this post was submitted on 25 Jul 2023
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Or maybe fascists are just transphobic bigots who want to torture and kill trans people because, well, they're fascists, it's what they do?
You need to understand the far right doesn't give a damn about economic issues. Not one crap. (Because most far-right supporters are middle-class or higher, for the record!) They want power for one reason, and one reason only: to lord it over the minorities they consider their inferiors, if not outright killing them.
This isn't a "distraction", it's the fucking goal.
Why not both? Far right movements, at least as far back as the transition of the Tories into the conservative party in the early 1800s, have been lead by the interests of the ultra rich. Far right "philosophy" has always been to their service, whether its regressive "economics" of Malthus or the complete fiction of scientific racism. Almost definitionally, there isn't a far right movement without a ruling class that it supports and is supported by; that's what they are trying to "conserve".
Part of this is having a permanent underclass. Or more than one. Just as the "middle class" is under the ruling class, the under class must be beneath them. This is part of the conservative mindset, which again is created and nurtured by the ruling class for this purpose. The difference between garden variety conservatives and fascists, in this regard, is simply that fascists want the elimination of the permanent underclass.
Fair enough. I just get pissed when people like OP suggest bigotry only exists because Economically Anxious^TM people are being manipulated by The Elites^TM. Anyone who's interacted with well-off people for longer than a few minutes knows being economically secure doesn't magically make you not a bigot anymore.
And I hate the implication bigotry is somehow "less important" an issue than economic inequality. Especially since the two are so intimately intertwined, especially in the US, it's impossible to make progress tackling one without tackling the other.
Naw, it's more like these systems were built by elites to create conditions favorable to themselves. Racism in its modern form was a long term project to prevent tax revolters and enslaved people from joining up, at least in the US. Billionaires today still benefit from and create these conditions, so I find the meme pretty valid. It's not that bigotry is less important, it's that they are the same thing. You can't fight the economic fight without fighting the racial justice fight... You'll just undercut yourself. You need the gender equality flight and the immigrants rights fight and the disability rights s fights too... Leaving out anyone gives the billionaires an opportunity to undercut and win.