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Timothy Snyder: What does it mean that Donald Trump is a fascist? - We should expect him to try to cling to power until death, and create a cult of January 6th martyrs (www.newyorker.com)

submitted 1 month ago by tardigrada@beehaw.org to c/politics@beehaw.org

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Trump has always been a presence, not an absence: the presence of fascism. What does this mean?

When the Soviets called their enemies “fascists,” they turned the word into a meaningless insult. Putinist Russia has preserved the habit: a “fascist” is anyone who opposes the wishes of a Russian dictator. So Ukrainians defending their country from Russian invaders are “fascists.” This is a trick that Trump has copied. He, like Vladimir Putin, refers to his enemies as “fascists,” with no ideological significance at all. It is simply a term of opprobrium.

Putin and Trump are both, in fact, fascists. And their use of the word, though meant to confuse, reminds us of one of fascism’s essential characteristics. A fascist is unconcerned with the connection between words and meanings. He does not serve the language; the language serves him. When a fascist calls a liberal a “fascist,” the term begins to work in a different way, as the servant of a particular person, rather than as a bearer of meaning.

[...]

Fascism is a phenomenon, not a person. Just as Trump was always a presence, so is the movement he has created. It is not just a matter of the actual fascists in his movement, who are scarcely hiding, nor of his own friendly references to Hitler or his use of Hitlerian language (“vermin,” “enemy within”). He bears responsibility for what comes next, as do his allies and supporters.

Yet some, and probably more, of the blame rests with our actions and analysis. Again and again, our major institutions, from the media to the judiciary, have amplified Trump’s presence; again and again, we have failed to name the consequences. Fascism can be defeated, but not when we are on its side.

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[–] averyminya@beehaw.org 7 points 1 month ago

Oh, believe me I 100% agree with you on both points. Just look through my history, 110% agree in full. The DNC's choice, while frustrating, made sense. I think acting early would have been the way to actually get a primary, and that wasn't happening because Biden decided he wasn't a 1 term President for a little while. Because of this people around here blame the DNC for causing this situation in the first place, which I'm 50/50 on. The situation was from the DNC, but at the same time, if Harris wasn't your first choice and you have no other alternatives, why the heck didn't anyone vote for Ranked Choice Voting on their ballot? It failed nation wide. And people point out that abortion won in red states, as if that changes my point? Granted, ranked choice could have been different for each states ballot, I'm not certain on what the specifics are for each state, or why they might have failed if abortion passed.

However in post election, the Greens got what, 1 million votes? At least they voted, at all. I don't really think it's the greens and most of those voters that were telling people to not vote. The fact of the matter is that with our numbers in the electoral college, they all could have voted for Harris, all Democrats could have voted for Stein, it wouldn't have mattered, because people didn't show up to vote.

I think that it was a combination of a lack of enthusiasm for Harris after staying so strongly pro-Israel instead of more heavily actively campaigning for, at the very least, a two state solution. Though really we all know that we want the genocide to end, and that was all the campaigning that would really be needed.

It would be a different story if it was 75 million to 74 million (Harris) down to a swing state or two in the E.C., but it wasn't. It was a blowout because people didn't go vote.

So whatever caused people to choose not to vote was really the issue. What those are though will be different depending on who you ask (and in reality, any answer is probably a correct answer for about a thousand people)