http://www.vvaacc.com/2012/10/the-nice-thing-about-using-hier/…

This is the equivalent of bemoaning the fate of blacksmiths in 1901.

The utopia part is just insulting. Name the most prominent utopian thinker you are referring to.

The problem with making any statements about NS ideology is that it’s not a consistent ideology and is riddled with contradictory themes. Looking at the whole of NS history, the ideology varied over the years especially depending upon which wing of the NSDAP was in favor of the moment.

So, yeah, NS ideology was collectivist in the sense that it demanded complete submission of the individual to the Aryan state. Yet it rejected socialist and Communist economic (e.g. public ownership of the means of production) ideologies at the same time, which is a core tenet of socialism. Meanwhile NSDAP and its affiliates heavily preached individualist themes of independence, self-reliance and of “strong individual = strong state” and sought to crush any notions of egalitarianism.

Basically NS ideology is hard to categorize other than that it was a completely racist, militaristic and vicious ideology that embraced both left-wing and right-wing ideologies just to advance its goal of the Aryan domination of Europe. Like I said in my earlier post, it’s still my opinion that lumping it together with socialism or Communism is too simple of an approach and underestimates how dangerous and destructive these ideologies are.

By the by Hermann Rauschning’s book was made up. I’m not going to dig up a complete sourced statement on that, but from the wiki, “Nachdem bereits einige Historiker die Authentizit

(The Pournelle Axes in detail)

While I agree that communism, fascism, naziism, etc. are failed policies, and while I’ll also agree that they are most often implemented, as you say, as a way to convert idle youth into a putsch .. they are different, and insisting on using your own definition will cause confusion, eh?

Mew

Aside from having the same end, they are in the abstract, almost identical. Both rely on demonizing a group, using ambiguous vocabulary to work on the passions of masses of dissatisfied, often poor and uneducated people. Both rely on terrorism to shut down ideological opposition. Both require outward shows of loyalty, both use mass imagery and symbols to ‘create’ a new reality. Both require control of religion, and the redefinition of morality. And on and on and on. Both end with state control of resources.

in short, all are forms of what Eric Voegelin called ‘gnosticism’.

All seek to achieve some utopia. All are based on the idea of annihilating the individual and using mass movements based on dissatisfaction with the status quo. The mask slips with quotes like what I presented to zachv below.

To my mind, they are as different as two pieces of the same porcelain dish whose only difference is the color they’re painted. If you focus on the trappings, then yeah, i guess I’m wrong. if you focus on the methods, actions and outcomes, i’m not so sure i’m that far off base.

Different route, same destination.

both are collectivist and annihilate the individual.

did you know that a contemporary of Hitler et al., Heinrich Bruening, referred to Nazis as ‘brown Bolsheviks’? In the book ‘The Bunker’, a Nazi youth leader, Artur Axmann, is quoted mentioning this fact, and saying that Herr Bruenings ‘bourgeois instincts were not wrong’.

Hitler’s own words are quite telling:

‘It is not Germany that will turn Bolshevist, but Bolshevism that will become a sort of National Socialism’. ‘Besides, there is more that binds us to Bolshevism than separates us from it. There is, above all, genuine revolutionary feeling, which is alive everywhere in Russia except where there are Jewish Marxists. I have always made allowance for this circumstance, and given orders that former Communists are to be admitted to the party at once. The petit bourgeois Social-Democrat and the trade-union boss will never make a National Socialist, but the Communist always will.’

- The Voice of Destruction: Conversations with Hitler 1940 Hermann Rauschning.

Not to mention the Soviet Communist Molotov’s comment that ‘fascism is a matter of taste’.

Sure when the Nazis and Soviets made friends with their pact, it threw useful idiots on both sides into fits. But those were sensory idiots, who thought that differing imagery and vocabulary meant different philosophies. Those in power knew better and that’s why quotes such as those above came to be.

Second, while you are right that large groups of jobless people is not good for stability, I am not aware of any examples from history where this has happened from free trade. Implementing free trade certainly does create short term job losses, so maybe it could lead to a revolt if all industries were freed up at the same time. Otherwise there isn’t much of a case for free trade by itself leading to socialist revolution, and certainly not from history.