Lemmy Support

I support this feature. But Wikipedia is not an authority on what fascism is. The dictionary attempts to describe the usage of a word in this case as it relates to an objective phenomenon. Before we can attempt this description, an understanding of the objective phenomenon must be had. We can rely on definitions for understood phenomena like water, jogging, or birds. But what exactly fascism is is a hotly debated topic, not a well understood phenomenon that we hold absolute knowledge and certainty of. Even your dictionary source admits it is a characterization of fascism, not exactly a definition.

A conservative will reason discursively that Hitler was a leftist, because the Left can be defined as more government, so Fascism is far left. In the same way, that buzzfeed employee could argue their own view of what misogyny is. To them, when a man spreads their legs in public, this is the sexist act of manspreading.

What these people (and you) are doing is taking a word that has a strongly negative connotation, arguing for an expanded categorization of this word in an attempt to rub off that connotation on something else. But all this succeeds in doing is devaluing said word.

Fascism has a negative connotation because its consequence was the death of 60-100 million people. That has nothing to do with Bernie supporters wanting to give people free healthcare. The "more government" connection (what even does 'more government' mean?) has to be proven more than circumstantial. Likewise, sexism has a negative connotation because of rape, women in the past not having basic rights like the right to vote, etc. But a man letting his balls get some air has nothing to do with that, even if people find it a little rude.

They have algebraically replaced a world phenomenon with a term, much like a mathematician replaces a quantity with the letter 'X' on paper. Then they have discursively reasoned using the term, not the phenomenon. You can find the length of a square's side from the root of the area. We have a square that is 4 cm^2^. So what is √4? Math tells us that it is ±2. So a square in real life can have a negative length? This is the lunacy that you will accept with analytical reasoning if you do not understand its premises.

So instead of lazily giving us a definition full of nebulous terms, why not prove to me that any similarities between modern Russia and the Fascist countries are more than circumstantial? What is the unity behind these particular examples? All states are militaristic. All states suppress real opposition. Authoritarianism is no realer than the boogeyman. Russia does not have a "strong regimentation of society" so you're just flat out wrong there.