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[WeepingElf]

If Trump is a Nazi, so are many other post-WW2 authoritarians -- which really dilutes what the original Nazis did. Thing is, we already have a perfectly good term for people like him -- fascist.

The term “fascist” itself has been diluted due to overuse. It is no longer a “perfectly good term”. The euphemism treadmill rolls on.

Yes. In German, Faschisten is now almost exclusively by the radical left, and they overuse it a lot - which is the very reason why it has fallen out of favour in mainstream political discussion.

[Travis B.]

If Trump is a Nazi, so are many other post-WW2 authoritarians -- which really dilutes what the original Nazis did. Thing is, we already have a perfectly good term for people like him -- fascist.

The term “fascist” itself has been diluted due to overuse. It is no longer a “perfectly good term”. The euphemism treadmill rolls on.

Yes. In German, Faschisten is now almost exclusively by the radical left, and they overuse it a lot - which is the very reason why it has fallen out of favour in mainstream political discussion.

The problem is that the alternative, 'far-right', doesn't have quite the same bite nor does it really sum it all up as an ideology. It's unfortunate that leftists for a while there were calling conservatives in general 'fascists'...

[Torco]

ya, i wouldn't call maga a nazi movement, but i'd call it a fascist movement, and us nazis by all account enthusiastically support it.

but there's really no other option, fascist is always going to be a term used mostly by the left, cause it's gonna be naturally the left that's concerned when right wingers do fascist stuff, or inch closer to fascism, or capitulates to fascism, or starts implementing some form of fascism light. back in the bush years leftos would call ICE and the whole war on drugs and terrorism thing and the patriot act and the militarization of police, the surveillance-everywhere-don't-worry-it's-for-security thing fascist, not in the sense that "the us turns immediately into a carbon copy of italy in 37", but rather in the sense of "this is exactly the sort of rhetorical, material and political infrastructure that makes it much easier for any possible future fascist leader that may arise to, you know, do a fascism"

turns out, of course, leftos were in this correct. when the mainstream response to these early warnings is "but we are not in italy and it is not 1931", well, yeah, fascism really does sneak up on you.

[Man in Space]

The problem is that the alternative, 'far-right', doesn't have quite the same bite nor does it really sum it all up as an ideology. It's unfortunate that leftists for a while there were calling conservatives in general 'fascists'...

Is "alt-right" not used anymore?

[Travis B.]

The problem is that the alternative, 'far-right', doesn't have quite the same bite nor does it really sum it all up as an ideology. It's unfortunate that leftists for a while there were calling conservatives in general 'fascists'...

Is "alt-right" not used anymore?

I've noticed that 'alt-right' indeed isn't used much these days, being replaced by 'MAGA' and 'Trumpists'.

[WeepingElf]

The problem is that the alternative, 'far-right', doesn't have quite the same bite nor does it really sum it all up as an ideology. It's unfortunate that leftists for a while there were calling conservatives in general 'fascists'...

Is "alt-right" not used anymore?

I've noticed that 'alt-right' indeed isn't used much these days, being replaced by 'MAGA' and 'Trumpists'.

Probably because they are no longer alternative in the United States, but the ruling faction.

[Man in Space]

ya, i wouldn't call maga a nazi movement, but i'd call it a fascist movement, and us nazis by all account enthusiastically support it.

You mean “US” as in “United States” here, right?

[zompist]

Not quite what I said, but I did quote Charles Stross: "I don’t want my self-driving car to argue with me about where we want to go today. I don’t want my robot housekeeper to spend all its time in front of the TV watching contact sports or music videos."

That reminds me of another idea of mine: whatever may or may not happen with regard to full-fledged AIs, in the future, there might also be devices that would be what someone called "subsmart". Was that you, zompist? That is, such devices would be able to do all kinds of things traditionally seen as human work, but still wouldn't have "general" intelligence.

Yes, that's the term I used for the Incatena.

For instance, there might be a type of robot which would be able to cook, bake, brew, mix, and otherwise prepare a dizzying array of foods and meals and drinks from all the world's cuisines; which would be able to do basic repairs of all the devices and gadgets the average upper middle-class person in its time would be likely to own; which would be able to do all other kinds of odd jobs around the house that either have to be done all the time or might need doing every now and then; which would be able to provide any minor medical treatment that only requires a well-stocked first-aid kit; which would be able to form teams with other robots of the same type which would be able to play all of the world's major team sports at levels above the best human teams; and which would be good in bed almost independently of what the humans it would be with would be into; but which would still be completely helpless in any situation for which it wouldn't have been specifically programmed, because nothing would enable it to figure anything out on its own.

Most of what you're describing is simply a "servant". I can't say that people don't want servants, as many people obviously do, and some (e.g. the disabled or elderly) really need one. See any number of SF stories for robot servants.

My first reaction to this description is "Are you sure you want all this in one robot?" You want to share your life with a device which, per your description, is physically stronger than you and knows how your body works? That's an awful lot of confidence in manufacturers who, in every other area of life, have turned out to be careless and shortsighted. (And I don't just mean IT; it was a fight of decades to get cars that were not "unsafe at any speed", as Ralph Nader put it.)

I'm worried about smart refrigerators, doorbells that send their video to ICE, "Clouds" that sell all my data to advertisers, and cars that brick themselves if you don't pay the extra upgrade fee. I wouldn't trust a robot built by any of the current tech companies.

Admittedly this is a personal taste, but I also think it'd be cumbersome and overblown. Where do you store the thing; isn't it always getting in the way? Modern devices have eliminated 99% of the toil of a traditional household: washing machines, dryers, dishwashers, vacuum cleaners, microwaves, etc. I guess there is always a little bit more that could be eliminated, but the amount of work my wife and I need to do is pretty small. I'm happy with Trader Joe's food most of the time (that's Aldi Nord to you, though I don't know if the stores and products are similar); if I want something nicer I'd rather cook, or go out to eat. Major repairs are the building's responsibility; my doctor is a few blocks away; and I don't want to fuck a robot.

Maybe the elderly would like one. I can't help thinking of my mother: she had very strict standards about household work and had trouble even with actual human helpers. As for companionship, she would certainly prefer an hour with an actual friend or relative to 24 hours a day with a machine.

I've talked about Star Trek food duplicators before; I'm skeptical of devices that are supposed to cook anything you want. What if I was born in Sichuan and want, not just móyù shāo páigǔ, but the type my grandmother used to make? Cuisine is far more complex than most people think, not just a matter of recipes, but of ingredients, terroir, freshness, specialized implements, and a huge array of techniques.

This isn't to say that I don't want any more machines. I kind of wish we had a bread maker. Omigod would I ever want a Cintiq tablet/monitor. I recently drove a rental car with one of those rear-view cameras for parking; that was sweet. Everyone I know who has a 3-D printer gets a little crazy with it. I'm starting to think that a dazzle-style face mask to defeat face recognition systems should be developed and widely used.

The SF writer, and eventually humanity, will have to decide what they want human life to look like. Is it a cocoon of ease where a robot does everything for you— both your personal assistant/athlete/sexbot, and malloc's device that will feed you the anime of your dreams? To me that's a sinister vision, a world where humans have no actual purpose and no need to develop one. I'm much more interested in worlds where humans use automation as a tool, freeing themselves up for work they love, and interactions of all sorts with other human beings. Plus, y'know, didn't you see WALL-E?

I kinda think humans should still know how to do stuff, from growing things to making art to raising animals and children to working out problems with each other. And I think, as a nerdy American, I'm already way over on the accepting automation side of the continuum. My brother, for instance, is the sort to live in the woods, build his own house, take trucks apart, and in his spare time make his own music.

[Raphael]

Wow, thank you for that long, detailed, and thoughtful reply, zompist!

I hadn't really thought much about whether a robot like that would sell, or whether anyone would buy it, or whether anyone should buy it. I was more thinking in terms of what might be called "proof of concept".

I first got the idea for a robot like that when I read up on the RoboCup: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RoboCup

It got me thinking: If they can get robots to play soccer, why not integrate functionality for other team sports as well? And once you do that, why not even more functionality in other fields? And the ideas kept coming.

[Raphael]

Point taken. There is always the possibility that Trump will come up with a Final Solution to the Migrant Problem, but to our knowledge that hasn't happened yet. When and if that does happen, we can then actually compare Trump with Hitler. For the time being, though, we can only go by how things are now, rather than by extrapolating based on the assumption that Trump will seek to emulate the Nazis, with the slight substitution of foreign-looking people of color in general for Jews, Roma, Sinti, Communists, gays, disabled people, and like.

That seems to be you missing the point - the point which zompist makes there, and a similar point I myself made a while ago in a different discussion of a similar question.

Given that Hitler himself and his friends were clearly already Nazis before they had gotten around to committing genocide, it follows that committing genocide is not necessary to be a Nazi. Nazism is not a question of doing either specific bad things, or bad things in general. It's a question of ideology. So for me, a Nazi is someone who's either openly supporting Nazi ideology, or who's the type who might angrily demand retractions if you call them a Nazi because technically, you can't prove that their use of Nazi symbols, Nazi fashions, Nazi slogans, Nazi terminology, or some combination of those makes them a Nazi.

A skinhead who occasionally shouts "Hail Hitler" while listening to songs by their favorite white power bands is a Nazi even if they haven't personally taken part in any genocides yet.

And by the way, that seems to be the usual standard used for other political movements, too. If you spend a lot of time talking about how great conservatism is, most people would probably agree that you're a conservative, even if you've never done anything that might be stereotypically seen as a Thing Conservatives Do.

[Travis B.]

Point taken. There is always the possibility that Trump will come up with a Final Solution to the Migrant Problem, but to our knowledge that hasn't happened yet. When and if that does happen, we can then actually compare Trump with Hitler. For the time being, though, we can only go by how things are now, rather than by extrapolating based on the assumption that Trump will seek to emulate the Nazis, with the slight substitution of foreign-looking people of color in general for Jews, Roma, Sinti, Communists, gays, disabled people, and like.

That seems to be you missing the point - the point which zompist makes there, and a similar point I myself made a while ago in a different discussion of a similar question.

Given that Hitler himself and his friends were clearly already Nazis before they had gotten around to committing genocide, it follows that committing genocide is not necessary to be a Nazi. Nazism is not a question of doing either specific bad things, or bad things in general. It's a question of ideology. So for me, a Nazi is someone who's either openly supporting Nazi ideology, or who's the type who might angrily demand retractions if you call them a Nazi because technically, you can't prove that their use of Nazi symbols, Nazi fashions, Nazi slogans, Nazi terminology, or some combination of those makes them a Nazi.

A skinhead who occasionally shouts "Hail Hitler" while listening to songs by their favorite white power bands is a Nazi even if they haven't personally taken part in any genocides yet.

And by the way, that seems to be the usual standard used for other political movements, too. If you spend a lot of time talking about how great conservatism is, most people would probably agree that you're a conservative, even if you've never done anything that might be stereotypically seen as a Thing Conservatives Do.

Essentially, what you're saying is that because of the commonalities between Nazism and MAGA, one might consider MAGA to be a Nazi movement even though it has not committed genocide (yet) as genocide is not what made the original Nazis Nazis.

Of course, MAGA hasn't adopted Nazi symbols, Nazi fashions, Nazi slogans, or Nazi terminology, to use what you mention above as examples, unlike many latter-day Neo-Nazi movements.

That said, I would consider latter-day adherents of Nazism Neo-Nazis per se, and reserve the term 'Nazis' unqualified for the original Nazis.

Part of my hesitance to call MAGA 'Nazi', as I mentioned earlier, is if MAGA is Nazi, then many other post-WW2 authoritarians are also Nazis even if they have not engaged in genocide or adopted Nazi ideology and symbolism, thus reducing the significance of the term 'Nazi'.

[WeepingElf]

Essentially, what you're saying is that because of the commonalities between Nazism and MAGA, one might consider MAGA to be a Nazi movement even though it has not committed genocide (yet) as genocide is not what made the original Nazis Nazis.

Of course, MAGA hasn't adopted Nazi symbols, Nazi fashions, Nazi slogans, or Nazi terminology, to use what you mention above as examples, unlike many latter-day Neo-Nazi movements.

That said, I would consider latter-day adherents of Nazism Neo-Nazis per se, and reserve the term 'Nazis' unqualified for the original Nazis.

Part of my hesitance to call MAGA 'Nazi', as I mentioned earlier, is if MAGA is Nazi, then many other post-WW2 authoritarians are also Nazis even if they have not engaged in genocide or adopted Nazi ideology and symbolism, thus reducing the significance of the term 'Nazi'.

Precisely. The term "Nazi" should be used only for the historical Nazi party; later far-rightists who openly identify with the historical Nazis (e.g. by calling themselves "National Socialist Underground", waving a Nazi flag or shouting "Heil Hitler" in public) are neo-Nazis, and far-rightists who do not identify with them aren't Nazis at all; they are just far-rightists. There are many far-rightists who opine that the Nazis took it too far, for instance.

[Raphael]

Essentially, what you're saying is that because of the commonalities between Nazism and MAGA, one might consider MAGA to be a Nazi movement even though it has not committed genocide (yet) as genocide is not what made the original Nazis Nazis.

Yes.

Of course, MAGA hasn't adopted Nazi symbols, Nazi fashions, Nazi slogans, or Nazi terminology,

???? We keep running into examples of MAGAts who are using those.

That said, I would consider latter-day adherents of Nazism Neo-Nazis per se, and reserve the term 'Nazis' unqualified for the original Nazis.

Why? Really, why? Would you limit the term "socialist" to the original early-to-mid 19th century Utopian Socialists, too?

Part of my hesitance to call MAGA 'Nazi', as I mentioned earlier, is if MAGA is Nazi, then many other post-WW2 authoritarians are also Nazis even if they have not engaged in genocide or adopted Nazi ideology and symbolism,

Only if you use the "everything bad in politics is Nazism"-standard, which I've said myself I don't accept. My standard is about belonging to specific traditions. Traditions that might be called "intellectual traditions" if that wouldn't be a pretty inappropriate term in this context. People who speak of their love of Hitler clearly belong to the Nazi tradition.

thus reducing the significance of the term 'Nazi'.

Ah yes, the "significance" argument. You know what, as far as I can see, would really make the term "Nazi" insignificant? If it would really be accepted that no one born after 1945 could possibly be a Nazi. If no one younger than retirement age today, and no one born today or in the future, could possibly be a Nazi, what would be the point of educating people about how bad Nazism is?

Your worry seems to be that if everyone's a Nazi, no one is. Well, if no one's a Nazi, no one is, either.

Precisely. The term "Nazi" should be used only for the historical Nazi party; later far-rightists who openly identify with the historical Nazis (e.g. by calling themselves "National Socialist Underground", waving a Nazi flag or shouting "Heil Hitler" in public) are neo-Nazis,

Why? Why, why, why? What exactly makes you so vehemently pedantic on this point? Why bother?

Now, I suspect that many anti-Nazis got so passionate about never wanting to accept anything else as in any way like the original NSDAP as a kind of overreaction to the Historikersteit. Thing is, in my opinion, the Nazi apologist side of the Historikersteit wasn't completely wrong about the uniqueness or non-uniqueness of the Holocaust; they were just wrong about whether their arguments on that matter made sense as a starting point for Nazi apologetics. The at-least-trying-to-be-non-repulsive-human-beings side of the Historikersteit used the wrong counterarguments against the Nazi apologist side: instead of coming up with more and more special pleading to assert that the Holocaust really was unique, they should have simply argued forcefully against the whole idea that something has to be unique in order to be bad or evil or indefensible.

If someone would be accused of murder, and brought to trial under charges of murder, and would then try to defend themselves by saying "Yes, I murdered someone, but a lot of other people did that, too!", few people would take that defense seriously. But somehow, when the charge is mass murder, a whole lot of people in the more repulsive parts of the political spectrum, from the jingoists of many different countries all the way to the tankies, seem to think that's a very good point. Complete nonsense, as far as I'm concerned.

[Travis B.]

Of course, MAGA hasn't adopted Nazi symbols, Nazi fashions, Nazi slogans, or Nazi terminology,

???? We keep running into examples of MAGAts who are using those.

There are plenty of MAGAts in the area where I live, yet I haven't seen or heard of them displaying variants on the Nazi flag (including things like the flag where green replaces red and the Celtic cross replaces the swastika), using the Nazi eagle, marching around in brown uniforms, proclaiming 'Heil Hitler!' or using code like 'HH' or '88', using terms like 'Aryan' or 'Nordic', and so on. The MAGAts have their own symbolism and language independent of that of the Nazis.

As for the MAGAts who do adopt such things, they probably are Neo-Nazis. I am not claiming that there is not an overlap, just that for the most part MAGAt is symbolically distinct from Nazism.

That said, I would consider latter-day adherents of Nazism Neo-Nazis per se, and reserve the term 'Nazis' unqualified for the original Nazis.

Why? Really, why? Would you limit the term "socialist" to the original early-to-mid 19th century Utopian Socialists, too?

The Utopian Socialists don't have one of the greatest crimes in all of history to their name.

Part of my hesitance to call MAGA 'Nazi', as I mentioned earlier, is if MAGA is Nazi, then many other post-WW2 authoritarians are also Nazis even if they have not engaged in genocide or adopted Nazi ideology and symbolism,

Only if you use the "everything bad in politics is Nazism"-standard, which I've said myself I don't accept. My standard is about belonging to specific traditions. Traditions that might be called "intellectual traditions" if that wouldn't be a pretty inappropriate term in this context. People who speak of their love of Hitler clearly belong to the Nazi tradition.

Thing is, MAGA is clearly distinct from the Nazi tradition, even though there are MAGAts who are also Neo-Nazis.

thus reducing the significance of the term 'Nazi'.

Ah yes, the "significance" argument. You know what, as far as I can see, would really make the term "Nazi" insignificant? If it would really be accepted that no one born after 1945 could possibly be a Nazi. If no one younger than retirement age today, and no one born today or in the future, could possibly be a Nazi, what would be the point of educating people about how bad Nazism is?

Your worry seems to be that if everyone's a Nazi, no one is. Well, if no one's a Nazi, no one is, either.

There are groups in modern times that belong to the Nazi tradition, such as WeepingElf's example of the National Socialist Underground, and I would call them Neo-Nazi.

Precisely. The term "Nazi" should be used only for the historical Nazi party; later far-rightists who openly identify with the historical Nazis (e.g. by calling themselves "National Socialist Underground", waving a Nazi flag or shouting "Heil Hitler" in public) are neo-Nazis,

Why? Why, why, why? What exactly makes you so vehemently pedantic on this point? Why bother?

Now, I suspect that many anti-Nazis got so passionate about never wanting to accept anything else as in any way like the original NSDAP as a kind of overreaction to the Historikersteit. Thing is, in my opinion, the Nazi apologist side of the Historikersteit wasn't completely wrong about the uniqueness or non-uniqueness of the Holocaust; they were just wrong about whether their arguments on that matter made sense as a starting point for Nazi apologetics. The at-least-trying-to-be-non-repulsive-human-beings side of the Historikersteit used the wrong counterarguments against the Nazi apologist side: instead of coming up with more and more special pleading to assert that the Holocaust really was unique, they should have simply argued forcefully against the whole idea that something has to be unique in order to be bad or evil or indefensible.

If someone would be accused of murder, and brought to trial under charges of murder, and would then try to defend themselves by saying "Yes, I murdered someone, but a lot of other people did that, too!", few people would take that defense seriously. But somehow, when the charge is mass murder, a whole lot of people in the more repulsive parts of the political spectrum, from the jingoists of many different countries all the way to the tankies, seem to think that's a very good point. Complete nonsense, as far as I'm concerned.

Even if we accept that Neo-Nazis are 'Nazis', the matter is that there are other far-right ideologies, e.g. MAGA, that are largely not part of the Nazi tradition, even if there is a degree in overlap of the membership.

[Raphael]

That said, I would consider latter-day adherents of Nazism Neo-Nazis per se, and reserve the term 'Nazis' unqualified for the original Nazis.

Why? Really, why? Would you limit the term "socialist" to the original early-to-mid 19th century Utopian Socialists, too?

The Utopian Socialists don't have one of the greatest crimes in all of history to their name.

The Stalinists do, and I have absolutely no problem with calling today's tankies "Stalinists", instead of insisting that there has to be some kind of new term like "neo-Stalinists" for them.

Even if we accept that Neo-Nazis are 'Nazis', the matter is that there are other far-right ideologies, e.g. MAGA, that are largely not part of the Nazi tradition, even if there is a degree in overlap of the membership.

*shrug* I'm not that much interested in being very very precise about the important difference between Nazis and followers of movements that have, as you put it, "a degree in overlap of the membership" with the Nazi movement.

[Torco]

ya, i wouldn't call maga a nazi movement, but i'd call it a fascist movement, and us nazis by all account enthusiastically support it.

You mean “US” as in “United States” here, right?

lmao totally, yes. US nazis, caps intentional on both accounts

[Travis B.]

Why? Really, why? Would you limit the term "socialist" to the original early-to-mid 19th century Utopian Socialists, too?

The Utopian Socialists don't have one of the greatest crimes in all of history to their name.

The Stalinists do, and I have absolutely no problem with calling today's tankies "Stalinists", instead of insisting that there has to be some kind of new term like "neo-Stalinists" for them.

I would not be against calling modern-day Stalinists 'neo-Stalinists' myself, but there is no established tradition of doing so

Even if we accept that Neo-Nazis are 'Nazis', the matter is that there are other far-right ideologies, e.g. MAGA, that are largely not part of the Nazi tradition, even if there is a degree in overlap of the membership.

*shrug* I'm not that much interested in being very very precise about the important difference between Nazis and followers of movements that have, as you put it, "a degree in overlap of the membership" with the Nazi movement.

I'm speaking from the perspective of someone living here in the US, in an area with plenty of MAGAts, where it is clear that there is a distinction ideologically and symbolically between the MAGAts here and National Socialism.

[WeepingElf]

This is a meaningless battle of words; count me out. But I have to think of something Ralph Giordano, a German Jewish writer who had survived in exile in the UK, once said. He objected against calling the Nazis "fascists" because the Italian Fascists were nowhere near as murderous and as efficient as the German Nazis - they wouldn't have managed to murder so many people even if they had wanted to, because they couldn't get the trains to run in time and all that.

[Raphael]

ZBB question: given that I've changed my settings to always hide my online status a while ago, I wonder: can zompist himself, as an Admin, see me when I'm online?

[bradrn]

ZBB question: given that I've changed my settings to always hide my online status a while ago, I wonder: can zompist himself, as an Admin, see me when I'm online?

I still have admin privileges from when I helped upgrade the board a while back; I don’t actively use them, but I can confirm that I can see the status of all users, including yourself — though it puts your name in italics as a signal that other users can’t see you.