Fascism is Leftist
It would be nice, if, once and for all, the smear used by the Left of calling everyone who supports fascism “anti-fascist” and everyone who opposes fascism “fascist” were abolished and forgotten.
This lie, as all commonplace lies in the modern press and modern politics, is Leftist.
The designation of Left or Right, originally born in the politics of monarchic France, was co-opted by the Socialists to apply it to themselves, in order to cloak their totalitarian death-cult dogmas in the glamor and demeanor of pro-liberty and pro-equality measures popularized by the writings of Locke and Montesquieu and the success of the American Revolution.
Only by avoiding definitions, can the confusion of terms continue.
As used by Leftists, the word “Leftist” refers to any who support the overthrow of traditional institutions, monarchic or republican, the free market or the established church or the nuclear family, in favor of Socialist revolution, and “Right” refers to any opposition to that overthrow.
Since Hitler and Mussolini, both of them ardent socialists, preached the overthrow of traditional institutions in the name of halting Communism, the Communists listed them as “Rightwing” alongside the Monarchy, the Papacy, Established Protestant national churches of Europe, Imperial Japan, and the anti-monarchical disestablishmentarian republicans of America.
In other words, everyone but them.
The fact that the monarchies, the Church, and the republicans where deadly opponents to Nazis and Fascists, and, indeed, fought to global war to overthrow them, the Leftists pretended was a difference of degree, not of kind, and said that the Nazis were merely “more” anticommunist than monarchists or republicans, that is, all were rightwing, but the Nazis were “far” right.
The republicans of America, with her natural rights enshrined in law, freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, the right to bear arms and own property, are hence said by the Left to be theocratic militarist despotic Jew-killing eugenicists just like the Nazis, except that the Nazis are more so.
Of course, the Left also claim that Zionists are Nazis, so their claims do not suffer from the limitations of self-consistency or sanity.
When the fact is mentioned that the Nazis and Commies agree on every point of theory and practice, and disagree only on minutia, the Leftists quickly explain that the line describing the spectrum of possible political opinions was actually a circle, on the grounds that whatever trait it is that the spectrum actually measures, an extreme amount of it is the same as an extreme lack.
Such a trait does not exist, of course, so this circular spectrum is designed to be nonsensical.
This idea of a circular spectrum, which runs all the way from one kind of totalitarian socialism to another kind of totalitarian socialism, was taught as gospel in the schools in my youth, and reported as fact in newspapers.
Few ideas are stupider.
Imagine a thermometer to measure the temperature running in a circle, so that when more heat is added, somehow it measures as cold again. Whatever the circular instrument is measuring, therefore, cannot be increments of heat, or anything else.
As used by everyone but Leftists, the word “Leftist” refers to Socialists, who seek state control of industrial and economic activity; which means all human activity; which means the subordination of individuals to the collective; which means the denial of natural rights.
That this denial of natural rights is done in the name of natural rights shows only the insolent hypocrisy of the dogma. Leftism seeks to spread totalitarianism in the name of democracy; to erect a despotic Glorious Leader in the name of the people; to banish liberty in the name of equality; and banish equality in the name of liberty. They call themselves “Liberal” because liberty is what they wish to vanquish. (Perhaps this is akin to Apollo being called “Pythian” because he vanquished the monster Python.)
“Rightwing” refers, in America, to those upholding the Enlightenment theory of government based on natural law as articulated in the opening clauses of the Declaration of Independence.
In Europe, “Rightwing” refers to those upholding the post-Reformation nation-states, with established churches under the rule of monarchs, the aristocratic class, or some combination of the two.
Socialists come in two flavors: international socialists, called communists, and national socialists, called fascists.
The Nazis of Germany were the National Socialist German Worker’s Party. Note the word Socialist.
The Fascists of Italy proposes a collectivist program where all individualism was subordinated to the state, hence the term, “fascist” which refers to the fasci, a bundle of sticks which can be each broken separately, but not when bound together.
There are those who see the modern liberal system as being little more than a continuation of the project of the Enlightenment, which is to destroy traditional institutions.
The Enlightenment program in France, during the Terror, was certainly meant to destroy traditional institutions.
The Enlightenment program in the American colonies was explicitly and obviously meant to preserve our rights as Englishmen, granted by charter, and grounded in Common Law running back to medieval times, with roots on the Civic Law of Roman Britain, and the Canon Law, whose roots go to Moses, who lived in the Bronze Age. A more traditional basis for mutiny cannot be imagined.
The Enlightenment program in the American colonies was implicitly rediscovering and reimplementing restrictions on national governments which had been commonplace in Europe before the rise of the nation-state, namely, the limited forms of power known to medieval kings, who were hedged about with parliamentary charter, civic charter, canon law, the commons, and the barons and bishops.
There was no First Amendment in the Middle Age guaranteeing no national church would be established by the king, because there were no national churches in the Middle Ages.
The Enlightenment program in the American colonies was the program of restoring the powers of a monarchy to the Republican form of government, as was known to the Romans before Caesar, followed the spirit and letter of Samuel, who warned against, not the excesses nor abuses of monarchy, but against the existence of monarchy.
To erect a monarch above the other sons of Adam, as Thomas Hobbes says, is to erect a mortal god. As God Himself says to Samuel when the people clamored to be ruled by a king as other folk were: they have not rejected you, they reject me.
Socialism claims to be a continuation of the Enlightenment program of basing government on the natural rights of man rather than the divine right of kings.
But the claim is an outrageous and obvious lie, since socialism, by its nature, because it claims sovereignty over all economic activity hence over all thought, word, and deed of its subjects, cannot help but erect a governing despot who is above the law, less bound by natural law, religion, and tradition than even the most absolute of kings.
Leftism is socialism is leftism.
Leftism denies the natural rights of man by asserting a supremacy of one collective over another. The collective named to be supreme differs between differing flavors of leftism, but this difference is cosmetic, not substantial.
Allow me to quote in part from the 25 point program of the Nazi Party from 1920, which remained unchanged throughout the Third Reich.
We will mark which points align with Socialist hence Leftwing doctrine versus Constitutionalist hence Rightwing.
The first ten points establish a racial collective state, where members of different races are ruled under different laws. Affirmative Action, in other words. That is so remarkably and obviously leftwing as to need no further comment from me. See Black Lives Matter for details.
11. The abolition of incomes unearned by work.
This refers to interest from investments without which industrial activity cannot be privately funded. This is an implicit call to nationalize all investment. Socialist.
12. We demand therefore the ruthless confiscation of all war profits.
This is an explicit call to nationalize all military supply industries. Socialist.
13. We demand the nationalization of all businesses which have been formed into corporations (trusts).
This is an explicit call to nationalize all corporate industries. Socialist.
14. We demand profit-sharing in large industrial enterprises.
This is an explicit call for state control of terms of compensation. Socialist.
15. We demand the extensive development of insurance for old age.
This is an explicit call for socialized pensions. Socialist.
16. We demand … immediate communalizing of big department stores, and their lease at a cheap rate to small traders…
This is an explicit call for socialized retail. Socialist.
17. We demand a land reform suitable to our national requirements, the passing of a law for the expropriation of land for communal purposes without compensation; the abolition of ground rent, and the prohibition of all speculation in land.
This is an explicit call for communal farms, state control of rents, nationalization of investment in land. Socialist.
18. We demand the ruthless prosecution of those whose activities are injurious to the common interest. Common criminals, usurers, profiteers, etc., must be punished with death, whatever their creed or race.
Note the listing of common criminals with usurers and profiteers. This is the implicit criminalization of the free market. Socialist.
19. We demand that Roman Law, which serves a materialistic world order, be replaced by a German common law.
This is an explicit call for the elimination of the traditional judge-made sources of law, akin to Anglo-American Common Law, in favor of reformers and radicals.
The elimination of Common Law is the heart and soul of radicalism. Socialist.
20. The State must consider a thorough reconstruction of our national system of education
This is an explicit call for a nationalized public school system, to eliminate private and religious schooling. Socialist.
21. The State must ensure that the nation’s health standards are raised by … by prohibiting child labor, by promoting physical strength through legislation providing for compulsory gymnastics and sports….
Laws against child labor are core leftwing crusading goals, since before the time of Dickens. Compulsory gymnastics and sports was enacted into law in Ohio and California after the Civil War, so this one point, finally might be arguably rightwing or leftwing, depending on whether compulsory public education is.
My personal opinion is that compulsory public education is and always was socialist in origin and aim. See John Dewey for details.
22. We demand the abolition of the mercenary [i.e. professional] army and the formation of a people’s army.
A call for a conscript army rather than a professional army corps is socialist.
23. We demand legal warfare on deliberate political mendacity and its dissemination in the press.
This is a call to stop the spread of disinformation. Denies free speech. Socialist.
24. We demand freedom for all religious denominations in the State, provided they do not threaten its existence nor offend the moral feelings of the German race.
And this is a call to stop hate-speech. Like banning sermons that offend sodomites, curtailing religion in deference to secular authority is socialist. Socialism is a jealous god, and must destroy all other institutions, divine or human.
No further evidence is needed. Aside from the racism, there is nothing the Nazis propose that Left can claim to oppose.
And even their so-called opposition to racism is just the convenient Leftwing excuse to introduce racism into every American institution, in order to undermine those institutions by fomenting race warfare. This is because fomenting class warfare is futile in a classless society.
May we stop calling Nazis “rightwing” now?
May we stop the gaslighting?
About John C Wright
John C. Wright is a practicing philosopher, a retired attorney, newspaperman, and newspaper editor, and a published author of science fiction. Once a Houyhnhnm, he was expelled from the august ranks of purely rational beings when he fell in love; but retains an honorary title.
