"running out of people" Topic
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robert piepenbrink | 24 May 2023 6:01 p.m. PST |
One of us does, Blutarski. High Crusade has an honorable place on my shelves, but it's by Poul Anderson. Aliens land on an English village near the start of the Hundred Years War and live to regret it. The Andre Norton book in which humans serve as mercenaries to aliens is Star Guard, with a main plot stolen from the Anabasis, but those are modern, even somewhat future humans. The ones with aliens using ancient humans for mercenaries--well, I can think of two series: the David Drake beginning with Ranks of Bronze, and Jerry Pournelle's Janissaries books. The Drake began with a Roman contingent--Crassus' men--and I think followed up with medieval English. In the Pournelle piece, the aliens were coming back for fresh talent at about 700 year intervals--Bronze Age, pre-classic Greek, Roman, Byzantine and hints that something had gone wrong with the 1400 AD batch. I never really thought of them as a sub-genre, but I suppose they are. And if I'd paid that much attention to Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Steinbeck and Faulkner, my high school English teachers would have been much happier with me. |
doc mcb | 24 May 2023 6:17 p.m. PST |
Yes, yes, and yes. Why do English teachers insist on BORING books? |
Arjuna | 24 May 2023 8:37 p.m. PST |
Sneaking in something completely unrelated but quite interesting and letting the audience find a wargaming connection. Now, that is a nice game. I like that. As an eager Machiavellist of the garden gnome variety, I sneak in the findings of Dr. Michael Blume about the reproductive advantages of religiosity as homework for the students. blume-religionswissenschaft.de – His personal website A short PowerPoint presentation from a lecture in 2009 as a collection of keywords for the interested: link To find the right angle, or the left… A pity his book 'Gott, Gene und Gehirn' (God, Genes and the Brain) wasn't translated into English. Gnothi Seauthon and read responsibly, as the preacher says, your brain may alter. Which is the whole point of having a human brain. To adapt to new environments and not just follow your instincts. ;-) |
Arjuna | 24 May 2023 9:26 p.m. PST |
colonists are both cheaper and more effective than garrisons I always notice this when I visit a Turkish restaurant in Germany… This brings me to the influence of the host. The birth rate of second-generation Turkish colonists in Germany for example is almost as high as that of the third to fifteenth generations Germans. So if the intake of new delights from faraway countries is small enough, they can simply be swallowed. Which is, with regards to Turkish delights, fine by me. Much too sweet and heavy for my taste. Not to speak of its Islamic flavor. |
dave8365 | 24 May 2023 9:33 p.m. PST |
Not sure what a "Christofascist" is but if they outbreed you, as seems likely, they win. Funny thing, breeders keep making people like me. So maybe not. As for "Christofascist", you are clearly advanced enough to understand what "google" is. In the present context, it is best described as one who clings to an extremist superstition which thrives in the suppression of independent thinking. |
dave8365 | 24 May 2023 9:39 p.m. PST |
My side may be winning… link |
Arjuna | 24 May 2023 11:40 p.m. PST |
Whoa, that escalated slower than expected. Though the discussion technicallly ended with the introduction of the Argumentum ad Hitlerum. At least sort of. Still waiting to be called a Nazi myself. I mean, being German, reading Nietzsche as a pastime, making fun of Russians and Turks, citing respectable sources on the subject… |
Arjuna | 24 May 2023 11:48 p.m. PST |
I say we invade Canada. Mr.Tibbles said so. There is a Near Future Comic about that from Cross Cult/Image Comics. US invading Canada mid-next century for their water resources. We Stand On Guard – On ImageComics.com Canadian resistance, big stomping robots, bloody graphic graphics, and the storyline is of course not for everyone. It is for me, though the story could be better and the characters have more depth. There're better-written stories from Vaughn, Saga of course. Don't go there, you will hate it. Saga I mean. Much too woke. |
Arjuna | 24 May 2023 11:53 p.m. PST |
Anyone read 'Old Men's War' from Scalzi? Reading the blurbs and skimming one or two reviews it looks like the protagonists aren't old for too long and it's more vanilla-flavored military SF. |
robert piepenbrink | 25 May 2023 3:39 a.m. PST |
Read and forgotten. It's basically a rejuve scheme in which oldsters get new bodies in return for enlistment. I've read worse--I've read some really bad fiction in my day--but I gave up long before Scalzi did. The arc of the series matches the OP--population pressure, limited habitable planets and resource wars--but the cause of a war is seldom useful on the tabletop. For all I care as a wargamer, ALL wars start because Elector Petrus I kidnapped the Emperor's daughter. Invading Canada has never worked out well for the US. Once in the Revolution, twice in the War of 1812, three proxy invasions by the Fenians. Invading Spanish-speaking lands has worked out much better, or even fighting Germany. |
Arjuna | 25 May 2023 5:28 a.m. PST |
It's basically a rejuve scheme in which oldsters get new bodies Ah, not for me then. Still looking for new stories of graying heroes fighting their last battles, realizing their foolishness. A franchise killer, not a big market eh? Yes, a bit of 'Picard', a bit of 'Robin and Marian', a lot of Bilal's 'The Black Order Brigade'. the cause of a war is seldom useful on the tabletop That may be true, but it may be useful as a theme for a scenario and in the breaks at the buffet. Or on message boards for wargaming for that matter. Invading Spanish-speaking lands has worked out much better Yes, I heard about the successes of Spanish speakers in the US. Mainly Christians and a higher birthrate. Though not as high as it used to be. Bad influence I assume. ;-) even fighting Germany Thanks for your service, highly appreciated. Quite profitable for Germany. Just kidding, reminds me of 'The Mouse That Roared' |
doc mcb | 25 May 2023 7:35 a.m. PST |
Yes, I read the Scalzi books. Okay, but no desire to reread -- and I reread a LOT of fiction. Yes, breeders sometimes produce those who are unappreciative. Of course the breeders produce EVERYBODY. Those who refuse to reproduce are evolutionary dead-ends. And in the long haul, societal/cultural dead-ends as well. Groups like the Shakers who depend on converts disappear. (Of course the Shakers rejected sex, which moderns do not, while to a large extent rejecting the natural consequences of sex. But no babies = bye bye.) |
doc mcb | 25 May 2023 7:43 a.m. PST |
Dave, the GUARDIAN piece is too focused on part of the picture. (I saw a marvelous cartoon, decades ago, that showed a typical downtown street corner, traffic and pedestrians, dog walker, etc. And the caption said "THE MILKY WAY (detail).") Christianity has had great ebbs and flows over the past 2000 years, as the Stark books or indeed any history of Christianity will attest. Judaism too, and I suspect Islam (though I do not know enough of their history to be certain). Religions must adjust to developments in technology and politics etc -- and do, Google "Great Awakenings" and you can join the debate over how many we have had and how long each has been. No reason to think that is over and done with. |
dave8365 | 25 May 2023 8:22 a.m. PST |
Christianity has had great ebbs and flows over the past 2000 years, as the Stark books or indeed any history of Christianity will attest. Judaism too, and I suspect Islam (though I do not know enough of their history to be certain). Religions must adjust to developments in technology and politics etc -- and do, Google "Great Awakenings" and you can join the debate over how many we have had and how long each has been. No reason to think that is over and done with. Mankind has, and will, always require something to believe in. But as Joseph Campbell noted, "God is a metaphor for a mystery that absolutely transcends all human categories of thought, even the categories of being and non-being…So half the people in the world are religious people who think that their metaphors are facts. Those are what we call theists. The other half are people who know that the metaphors are not facts. And so, they're lies. Those are the atheists." Flavors of myth/religion run their course. The Greek and Roman pantheon lasted nearly 3,000 years. Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Zoroastrianism have lasted even longer. Christianity and Islam are relative newcomers in the mythological panoply. The key to the survival of the latter two depends on how aggressively their practitioners sow the seeds of their own destruction by alienating prospective adherents. They both seem to be doing a pretty good job of it. |
doc mcb | 25 May 2023 8:29 a.m. PST |
link Historically the Awakenings have been WITHIN American Christianity -- and the church has had similar upheavals in some other countries -- certainly Britain -- over the centuries. But the next one is likely to be not evangelicals versus a church establishment (First GA) but more like the 2nd GA when Methodist circuit riders and Baptists brought new institutions out to the frontier. In the early 1800s there were many areas in the west that the government hadn't reached yet so the only existing institution was a church, which handled things like boundary disputes (which would normally be the secular government). All a church could do was excommunicate, but if pretty much everyone in the area attends that one church, that amounted to ostracism. I suspect that the multiple overlapping upheavals and dislocations of our times are and will continue to produce similar vacuums (perhaps legal, certainly educationally and culturally and psychologically) that some religion will move to fill. Maybe RIVAL religions -- indeed very likely. We may see a new age of religious wars, though smaller scale, not between national governments. |
doc mcb | 25 May 2023 8:33 a.m. PST |
Well, if the atheists are right, neither of us will ever know whether your envisioned future is correct, or mine. Otoh, if theists are correct, we both may know it forever. Campbell is okay for what Campbell does, but I think CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien's idea of myth is far more profound -- and also true. |
doc mcb | 25 May 2023 8:42 a.m. PST |
Dave is of course correct that humans need something in which to believe. Lacking such tends to restrict reproduction. So the future is theistic. WHICH theism is the question. |
Arjuna | 25 May 2023 9:18 a.m. PST |
Mid-next decade the number of babies born to Muslim mothers should outnumber babies born to Christian mothers. Around 2060 the percentage of Muslims as a share of the world population will probably be equal to that of Christians. The percentage of Hindus will probably stay the same, and the percentage of Buddhists, a non-theist religion to a large extent by the way, and non-affiliated will shrink. Their absolute numbers will still grow. Some faster some slower. The number of atheists worldwide will grow in absolute numbers, but we're a negligible number of people in relation to the world population as a whole. Makes us perfect scapegoats. Same with Jews. What that will mean in 40 years is a whole different question. Being an atheist, though not areligious. In the sense that transcendence is an inseparable part of existence, just not personal. Knowing a lot, in the meantime I consider not knowing a blessing. |
dave8365 | 25 May 2023 11:51 a.m. PST |
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doc mcb | 25 May 2023 12:04 p.m. PST |
Yes, the world will always want scapegoats. Arjuna, we probably have different definitions of "transcendence"; if it is not personal, who cares? (Flannery O'Connor, a devout RC, said of the Protestant view of the bread and wine, "Well, if it's just a symbol, then to hell with it.") Off topic, but another favorite Flannery story: she had lupus and died early of it. She went to Lourdes to bathe in the healing waters. They only change the water over night, and hundreds bathe there each day, so you want to be there EARLY. She reported later that no healing miracle was granted, but that she remained convinced that the pool had miraculous healing power, "the proof of that being that I didn't catch anything." Are you sure about Muslim birthrate? Maybe, but I think I have read that it is dropping, at least in places where modernity is intersecting. Worth researching, when I have time. But yes, in any case, the one-after-next big conflict may be the Crusades again. |
doc mcb | 25 May 2023 12:16 p.m. PST |
Well, wiki agrees with you about Muslim growth. Pew has an interesting report on Muslims in US including this: "Religious conversions haven't had a large impact on the size of the U.S. Muslim population, largely because about as many Americans convert to Islam as leave the faith. Indeed, while about one-in-five American Muslim adults were raised in a different faith tradition and converted to Islam, a similar share of Americans who were raised Muslim now no longer identify with the faith." The Muslim kids I knew 15-20 years ago in a boarding school were all quite devout. Otoh the ones I taught 5-10 years ago at UT Chattanooga (only a handful in both cases, so a meaninglessly small sample) were NOT devout and indeed tended towards being "nothings." (Our church has an active and not ineffective evangelism program at the university.) The decades difference in time might matter, OR that the boarding school kids were from VERY privileged families who remained back home in Saudi or Jordan or Egypt, while the more recent kids' parents had migrated to the US. Which (again, if I can generalize from such small numbers, which of course I shouldn't) might mean that American popular culture will do its work dissolving religious pieties and observances. Rock n' Roll is the universal cultural solvent. |
robert piepenbrink | 25 May 2023 2:46 p.m. PST |
Figure three generations, doc. That's what the language people figure--and about the point at which my ancestors stopped speaking German, by the way. But (1) it can be complicated by group identity, like the Irish-American family which "may be atheists, but we're CATHOLIC atheists" and (2) it will take at least three generations to know assimilation isn't working. I have also heard the argument that we have causality backward and the dropping birthrate drives lack of religion. I'm not convinced, but the evidence is about as good one way as the other. None of which drives any games. In that sense, the whole thread can only influence SF gaming, and I'll stand by the notion that the lower-birthrate society should be more casualty-averse, presumably with a qualitative edge, longer range and better armor. Which brings us to a different group of SF novels. Consider Starship Troopers of course, with humans vs Bugs. But also think of Gordon Dickson's exclusively human "Dorsai" stories, with the highly-trained handsful of Dorsai mercenaries as opposed to the much more expendable "Friendlies." I have my doubts about either as a glimpse of the future, but they're decent background for SF wargames. I can't seem to find Jacques Chretien on Youtube, but here at least are the lyrics. link |
doc mcb | 25 May 2023 6:35 p.m. PST |
I used to have a tape of fans doing the Dorsai songs, and can sing Jacques Chretian without looking. And bright the sun that morning rose upon each weaponed wall |
doc mcb | 25 May 2023 6:37 p.m. PST |
robert, do you know SILVERLOCK? And the Ballad of Bowie Gizzardsbane? Harsh that hearing for Houston the Raven: Fools had enfeebled the fortress at Bexar Leaving it looted and lacking the while Foes were sweeping swift on the land Hell-bent to crush him. |
doc mcb | 25 May 2023 6:41 p.m. PST |
As to religion and birthrates, children are now costs, big ones, instead of assets, and women have a choice. Only if they have a longer-term perspective will they accept those costs as reasonable for the benefit (which accrues only in part to themselves and as much to others including society at large). Religion provides that long-term perspective and changes the cost/benefit analysis. |
Arjuna | 25 May 2023 8:01 p.m. PST |
Are you sure about Muslim birthrate? Maybe, but I think I have read that it is dropping, at least in places where modernity is intersectingg That is right, the birthrate is dropping, albeit it will be higher than the average for some time. But the number of Muslim mothers will be higher than that of Christian mothers in the future, because, well yes of conversions, but mainly because women that aren't born now won't become mothers in 20 to 40 years. It's just one population is shrinking, the other is growing. Somewhere after 2050, about 2060 both projections intersect. |
Arjuna | 25 May 2023 10:30 p.m. PST |
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Arjuna | 26 May 2023 12:03 a.m. PST |
Arjuna, we probably have different definitions of "transcendence"; if it is not personal, who cares? Maybe, maybe not. > Who cares? Don't be so vain, it's not all about you. It's about being part of something greater. ;) First, of course, "atheist" is just a label under which a variety of people are subsumed or subsume themselves. Personally, I probably couldn't stand five minutes of metaphysical discussion anymore with certain types of atheists, either a classical Marxist or a disgruntled former Christian like Hazel Motes. In conversations with my former wife, a devout Christian, I gained fascinating insights into the Catholic mindset. We both hated 'Wise Blood,' the characters, not the book itself. It's fantastically written, and often funny, but just too Catholic. The absurd eternal struggle for personal faith in a hopeless world. We have two daughters, one similar to me in character, the other to her mother. They both go transcend us. They are something new that has never existed before. At this very moment, both of them are part of that special form of existence that feels itself, is aware of itself, thinks about itself. With each moment they discover not only themselves and their small part of the Milky Way and its connection to the rest, but also its immeasurable magnificence that no human mind can truly fathom and of which they are a part. You can call this God, I call it existence. Transcendence for me is the process of self-knowledge of existence. In man it has become personal. That means man is that part of self-knowing existence, which has to live with his finiteness and embed it in his knowledge, rules, laws, morals and so on. The greatest act to transcend pure existence is to create something new that has never been before and adds to the awesomeness of existence. In full awareness of what you are doing. |
robert piepenbrink | 26 May 2023 3:39 a.m. PST |
Doc, I have Silverlock ONLY for "The Death of Bowie Gizzardsbane." It's one of a handful of books which earn their places on the Great Wall of Fiction by a single scene, the rest of the book really not being worth the shelf space. |
doc mcb | 26 May 2023 5:54 a.m. PST |
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Arjuna | 26 May 2023 8:43 a.m. PST |
Sort of, but that was another me a long time ago. But with Pentecost approaching it's inevitable to read it. You can't really escape it, can't you? :))) That is the difference with my form of atheism. I have never fled, I am always there in my little garden. The Hound can come as he wishes. I show him the beauty of the garden I tend. There may be other Hounds that visit me from time to time. This is my garden, secluded, yet dependent on the beauty and majesty of an awe-inspiring existence that surrounds it like huge mountains rising in the distance. High up on these mountains springs clear and cold water that quenches the thirst of the garden and my own. I often climb up to these springs and drink the water where it is clearest and coldest and the air purest. The higher up, the further you can see. And being part of it, I look deep and far into myself. The Hound may be my companion on the way. I show him the springs from which I drink and the faraway mountains I see up there. And when I am gone, he may keep an eye on my garden until another gardener, wandering hidden paths, finds it and continues my work.
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doc mcb | 26 May 2023 10:17 a.m. PST |
Arjuna, you remind me of my son-in-law. Not a believer, but a beautiful mind and spirit. Grace abounds. Be well. |
SBminisguy | 26 May 2023 8:38 p.m. PST |
As for "Christofascist", you are clearly advanced enough to understand what "google" is. So…an Oxymoron pejorative term coined by a Marxist Liberation Theologist to attack Christians who opposed the Marxification of Christianity. Fascism is a totalitarian system, an expression of Socialism, and while may have co-opted various groups it holds only the State as the source of all power over society. The State IS God. It proclaims itself infallible and all powerful. Same with its evil twin, Communism. Christianity holds explicitly that humans are fallible, that all powers and principalities ultimately fall under God's authority -- there is no higher power. See the problem? The two systems are completely incompatible. That's why those troublesome priests and faithful who objected to the State as God were beaten jailed or killed under Fascist regimes as they have been and still are by Communist regimes. And that's why, if ever successful, Liberation Theologists, having served their purpose as Useful Idiots, will go to the gulag -- or the wall. |
Something Wicked | 27 May 2023 5:05 a.m. PST |
SBS You seem to believe that western democracies will always be democracies. Recent events have proved that this may not be true. A western theocracy would be a terrible place to live. |
doc mcb | 27 May 2023 7:55 a.m. PST |
Unless Islam prevails, the chance of a western theocracy is slim to none. If such had been possible, we'd have had it two hundred years ago when established churches were normal. When I grew up (1950s) there was a general protestant consensus -- culturally, not politically -- in the south and midwest; whatever the Baptists and Methodists and Presbyterians agreed on (which is quite a lot) was the standard. But nobody bothered the Jews. Nor the Catholics. Government was secular. I think fears of a theocracy in America belong with the monster under the bed. |
Arjuna | 27 May 2023 10:53 a.m. PST |
@doc Ha, you should have watched your daughter more closely. We are seductive… ;-) Doc, what you said is very, very kind of you. I am a little speechless. You're a kind soul. You never know in what strange or barren places a seed will grow into a tree. Or find understanding and kindness in a stranger. You see God's work in this, I rejoice in the thought that the seed I sow may come up. It does not matter whether I can harvest the fruit of the tree. What matters is that a new tree has been sown and may bear fruit. "I am a forest, and a night of dark trees: but he who is not afraid of my darkness, will find banks full of roses under my cypresses." ― Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra I assume your daughter is a believer, so I wish you, your daughter, and her husband to complement each other throughout their lives like body and soul. Yes, I know, a preacher has been lost on me. |
doc mcb | 27 May 2023 12:26 p.m. PST |
If you will send me an email (docmcbride@comcast.net) I will send you her account of her wedding, which was done outside in the midst of lightning. She speaks of what we have been discussing. |
Something Wicked | 27 May 2023 2:04 p.m. PST |
Interesting that you automatically assume that a western theocracy = the United States becoming a theocracy. Maybe you should take a longer look under the bed. |
doc mcb | 27 May 2023 2:39 p.m. PST |
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Silurian | 27 May 2023 3:02 p.m. PST |
SB, that's incredibly naive of you. Of course the two are theoretically and ideally opposed to one another, but have you met human nature? |
Something Wicked | 28 May 2023 4:02 a.m. PST |
"Well, where then?" I don't know, neither does anyone else. Australia? Japan? Italy (it has previous)? Western politics are moving increasingly to the right, and theocracies tend to be a bit fascist. |
doc mcb | 28 May 2023 6:29 a.m. PST |
"Fascism" was left wing, not right (socialist). Definitions. Technically theocracy means rule by a church. Even medieval Christendom was not that, or at least not more than half: see the investiture conflict, or Becket. It was CULTURALLY a Christian totalitarian system, but not poltiically. Even the Puritans (who in early Mass required church membership to vote) explicitly prohibited the clergy from holding secular office. Groups like Baptists (the most numerous Christians in the US) will NEVER agree to a unified church-and-state; it is one of their core principles. And they would oppose it strongly. But "theocracy" is sometimes used just to mean a religious influence on the culture. In that case, sure, and hooray. |
Something Wicked | 28 May 2023 10:59 a.m. PST |
"Fascism" was left wing, not right (socialist)." I'm sorry, but regardless of (mostly American) right wing views, it most definitely IS right wing (authoritarian). I know exactly what theocracy is, so no need to patronise me with Politics 101. A true western theocracy would indeed be an extreme authoritarian state. Theocracies tend to be, putting control of the populace foremost rather than its welfare. You could do better than lecture me about politics, and educate yourself about what socialism really is. |
doc mcb | 28 May 2023 12:27 p.m. PST |
Well yes, I DID used to teach Politics 101. Also World politics/Comparative Political Ideologies. I understand "authoritarian" to mean a state in which no political dissent is allowed (one party) but the government does not attempt to control the economy or the culture. (Nightclub comics can joke about everythimg except the dictator.) Franco's regime in Spain was authoritarian. Now, if you please, tell me what socialism really is. |
robert piepenbrink | 29 May 2023 3:40 a.m. PST |
OK, since no one wants to discuss wargaming, I shall briefly indulge myself. Atwood, Dave? ATWOOD?? The sloppiest thinker in SF--and the most self-indulgent--since Heinlein's declining years? Her paranoia makes RAH's early obsessions with the Reverend Nehemiah Scudder (and later the Fosterites) look well-reasoned by comparison, and shifts "It Can't Happen Here" into hard SF. You can use SF to make a point about how a society might come about and what how it would function, but it takes reasoning, and reasoning is what Atwood doesn't bring to the table. She's the literary equivalent of a comfy chair, guaranteed never to make a member of the left question his assumptions--which means you will learn nothing, and she is useless to convict or convert. If you want to wallow in leftist SF, Heaven knows there's Bellamy--and Wells on his bad days. There's Ellison, Mack Reynolds, Howard Fast, Ishmael Reed, who can actually write, and Samuel Delaney who has done first-rate SF. Go read the good stuff for a while and you can see the difference. |
doc mcb | 29 May 2023 5:07 a.m. PST |
Some of Howard Fast is good. Worth remembering how IDEALISTIC American Commies were in the old days. And some of Delany is quite good. |
robert piepenbrink | 29 May 2023 7:38 a.m. PST |
There are days that I think of all the writers of SF, only Poul Anderson, Avram Davidson and Samuel Delaney paid adequate attention to language. |
SBminisguy | 29 May 2023 8:42 a.m. PST |
"Fascism" was left wing, not right (socialist)."I'm sorry, but regardless of (mostly American) right wing views, it most definitely IS right wing (authoritarian). Sorry, regardless of your defensive revisionism, Fascism is Left Wing. Ya know, I even believed your opinion myself, that Fascism was "right wing" up until college when I was taking a course on 20th century western history. We were studying the rise of the great dictators -- Stalin, Hitler and Mussolini. The professor led us through an examination of Mussolini's rise to power. Mussolini, as it turns out, was a fervent believer in The Socialist International until WW1. Mussolini, the founder of Fascism, was born and raised into a family of committed Socialists and was very active as a Marxist in his youth. He was a committed Socialist and a leader of the International in Italy. He was the editor of "Avanti!," (Forwards!) Italy's leading Socialist/Progressive newspaper. He hated Capitalism and Liberal Democracy as obstacles to The Revolution. However, he was discouraged at the progress of Socialism in Italy and became disillusioned with the International (Socialist movement), since if it were true, then the workers of the world would have been united by class and not fought WW1. Instead, German socialists fought for Germany, and British socialists for Britain, etc. He also saw during WW1 that in the trenches there was no class distinction. Rich, poor, educated and ignorant were all equal in the mud -- they were reduced to being Italians serving the State, first and foremost. That's the vision he had for Socialism in Italy, all Italians serving the State. He felt there needed to be an *Italian* Socialism for Italians, the International movement would not work in Italy, and indeed had already failed as proven by WW1. So he worked with other disillusioned Marxists and Socialists like Giovanni Gentile to create and promote an alternate to Marxism to usher in Socialism. They rejected the International to create a *national* Socialist movement that Mussolini called "Fascism" -- named after the baton of power wielded by an ancient Roman field general or consul, the Fasces. This was a rod fashioned of small sticks, bound together to be strong -- representing the different interests of Rome working as one. Fascism's "sticks" were comprised of Socialist groups and Labor Unions. The controlling core economic principle was Corporatism -- the control of the economy and thus the nation via control over industrial leaders and the Unions. Rather than seize corporations and run them from the State, as in Communism, Fascism controlled industry by co-opting and forcing industrial leaders to bend to the will of the Socialist State and become part of the ruling party structure. The working class was led and controlled by the State through the Unions. So under Corporatism, companies and labor Unions become part of the State's power apparatus -- those Unions and companies that did not bend to the will of the State were crushed. The same thing with other power centers of Society -- priests and Churches that opposed the State were crushed, those that went along were able to continue under State monitoring. Property was also allowed so long as it didn't conflict with the needs of the State, and the Individual was subordinate to the needs of the State -- true freedom, according to Mussolini, came from surrender of the Individual to the State. So, I asked my professor --Mussolini was a Socialist, embraced Socialism, saw Capitalism as the Enemy and created a State controlled society with the Individual subordinate to the needs of the State. How does that make him "Right Wing?" Why, Nationalism, of course, he said. However, I said, we'd just studied Stalin and the rise of the Communists to power, and they resorted to heavy ethnic and nationalist appeals in their propaganda wars. So why is it different in Italy? Why, because it's Fascism! He had a closed loop argument, he got very angry that he couldn't explain why Italian Nationalism in the service of a Socialist movement was different from Russian Nationalism in the service of a Socialist movement -- it just was, so stop being stupid, he told me! After that my professor would take opportunities in class to harangue me, slight me and tried to embarrass me in front of my peers to silence me. Wow. That was an eye opener. Red Pill, anyone? Fascism and Communism are two sides of the same coin, they are both Statist, Socialist systems. That Fascists and Communists fought is little different from how Stalinists and Trotskyites fought for control of their movement. Here's a quote from a Fascist and a quote from Antifa. You decide which one is which: "We are socialists, we are enemies of today's capitalistic economic system for the exploitation of the economically weak, with its unfair salaries, with its unseemly evaluation of a human being according to wealth and property instead of responsibility and performance, and we are all determined to destroy this system under all conditions" We make no apologies for the necessary violence of our struggle and will spare no sacrifice for the battles to come because we are revolutionaries committed to the overthrow of Capitalism." |
Something Wicked | 29 May 2023 9:31 a.m. PST |
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 I'll bet that you think the first quote was one of Hitler's. You're wrong, it was Gregor Strasser, who was murdered in the Night of the Long Knives. By the SS, Hitler's attack dogs. |
doc mcb | 29 May 2023 10:10 a.m. PST |
SB, yes, and that closed-minded attitude of your prof persists today. I've had similar conversations. See, the National Socialists were . . . socialists! No, no, they were NAZIS, you right-wing fool!! Still waiting for Something Wicked to tell us what socialism really is. |
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