Gregory's ServerThe very fact we have to say “vote against fascism” is a damning indictment of the failure of our democratic institutions and the rule of law. You shouldn’t be able to vote FOR fascism. Democracies that lack constitutional safeguards against fascism will, eventually, stop being democracies. When? At the last election. The one that elected the fascists. Democracy cannot tolerate fascism. Tolerance cannot tolerate intolerance. I’m afraid this is a lesson we will learn the hard way. Again.
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@schrotthaufen @aral but still not enough to buy a (front row) seat in parliament!  @aral * last democratic election. The Nazi party got ~40% of votes at that one, and ~92% at the first nondemocratic one, ~99% at the second after using the first to choose who to purge and arrest. Subtle reminder for those in the US with a Trump planning to lock up those against him. @aral I agree. The hesitation from politics to ban clearly extremist parties pains me a lot. And we have been there in Germany. We have the safeguards, but they have to be implemented and used. @aral as far as ive been able to tell, mass media is most responsible for a failing democracy by disseminating low-fact information, scare mongering and countless subtle & unsubtle right wing bias. Vaguely 'saving democracy' isn't possible, its saved specifically by taming a fascist media owned by psychopathic oligarchs. @media_dept @aral so weird how repealing all of the media ownership concentration laws resulted in all of the media being controlled by a few megacorporations and a tiny number of incredibly wealthy people. @celeduc @media_dept @aral We've found a silver bullet to oligarchic press dominance in México, perhaps not replicable... AMLO, the president has been giving a long early morning press conference, la mañanera, 5 days a week for 5 years and counting. It has effectively counterbalanced oligarchic right wing media narratives. Instrumental in deflecting coups that have been plaguing lefty leaning gouvernements in LatAm ,and in helping his govt to continue into next term with a wide margin. @aral @media_dept The word “oligarch” needs to come into the daily American vocabulary, and quickly. There is no better description of the members of the right-wing multi-billionaire cabal steering the world into authoritarian tyranny. I suspect that one or more of them are already trillionaires.  @aral it's also pernicious even within a supposed democracy: I would encourage anyone to look at who gets to be a candidate and check their background of family and political ties going back a few decades at least. Especially in countries where third parties have basically zero chance of entering the political theatre. More often than not what is seen as a democracy is an oligarchy switching power between a few groups and using the same extreme discourse as true fascists to polarise people. @aral "You shouldn’t be able to vote FOR fascism." Yes, unfortunately, you should. This is a fundamental flaw in democracies, and is inherent in ALL democracies. The freedom to vote means the freedom to vote in a destructive fashion. The solution is outside the voting process in education. Democracies REQUIRE an educated, informed citizenry. @glennhiggins @aral The freedom to destroy other peoples freedom is not a freedom anyone should have. An educated, informed citizen would understand that. If the people I am voting for to stop fascism only do a barely passible imcompotent token job at it, am I really voting to stop it again? @aral in two-party systems, the last democratic election is one election earlier. It's the one before one of the parties becomes antidemocratic and makes it impossible to chose between political alternatives.  @aral  @aral 🙈 🙉 🙊  @aral Guess what Germany has constitutional safeguards against fascism, and they’re still having a problem with fascists (the AfD). I know some folks love to say that when the U.S. has certain problems it’s because the U.S. is uniquely fundamentally flawed and bad. But this isn’t one of those problems.  @MisuseCase @aral USA system has a very huge flaw that makes it very easy to become anti democratic. Its constitution is not codified and is left to very free interpretation. Even more, lots of people see it as "flexibility" and "strength". @peteriskrisjanis @aral Yeah the U.S. definitely has some systemic issues that can let fascism grow, and have, but there isn’t One Weird Law Trick to prevent fascism either. We are seeing fascist parties grow in all those European social democracies so many leftists like. @MisuseCase @aral They don't get mass appeal and spotlight, and can't overturn de facto state of the country. @peteriskrisjanis @aral >> They don't get mass appeal and spotlight, They are, riding on immigration issues. >> and can't overturn de facto state of the country. They absolutely can. In countries where the far-right parties have gained enough power and/or a governing coalition, they are stripping back social welfare, workers’ rights, women’s rights, etc. @MisuseCase @aral in nutshell, every time someone mentions America is big experiment, I want to slap their faces. It is real country, real people, real power and world cannot deal with this shit anymore. @aral you do realize that fascism is massively in support of law, right? @aral@mastodon.ar.al @aral Honestly this is why we dislike the term democracy at this point. The issue is with weak electoralism and Liberalism (big L, not attached to a single political party in any one government) that, as you point out, allows for fascists to gain power. |
@aral If I had a nickel for every time I had to explain the tolerance paradox, I’d have a lot of nickels.