The "Fascist" Cheap Shot

Gregory Melleuish, showing more discernment than some of his more deranged colleagues in academe explains the basic differences between Liberalism and Fascism:

Fascists, like socialists, did not support the idea that individuals were the best judges of their own interest. Rather, individuals needed the state to organise them and to tell them what to do. Moreover the fascist state, what Mussolini called the ethical state, sought to bring every member of society under its control.

In fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, this meant bringing individuals under state domination by controlling the organisations to which they belonged. These included youth groups, leisure clubs and the organisation of industry through state-sanctioned corporations. In Germany, even cat lovers' clubs had to be Nazified.

There were two enemies. The first was liberalism and the autonomous individual who could exercise his or her conscience in deciding a proper course of action. The second was civil society, those voluntary organisations that individuals freely create to pursue their particular interests and that stand outside state supervision. In particular, fascism opposed the various churches. Fascist ideals and the worship of the state would form the core of people's religious beliefs.

Discussing the Howard government's proposed industrial relations reforms, he argues:

...there certainly is a paradox at work here. In order to sponsor legislation that increases individual autonomy, the commonwealth Government is indeed seeking to centralise more power in its hands. This is part of a wider trend of which university policy is another example. A similar criticism was made of Margaret Thatcher, who also sought to increase individualism through centralisation. Liberals recognise that this is a worrying trend. But the causes should be sought as much with the states as with the commonwealth. Their financial dependence on the commonwealth is matched by an apparent incapacity to act responsibly. One suspects that this situation would only be resolved if the states were forced to raise their own finances.

It is insulting to the memory of the victims of Fascism and Nazism that so many of the opponents of the current US administration, and of the current Australian government feel compelled to compare Messrs Howard and Bush to Hitler. If the comparison had any merit whatsoever its proponents would be dead or at the very least, being tortured behind barbed wire. In the case of the American President, it is ironic that many of the chief proponents of this ignorant, historically illiterate rhetorical device are often the first to deride George W Bush's alleged "stupidity".