Fascism, Nazism, Communism – All Species of Leftist Collectivism
This article is an opinion piece from Bill Lockwood. Catch American Liberty with Bill Lockwood weekly at 11 a.m. Saturdays on NewsTalk 1290.
The common university mis-teaching of fascism and collectivism is that “fascism” is a species of “right-wing” political philosophy. Nothing could be further from the truth.
The debate is not simply academics. Taught to hurl insults at conservative Constitutionalists, the slur that most frequently mimicked is that somehow those on the right are leaning into “fascism.” And fascism, as we all know, is something to be feared.
In truth, fascism, like its cousins, Nazism and Communism, is a leftist collectivist philosophy.
Fascism takes its name from the "fasces" —a bundle of rods bound together with a protruding blade. This was the symbol of authority dating back to ancient Roman times. Of particular interest is the fact that Benito Mussolini of WWII Italy was nothing akin to any “right-wing” conservative cause. He was for years on “orthodox Marxist” — an Italian Socialist.
Eugene Methvin, once editor of the popular Reader’s Digest, said that the difference between Lenin and Mussolini was “ephemeral; the similarities are fundamental.” Mussolini “considered himself a good socialist and revolutionary until a short three years before his ‘March on Rome.’ He always referred to his seizure of power as ‘the fascist revolution’ much as a Russian Bolshevik might refer to ‘the Soviet revolution.’ And to Italians the word ‘fasci’ means about the same as ‘Soviet’ to the Russians,” ("The Rise of Radicalism," quoted by William Hoar, The New American, 4-5-93, p. 26).
Hitler also, like Marx and Engels, was influenced by the teaching of Hegel. In "Mein Kampf" he admitted that he “studied Bismark’s Socialist legislation in its intention, struggle, and success.” As William Hoar comments, “Remember, this is a man ‘liberals’ are still trying to identify as a creature of the right.”
In the mid-twenties, Nazi leader Joseph Goebbels published an open letter to a Communist leader “assuring him that Nazism and Communism were really the same thing. ‘You and I,’ he declared, ‘are fighting one another, but we are not really enemies,” (William Shirer, "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich").
Nobel laureate Friedrich A. Hayek declared in his "Road to Serfdom" that “basically National Socialism and Marxism are the same.” Too many forget that Nazism was actually called “National Socialism.”
Foundational Core of All Three
Much more can be added above, but to establish the point more clearly, consider the under-pinning belief systems of all three.
First, the foundational core of all three is atheistic philosophy and a denial of universal right and wrong.
Karl Marx’s position is well-known. Hitler practically made a cult of Friedrich Nietzsche, who described himself as a “nihilist,” “immoralist,” “atheist,” and the “Antichrist.” Listen also to Mussolini’s fascist concept: “If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories of men who claim to be bearers of an external objective truth, then there is nothing more relativistic than fascist attitudes and activity …all ideologies are mere fictions,” (Quoted in M. Stanton Evans, The Theme is Freedom, p. 49-50).
Second, the absence of eternal values justified the use of force against society.
Actually, every system that denies the dignity of a God-created individual will inevitably resort to authoritarian power to control the masses. Values are created by power alone. Marx called for revolution, “Without revolution, socialism cannot develop.” Hitler’s hero Nietzsche preached, “A man filled with joyful determination and will to power is of greater value to the national community than an ingenious weakling.” Mussolini made clear that fascism “reaffirms the state as the true reality of the individual …” “For fascism the state is an absolute before which individuals and groups are relative.”
Third, all three systems hated Christianity which affirms the dignity and worth of the individual.
Hitler, for example, wrote that, “with the appearance of Christianity the first spiritual terror has been brought into the much freer old world.”
Fourth, all three systems are various species of a Collectivist style of government.
Communism is well-known here. Consider Hitler’s Nazism: “Our nation can only achieve permanent well-being from within the principle of placing the common interests before self-interest .. That our demands be realized, we demand the creation of a strong central power.”
What is the difference in that description and the following?
Against individualism, the fascist, everything is in the state, and nothing human or spiritual exists, much less has value, outside the state. In this sense fascism is totalitarian …the state, in fact, as the universal ethical will, is the creator of right.
All three systems devalue the individual; all three are forms of dictatorships; all three are brands of racism; and all three severely curtail freedom.
Fascism, like Communism and Nazism, is a creature of the Left. Perhaps today’s university professors should consider the fact that it is a complete opposite world-view for one to understand that our individual rights were bestowed by God and that government was only compacted by individuals to protect what God gave them. A far cry from “fascism.”
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