Saturday, May 5, 2012

Is He a Fascist? Is She? A Test

I glanced over this obviously biased piece on tell-tale signs that a person or a political group may be fascist in nature. Disclosure: I share the article's bias, in that I believe the Republican Party, and in particular the Koch-funded Tea Party movement, is becoming more fascist daily. That said, I'd prefer a test stated in a way that isn't so obviously leaning towards a predetermined outcome. In 2003 Dr. Lawrence Britt put out a famous fourteen-point list of things all fascist governments commonly do, but that's not quite the same thing. I'm looking towards symptoms of such a movement before it comes to total power, not after. (This presumes, of course, that this hasn't already happened in the USA...) Anyway, combining the two articles and rewriting to make them more universal and less targeted at Republicans and fundamentalist Christianity, here's my rewrite:

1) If you believe it is impossible for your country to ever do anything morally wrong, for the sole reason that it is YOUR country...

2) If you demand that everyone else love YOUR country, whether or not it loves them back...

3)  If you believe that some people are inherently better than others, and that the other people don't deserve the same rights, privileges and freedoms you have...

4) If you believe that all the bad things in your country stem from a single group of people, and you demonize and denounce these people to the point of manufacturing "evidence" of their crimes where none exists...

5) If, when a disaster occurs, your very first reaction is to blame the group of people you believe is the cause of all things bad, without regard to any search for the facts, and push for immediate strong action against that group...

6) If you believe the military is the single most important function of government- and possibly the only legitimate function of government...

7) If you believe that offensive war (or "pre-emptive defense") is morally justified...

8) If you believe that it is the responsibility of the government to enforce social norms, to restrict the freedom of women, and to crack down on sexual perversion...

9) If you believe that religion, education, art, the mass media, and even facts themselves serve no purpose other than to advance the agendas of the powerful, and therefore they should advance only YOUR agenda, delivering ONLY the facts and opinions you approve of...

10) If you believe that the moral worth of a person is measured by his or her financial worth, and that the wealthy elite should by right rule over the ordinary people...

11) If you believe the laboring classes need to be suppressed, and that mass labor movements need to be crushed to protect the business owners' interests...

12) If you believe that freedom of expression must be curtailed to protect the interests of those in power...

13) If you have contempt for the highly educated, or for those who make learning or education their life's work...

14) If you believe all restraint on the power of law enforcement should be removed in the name of keeping the people and the nation safe, and that punishing the innocent is better than allowing the guilty to roam free...

15) If you believe that it is right and proper that those who helped put a government in power should get special treatment by that government...

16) If you believe it so important that your candidate, the RIGHT candidate, be elected that you rig the system to prevent your opponents from voting, to drown out your opponent's campaign speech, or to rig the outcome outright...

... then you MIGHT be a fascist.

You may notice, the way I write this, that a lot of Democrats have fascist leanings, too. It's not all about conservative v. liberal. It's about POWER. Don't ever forget it.

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