Traditionalism vs. Fascism - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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The non-democratic state: Platonism, Fascism, Theocracy, Monarchy etc.
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#14636860
I understand that both groups of people are on this board, myself being part of the traditionalist camp. I was curious to know from fascists what you think differentiates you from traditionalists and vice versa.

I suppose the main reasons why I reject fascism in favour of traditionalism is: 1) Fascist states have historically been totalitarian police states, which I find totally unnatural and dehumanising. Great men cannot flourish out of totalitarian conditions of perpetual paranoia and fear. I also believe that as a result of totalitarianism viewing the individual as simply a instrument of the state, it means any form of inhuman atrocity can be committed. Again, this cannot be a realistic method of encouraging virtuous behaviour amongst men. 2) As Antonio Salazar said, fascism - as a result of its rejection of Christian morality - seems to have no respect for the legal or moral order. A fascist dictator lacks moral restraint, and thus, the aforementioned totalitarian state can be birthed. As someone of the Anglosphere, I could not reasonably reject the right to a fair trial, yet all Fascist states (as far as I am aware) removed this right. This is a perfect example of the fascist state seeking to eradicate all moral constraints in favour of running an efficient totalitarian state. I will note however that Oswald Mosley supported the protection of such a right, so perhaps this particular objection to fascism is based upon the historical instances of fascism rather than the underlying philosophy of fascism. 3) Its adoration for violence I find abhorrent and rather silly. I am by no means a pacifist and very much recognise that glory and strength can emerge from warfare, but to actively endorse violence as a means of character building and instilling virtues is insane. Society must be stable and somewhat peaceful in order for it to reach its civilisational heights.
#14636899
I notice you seem to suggest that rejection of Christianity automatically breeds immorality.

What makes traditionalism good, or even ultimately any different than all of this?

Traditionally human societies venerate violence and torture, the Romans used it as entertainment for the masses. What was legal or moral has changed constantly since we started having human societies. The Romans would also committed infanticide as a regular practice. Disagreeing with authority was a quick way to die. A guarantee to a fair trail is quite a new phenomenon for humanity, most of human history granted no such legal promise. The enforcement of traditional values often requires a police state, look at the militarization over just preventing people from smoking pot. Are we really suggesting that a police state wouldn't be required to find and arrest gay people?

It's a very odd set of traditional values you hold if you are rejecting what was normal for most of human history.
#14636903
Radical traditionalism is good because transcendence and numen are real things. It doesn't get us very far unfortunately since modern spiritual conditions render them inaccessible to most people.

As to the OP, he is presuming inherent value in the freedom to be an individual, which fascism limits more than traditionalism.
#14636907
My point is that there is nothing traditional about that value, liberalism is a much more recent phenomenon and not a particularly popular one till the last two centuries.
#14636909
Something people often don't understand about traditional societies is that things like due process were not necessary when you lived in smaller population centers, in which everyone knew each other. Due process presumes that the people involved in administering justice and punishing transgressions do not really know each other. So I think it's rational today for a traditionalist to support concepts like due process in trials. It is a weak substitute for intimate familiarity but still the best thing we have under current circumstances.
#14636913
Rome was not large?

What people also forget is that we have massively better technologies that facilitate administration. Now one guy can deal with a hundred things a day when in those small societies you'd be lucky if they could do ten.

Also due process is massively more complicated and difficult to do then simply throwing people in jail without going through all the extra effort of a trial.
#14636915
mikema63 wrote:Rome was not large?

What people also forget is that we have massively better technologies that facilitate administration. Now one guy can deal with a hundred things a day when in those small societies you'd be lucky if they could do ten.

Also due process is massively more complicated and difficult to do then simply throwing people in jail without going through all the extra effort of a trial.

Rome was large but most of the population did not live in the large cities. Until the rule of Justinian in the Byzantine period, Rome was merely trying to approximate traditional forms of law in a setting where it did not always work.

Of course, in terms of efficiency it worked very well, but the discontent it also caused probably fed the rise of Christianity.
#14636923
mikema63 wrote:I notice you seem to suggest that rejection of Christianity automatically breeds immorality.


In retrospect, I should have clarified myself. Fascism abandoned the spiritual restraint enforced by Christianity in favour of broadly materialistic and biological concepts such as eugenics and blood and soil ideology. It wasn't something specific to Christian ethics that maintained the moral order, rather it was the primary spiritual basis for morality at that time.

What makes traditionalism good, or even ultimately any different than all of this?


It is the transcendent constant that links one generation to another and is necessary for the stability and growth of that civilisation. Every single civilisation has entered its decline and eventual fall as a result of demolishing the institutions - as well as the spiritual forces that built those institutions- that had once built it.

Traditionally human societies venerate violence and torture, the Romans used it as entertainment for the masses. What was legal or moral has changed constantly since we started having human societies. The Romans would also committed infanticide as a regular practice


I wish to maintain or revive general customs, rather than specific customs such as those that you have described.

A guarantee to a fair trail is quite a new phenomenon for humanity, most of human history granted no such legal promise.


In British law, it has been codified for much of our history. But I suppose in the grand scheme of history, you are probably correct. I think Hong Wu made a good point regarding the necessity of such a legal right in order to maintain justice in an increasingly urbanised world however.

The enforcement of traditional values often requires a police state


I'm not sure if I agree with that assessment. An authoritarian government is required, and I'm not opposed to such a government. A totalitarian state most certainly isn't. If you look at drug law in places like Japan or Singapore, they are probably more extreme than American drug law, yet I wouldn't describe either society as having a totalitarian police state.

he is presuming inherent value in the freedom to be an individual


I presume from your tone that you view this to be false. Could you elaborate?
#14636924
mikema63 wrote:The rise of Christianity was largely fed by the empire using it as a tool to unite and better control the empire.

I'm pretty sure I disproved this meme to you in another thread when I first joined here, although my memory is hazy. Regardless, it's wrong and I have never seen anyone cite anything in support of it. Atheists tend to be presumptively cynical on spiritual matters which is the only reason why this rumor exists.

@Rice, I don't think individuality matters although I like freedom of religion. If you have that then you practically have everything else since religion can encompass pretty much anything. In application it's a fairly libertarian mindset.
#14636927
I'm not sure if I agree with that assessment. An authoritarian government is required, and I'm not opposed to such a government. A totalitarian state most certainly isn't. If you look at drug law in places like Japan or Singapore, they are probably more extreme than American drug law, yet I wouldn't describe either society as having a totalitarian police state.


I wouldn't describe them as particularly pleasant either.

I presume from your tone that you view this to be false. Could you elaborate?


I don't think you can prove one value is inherently better than any other, they are ultimately nothing more than things we believe. Values aren't objective things that can be superior to one another.

The only thing that ensures one set of values wins over another is force.

I'm pretty sure I disproved this meme to you in another thread when I first joined here, although my memory is hazy. Regardless, it's wrong and I have never seen anyone cite anything in support of it. Atheists tend to be presumptively cynical on spiritual matters which is the only reason why this rumor exists.


It's actually a very vigorous debate within theological and academic scholarship why Constantine converted the empire, and yes I can be fairly cynical but that is almost always a safe assumption when it comes to history and humanity at large.
#14636930
mikema63 wrote:It's actually a very vigorous debate within theological and academic scholarship why Constantine converted the empire, and yes I can be fairly cynical but that is almost always a safe assumption when it comes to history and humanity at large.

I'm not familiar with it being much of a debate. Christianity came into being when Rome was still based in Rome and became the official religion hundreds of years later after they had relocated to Constantinople and are considered to be Byzantine. To reduce the hundreds of years of cultural back and forth that happened between Christianity and Roman paganism to a conspiracy is silly.
#14636931
Hardly a conspiracy, it came after a long span of civil unrest and Christianity was the easiest way to reunite a flagging nation. That this was a political move is suggested by Constantine having a christian mother but not actually converting till he was in his old age after having tried for decades to reintegrate Christians into roman society.
#14636979
This probably all comes down to the argument over whether or not fascism is an Enlightenment ideology or not.

A number of fascists leaders claimed to be opposed to the spirit of the Enlightenment and, also, to the French Revolution. Despite this appeal to the pre-modern era, they venerate one of the most liberal and modern ideas you can get: the Nation-State.

Another issue is culture, which differs greatly from each of the fascist ideologies. For example one of the most popular art styles in Fascist Italy, futurism (a remarkably modern artistic movement), was regarded as "degenerate" by the Nazis.

So, an answer for you might be that some fascists would try to distinguish themselves from traditionalists, and others would not. It also deals with the, ever-present, question of how much fascism owes to the left (Sorel, and such) and how much it owes to the right (Marraus).

...

We've got a few on this board so, hopefully, they'll fill you in. I expect Rei, for example, to tell you that she has very little truck with traditionalism but some of the others may be more sympathetic.
Last edited by Cromwell on 30 Dec 2015 14:39, edited 1 time in total.
#14636996
mikema63 wrote:I wouldn't describe them as particularly pleasant either.


Singapore has one of the least corrupt governments in the world, an incredibly low crime rate, and have the healthiest people in the world.

I don't think you can prove one value is inherently better than any other, they are ultimately nothing more than things we believe. Values aren't objective things that can be superior to one another.


If that's true, what exactly are your values and what reason do you have to disagree with my values?

Hong Wu wrote:I don't think individuality matters


I wouldn't say I'm an individualist by any means, but as someone who firmly believes in great men ruling society, it seems difficult for me to completely disregard the individual. If one is to determine whether someone has particular virtues, that requires acknowledging them as an individual first and foremost. The encouragement of virtue and discouragement of vice is one of the most important parts of a government's rule, in my eyes at least.


@Cromwell I suppose fascism owes far more to mass politics too. I haven't read Evola's books on the Italian Fascists or the Third Reich, but I know that that is a large part of his disagreement with fascism from a traditionalist perspective. The link to futurism is something I never particularly thought about, but it does demonstrate the movement's very radical modernist roots.

I've been very interested with Sorel lately, not necessarily because I agree with him, I just find his views fascinating. I noticed you have a picture of Sorel as your avatar, would you be able to recommend any particular books to read from him?
#14636997
Singapore has one of the least corrupt governments in the world, an incredibly low crime rate, and have the healthiest people in the world.


What exactly does corruption, crime rates, and population health have to do with proving that the government or police isn't overbearing?

If that's true, what exactly are your values and what reason do you have to disagree with my values?


I just don't think it's the highest value. Ultimate freedom is an impossible goal, you cannot be entirely free. I think people having the basic necessities of life, equality, and a host of other things are simply more important.
#14636998
RiceNaydon wrote:I suppose fascism owes far more to mass politics too. I haven't read Evola's books on the Italian Fascists or the Third Reich, but I know that that is a large part of his disagreement with fascism from a traditionalist perspective. The link to futurism is something I never particularly thought about, but it does demonstrate the movement's very radical modernist roots.


When Mussolini's party was first calling itself "fascist", remember, it was still, on the extreme left. Socialist, republican and democratic.

I've been very interested with Sorel lately, not necessarily because I agree with him, I just find his views fascinating. I noticed you have a picture of Sorel as your avatar, would you be able to recommend any particular books to read from him?


He's my favourite thinker so I'd pretty much recommend all of his writing. However, the three most important of his works, in my mind, are 'Reflections on Violence" (this is really comprehensive because it establish both his insistence on the power of myth, the failure of democratic politics and the need for direct action), 'Illusions of Progress' (this is the one you'd probably have the most truck with, since it's basically a hit piece on classical liberal/progressive ideology) and 'The Decomposition of Marxism' (his last major ideological statement, and my personal favourite).

What's your interest in him?
#14637002
Although I don't consider myself Fascist I have enough agreements with this camp for you to lump me in.

1. My main problem with Traditionalists is that most that I've talked to have been Transcendentalist mystics who were so concerned with metaphysics, and the immaterial world that they lost sight of, or didn't seem to care about what works for people in this world. I want to build an ideology that works here and now. An example is their general disdain for economics.

A corollary to this is that Traditionalists seek to revive the past, which I generally consider to be a vain exercise, an attempt to breath life back into skeletons.

2. You've already been called on this but I see no reason a legal and moral order can't exist without Christianity. Additionally my ideal, semi-Fascist society would have a constitution or some type of charter of principles that could act as a moral document.

3. I believe that you've largely overstated the adoration for violence, most Fascists are similar to you, and simply believe that violence is part of the human condition and take a more realistic view of it, while acknowledging things like glory.
#14637025
mikema63 wrote:What exactly does corruption, crime rates, and population health have to do with proving that the government or police isn't overbearing?.


You said it was an unpleasant state, not that it was necessarily a police state. The data I presented suggested that it was not an unpleasant place to live. I can't really verify the degree to which there is an overbearing police force, but Singapore is among the happiest countries in the world, so I would presume it doesn't police affairs as unpleasantly as you seem to think it does.

I just don't think it's the highest value. Ultimate freedom is an impossible goal, you cannot be entirely free. I think people having the basic necessities of life, equality, and a host of other things are simply more important.


If values are subjective, why do you have any values at all? And why would you debate with me about the validity of traditionalism if your own values aren't objective?


Cromwell wrote:When Mussolini's party was first calling itself "fascist", remember, it was still, on the extreme left. Socialist, republican and democratic.


If you ignore the author of the Manifesto, it reads very much like a radical left-wing set of policies.

In regards to Sorel, I will have to read Reflections on Violence, since it seems as though that would be his 'magnum opus' so to speak. Illusions of Progress definitely intrigues me too. I'd happily read anyone bashing liberal dogma

As for my interest in his writings, I find the more left-leaning fascists fascinating. Strasser, and to a lesser extent, Mosley are the most interesting figures of the fascist movement. I know that Sorel wasn't a nationalist in the same way as the rest of the Fascist movement was, but his opposition to parliamentary democracy seems to align itself with fascist ideals. I also find Sorel's unique spin on Marxism interesting, and I largely agree with his critiques of science.


warsmith17 wrote: My main problem with Traditionalists is that most that I've talked to have been Transcendentalist mystics who were so concerned with metaphysics, and the immaterial world that they lost sight of, or didn't seem to care about what works for people in this world. I want to build an ideology that works here and now.


I can understand that very much. It is a common problem amongst traditionalists to flirt heavily with intellectualism in a very unhealthy manner. I myself consider some of those metaphysical ideas useful, but I always try to remain grounded. I'm sure I'm not the only traditionalist to act in such a manner, but your criticism is still very much true.

A corollary to this is that Traditionalists seek to revive the past, which I generally consider to be a vain exercise, an attempt to breath life back into skeletons.


Again, I do somewhat agree with that. I have great sympathy for anti-industrialism and agrarian living, but I'm not naive enough to suggest that we could return to a rural society. You can't resurrect the exact societal models of pre-Enlightenment Europe, but you can resurrect the spirit and you should resurrect that spirit as much as possible.

2. You've already been called on this but I see no reason a legal and moral order can't exist without Christianity. Additionally my ideal, semi-Fascist society would have a constitution or some type of charter of principles that could act as a moral document.


Again, I should have made my point clearer. It was not the abandonment of Christianity specifically that caused moral chaos, but the abandonment of the spiritual basis of morality - embodied in Christianity - that caused such chaos.

A constitution serves as a similar spiritual basis for moral order, but you can have moral order without a constitution. You just need that spiritual basis.

Out of curiosity, what is your ideal society?

3. I believe that you've largely overstated the adoration for violence, most Fascists are similar to you, and simply believe that violence is part of the human condition and take a more realistic view of it, while acknowledging things like glory.


You are likely correct. I am basing that assumption on the fascists that I have talked to who seem to idealise violence as an ultimate form of good, but they are probably not representative of fascist ideology.
#14637037
RiceNaydon wrote:
Again, I do somewhat agree with that. I have great sympathy for anti-industrialism and agrarian living, but I'm not naive enough to suggest that we could return to a rural society. You can't resurrect the exact societal models of pre-Enlightenment Europe, but you can resurrect the spirit and you should resurrect that spirit as much as possible.


Spirit being a vague term I agree, for example I would like a revival or strengthening of the pagan spirit without necessarily having a revival of the religions. Personally I believe that the best way to do this is to capture the narrative as it recurs today. Environmentalism is the best example of this in action. My Traditionalist/Fascist/Third Positionist groups/people have views on nature that coincide in some ways with those coming into fashion.



Again, I should have made my point clearer. It was not the abandonment of Christianity specifically that caused moral chaos, but the abandonment of the spiritual basis of morality - embodied in Christianity - that caused such chaos.

A constitution serves as a similar spiritual basis for moral order, but you can have moral order without a constitution. You just need that spiritual basis.

Out of curiosity, what is your ideal society?


It's probably due to being an American, but I don't like the idea of operating without a formal document. I know unwritten constitutions have and do function well, but the concept is rather foreign to me.

As to my ideal society, this is a very short version:

I envision a type of republic where the voting franchise is based upon national service (Hence why I'm not voting until I'm further along in my military service). This national service is not to be based upon military service, though it could be an option. I envision it more as a way to create national solidarity and communal spirit while learning valuable skills. National service could be anything from national park work, to being a teachers aid, EMT, and a variety of other useful occupations. I envision this as lasting about 2 years, and could hypothetically be completed at any time. Those who do not complete it would have all rights, except voting or holding office.

Essentially its all about contributing to bettering one's community.

Corporatism would be used as the economic model, and for social bargaining. I envision an economy that is protectionist as it concerns vital industries, relating to defense and other key areas. Syndicalism would be the model in representative institutions.

Foreign Policy based around national interest/realpolitik.



You are likely correct. I am basing that assumption on the fascists that I have talked to who seem to idealise violence as an ultimate form of good, but they are probably not representative of fascist ideology.


Fascism is such a broad range of ideologies (I classify it under Third Positionism), that it is difficult to say anything for sure. It's also problematic that many followers refuse to see it evolve past its first few decades, and develop a broader, more refined range of thought.

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