Ageism.

[Anarchia]

1: social-democracy isn't socialism.

2: the Nazi party weren't socialists. It could maybe be argued that their Strasserite wing (eliminated by Hitler, including in the night of the long knives) was some sort of socialist, but even that might be a stretch. Just because they had it in their name, doesn't mean its accurate - is the Democratic Republic of North Korea democratic?

3: "more people have been murdered by social democrats than were murdered by the nazis" True, but irrelevant. I never said social-democrats were nice or had good politics (they don't). I said there is a difference between social-democracy and Nazism.

4: "more people were murdered in ... the nakba than in the shoah."

Umm, what? Get your facts right. The Nakba saw between 600,000 and 1.4 million Palestinians (generally accepted figure is ~720,000) made into refugees, and far, far less than that killed (can't find figures, but certainly no more than 10,000, probably far, far less). The Shoah saw ~6 million Jews killed, not to mention leftists, unionists, communists, anarchists, queers, roma, disabled, etc etc. They aren't even remotely close in scale.

5: "what happened to your family is not only not unique, it's commonplace."

I wouldn't call it commonplace, although obviously it isn't unique! Calling a social-democratic individual with little-no political power a Nazi, however, completely diminishes the meaning of what a Nazi is. As anarchists, we have a sound critique of social-democracy - we should use it. There's no point leaping to hyperbole, especially when it proves offensive to people (for entirely legitimate reasons).

Francois - In short, no. A Nazi is, strictly, someone who was a member (or perhaps supporter) of the Nazi party. A Neo-Nazi is one who supports similar goals, but after the destruction of the Nazi party. Nazism isn't socialism + nationalism (otherwise the CCCP would be Nazis, so would the DPRK, etc etc, if you want to call them socialist, that is. I wouldn't.) Nazism is actually a fairly incoherent and fluid ideology - as opposed to, say, Leninism or Maoism. Perhaps in that sense it can be compared to anarchism, in that while all Nazis (and all anarchists) share a few basic principles, there is also a lot of difference between them.

Nazis are: in support of an all-powerful state (although arguments have been made that the organisation of the Nazi state means it ceases to be defined as a state as we know it. I disagree); believers in the existance of races (generally biologically, sometimes also mystically); believers in the supremacy of the "Aryan" race; full of hatred for Jews (often not considered human), blacks, left wingers, disabled people, queers, Asians (generally considered lower classes of human, and yes, some Nazis even have a ranking scale of who fits where); "conservative revolutionaries" - generally harking back (especially in Germany) to a historical tradition; believers in innate biological roles for men and women.

I'm sure you could find more on Wikipedia or in other places, that's all I can really be bothered to write up for now...

[Francois Tremblay]

I thought Nazism was characterised politically by a belief that the individual must be subordinated as a cell to the social body, and thus an unwavering belief in authority.

[Anarchia]

Yes and no. If you'd said Fascism, I would certainly agree that that is one of the defining characteristics of fascism. While it is certainly a feature of Nazism, I don't think it's the sole one worth mentioning, and perhaps not even a defining one (this is where the "was Nazism a type of fascism, or was it just convenient to lump them together at the time" argument comes in. I'm yet to be convinced either way, depends on who's defining fascism)

[birthday pony]

Equating one's beliefs with another's actions is silly. I might call myself an anarchist or a socialist, but that doesn't mean I support every action, including murder, that other self-defined anarchists or socialists have done.

Likewise if someone says "I'm a Democrat" though we might disagree with their beliefs, it's silly to jump to the conclusion that they supported bombings by Clinton and other such things. You'd find that a lot of Democrats don't even know about those. And moreover those that do still may not like them, but think the Democratic party is closest party to their beliefs. Just like anarchists have murdered people in cases I might not support, I still might call myself an anarchist. And just like Stalin called himself a socialist, I still call myself a socialist and don't support Stalin.

[ambi]

1: social-democracy isn't socialism.

yawn.

2: the Nazi party weren't socialists.

massive state spending to prop up economy.

lots of people who call themselves socialists aren't socialists, so what? the person we were talking about isn't even a socialist or a social democrat, he just uses that label along with a bunch of others. it was you who said he's a nationalist and a social democrat.

3: "more people have been murdered by social democrats than were murdered by the nazis" True, but irrelevant.

completely relevant. shall we go around telling anarchists they are "fucking idiots" if their mention of social democrats doesn't not properly express the unique evil of social democracy?

no, you reserve that for just one particular, but commonplace, evil - the nazis - a lesser evil whether we measure by body count or by longevity or by existing threat.

Umm, what? Get your facts right. The Nakba saw between 600,000 and 1.4 million Palestinians (generally accepted figure is ~720,000) made into refugees, and far, far less than that killed (can't find figures, but certainly no more than 10,000, probably far, far less). The Shoah saw ~6 million Jews killed, not to mention leftists, unionists, communists, anarchists, queers, roma, disabled, etc etc. They aren't even remotely close in scale.

you conveniently left out the holomodor, in which 20 million people died. as for your numbers, i do not believe them, in particular the 6 million figure which is enforced by law. but that isn't really the issue here.

no matter what you or i think the numbers are, evil is evil and should be opposed. but one evil is not uniquely evil over others.

Calling a social-democratic individual with little-no political power a Nazi, however, completely diminishes the meaning of what a Nazi is.

as i previously pointed out, social democrats are worse than nazis. only if you think the evil of nazis is both supreme and unique would you have to assert that "diminishing" the meaning of the nazis occurs when you call them social democrats. again, why don't you get upset when people use or misuse the social democrat term - afterall, they are far worse murderers than the nazis ever were.

There's no point leaping to hyperbole, especially when it proves offensive to people (for entirely legitimate reasons).

what hyperbole? again, social democrats are demonstrably worse than the nazis. again, nazis are not the end-all and be-all of evil that you make them out to be.

A Nazi is, strictly, someone who was a member (or perhaps supporter) of the Nazi party. A Neo-Nazi is one who supports similar goals, but after the destruction of the Nazi party.

simply not true. what about the nazis who moved to south america? did they become neo-nazis because the nazi party had been destroyed? no, they were just nazis. what about the nazis like gehlen and von braun who joined the US, were they suddenly neo-nazis? no, again, just plain fucking nazis.

neo-nazis are, virtually without exception, agents of various states and dupes of the same. bill white being the poster boy.

Nazis are: in support of an all-powerful state (although arguments have been made that the organisation of the Nazi state means it ceases to be defined as a state as we know it. I disagree); believers in the existance of races (generally biologically, sometimes also mystically); believers in the supremacy of the "Aryan" race; full of hatred for Jews (often not considered human), blacks, left wingers, disabled people, queers, Asians (generally considered lower classes of human, and yes, some Nazis even have a ranking scale of who fits where); "conservative revolutionaries" - generally harking back (especially in Germany) to a historical tradition; believers in innate biological roles for men and women.

doesn't sound any different from the ideology of some aztlan activists i've met, simply replacing 'aryan' with 'la raza.'

I'm sure you could find more on Wikipedia

wikipedia is bullshit when it comes to history and politics.

that's all I can really be bothered to write up for now...

thanks for deigning to put finger to keyboard. if it's such a bother going around yelling at people who "offend" you by making a joke wherein a nationalist and a socialist is called a nazi, maybe you need to ... get off your high horse.

for anyone interested in the topic of the (non) supremacy of euro-sephardim-khazarian genocide of the 1930s/40s, check out a little matter of genocide by ward churchill. for a good play which uses analogy to explain the rise of hitler, see the resistable rise of arturo ui by bertolt brecht.

[Francois Tremblay]

I think you guys are confusing "socialism as collective ownership of the means of production" and "socialism as greater control of the means of production by the State."

[Maithuna69]

it is a nice quote, but you should keep in mind the POV of the person who said it. he was a fabian socialist who was interested in replacing the old institutions (aristocratic states, churches, etc.) with authoritarian socialism, gradually attained.

just as the fabian society symbol shows, he was a wolf in sheep's clothing.

I'd go along with that to an extent but I tend to seperate ideas frmo the people who put them forward, to avoid slipping into ad hominem nonsense.

[Guest]

I'd go along with that to an extent but I tend to seperate ideas frmo the people who put them forward, to avoid slipping into ad hominem nonsense.

sometimes "who said it" matters.

for example, bush recently chastised russia for attacking another nation.

now, it's true that nations shouldnt attack nations, but when bush says it, most of the world laughs because of a little thing called iraq - that, and the fact that georgia was the aggressor along with US/israel...

[Zazaban]

I'd go along with that to an extent but I tend to seperate ideas frmo the people who put them forward, to avoid slipping into ad hominem nonsense.

sometimes "who said it" matters.

for example, bush recently chastised russia for attacking another nation.

now, it's true that nations shouldnt attack nations, but when bush says it, most of the world laughs because of a little thing called iraq - that, and the fact that georgia was the aggressor along with US/israel...

But the identity of the person saying it does not add to or detract from the value of the ideas being presented.

[ambi]

Likewise if someone says "I'm a Democrat" though we might disagree with their beliefs, it's silly to jump to the conclusion that they supported bombings by Clinton and other such things. You'd find that a lot of Democrats don't even know about those.

that's just american exceptionalism.

democrats do know about the bombings. go back and look at the news form the mid 90s - USliberals were falling over themselves in their rush to support the radioactive attack on yugoslavia. to this day, you will find that most democrats still support clinton's actions there.

democrats don't watch 60 minutes? it's the biggest USliberal tv news magazine in the country. its producer openly claims that he single-handedly saved the clinton campaign in 1992. democrats didn't see this video?



democrats are not ignorant, they are willfully ignorant.

the idea that they are not responsible for their actions is disgusting.

birthdaypony, your analogy is false. you (an anarchist-socialist), are opposed to stalin (an authoritarian communist), therefore you wouldn't have voted for stalin, wouldn't have worked for stalin, wouldn't have helped stalin.

but democrats vote for democrats. democrats help democrats. and then they have the chutzpah to say "oh, sorry, we didn't know about all that bad stuff!"

and people wanna give me shit for referring to them as subhuman scum. amazing.

[ambi]

But the identity of the person saying it does not add to or detract from the value of the ideas being presented.

sometimes yes, and sometimes no.

if you are riding the bus and the guy next to you happens to be a neocon says "gosh, it sure is a nice sunny day" that's one thing.

but if he says "don't you think liberty and freedom should be spread throughout the world" it gets a little trickier, doesn't it?

fabian socialists are total scum. when they say something political, it is measured to appeal to those sentiments which street-level socialists love. but the purpose of the words is to fool you, to get you to go with the fabian program - which is naked authoritarianism.

i'm sure we could sift through the speeches of hitler and find a passage or two that would appeal to all of us. i'm also sure that if someone posted such a quote, it would be pointed out fairly quickly that hitler wasn't a good guy, and that his motives for saying such words are suspect. (and fabians are far worse than nazis.)

[Francois Tremblay]

Don't the Fabians control British politics?

[ambi]

Don't the Fabians control British politics?

far more than that, starting with the minds of most political academics.

the fabian window, designed by george bernard shaw. the intellectuals of the fabian society "mould [the world] nearer the heart's desire," following the imperative "pray devoutly [and] hammer stoutly" while the masses worship the books of authoritarian socialism. dancing on top of the globe is a wolf in sheep's clothing, holding a fabian society flag.

[birthday pony]

I'll concede everything, until here.

and people wanna give me shit for referring to them as subhuman scum. amazing.

Humans have murdered each other for all history. In order to be subhuman I'd imagine you'd have to somehow break the mold. I wouldn't give Democrats that much credit.

[ambi]

Humans have murdered each other for all history.

i hear this alot, especially from USamericans. it seems to make them feel better.

it would be far more accurate to say that humans have been tricked into killing each other by the 20% of society that is psychopathic.

but why do they have to be tricked? because they have human values - basic shit like "dont kill innocents" and "more freedom is a good thing" and "cruelty is wrong."

most people, while imperfect, practice human values most of the time. when they don't, they still aspire to, in general.

and some people are hell bent on living beneath human values.

like members of the democratic party of the USA, and the people who vote for them.