I feel sick reading this. It's like watching a lobotomy.
While nationalism has been a prominent feature of the exceedingly few examples of real-life fascist states, fascism is not a component of nationalism, and the chatbot (which is what ChatGPT is in reality) seems written to conflate weighted options creating a false binary divide; left/right.
There's no left/right in ideology or in politics, never was and never will be - it is purely mental imagery originating with the british (originally roman) style of parliament with one side being incumbent and the other in opposition, and with how the governing assembly before and during the French Revolution was seated.
It has been something which has depressed me for decades, that centuries old seating arrangements have created a doxa about politics and ideologies which simpy is no more true than the doctrine of signatures.
Liberalism must always be separated into basic/classic and neo-varieties, as they are very different beasts indeed, as different to each other as national socialism and socialist democracy was.
Communism must be understood based on the main cultures that have tried to implement it: russian, german, chinese, korean, and a couple of others. While ruthless, there's a world of difference between the german post WW2-communism and present-day chinese such.
Fascism must be narrowed down and specified in the same way. The original version grew out of italian marxism and communism, when Mussolini realised that international communism in reality meant that every nation which turned communist would become a de facto political vassal under Lenin's Russia - the solution was to introduce romantic neostalgic nationalism instead of atheistic in-theory humanitarian and egalitarian internationalism. One could say that Mussolini's fascism née marxist communism was simply nothing more than honest communism with the semantics and rethorics filed off and replaced with the aforementioned neostalgic romanticism.
Sorry for the ramble, but I'm "professionally upset" by the stupidity called AI, which will soon infect the greater majority with a doctrinate purity not seen since before Luther and Gutenberg.
What can I tell you? There was a Marxist reading club at the U of Zurich, and there are many deeply 'red' associations elsewhere today. In the West.
Of course, they do employ the same sleight-of-hand as ChatGPT, that is, they refer to the 'mistakes' of communism's prior application. For them, it cannot, never ever, be about the in-built problems of that particular creed.
Like you, I'm flabbergasted at the distortion wrought by 'AI', and the one thing that one can do is: heap scorn on this kind of BS.
As to you pointing to differences between various national cultures in applying, or 'doing' communism, there is at least one common variable: violence vs. any opposition. Since you bring up Mussolini, Antifa's outfits--ironically, they run around all in black, much like Mussolini's shock troops--and demeanour shows this clearly: victory goes to those who are more ruthless than their opponents. Same with 'BLM', which, in the absence of anything even closely resembling law enforcement, soon degenerated into orgies of gratuitous violence ('fiery, but mostly peaceful'), egged on by the 'support' of politicians with ulterior motives.
Don't forget that, historically speaking such debasing times also generated a backlash.
Antifa is just getting back to their roots, really. This time, there's no SA to fight them.
Fascism and communism wasn't even more violent or oppressive than previous systems and regimes, they were just able to be better at it thanks to industrialisation and modern communications, both logistics-wise and logistically.
Imagine a Spanish Inquisition with access to drones, Facebook ("Popebook"?), e-money and so on - there's zero possibility or probability that they hadn't used the tech to its fullest extent according to their system of ideas.
(Which ironically enough is me using the original marxist understanding of history as a action/reaction between technology and natural science and the implementation of same by social science and culture.)
Recently I was in Prague for work and I can recommend a visit to the Communism Museum, it will leave one under no illusions as to the failings of that particular 'ism' which reigned in Czech and Slovakia after World War II.
I also picked up Vaclav Havel's, "Power of the Powerless", his political essay from 1978 (the period between Czechoslovakia's crushed revolution of 1968 "Prague Spring" and their successful "Velvet Revolution" in 1988. I find it to be much more than just a critique of the Communist regime of his day, criticizing any and all totalitarian systems which suppress individual expression and freedom. It startlingly speaks to our present moment of increasing censorship and growing state authoritarianism in the so-called West.
The copy I picked up is from 2018 at the height of Trump Derangement Syndrome and features a predictable foreword by the American academic Timothy Snyder though it might as well have been written Chat GPT. What I am increasingly sensing is a disconnect by those who see themselves as 'non-right', in that they are filled with such self-righteousness they are blinded to their own failings and hypocrisies. I fear we are stumbling if not sleep-walking into a new totalitarianism.
Did you see the Dems try to censor RFK at the hearings on censorship yesterday? I know it's cliche at this stage but, "the center cannot hold" much longer, oder?
I think 'the centre' has been breached a while ago, esp. as the censorship of RFK dovetails with the persecution, based on frivolous, if not outright treasonous, grounds of Trump. Moreover, if you happen to have watched De Santis press conference about the alleged book bans in Florida, you'd also see that legacy media turned away when he showed these 'children's books'.
As to Havel, well, he's among the first people whose writings I suggest to the rare student who asks for 'more'. (One did so in the past three years, but the effect of Havel's essays was revelatory, he later told me.)
I do think that the post-Cold War accounts--illusions--of communisms are a great curse and a kind of mind-virus that infected our body politics, even though, to stay with the metaphor, our body politics were chronically sick for some time before its most recent iteration, Woke-ism, reared its ugly head.
The difference between the theory and practice of fascism is much narrower than in communism. In this sense communism is a much more radical -ism. Temporary dictatorship of proletariat is mostly a theoretical concept which in practice always ends up in a permanent totalitarianism led by the “new class”. Interestingly, the other foundational communist belief which ChatGPT doesn’t seem to mention is that in communism the state eventually withers away, but that can never happen in practice. The end result is always furthering of totalitarian rule to prevent the rise of any competitive center of power. After all potential competition is eliminated, any reforms to ease off on totalitarianism will result in the eventual collapse of the system because the “new class” desires to transform itself into a capitalist oligarchy.
The new totalitarianism is the dystopian combination of the worst of both historical totalitarianisms in service of the global capitalist oligarchy. It is what Sheldon Wolin described as inverted totalitarianism, with no strong man and no strong party. The system is embedded into the technocratic rule of the deep state structures through which global capitalist oligarchy rules directly. The existing national governments are essentially sidestepped and become toothless and are allowed to exist as a modern day Potemkin Village solely to fool the populace into believing they still live under their previous “constitutional” frameworks. While Fascist and Communist regimes have their “leader”, no such leader is either desirable or needed in the inverted totalitarianism. The ideal top figure is an utterly corrupt oligarchical figurehead servant. Joe Biden may be considered an epitome of such figurehead.
Excellent points, esp. the first one about the alleged--envisioned--'withering away' of the state. I think it's very fair to assume that this is, quite likely, the last thing that's on the minds of these revolutionary zealots.
I also fear that Wolin was correct, in particular about the US; it remains to be seen if that also applies elsewhere. You write, very aptly, that
'existing national governments are essentially sidestepped and…allowed to exist as a modern day Potemkin Village solely to fool the populace into believing they still live under their previous “constitutional” frameworks. While Fascist and Communist regimes have their “leader”, no such leader is either desirable or needed in the inverted totalitarianism. The ideal top figure is an utterly corrupt oligarchical figurehead servant.'
Spot-on. Reminds me a bit of what Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf, though, when he chastised parliamentary republics in the mould of Western Liberalism. (Mind you, I'm not alleging you're preaching Hitler's creed, I just noticed the similarities.)
I feel sick reading this. It's like watching a lobotomy.
While nationalism has been a prominent feature of the exceedingly few examples of real-life fascist states, fascism is not a component of nationalism, and the chatbot (which is what ChatGPT is in reality) seems written to conflate weighted options creating a false binary divide; left/right.
There's no left/right in ideology or in politics, never was and never will be - it is purely mental imagery originating with the british (originally roman) style of parliament with one side being incumbent and the other in opposition, and with how the governing assembly before and during the French Revolution was seated.
It has been something which has depressed me for decades, that centuries old seating arrangements have created a doxa about politics and ideologies which simpy is no more true than the doctrine of signatures.
Liberalism must always be separated into basic/classic and neo-varieties, as they are very different beasts indeed, as different to each other as national socialism and socialist democracy was.
Communism must be understood based on the main cultures that have tried to implement it: russian, german, chinese, korean, and a couple of others. While ruthless, there's a world of difference between the german post WW2-communism and present-day chinese such.
Fascism must be narrowed down and specified in the same way. The original version grew out of italian marxism and communism, when Mussolini realised that international communism in reality meant that every nation which turned communist would become a de facto political vassal under Lenin's Russia - the solution was to introduce romantic neostalgic nationalism instead of atheistic in-theory humanitarian and egalitarian internationalism. One could say that Mussolini's fascism née marxist communism was simply nothing more than honest communism with the semantics and rethorics filed off and replaced with the aforementioned neostalgic romanticism.
Sorry for the ramble, but I'm "professionally upset" by the stupidity called AI, which will soon infect the greater majority with a doctrinate purity not seen since before Luther and Gutenberg.
What can I tell you? There was a Marxist reading club at the U of Zurich, and there are many deeply 'red' associations elsewhere today. In the West.
Of course, they do employ the same sleight-of-hand as ChatGPT, that is, they refer to the 'mistakes' of communism's prior application. For them, it cannot, never ever, be about the in-built problems of that particular creed.
Like you, I'm flabbergasted at the distortion wrought by 'AI', and the one thing that one can do is: heap scorn on this kind of BS.
As to you pointing to differences between various national cultures in applying, or 'doing' communism, there is at least one common variable: violence vs. any opposition. Since you bring up Mussolini, Antifa's outfits--ironically, they run around all in black, much like Mussolini's shock troops--and demeanour shows this clearly: victory goes to those who are more ruthless than their opponents. Same with 'BLM', which, in the absence of anything even closely resembling law enforcement, soon degenerated into orgies of gratuitous violence ('fiery, but mostly peaceful'), egged on by the 'support' of politicians with ulterior motives.
Don't forget that, historically speaking such debasing times also generated a backlash.
Antifa is just getting back to their roots, really. This time, there's no SA to fight them.
Fascism and communism wasn't even more violent or oppressive than previous systems and regimes, they were just able to be better at it thanks to industrialisation and modern communications, both logistics-wise and logistically.
Imagine a Spanish Inquisition with access to drones, Facebook ("Popebook"?), e-money and so on - there's zero possibility or probability that they hadn't used the tech to its fullest extent according to their system of ideas.
(Which ironically enough is me using the original marxist understanding of history as a action/reaction between technology and natural science and the implementation of same by social science and culture.)
Recently I was in Prague for work and I can recommend a visit to the Communism Museum, it will leave one under no illusions as to the failings of that particular 'ism' which reigned in Czech and Slovakia after World War II.
I also picked up Vaclav Havel's, "Power of the Powerless", his political essay from 1978 (the period between Czechoslovakia's crushed revolution of 1968 "Prague Spring" and their successful "Velvet Revolution" in 1988. I find it to be much more than just a critique of the Communist regime of his day, criticizing any and all totalitarian systems which suppress individual expression and freedom. It startlingly speaks to our present moment of increasing censorship and growing state authoritarianism in the so-called West.
The copy I picked up is from 2018 at the height of Trump Derangement Syndrome and features a predictable foreword by the American academic Timothy Snyder though it might as well have been written Chat GPT. What I am increasingly sensing is a disconnect by those who see themselves as 'non-right', in that they are filled with such self-righteousness they are blinded to their own failings and hypocrisies. I fear we are stumbling if not sleep-walking into a new totalitarianism.
Did you see the Dems try to censor RFK at the hearings on censorship yesterday? I know it's cliche at this stage but, "the center cannot hold" much longer, oder?
I think 'the centre' has been breached a while ago, esp. as the censorship of RFK dovetails with the persecution, based on frivolous, if not outright treasonous, grounds of Trump. Moreover, if you happen to have watched De Santis press conference about the alleged book bans in Florida, you'd also see that legacy media turned away when he showed these 'children's books'.
As to Havel, well, he's among the first people whose writings I suggest to the rare student who asks for 'more'. (One did so in the past three years, but the effect of Havel's essays was revelatory, he later told me.)
I do think that the post-Cold War accounts--illusions--of communisms are a great curse and a kind of mind-virus that infected our body politics, even though, to stay with the metaphor, our body politics were chronically sick for some time before its most recent iteration, Woke-ism, reared its ugly head.
The difference between the theory and practice of fascism is much narrower than in communism. In this sense communism is a much more radical -ism. Temporary dictatorship of proletariat is mostly a theoretical concept which in practice always ends up in a permanent totalitarianism led by the “new class”. Interestingly, the other foundational communist belief which ChatGPT doesn’t seem to mention is that in communism the state eventually withers away, but that can never happen in practice. The end result is always furthering of totalitarian rule to prevent the rise of any competitive center of power. After all potential competition is eliminated, any reforms to ease off on totalitarianism will result in the eventual collapse of the system because the “new class” desires to transform itself into a capitalist oligarchy.
The new totalitarianism is the dystopian combination of the worst of both historical totalitarianisms in service of the global capitalist oligarchy. It is what Sheldon Wolin described as inverted totalitarianism, with no strong man and no strong party. The system is embedded into the technocratic rule of the deep state structures through which global capitalist oligarchy rules directly. The existing national governments are essentially sidestepped and become toothless and are allowed to exist as a modern day Potemkin Village solely to fool the populace into believing they still live under their previous “constitutional” frameworks. While Fascist and Communist regimes have their “leader”, no such leader is either desirable or needed in the inverted totalitarianism. The ideal top figure is an utterly corrupt oligarchical figurehead servant. Joe Biden may be considered an epitome of such figurehead.
Excellent points, esp. the first one about the alleged--envisioned--'withering away' of the state. I think it's very fair to assume that this is, quite likely, the last thing that's on the minds of these revolutionary zealots.
I also fear that Wolin was correct, in particular about the US; it remains to be seen if that also applies elsewhere. You write, very aptly, that
'existing national governments are essentially sidestepped and…allowed to exist as a modern day Potemkin Village solely to fool the populace into believing they still live under their previous “constitutional” frameworks. While Fascist and Communist regimes have their “leader”, no such leader is either desirable or needed in the inverted totalitarianism. The ideal top figure is an utterly corrupt oligarchical figurehead servant.'
Spot-on. Reminds me a bit of what Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf, though, when he chastised parliamentary republics in the mould of Western Liberalism. (Mind you, I'm not alleging you're preaching Hitler's creed, I just noticed the similarities.)
Fascism and communism are two wings of the same bird, basically.