Fascism:
(1) armed politics
(In 1920, Hemingway defined Mussolini's Fascists as
an armed political party);
(2) the credo in action that, since
God loves people made of the right stuff and gives unto them physical
and economic and political and military strength to prove his love,
their strength is the revealed proof of their god-approved superiority
over others and therefore THEIR STRENGTH IS THEIR LICENSE (i.e. their
god-given might makes them right) to trick or trample, brutalize, and
exploit or kill others to benefit themselves, i.e mystic rightness earns
real-world might which makes its possessors right in every real-world
arena;
(3) (merely conveniently but also
inevitably) a justification for the otherwise irrational anointment
of a chosen tribe. Since the benefits of fascism accrue mainly to
insiders, but fascism by nature needs an army of suckers out front,
to cheer for speeches and die in battle, who can be cynically used yet
trusted to carry guns; and since the best recruits for that necessary
army are insecure lumpen who need to feel important (as if they were
the "right stuff," too), in order to thrill, recruit, hypnotize, and
psychologically blind and bind enough such dumb followers to form that
army, insiders just about have to oratorically share the glow of god-favor
with their tribes, so fascism and the definition of fascism obviously
HAVE TO include the concept of a chosen TRIBE, reinforced by a circus
of flags and uniforms and drums and marching and hysterical tribal spirit
(i.e. patriotism) and, under the table but still obviously (like the
looting franchise pirate captains gave their crews), the implied licensing
of bullies in the ranks to rob, rape, kill, hurt and torture anyone
outside the tribe or perceived traitors within the tribe randomly, gratuitously
or for real or made-up reasons, as they wish.
Fascism, as I am defining it, parallels the
puritan ethic, Darwin's implicit theory that nature rewards and justifies
strength, Ayn Rand's pseudo intellectual crackpot theory of objectivism,
and the lumpen capitalist belief that competition is self-evidently
good and that the winners are the good guys because they won, while
the losers are contemptible. There are enough parallels to fascism in
a range of human social modes to suggest that fascism is both genetic
and rational. And, zooming the discussion focus in on the rational coffee
shop crowd that actually discusses things, in the context of my own
better-than-Marxist view of modern human history as a slow revolutionary
movement out of the jungle toward civilization, assuming most fascists
only follow a few much smarter or more cunning leaders, my fourth definition
of fascism may be the inside best:
(4) the philosophical excuse of the muscular,
realistically selfish, often intelligent, probably atheist, admittedly
courageous human predators (i.e. pig realists) who resist progress toward
what they consider prissy do-gooder too-restrictive civilization, because
they prefer the exciting risk and freedom of the jungle and the jungle
ethic that lets them take what they want (get rich in fact) and either
dominate and use other people or maneuver them out of the way (or kick
them out of the way if need be).
AN IMPORTANT CHARACTERISTIC: Mussolini's
black shirted muscle boys campaigned by going around beating people
up, especially communists, and though it's not part of the definition,
it's as reliable an identifying factor as a rattlesnake's apparent insane
fury that fascists always both instinctively and expediently despise
communists, because the communists are offensively smarter than them
and inconveniently espouse equality.
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DEFINITIONS