Racists are the new Communists.

Recall the early Fifties, and Sen. Joe McCarthy seeking out those who “lost” Eastern Europe and then China. Commie! was the charge against which no defense was possible.

Conveniently for powerful right-wingers, this accusation could only blight the lives of those on the left.

So today, the guardians of public morality seek out those who sully society with white privilege and oppression.

And happily for these establishment left-wing figures, their improved poison only bites people to their right.

I sometimes wish that each person who has scored a political win by smearing somebody as a racist could have firsthand experience of being falsely accused. Perhaps as a child pornographer.

It might do wonders in restoring civility to public life.

We used to:

“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”

Who was that guy again?

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How do you know he didn’t?

What’s to say he didn’t have someone rig up that site with its purported 40 members?

I remember seeing something right after the inauguration on how Obama was driving tens of millions into the arms of the “militia” and “klan” movements.

7. We demand that the State shall make it its primary duty to provide a livelihood for its citizens.

25. To put the whole of this programme into effect, we demand the creation of a strong central state power for the Reich; the unconditional authority of the political central Parliament over the entire Reich and its organizations;

The fascists were socialists+nationalists. International socialism was not popular amoungst hoi poloi because ordinary people identify more with their fellow countrymen than they do with people from other countries, regardless of social class. So Mussolini and others added nationalism to the socialist idea. It wasn’t so much a third way as a more polically palatable form of socialism/communism. The fascists were called at the time (around 1930s) “right wing socialists”. But they were still well to the left of centre. Once fascism became unpopular the left dropped “socialists” from the phrase and started referring to fascists as just ‘right wing’ [socialists]. Such was the success of that deception that even present day right wingers get referred to as ‘nazis’, without any hint of irony. (ref Jeffrey Goldberg, Liberal Fascism).

Many of these groups restrict membership to members of their own race or ethnically, and whose main objective is to promote themselves. So what is wrong with whites promoting other whites?

Because it violates the American ideal. Our goal is to eliminate such divisions as much as possible. Just because we can’t eliminate it all doesn’t mean we shouldn’t eliminate every bit we can’t. Allowing racist groups for non-whites tells us that collectively we still regard non-whites as moral and intellectual inferiors. We expect white people to have the moral chops to associate with people based on merit or non-innate characteristics but we don’t believe non-whites are capable of reaching that standard.

We need to encourage all Americans to shed bad habits instead of allowing those who’ve beat those habits fall back.

We humans in the developed countries have too much free time, and we spend it coming up with new things to argue about.

Since you did recognize it is off topic, I’ll let it stand.

I think that developed countries have more complex societies and more to talk about. For one thing, we spend a lot of time talking about how to manage our technology if nothing else.

That said I have a thought experiment and would like some feedback on this premise. As an amateur military historian and having incredible respect for the military I think military people are drawn to stories of martial excellence. I am reminded by the news story a while back from the Citidel Military Academy about a couple of students who were found to have drawn swastikas in there notebooks. Of course the left went nuts claiming the military was creating Nazis.

I believe that just as soldiers “respect” Spartan or Roman soldiers they “respect” the German soldier. Can an educated person separate the Wehrmacht from the Nazis? A British military historian – sorry cannot remember his name – did a detailed study and said the German soldier of WWII was the best soldier “man for man” on the battlefield. Does that make this historian a Nazi? I also understand I am straying into dangerous rhetorical territory as most cannot see any difference between, say, Heinz Gurderian and Joseph Geobbels.

Anyone have any thoughts on the subject?

He’s an alarmist but he doesn’t (at least he didn’t when he wrote that) think that everyone is a Nazi.

From his point of view, McVeigh was a former soldier. That’s not all that meaningful but it’s true.

The other problem with investigations is that it starts treading on First Amendment territory. That doesn’t protect members of the military much, but it does protect civilians. If going around the government uprooting communists is McCarthyism, it’s hard to see how this wouldn’t be.

Not that I have much use for Nazis. A bunch of my relatives had to go to Europe to get rid of them, and not all made it back. It boggles my mind that Americans would support that ideology after that.

I’d like to defend D&D players by pointing out that most of us realize we are just pretending and playing a game.

I know, I used to play role play a lot in youth back when the earth was flat and we carved our 20-sided dice out of dinosaur bones. I did however, know a friend of a friend who went over board and came to believe was actually living in the world of a a role playing game (Steve Jackson’s “In Nomine”) that involved the conflict between Angels and Demons. He ended up medicated.

I like to compare leftists fantasies to role playing because I think on some level the do understand that their constant moral preening is just entertainment for them. But clearly, when your standing beside a ditch in the Ukraine shooting people in the back of the head, you’ve gone to far.

Well, the National Socialist part is off-putting in the extreme, of course. But the “for whites by whites” part puts me in mind of FUBU. I wonder how many black military folks wear FUBU shirts when they are not in uniform.

This: “The danger in threat inflation is not that people will be distracted by wild claims, but that they will become inured to them.” is correct, of course. A commenter elsewhere remarked that the family court system’s unfairness to men was at least as immoral and destructive as the Gulag. It’s like the “gossip” game, where a word or phrase gets passed from one person to another until it’s garbled beyond recognition. One wants to tell people – read some history and get some damn perspective. Only that would require effort on their part.

I respectfully disagree. The danger in threat inflation is not that people will be distracted by wild claims, but that they will become inured to them.

The Petulant Leftist who screams, “Republicans are Nazis, and Bush is Hitler!” is met not by stunned conservatives crying, “zomg!!1!! I’ve got to only vote for Democrats from now on!” but by them saying, “Well, I’m a Republican, and I’m not that bad, so Nazis must not be, either”. From there it is but a short if lethal step to, “Nazis are just Repulicans with spiffy uniforms”.