domain:ryandv.substack.com
VoxelVexillologist
Multidimensional Radical Centrist
2hr ago
I think this is a different argument from the typical "words are violence". This seems to come from the libertarian view that "government is [a monopoly on] violence", and ultimately that all laws the legislators craft are enforced at the threat of violence. You do something that sounds banal like banning the sale of "loosie" individual cigarettes to enforce tax laws and maybe wave hands about "public health", and ultimately if some of the populace resists this seemingly-nonviolent policy, your enforcers will end up killing them. I doubt there's a single law of the state for which sufficiently determined noncompliance won't end with physical violence.
That said, while I think the libertarians have a mostly-self-coherent ethical view (which is more than many can say), I think some level of civilization is worth the trade off in terms of absolute freedoms.
Obligatory warning against arguing from fictional evidence (though I can't remember where I first saw this warning), but this definition from an alternate-history author who presumably has done some research into the topic may be relevant.
Between January and June of 1929, the CAUR [Comitati d'Azione per l'Universalità di Roma, Action Committees for the University of Rome, led by Eugenio Coselschi at the direction of Mussolini] worked on three separate goals: a universal definition of fascism, an aim later picked up at the Conference of Montreux in 1929 and 1930; to identify the criteria that an organization must fulfill in order to qualify as truly "fascist"; and, finally, to lay the groundwork for the Conference, to be held in December of that year. The first major obstacle, that of creating a proper and official definition of fascism, proved to be particularly troublesome and ultimately led to rather loose criteria's being used for the first conference, which was opened to all who had "their spirits oriented toward the principles of a political, economic, and social renovation based on the concepts of the hierarchy of the state and collaboration between the classes". In practical terms, this meant using criteria such as adherence to anti-communist ideals, the principle of "National Revolution", and corporatism, which was in itself loosely defined and allowed for the potential inclusion of any conservative or rightist groups—and, indeed, regimes that were "merely" corporatist.
In this work of fiction, there later is a schism between Nazism and fascism proper.
Amongst the declarations made at Montreux the day following the walkout [from the 1934 Montreux Conference of the NSDAP and its allies], of particular importance was that of Eugenio Coselschi, who in his capacity as Chairman of the Fascist International declared Hitler and Nazi Racism as dissidents who "yesterday opposed Christian Civilization, today Latin Civilization, and tomorrow human civilization itself". Furthermore, a formal declaration was made proclaiming that the International "rejected any materialistic concept which exalts the exclusive domination of one race above others".
Stefferi
Chief Suomiposter
2hr ago
A fair amount of those actually aghast about this stuff consists of old Republicans (the sort of figures that would be called "GOPe", though they're not really the establishment any more), with many libs/leftists more in the exasperated "Yes, of course they're saying that stuff, have you not been playing attention?" mode.
07mk
2hr ago
From what I've seen of the jokes, I couldn't help but be taken aback by how completely run-of-the-mill banal these would have been coming out of the mouths of standard issue blue tribe liberal progressive young adults in the 90s-00s with some equivalent nouns swapped around (or perhaps not, depending on how edgy they wanted to be), as someone who was one of those in that time. I feel like it exemplifies better than almost any single event I've seen recently of how much of the blue establishment and the Democratic party has taken on the role of the excoriating church lady, and as much as I hate the "[side] pounces" meme, this fits "Democrats pounce" to a tee. 2028 is still a ways away, but Vance's response is the one thing here that makes me slightly more optimistic about that, since he's probably the front runner to win that election right now.
Clementine
2hr ago
That's the kind of thing that sounds good in theory but has at least two major issues I can think of in practice:
- Geographically/logistically I'm not sure how it would work. Would it be just maintaining the status quo in the west bank but on a village by village basis giving the entire village citizenship? I don't have a good mental model of how the handover of administration from PA to Israel would work, I also suspect the PA would just... Not be pleased to be doing that handover.
- Peaceful Palestinians are at risk of getting lynched by their less peaceful compatriots. If I write that coexistence event thing as a separate post I'll address it in more depth but we couldn't take pictures of any Palestianians attending in case they got murdered as traitors. I don't really know how high the risk of this is — presumably non-zero or we wouldn't have been given those instructions — but I do know that generally if a Palestinian talks too much about maybe coexisting with Israel you'll get a lot of public disavowals, his family saying he's a disgrace to the family and they don't agree with him, etc. There's a lot of pressure to toe the line and that pressure it not just social/verbal.
On the other hand, perhaps if approached on a clan-by-clan level it could be doable? That's not really very different from village-by-village (because a clan usually stays close together anyway). This is the kind of thing where it would help if I had better knowledge of clan politics, but all I know about it is things I absorb second hand from coworkers etc. Maybe I'll ask my husband later, he's active in hebrew-arabic language exchange groups and might have a better idea.
Anyway basically: I don't think the majority of Israelis would be opposed but that doesn't make it a feasible solution. Maybe someday though, if things develop in a promising direction.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
2hr ago
A parliametary committee crafting legislation isn't violence any more than a crime boss saying "And anyone but us starts dealing drugs north of Third Street, you put them in the hospital". Nor any less.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
2hr ago
At least some of the “praise for hitler” was mocking their own side/base for being far right.
I don't think it was even that, it was a straight up joke.
AD: "He did say 'My delegates I bring will vote for the most right wing person'"
PG: "Great. I love Hitler"
magicalkittycat
3hr ago
absolutely correct that the leak of this groupchat is lame pointscoring at its worst and in fact reinforces the notion that leftists are hypocritical scolds (we can celebrate charlie kirk getting capped but nono words are proof of the Bad Nazi!)
"I love Hitler" seems about as literal Nazi as possible. If that is not "proof of Bad Nazi" to you, what is?
And it's not just "leftists", the Republican governor of Vermont has also joined in condemning the group chat. https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/5556112-vermont-gov-scott-calls-state-senator-resign-gop-group-chat/
Or maybe the group chat's commentary about the pressure they feel to never publicly disagree with the leader or else they get labeled RINOs is true, and "leftists" just includes Governor Scott and Elise Stefanik as exiles who spoke up against the tribe.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
3hr ago
The question is whether you are particupating in the "who whom" yourself.
magicalkittycat
3hr ago
I join the chorus of condemnations for Hanania and anyone else lowly and contemptible enough to invite him to a private group chat.
Well since you're a fan of throwing out condemnations, I notice there is one thing you didn't condemn. The support of Hitler mentioned in the article.
Why is Hanania deserving of condemning but not neonazism? I don't want to assume you're a neonazi then, but "Hanania bad and needs condemning, neonazism ok don't condemn it" suggests that.
magicalkittycat
3hr ago
Has the definition of woke gone so far as to cover "Being against the love of Hitler"? If that's the case, the pendulum is going to start swinging back into "woke" pretty quickly given how most of the US do not support the Nazis.
WhiningCoil
Ghost of Quokka's Future
3hr ago
Don't care, and this is also a false equivalence. To the best of my knowledge, nobody was fired because of things they said about Charlie Kirk in leaked private messages. They were fired because they were in positions of trust (teacher, doctor, etc), and they posted horrific things endorsing his assassination publicly and proudly under their full name. These are not the same thing, don't pretend they are, I'm not playing along.
But that's how these arguments always go. Jay Jones wasn't directly telling his political opponents over SMS and then a phone call that they deserve to die, something which if I'd done would have been a terroristic threat, it was a "leaked private conversation" and a "joke". No, it fucking wasn't, and also, that's exactly what these Young Republicans are getting fired for.
I said before, when teachers were getting fired because nobody wants psychos like that teaching their children, that the left wasn't upset that the right were hypocrites, they were upset that the rules they thought were meant only for them were being used by others. Then Jimmy Kimmel was back on TV after blood libeling his political opponents, and people pretended cancel culture had been defeated.
I don't know how many times this needs to happen before people stop pretending the defectbots will never stop smashing defect.
aaa
3hr ago
Taking Eco's definition
This thing was invented by Eco because he was seething at Silvio Berlusconi's electoral victory and came up with the broadest possible definition of Fascism that would include his party. That's all it is, not a deep reflection of an intellectual on the nature of fascism but a knee-jerk reaction to an italian political party from the 90s.
magicalkittycat
3hr ago
To be clear, is support of Hitler acceptable from politicians and staffers or is it not? If supporting Hitler is acceptable when done in private conversations, then what behavior if any is unacceptable to you?
Like I can hardly imagine something more awful than that. Jay Jones comments were nasty, but even that is about just a few kids instead of millions and millions of people.
- But try something for me ... go nurse some beers at a bar. Try and find a lonely guy to talk with. One hour into the conversation start making it clear that you are something absolutely reprehensible. A nazi, a closet racist, a former criminal, etc. As long as it is not something directly antagonistic to the guy you are speaking with (can't be a racist to a black guy, that is hard mode and you can try it next time) they will mostly shrug it off and proceed to tell you something equally reprehensible about themselves. It can sometimes accidentally turn into a one-upmanship of "im the worst human ever". I was drunk enough to type up an example of what me and one of my friends do in the "worst human ever" one-upmanship game. But that violates my other rule of treating this like a public space.
Should the standards we have of politicians and their staffers be "random lonely guy getting drunk at the bar"? Sounds like we're selecting for losers if our baseline is losers.
Idk, maybe you've talked about your love of Hitler in a bar before. But I've never said that I love Hitler, and I'm sure tons of other people never have so clearly it's not required to have a friendship or a private chat. Considering some of the Republican response here like Gov Scott, it seems many of them don't consider loving Hitler as normal chat topics either.
What is the difference between a person who says they love Hitler and a person like me who doesn't say it?
IGI-111
God was a dream of good government.
3hr ago
Eco is the worst possible source on this topic and deserves to be anathemized from polsci altogether for having originated it.
This is like if people just kept insisting that a human is a featherless biped to this day despite the definition being so prima facie terrible it was ridiculous and ridiculed in its own time.
Nothing less precise than "Palingenetic ultranationalism" is worth even entertaining.
magicalkittycat
3hr ago
I probably should write something more elaborate, in the spirit of cjet's post, but I'm sorry I cant be arsed to take any of this seriously anymore. I believe all this is, in fact, pearl clutching, that there is no actual moral outrage expressed by people trying to make a mountain of this particular molehill, and it's just a cynical attempt to make the outgroup jump through the ingroup hoops.
To be clear, is support of Hitler acceptable from politicians and staffers or is it not? If supporting Hitler is acceptable when done in private conversations, then what behavior if any is unacceptable to you?
sun_the_second
could survive a COD lobby and a gay furry discord server
3hr ago
The principle of "who whom" has been, to my understanding, established to broadly apply to both sides. So the most new information that can be gained is whether it applies specifically to JD Vance.
pbmonster
3hr ago
Television sets or (preferably) projector screens are for movie watching in company. Watching something together is fun.
But when I'm watching alone, I prefer studio headphones and my 30" 4K monitor 3' away from my face. It feels more immersive than IMAX (except for the bass, can't beat feeling explosions with your diaphragm).
quiet_NaN
3hr ago
I think that almost all societies which are commonly labeled fascist did not use that as an endonym. Comes with the territory -- "we just adopted an ideology of the Italians" is a hard sell for ultra-nationalists.
I think there is a cluster in thing-space for the states of Mussolini, Hitler, Franco, and it is useful to have a word to reference that cluster, and the word their opponents have adopted for better or worse is fascism. One can debate how well it applies even to Franco and if it ever applied to any other states, of course.
Just because the SJ lets people pick some common identifiers it does not mean that individuals get to pick all identifiers. The SJ certainly does not like "I identify as native-American", and "I identify as assigned-female-at-birth" is absurd. Nor do we respect people deciding that they are not schizophrenic, but merely willing servants of the man in the moon.
Fascism as used by Eco is mostly an exonym, and it makes sense to have an exodefinition for that.
Iconochasm
2. Bootstrap the rest of the fucking omnipotence.
3hr ago
Well gosh golly gee willickers, mister! All of that combined sounds almost as bad as a Weekend Update joke swap! By the inverse property of bipolar politics, I'm now feeling much friendlier towards the young democrats, the people who've spent the last two years in open, full-throated support of the demonic death cult that wants to rape and murder my children for being Jewish.
Nah, I'm just kidding. Michael Che goes way harder than any of the stuff in that Politico article during the left's weekly religious services. The crocodile tears are worth nothing until Colin Jost's head is on a pike.
And finally, no one but the most repulsive monsters would ever interact with a horrid goblin like Richard Hanania. I'm sure the Kamala Harris supporters of the "right", like Fuentes, are quite terrible in private. I join the chorus of condemnations for Hanania and anyone else lowly and contemptible enough to invite him to a private group chat.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
3hr ago
Not "did people who are freaking out about this have anything to say about the comments on Charlie Kirk"?
Bingbong
3hr ago
we'll do weird things like them away from their parents and raise them as our own'.
I'd say the intention of the Stolen Generation was ultimately benevolent from the government of the day even if the way it was carried out has a bunch of controversies. Also the ironicness of the Stolen Generation ultimately producing the vast majority of educated, reasonably-affluent Indigenous and their descendants who now rally endlessly about how bad the stolen generation was whilst their un-stolen counterparts essentially continue to rot in the ass-end of nowhere maybe deserves a serious thinkthrough.
Bingbong
3hr ago
Yeah but a lot of the China rhetoric stuff is paying tribute to the legacy that led them to the current moment and sufficient undercurrent of 'if you do not pay lip service, you will not advance'. At an individual level from having chatted to a decent amount of Mainlanders there's a collectivist spirit but anything that your standard Westerner would call 'communism' is fairly dead on the ground.
sun_the_second
could survive a COD lobby and a gay furry discord server
3hr ago
'Did JD have anything to say about the comments on Charlie Kirk's shooting' is the pertinent question here, I think.
After the lefty reaction to the Kirk assassination I absolutely don't care about this, and will never care about anything like this from my own side ever again. OP wildly overestimates the number of fucks the right has left to give.
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