Nah, thats just your bubble.. the overwhelming majority of people I talk to use the term liberal to mean classically liberal, and use some other term for DNC type liberalism (either neoliberal or progressive depending who you talk to)... now keep in mind most people arent that aware of the technical usage of terms either, so its a bit of a mess int hat regard.
There are certainly some pretty hallmark fascist things he has done.. military parades are sterotypical fascism for examples... I think the issue is the other way around, fascism can be pretty bad, and while i dont support it, there are milder forms of fascism (like military parades).
Now I am pretty sure I can say Trump leads more towards the fascism side of the spectrum.. but whether he is "mildly" fascist or extremely fascist leaves some room for debate.
#3 is only correct when you ignore the huge percentage of people who dont vote at all... once you factor that in a majority of whites did **not** vote and support Trump.
Even liberal is a messy term... classiclly liberal (as in personal freedoms).. no the DNC is very anti-liberal in that sense... liberal in the sense of focusing on social programs, yea in that form of the word liberal they do have that tendency (and is the reason i myself lean left)... sadly they are generally fairly self-destructive in how they execute that to the point of doing more harm than good on execution.
I dont expect any amount of logic to convince you... but generally (this is from wikipedia) the properties of fascism are:
dictatorial leader
centralized autocracy
militarism
forcible suppression of opposition
I see the left expressing these things in spades, at least from the far-left which dominates the left scene (I myself am centrist-left and wouldnt include myself in this, or any of the small-minority centrist-lefts)
dictorial leader is clear, the DNC left routinely expresses the idea that any choice other than them is unacceptable, and supporting even third-party candidates is usually meat with aggressive abuse from many on the left.
centralized autocracy - this goes hand in hand with the last point
militarism - Absolutely, both sides have done little to nothing to reduce our overwhelming waste on military funding.
forcible suppress of opposition - this one is the most evident for me. We have seen it in the violent riots at universities where right-wing people intend to speak to the point of damaging equipment or threatening lives all to suppress opposition. Also botht he right and the left actively suppress third-parties.
Calling yourself a thing doesnt make you that thing, likewise saying your not a thing doesnt make you not that thing... The left behave as fascists behave, ergo they are fascist regardless of what they claim they are.
Next time there is a police buyback program that offers 200$ per gun ill set up a little shop next door that says "We buy guns, 250$ per gun!"
I dont think people who support trump support him **because** he is fascist. But I do think that if you voted for trump you voted for a person who clearly has fascist tendencies...
Now that said I would say the same about voting democrat, equally so if you vote democrat you are voting for fascism, just of a different flavor.
Supporting either party right now is a support for fascism in my eyes.
If the argument is people who self-identify as white, regardless of if they are actually white or not, are likely to be fascist, I could see that as probably being true.
I'd imagine many people who are white, but dont support fascism, are also less likely to identify with any color and likely are the people who are more likely to check "unspecified"
I think his issue isnt just that the gun shops themselves support the NRA, but also that the gun manufacturers support the NRA.
He could custom-build though. You can buy the parts from third-parties and assemble yourself. Lots of gun people do that.
Its not the definition of fascist that is so much the problem (perhaps a bit)... at least not for me. I'd tend to agree if you support Trump you support fascism.. the bigger issue was the comment about "white people" and how to even define who is white or not.
I think it was the part about white people being overwhelmingly fascist... that would be hard to quantify (im not even sure how to objectively measure someones whiteness).. let alone probably not true even if we take a loose definition.
Given where your interests lie I suspect you might find it interesting.
@koherecoWatchdog @LouisIngenthron @kctipton @andytiedye
I should also point out, to confuse things more, I see two forms of extremism at play... there is extremism of views,a nd extermism of application. A peaceful levelheaded communist willing to discuss philosophy in good faith might have an extremism of views, but is not particularly extreme in their application... meanwhile a more moderate left person who will block you if you have any deviation of opinion, or might be violent and cause riots in support of hillary might not have the most extreme views but clearly extreme in their application.
So to muddy the waters more I have a tendency to lump these two together when i talk about "far-left", which may not be the best for communication purposes.
@TruthSandwich I just double checked.. you are correct, the numbers I was looking at was from before the primaries were over.
All examples I would agree with here. My avoidance of giving examples is largely just because i expect this to be followed by a toxic shit storm, blocks, and just general fruitlessness.... I hope im wrong.
@andytiedye @freemo @kctipton Freemo may not want to give out examples, but I'll wade into that muck. I'm a left-leaning-centrist with libertarian tendencies, so most of what I define as "far left" are good ideas at their core, but taken to the extreme.
A good example is gun control. Most Americans (including most gun owners) are in favor of reasonable gun control. The far left takes this to the extreme, though, and advocates outright banning of guns, usually based on arbitrary factors like what shape or color they are.
A second, quick example would be the whole "forgive student loans" thing. That was entirely driven by the far left in this country.
Another example is environmentally friendly cars. Most people are for electric vehicle subsidies, and improving charger infrastructure... to an extent. But California's attempt to ban non-electric vehicles (while its grid still runs more than 50% on natural gas, and the state faces widespread power shortages!) is endemic of far-left thinking, putting the cart before the horse.
Finally, you have free speech. Both the far left and the far right threaten free speech, but from opposite directions. The far right wants to ban books about homosexuality, while the far left wants the state to punish "disinformation" and charge Trump with incitement over nonsense (a lefty account I saw recently suggested he should be indicted for using the word "fight" on Truth Social, despite the fact that Dems use that term to refer to 'electoral fights' just as often).
So, yeah, I have to agree with Freemo that it's one of those things where, if you can't see it, it might be because you're in the middle of it.
@TruthSandwich Without counting super delegates the breakdown of delegates was:
Hillary: 829
Bernie: 1048
Bernie clearly had majority. Wth super delegates however it was:
Hillary: 1298
Bernie: 1076
@Sioctan Ewww thats just wrong, elves arent supposed to be teal, wtf!
Jeffrey Phillips Freeman
Innovator & Entrepreneur in Machine Learning, Evolutionary Computing & Big Data. Avid SCUBA diver, Open-source developer, HAM radio operator, astrophotographer, and anything nerdy.
Born and raised in Philadelphia, PA, USA, currently living in Utrecht, Netherlands, USA, and Thailand. Was also living in Israel, but left.
Pronouns: Sir / Mister
(Above pronouns are not intended to mock, i will respect any persons pronouns and only wish pronouns to show respect be used with me as well. These are called neopronouns, see an example of the word "frog" used as a neopronoun here: http://tinyurl.com/44hhej89 )
A proud member of the Penobscot Native American tribe, as well as a Mayflower passenger descendant. I sometimes post about my genealogical history.
My stance on various issues:
Education: Free to PhD, tax paid
Abortion: Protected, tax paid, limited time-frame
Welfare: Yes, no one should starve
UBI: No, use welfare
Racism: is real
Guns: Shall not be infringed
LGBT+/minorities: Support
Pronouns: Will respect
Trump: Moron, evil
Biden: Senile, racist
Police: ACAB
Drugs: Fully legal, no prescriptions needed
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