On Feb 18, 2010, at 10:52 PM, Marv Gandall <marvgandall at videotron.ca> wrote:
>
> On 2010-02-18, at 9:59 PM, Dennis Claxton wrote:
>
>> At 06:55 PM 2/18/2010, Matthias Wasser wrote:
>>
>>
>>> On general principle I stop taking a writer seriously whenever she
>>> claims a
>>> movement not from the 1930s or claiming direct descendance from
>>> such is
>>> "fascist."
>>
>>
>> But Marv is saying no one did that here. And I think he's right.
> =======================
> Neither Matthias nor Chris appreciate that the left has historically
> been divided in it's understanding and usage of the term.
>
> CP'ers and Maoists have loosely described many right-wing movements
> such as the teabaggers of being "fascist". So do today's anarchist
> protesters. I've quarreled with CB, with whom I otherwise often
> agree, about casting the net too widely. Carrol Cox and others have
> joined with me in criticizing sloppy usage of the term, in which
> fascism is employed as an epithet rather than viewed as an
> historically specific social movement with clearly defined
> characteristics which sets it off from other right-wing movements.
>
> A lot of my early political education was in the Trotskyist
> movement, which views Fascism in the latter sense, as do most social
> democrats. Though I'm no longer a Trotskyist, I'm still much
> impressed by the more rigourous analysis of fascism developed by
> Trotsky in the 30's. I'd recommend his writings on the subject
> without reservation ahead of those of Mussolini, some of which are
> collected in the pamphlet "Fascism: What it is and how to fight it"
> available here:
>
> http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/works/1944/1944-fas.htm
>
>
>
>
>
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