged.
Comparing Communism to Fascism as ideologies is not quite the same as whether somebody identifying as a Communist is likely to be as unsavoury and dangerous a person as somebody identifying as a Fascist. You can make a strong case for the ideologies being equally antithetical to human freedom and happiness but faced with two lifts, one occupied by a bloke wearing a swastika and the other by one sporting a hammer and sickle, ok you'd take the stairs, but if you couldn't, if you had to get in one of these lifts, you'd surely join the commie. Anybody says otherwise I'm not believing them.
That’s cultural conditioning, though. Most of us of a certain age grew up on films depicting the evil Germans at war and with the holocaust front and centre as exhibit A of their evil. The gulag archipelago wasn’t even widely known in the west until our adulthood, and how many top billing films are there about it?
There certainly is some of that. But it's also the point about fascism having violence and hatred in its dna whereas communism to the naive or unwary can be an idealistic set of ideas centred on equality and the emancipation of the poor. The only ideal in fascism is the supremacy of a race or people or nation. And 'strongman' is a feature not a bug, ie it celebrates in concept authoritarian rule. So I'm going to cut less slack to somebody signing up for that compared to somebody saying they believe in communism. Not much, don't get me wrong, but to my mind there is a clear difference when boiled down to the individual believer in this way.
There’s also the motivations of the mass movements that both ideologies required. It’s understandable, rational and even admirable that a barely emancipated Russian peasant who can hardly feed his children would want a fairer redistribution of wealth, even if the ultimate consequences were terrible. You can fathom the motives of a comparatively privileged German bouncing off defeat in one imperial war wanting to make Germany great again by stealing from and destroying its own minorities and subjugating other nations, but it’s not close to admirable even if the end result was similarly awful for them.
Yes absolutely. This is a PB repeater, isn't it, Fascism v Communism, and it surprises me slightly that it is, because to me it's clear that whilst both are abominations only one is wholly without mitigation as to intent and motivation.
“ Sir Keir Starmer has said there would be “no flights, no Rwanda scheme” if Labour wins power.”
Well he wasn’t lying so that’s good.
But the thing is, he is doing all he can.
Now that might not be very much, and that not very much that he is doing might not be very much use to anyone, but it's probably better than what any of the other choices we have as PM would be doing
I dont think that we have true fascists in the UK. There are those with some sympathy for it, but not the full Monty.
Real fascism requires paramilitary uniforms, a cult of leadership, milotarism and advocating political violence against internal and external enemies. A bunch of coked up fifty-somethings chucking beer cans at the police is just robbery, not fascism.
And let's not forget that Fascism is only now considered 'right wing' because of Soviet post-war revisionism.
Contemporaneous accounts of the 1930s and 1940s used a lot of terms to describe the Hitler and Mussolini regimes. 'Totalitarian', 'Despotic', plain old 'Evil'. You might've got a 'hardline Nationalist' in there when referring to Moseley.
But these movements weren't really presented as 'right wing' until after WWII, when the 'victorious' Soviets wanted to differentiate their own brand of wrongheaded Authoritarianism and state-sanctioned death cultury, as if they were polar opposites, when of course they weren't.
Horseshoe theory - which it didn't take long for most to twig - gets it semi-correct, but still allows the Octogenarian Strawman to remain standing.
'Far Right' *should* mean extreme Libertarianism/anarcho-capitalism. If being on the right is being pro-individual, small state, limited government then being far-right should mean being strongly in favour of such things.
I'd like to see a movement to Reclaim the term.
That doesn’t really make sense, though. That the Conservatives are a right of centre party isn’t in dispute. That they’ve become more right wing since they abandoned their pragmatism for Brexit, under Johnson and Truss, and having toyed with Patel, Braverman and Jenrick also isn’t in dispute. That Reform represents a further step to the right is hard to contest, that Trump is a step further appears clear, and if you project forward it isn’t that long before you arrive at a Mussolini type dictatorship.
It doesn't make sense because it's radical right bollocks.
I'd be interested to know what your typical small state anarcho-capitalist libertarian thinks about policing and border control.
Romanian far-right former presidential candidate Calin Georgescu has been charged with attempting to stage a coup after the first round of the presidential election was annulled last December.
Horatiu Potra, a former French legionnaire and militia chief in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and 20 other people were also charged.
Comparing Communism to Fascism as ideologies is not quite the same as whether somebody identifying as a Communist is likely to be as unsavoury and dangerous a person as somebody identifying as a Fascist. You can make a strong case for the ideologies being equally antithetical to human freedom and happiness but faced with two lifts, one occupied by a bloke wearing a swastika and the other by one sporting a hammer and sickle, ok you'd take the stairs, but if you couldn't, if you had to get in one of these lifts, you'd surely join the commie. Anybody says otherwise I'm not believing them.
That’s cultural conditioning, though. Most of us of a certain age grew up on films depicting the evil Germans at war and with the holocaust front and centre as exhibit A of their evil. The gulag archipelago wasn’t even widely known in the west until our adulthood, and how many top billing films are there about it?
There certainly is some of that. But it's also the point about fascism having violence and hatred in its dna whereas communism to the naive or unwary can be an idealistic set of ideas centred on equality and the emancipation of the poor. The only ideal in fascism is the supremacy of a race or people or nation. And 'strongman' is a feature not a bug, ie it celebrates in concept authoritarian rule. So I'm going to cut less slack to somebody signing up for that compared to somebody saying they believe in communism. Not much, don't get me wrong, but to my mind there is a clear difference when boiled down to the individual believer in this way.
There’s also the motivations of the mass movements that both ideologies required. It’s understandable, rational and even admirable that a barely emancipated Russian peasant who can hardly feed his children would want a fairer redistribution of wealth, even if the ultimate consequences were terrible. You can fathom the motives of a comparatively privileged German bouncing off defeat in one imperial war wanting to make Germany great again by stealing from and destroying its own minorities and subjugating other nations, but it’s not close to admirable even if the end result was similarly awful for them.
Yes absolutely. This is a PB repeater, isn't it, Fascism v Communism, and it surprises me slightly that it is, because to me it's clear that whilst both are abominations only one is wholly without mitigation as to intent and motivation.
To anyone who lived in the twentieth century - or even knows any twentieth century history - both are reprehensible.
Comments
Fifty years old, Jeez.
What a pitiful circus
He may have looked good on a t-shirt but he the oboy reason he isn't considered one of tge twentietg centiry's greatest villains is that there was so much competition.
Real fascism requires paramilitary uniforms, a cult of leadership, milotarism and advocating political violence against internal and external enemies. A bunch of coked up fifty-somethings chucking beer cans at the police is just robbery, not fascism.
Politically, they're committing seppuku.
Partly, the law os what the law is. Even the previous governments got that, for all their huffing and puffing. Partly, a government that feels it can ignore the law would be blooming scary, even if it was doing what I wanted.
Ultimately, if this turns out to be fine, the early excitement will be forgotten. If it doesn't, then the government does have a problem. But not yet.
And let's not forget that Fascism is only now considered 'right wing' because of Soviet post-war revisionism.
Contemporaneous accounts of the 1930s and 1940s used a lot of terms to describe the Hitler and Mussolini regimes. 'Totalitarian', 'Despotic', plain old 'Evil'. You might've got a 'hardline Nationalist' in there when referring to Moseley.
But these movements weren't really presented as 'right wing' until after WWII, when the 'victorious' Soviets wanted to differentiate their own brand of wrongheaded Authoritarianism and state-sanctioned death cultury, as if they were polar opposites, when of course they weren't.
Horseshoe theory - which it didn't take long for most to twig - gets it semi-correct, but still allows the Octogenarian Strawman to remain standing.
'Far Right' *should* mean extreme Libertarianism/anarcho-capitalism. If being on the right is being pro-individual, small state, limited government then being far-right should mean being strongly in favour of such things.
I'd like to see a movement to Reclaim the term.
Lewis Goodall
@lewis_goodall
Catastrophic
@ITVWales
polling from
@YouGov
showing Labour cratering in Wales in a distant third for the Senedd. Straight Plaid/Reform battle.
* Plaid 30% (n/c)
* Reform 29% (+4)
* Labour 14% (-4)
* Conservatives 11% (-2)
* Lib Dem 6% (-1)
* Green 6% (+1)
If realised could well be terminal for Starmer. It’s Wales, not Scotland which could finish him next year.
https://x.com/lewis_goodall/status/1967998859789078786
I found if I didn't HAVE to take notes, my attention drifted and nothing went in. If I did, I somehow managed to gain all the knowledge effortlessly, apart from a slightly tired writing hand.
Well he wasn’t lying so that’s good.
"Cavendish Cymru
@CavendishCymru
📊 Here's our Senedd seat projection for the ITV Wales/YouGov poll.
Reform UK: 36 Seats
Plaid Cymru: 36 Seats
Labour: 13 seats
Conservatives: 8 seats
Liberal Democrats: 2 seats
Green Party: 1 seat"
https://x.com/CavendishCymru/status/1967990812157022516
*Or indeed Ebert and Luxembourg.
Why? Because they thought that repudiating him would damage Communism.
That's actually the scariest thing about the whole shebang - the religious fervour it inspired.
Mr Justice Sheldon said the man's lawyers must do all that is possible to make further representations within 14 days, so that his case can be finalised at a future hearing.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1dqe2443l1o
Not yet, anyway.
Its fairly proportional, parties getting 4 to 7% throw it slightly out depending on their geographic spread
On the authoritarian axis in the UK, I place the parties as Authoritarian Reform, Green, Labour, Conservative, Lib Dem. Liberal
On the economic axis, I place the parties as Right Conservative, Labour, Lib Dem, Reform, Green Left
Perhaps there is also a cultural axis?
This is so ridiculous I really cannot think what the Judge is thinking. If he wanted to pursue this nonsense he could do so from France. He certainly does not need to be here.
Multiple crossovers possible.
Lab fourth behind Tories in Wales would be a game over moment
Lab fourth in Wales, fifth in Scotland and not first on popular vote in London in May is the Lotto jackpot result
Someone borrowing £10k to be smuggled in, their passport stolen, their family threatened is half-trafficked.
Someone paying 1400 euro for a boat ride is not being trafficked.
Is this T May's botched obsession with Modern Slavery again?
Well and truly hung.
I don’t believe that it’s good for any party to be top dog for so long as Labour have been in Wales. I think the same thing about those councils that have been firmly Labour/Tory for so long. The complacency that comes from never losing power doesn’t breed good government, IMHO.
There has to be a way that our grear country can behave in a decent way without being a soft touch. I sincerely hope and believe that.
MPs need to grow a spine and fix the contradictions that they helped create. The only way of doing so it asserting sovereignty and overriding the courts. I get that Parliament is queasy about the precedent this sets, but they’ve helped create the problem and they’re the only ones with the power to fix it.
Charlie Kirk shooting suspect Tyler Robinson's texts with roommate, from charging document
https://x.com/lookner/status/1968025297791619252
Now that might not be very much, and that not very much that he is doing might not be very much use to anyone, but it's probably better than what any of the other choices we have as PM would be doing
Am I getting the hang of it @Stuartinromford?
They had 12% constituency and 11% list for Holyrood at their nadir in 2019
I'm sorry but there is all the difference in the world between sending people to dangerous prisons in El Salvador without any process whatsoever and returning someone back to France where he was a few weeks ago. I am not saying we might never have a case that needs a closer look under this scheme but it was not this case.
This sort of madness threatens the very principles we both hold dear because the risk is that they will simply be swept away in exasperation.
We can get that from either 20C political history, or eg Jonestown - "1 2 3 Quaff" (thud).
Come the Apocalypse, three things will survive - dust, cockroaches and Welsh Labour.
Do cases just get randomly assigned to a judge?
How do they decide which court (town/county) the case is heard - are there just a few courts bearing the bulk and the same few judges in areas where there is a large concentration of asylum seekers?
If there aren’t, would it be a workable/good idea to have special immigration courts specifically to deal with a set group of selected judges who are well acquainted with immigration and human rights law?
If there are already immigration specialist courts how are the judges appointed?
Horatiu Potra, a former French legionnaire and militia chief in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and 20 other people were also charged.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4g5ky0vex8o
I will vote conservative because not only do I know our MS personally but she is excellent with many years of service
I should also add I know Darren Millar, the leader of the Welsh conservatives and he is a good MS as well
And as always I would caution against projecting todays polls to next May as labour could fall further
Indeed few if any labour or conservative seats are safe