No Stupid Questions

They have kinda always been a thing. Nazi's were just one flavor of nationalist, after all.

Charles de Gaulle defined nationalism best: "Patriotism is when love of your own people comes first; nationalism, when hate for people other than your own comes first."

For most people, it's extremely easy to blame others for problems of their own creation. By the same token, people who can't see their own shortcomings will also usually latch on to leaders who are able to amplify that bias. For the Nazis, it was mostly against the jews.

Also, what you are seeing in the news is partially amplified by the news itself but also, politicians are getting more brazen in mustering the support of those groups. This has lead to people being a little more open about something that needs to stay taboo, IMHO.

Because we have been letting them run their mouths again without being afraid.

You wana know how to get them to shut the fuck up look up why nazis don't go to punk shows anymore.

You want to get rid of them. You have 2 options 1 is illegal, and I can't say what it is, and option 2 is through education and thearpy and them wanting to change.

Dude I live in Ohio and see the confederate flag on porches. OHIO!!!! I'm so far north in Cleveland that only a lake seperates me from Canada!!!

We were NEVER part of the confederacy! And once you leave Cleveland area, into the rural farmlands, its all confederate flags and trump flags.

That should tell you everything you need to know.

There have always been susceptible idiots.

Nazi's are just a byproduct of an eroding standard of living. When things are good and getting better, there just isn't the fertile ground for that kind of ideology, even among the idiots.

When standard of living is on the decline? Anyone who gives a simple answer and a simple solution gets the attention of idiots.

Because a specific group of populists 'lost', but populism still works and will continue to work wherever there is people in dire situations.

The more dire your situation is, the more you need a solution. And then someone telling you "it's the fault of those other people", that just offers up a real straightforward supposed solution.

Even if it's pretty clear that it cannot possibly actually solve the real problem, the prospect of a mild improvement will have many going along and ignoring morals.

If you think your dad was sent to fight against the Nazis for ideological opposition, i have bad news for you. Maybe he personally fought out of that motivation, but must countries at the time were either fascist themselves or on the edge to fascism.

If you look at the US there was the ongoing genocide against native Americans, the racial segregation, eugenics, despicable human experimentation carried out on minorities, concentration camps for Japanese during WW2... Even the pledge to the flag in the schools was something Hitler admired and copied. Until the German Nazis became unpopular in the US the pledge to the flag with done with the "Bellamy Salute" that is the same as the Nazi salute. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bellamy_salute

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The truth is, they never left.

What is different though is that after WW2 it was understood which social problems, in particular fucking over the lower and middle class, create the breeding ground for fascism to be successful. Since the 1980s with Thatcher and Reagan and then the neoliberal wave over Europe, we had 40 years of deliberately empowering fascism. Now they reap what they sew.

Considering the Nazi’s were inspired by the US in many ways and the US continued promoting their racist opinions on immigrants, doing coups, and installing far right dictators around the world im more surprised the resurgence isnt bigger.

look at the genocide being funded and armed by the US in Palestine. Israel is invading and preparing for war with like 4? Countries already? Arguing they can rape people they detain and the US threatens the International Criminal Court after they deemed Netanyahu is a war criminal.

The US leads the world culture in a big way, the US is promoting an authoritarian who admires Hitler and the opposition to him continues sending bombs to a war criminal and threatens people who want to stop him.

Its been a long slow boil. And Nazis were only part of the problem. In the early 1930s many businessmen and Republicans in the US plotted a Hitler style coup against FDR. They did worse than Hitler, but escaped most consequences. And over the last century quietly plotted and built. Here and abroad. Fostering the "right kind" of fascism. Theirs.

It probably would have gone on a little longer. Because I don't think they were quite ready to actually try to coup again. But they've been socially engineering a new class of supremely manipulable Voters who lack any critical thinking skills. However a childish malignant narcissist managed to get the attention of that tool. And stole it from the Republican fascist. Basically largely spoiling the plot. And causing them to have to move before they were ready.

Also the ability for instance Global and often still largely Anonymous communication made propaganda easier and cheaper than ever before. The old style leaflet drops over territories were never very effective. And even radio broadcasts or easy to thwart. Now enemy Nations only need to pay a few people for online shitposting in hot beds lacking critical thinking. And they can turn their enemies people into their own tools.

capitalism. fascism is the logical conclusion of capitalism, so the entire world living in a capitalist society helps fascism rise. if you crush people's spirits hard enough, you can give them easy solutions to their problems so they can get off your scent.

no no, the billionaires are awesome; it's the immigrants honey. the education system would be awesome if not for drag queens baby. you would have healthcare but see it's all the DEI hire sweetie.

it's just lizard brain shit. "brown people bad" is just an easier and more convenient message to digest than trying to understand how the government and the economy actually works.

billionaires are so afraid of being taxed they'll happily fund people and groups who want to kill people who want to tax them.

Severely undereducated selfish people who think all of their problems is someone else’s or some other tribe’s fault.

Almost all Nazis share one common trait: a complete lack of empathy.

And almost all American Nazis share two additional traits: no critical thinking skills and gullibility.

They didn't lose. You're probably talking about Nazi Germany. Yes, that country lost. Doesn't mean Nazis in Germany magically disappeared. Doesn't mean Nazis anywhere else disappeared. Your dad never won over Nazis, just one particular Nazi country.

There is no "recent resurgence".

• 1. Nazis never went away. Underground Nazi groups, as well as fully fledged Nazi political parties were common throughout post-WWII Europe.
• 2. The people fighting the Nazis weren't ideologically much better than them. The Americans were still racist as fuck. The British and the French were imperialist world dominators. All of these allies were involved in their own genocides. The Soviets believed in sacrificing huge swaths of their own people to accomplish "great leaps forward".
• 3. Nazism and similiar ideologies are fundamentally based on in-group bias, and that is just something psychological. There will always be people who are more open to others and people who are less open to others.
• 4. If you look at recent wars, you will see that even the non-Nazi, "moderate", "liberal", "centrist" political parties can have blood on their hands and be complicit in atrocities very much reminiscent of the evil the Nazis committed.

I think the bottom line is, you have to unlearn a lot of the just-so narratives that you have been taught about the world.

Is your dad still around? Maybe he was holding them at bay.

As actual living memory fades away it almost seems like a natural inevitability. It is already as mythologicial to many as World War 1 cavalry.

I guess people like to be lied to. They prefer to live in their own imagined worlds fueled by lies and propaganda instead of facing real problems, finding solutions, and sometimes just admit to being wrong. This is why rectionaries are getting so much approval in our fast changing world. sometimes people are not ready for speed of those changes, do not forget not forget it hasnt been long time since we left our caves. and billionaires propaganda is making it's part too

It’s not just Nazis. The world is trending towards authoritarianism across the board, on the right and the left. Democratic and social institutions everywhere are failing. People don’t trust each other anymore.

The real problem: in the race to build massive civilizations we have destroyed all of our communities.

They weren't all executed, that's the deal

Millions of people died from COVID yet look how many denied its effects (and still do) and didn't/don't get vaccinated. Because it wasn't happening to them right there in their faces (and in some cases it was and they still denied it on their death beds). If people can't even learn from that as it happened in real time all around them, what hope do we have for people to care about and learn from things that happened 80-90 years ago?

My dad fought the Nazi's they lost

"Oh I'm sorry. How did they die?"

"Die? No, we lost them. And now we cannot find them"

"Oh there they are! Right there!"

Racism, discrimination, xenophobia, patriotism, nationalism, they will always exist. The question is how each society will handle them.

The US imported a LOOOT of Nazis to get access to research - Operation Paperclip. So Nazis in government jobs given immunity

It makes a lot of sense how that bled out

The Nazis, as all the populists, offered simple solutions to complex problems. The simple people who are struggling and/or in fear of change like that a lot.

Blackshirts and Reds by Michael parenti explains it very thoroughly and gives great historical context.

pdf audio