tk1989 said:
Fascism and communism do have a lot in common. Fascism is commonly misconceived as being an extreme right wing movement, when its more effective to name it as being a combination of the best parts of socialism and capitalism; this was how it was originally devised to be in Italy, something that Mussolini even said in many of his speeches.
Still, to have knowledge of this would require one to have studied the subject (something i am actually doing right now), and it is extremely clear that the people in this video have no idea what they are talking about and are just talking bullshit.
I disagree. Fascism is a distinctly right-wing movement.
The closest thing I can find to a consensus minimal definition is palingenetic ultranationalist populism(*).
Fascism isn't defined by economic policy. It's true that Mussolini claimed an economic "third way" balancing laissez-faire capitalism and state communism, but Italian fascists, Nazis, and others were all very flexible about what the hell their policies actually were, altering them greatly to attract targeted support. They were able to do this because fascism isn't really about policy-making at all. It's about myth and emotion.
Fascist movements are based on an appeal to a sense of corrupted national identity -- the order is fading and the nation needs zeal and unity and redemptive violence to restore its strength and purity. This myth inherently emphasizes nationalism, hierarchy, and order -- all pillars of the right. Fascism wraps these ideals up in the energy of populism rather than the language of the elites, but populism itself isn't a left-wing force -- and, ultimately, fascism, with its devotion to hierarchy and (fictionalized) national tradition, maintains the elites fairly comfortably despite its populism.
-- Alex
__________
* - Populism is political
discourse that focuses on "the people". Ultranationalism is mostly self-explanatory. Palingenesis is the myth of national rebirth.
