• squiblet@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    A lot of conservatives have problems understanding words, especially words that apply to political beliefs. It’s party ignorance and partly a result of years of indoctrination. One example, thinking that anyone who isn’t hard-right is a ‘socialist’ or a ‘commie’ and not understanding that those aren’t the same thing. Then, fascist… many people seem to think fascist means an authoritarian government, independent of any other qualities or beliefs.

    • madcaesar@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Fascism : a way of organizing a society in which a government ruled by a dictator controls the lives of the people and in which people are not allowed to disagree with the government.

      I mean, that’s what most people imagine, when they think fascist and I think it’s good enough.

      Is every fascist government identical? No. But as near as makes no difference they are all the same type of asshole.

      The rest of your points stand, however. People do not understand communism, socialism, nor Marxism.

      • Raconteur_Rob@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        You actually just proved their point by defining authoritarianism and calling it fascism. Fascist governments are authoritarian but that’s just one aspect of it.

        • madcaesar@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I literally just pulled the first result on google…

          And like I said for general conversations this definition is absolutely adequate.

          It’s like talking about American Democracy and someone goes “well, technically we’re a Republic!”… Ok great…

          The difference between fascism and communism is that people have generally a good idea of what a fascist government looks like, while they really don’t understand the other terms.

          • Stoneykins@lemmy.one
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            1 year ago

            I disagree that people generally have a good idea what a fascist government looks like, or else there wouldn’t be this level of confusion. I think most people at best, know what countrys had a problem with fascism in the past, without any certainty of what parts of of those governments were where the fascism was, just guesses.

            Thats why comparisons to nazis and such are so common I would say. People find it a lot easier to point out similarities to known fascism than to try and concisely point out the exact point where an action became “fascist”

          • lolcatnip@reddthat.com
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            1 year ago

            I literally just pulled the first result on google…

            Don’t believe everything you read on the internet.

      • squiblet@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        It’s not good enough because fascism is specifically a form of right wing authoritarianism which includes hyper-capitalism, close relationship between the state and corporations, sexism, racism, and xenophobia. Otherwise we’re back to the idea that a fascist dictatorship and a communist dictatorship are the same thing, which clearly they’re not.

      • Spike@feddit.de
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        1 year ago

        I think it’s good enough.

        Most of the time, yeah. We take these mental shortcuts to avoid a lot of unnecessary headache and talking.

        Problem is, these shortcuts get hijacked by asshole grifters to push their own agenda in todays climate of tiktok and youtube shorts. And this is especially potent when the usual everyday use of the word is not good enough. Want another example: “What is a woman?” Same mental shortcut. Same method to exploit the shortcut. Same bullshit. Nuanced discussion not happening.

        Sometimes, we just need to be precise in discourse. These people are intentionally not being precise. They hijack our mental shortcuts.

        Another example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4F6GVLBVcQ

        But yeah, in everyday use it’s good enough. Of course it is.