I never really seriously thought we could have a dictator here, until Trump showed up on the scene with the Tea Party and made his authoritarian attempt in 2016. I knew the country had authoritarian elements. But I didn't realize just how easy it was to go from wingnut cranks to a movement like Trumpism until I started reading Robert Altemeyer while Obama was still President. Trumpism is fascism. It is the latest incarnation of a system of government that underlay Monarchies and republics alike for most of history.
Until I saw Trump at work, As I've explained before, Trumpism predates Trump. But the word "Trump" perfectly describes the nature of the movement. It derives from joker, fool or con artist, and Trumpism started as a money grubbing con. A Trump card is a card that is, by the rules of the game, supreme, not by merits. Trumpism meets all the attributes of fascism. One can argue about how fascist they are, but not that they are. At it's beginning Trumpism lacked a youth movement, but that quickly changed as he either adopted, consumed or subsumed existing ones and created a few of his own.
- Hypernationalism
- Militarism
- Violence fetish
- Youth fetish
- Masculine fetish
- Leader cult fetish.
- Lost Golden Age fetish
- Self definition by opposition
- Mob behavior/Mass Mobilization & policy
- Hierarchy based on loyalty
- Theatricality!
All the attributes of fascism can be measured. As attributes they are present in movements, and governments. To a degree they are common. But the quantity and intensity of these attributes should be the way we judge whether our political opponents are behaving like fascists. You can measure a countries nationalism by its propaganda and reporting about it's peoples. And by its actions. Patriotism is normal. When a government starts killing or oppressing ethnic minorities and justifies it on a tribe, clan or nation as tribe, that is hypernationalistic. When a country is at peace with its neighbors and patriotism includes all the people living there, that is not hypernationalism.
All the tensional attributes in this list can be found (Patriotism vs nationalism, militarism vs readiness, fetishing youth for example) are present in more normal societies to a degree. And to ebb and flow towards or away from fascism is normal.
Fascism refers to the Punishing Power of the State
It is the degree and combination. When society becomes malevolent towards dissidents and minority groups, power combined with violence, that is fascist. The word fascism referred to the punishment power of the State. A fascist movement can seem downright anarchistic out of power, but fetishing official violence is a feature that is fascist. Fascism can emerge in a previously mildly authoritarian state top down, or it can start as a movement. In the case of Trumpism it started as several movements within the Republican party.
HyperNationalism
Hypernationalism, xenophobia, “us versus them,” another term is Chauvinism. politics against neighbor ethnic groups, these are features of fascism. In a normal republic, patriotism defends the republic, it's principles and people. In a fascist system loyalty to the state means loyalty to the central figure. In the run up to WW2, WW1 veterans who happened to be Jews, started out thinking that their patriotism would protect them from German Chauvinism. It doesn't.
Militarism
A feature of fascim is militarism. Sometimes that militarism is outwardly directed, but it usually is inwardly directed. That is, the militarism is a tool of control and power. A fascist movement usually employs cadres of agent provocateurs and thugs to beat up enemies and recruit adherents. These groups get called various names, black shirts, brown shirts, or proud boys. They run in paramilitary form. They infiltrate and eventually displace or become the police. And they wage war on internal enemies. Fascism as attributes can be left or right. But militarism is almost always a feature.
Violence Fetish
Fascism believes in violence. It's notion of “law and order” is perverse. To a fascist movement “enemy” and “criminal” often become synonymous. And heaven help people when a fascist movement has full governing power. The symbol of the "fascii", sticks for beatings and an axe for cutting off heads, explains why fascist movements resemble one another left or right, christian or moslem. Freedom is for the movement, its powers, and its leaders, everyone else must "freely obey." The fearless leader can do anything, so long as he pretends to live up to that myth.
Youth Fetish
Fascist movements depend on propaganda. Part of that propaganda is the notion that there is a utopia waiting for the children of the faithful. Fascist movements dream of 1000 year reigns and permanence. And they seek to get to that permanence by indoctrinating youth. Fascist youth movements provide shock troops for both representing dissidence within the country and for the wars that fascist movements usually pursue.
Masculine Fetish
Fascist leaders use words like “strong” or “powerful” to describe themselves and words like “weak”, “corrupt”, “swamp” for enemies. They often project their own fears and plans onto their targets. This masculine fetish goes with the violence. The leader must be a hero, a superman. Mao Tse Dung swimming the Yangtze, Putin riding a horse, Hitler or Mussolini standing tall and strong at a review stand. The followers carry guns or weapons to compensate for their own feelings of inadequacy.
Leader Cult Fetish
Fascist movements are basically cults, except usually larger scale. The leader, often full well knowing he is conning them, and the conned, top flying monkey knowing they are being conned but along for the ride – portray the leader as masculine, strong, a father figure, who can do no wrong. This happens in ordinary politics too, but, again, it is the degree to which a fascist movement or government does this that distinguishes it from democratic or more normal movements and governments.
Lost Golden Age
For all the bravado and claims of positivity, at heart most fascist movements live on resentment, fear and grievance. The propaganda message is always “It's not our fault. You were robbed!”, even as the kakacrats who usually lead such movements are looting and despoiling, dispossessing and conning their followers, they point to a lost past Golden age and/or dreams of a future golden age, to motivate their flock of goats to keep going forward and to attack enemies. For Hitler it was the "stabbed in the back narrative". For Mussolini it was Romes ancient glory. For Spain it was God, King and Catholic Church. Fascist movements brand themselves according to the people they are conning.
Self definition by opposition
An accomplished demagogue, like Trump, can turn anything into a motivation for this pigeons. Mask wearing, because it was promoted by his “enemies” (including doctors trying to save lives), became a rallying cry for Trump and his Trumpers, with tragic consequences. This part of propaganda puts a wedge between people who follow Trump and everyone else. It is part of his power strategy, part of the propaganda. The border wall is an example. It's not really about keeping out Mexicans, it was about defining his opposition to immigrants and minorities and giving it a symbol. Support the wall, you are with him. Think it's a bad idea? You are the enemy.
Mob Rule; Mass rule and mobilization
And of course, fascists blur the line between all the people and the people. To Trump, "the people" were his mob. Anyone not with him, was not part of his people.
Hierarchy based on loyalty
I'll be talking about this in more depth later. Balint Magyar describes the modern version of fascism as “the Mafia State”, the underlying archetypical image is of devoted followers kissing the Godfather's ring. In a fascist state, the ruling family is the state. Absolute monarchy was a form of fascism before the term was popular. In modern fascism, the Godfather is the State, violence and criminality are state tools. In classic fascism, devotion to the leader was mandatory and supposed to be unquestioning.
Propaganda
At the heart of fascism, classic or modern, is propaganda. In power fascist governments believe that might makes right, that the will can triumph over everything. And if you can't make a promise happen, you can pretend to make that promise happen. Some of the diabolical ways that totalitarian authoritarians do this were described in "Origins of Totalitarianism" by Hannah Arendt. If you can't make unemployment go away, starve the unemployed!
Theatrical
It is no accident that Trump rode his job at the "Celebrity Apprentice." Fascism at heart is always a deep fake. Insecure and narcissistic leaders. Tons of lies and and misrepresentations. Looting and kleptocracy. All running alongside theater designed to indoctrinate and entertain the masses. Trump's Presidency has been “Celebrity dictator Apprentice” and ran 6 seasons and is not yet over.
Hopefully it's cancelled
This post memorializes a mix of memes I created myself and ones I borrowed from others. I wrote it first with my cell phone and was having trouble editing it or it would have been published a while ago.
