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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On March 11 2017 03:23 Biff The Understudy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 11 2017 02:31 LegalLord wrote:On March 11 2017 02:28 LightSpectra wrote:
Interesting that the baby boomers don't like Le Pen, it's the 25-50 year-olds that like her. My guess is that it's colored by their perceptions of what the FN was in their time. Or they have the perspective to see what the FN really is.
An organization with a racist history that has tried to reinvent itself as a more vanilla right-wing ("far right") party?
In other words, what are you saying the FN "really is" here? I am aware of its history but it's something of an aggressive assertion to say that it's basically promising to dump pure evil into the rivers and such.
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"Tried" being the keyword there. 2/3rds of France still see FN as fascists, just fascists that have learned to shut up on the Holocaust denial and contempt for democracy.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
At this point it's probably more vanilla nationalist than fascist. Unless you take the view that its outward appearance is masking a secret agenda of traditional FN fare, of course.
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I don't think it's at all controversial to say that the FN under daddy Le Pen was a fascist party. So the question is if they've managed to clean up the image under Marine. Going by the opinion polls, they've only risen in popularity by 7% (I'm going by current opinion polls putting Marine at ~25% for the upcoming election, and Jean-Marie's 18% turnout in 2002). So no, it doesn't sound like they've successfully reinvented themselves, albeit that's a huge increase from 15 years ago.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
Daddy Le Pen got almost zero additional points in the runoff against Chirac.
Daughter Le Pen is likely to rise to at least 40% in round 2.
Almost half the country would vote for her over any given opponent. That does represent an important change in public perception, in that Le Pen is no longer unpalatable to an important fraction of the population, first choice or no.
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That's a fair point. By that metric, yeah, they've tripled the number of people that would vote for them, albeit not by their first choice.
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On March 11 2017 04:31 LegalLord wrote:
At this point it's probably more vanilla nationalist than fascist. Unless you take the view that its outward appearance is masking a secret agenda of traditional FN fare, of course.
In French we have a word, fascisant, which means “close or tending to fascism”. The FN can also be labelled as nationalist and national-conservatist.
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The question is if the party and La Pen have changed in significant ways or if the voting public is so far removed from the rise of fascism that they see the party differently. It is likely a mix of both, but the makeup of that mix is almost impossible to tell.
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On March 11 2017 04:08 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On March 11 2017 03:23 Biff The Understudy wrote:On March 11 2017 02:31 LegalLord wrote:On March 11 2017 02:28 LightSpectra wrote:
Interesting that the baby boomers don't like Le Pen, it's the 25-50 year-olds that like her. My guess is that it's colored by their perceptions of what the FN was in their time. Or they have the perspective to see what the FN really is. An organization with a racist history that has tried to reinvent itself as a more vanilla right-wing ("far right") party? In other words, what are you saying the FN "really is" here? I am aware of its history but it's something of an aggressive assertion to say that it's basically promising to dump pure evil into the rivers and such.
They are a wolf in sheep's clothing, witha very good PR machine, behind which lies what the FN has always been: an old school fascist party.
I met some of the FN local politicians in the area I sometimes work. They are simply the worst people you can get: extremely mean, extremely aggressive, extremely racist and usually, uncannily stupid.
The FN has more in common with old school european fascism, Franco, Mussolini, Pétain, than with, for example, Donald Trump.
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On March 11 2017 04:49 Plansix wrote:
The question is if the party and La Pen have changed in significant ways or if the voting public is so far removed from the rise of fascism that they see the party differently. It is likely a mix of both, but the makeup of that mix is almost impossible to tell.
My grand parents are EXTREMELY right wing, but absolutely loath Le Pen and would see their house burn rather than vote for her. It just happened they lived the war and under a regime that had the same root ideology than the FN and they don't have great memories of it.
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On March 11 2017 05:00 Biff The Understudy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 11 2017 04:49 Plansix wrote:
The question is if the party and La Pen have changed in significant ways or if the voting public is so far removed from the rise of fascism that they see the party differently. It is likely a mix of both, but the makeup of that mix is almost impossible to tell. My grand parents are EXTREMELY right wing, but absolutely loath Le Pen and would see their house burn rather than vote for her. It just happened they lived the war and under a regime that had the same root ideology than the FN and they don't have great memories of it.
My grandfather was a hard line US Republican since WW2. But even he abandoned the party after W. Bush and voted for Obama. I am just happy he passed away before this election cycle.
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On March 11 2017 05:05 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On March 11 2017 05:00 Biff The Understudy wrote:On March 11 2017 04:49 Plansix wrote:
The question is if the party and La Pen have changed in significant ways or if the voting public is so far removed from the rise of fascism that they see the party differently. It is likely a mix of both, but the makeup of that mix is almost impossible to tell. My grand parents are EXTREMELY right wing, but absolutely loath Le Pen and would see their house burn rather than vote for her. It just happened they lived the war and under a regime that had the same root ideology than the FN and they don't have great memories of it. My grandfather was a hard line US Republican since WW2. But even he abandoned the party after W. Bush and voted for Obama. I am just happy he passed away before this election cycle.
I can understand that. I don't have very warm feelings for my grand parents, but I really hope they don't live a day when MLP would access the presidency. They would really suffer from seeing those people and those ideas getting back to power after all that time.
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On March 11 2017 05:44 Biff The Understudy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 11 2017 05:05 Plansix wrote:On March 11 2017 05:00 Biff The Understudy wrote:On March 11 2017 04:49 Plansix wrote:
The question is if the party and La Pen have changed in significant ways or if the voting public is so far removed from the rise of fascism that they see the party differently. It is likely a mix of both, but the makeup of that mix is almost impossible to tell. My grand parents are EXTREMELY right wing, but absolutely loath Le Pen and would see their house burn rather than vote for her. It just happened they lived the war and under a regime that had the same root ideology than the FN and they don't have great memories of it. My grandfather was a hard line US Republican since WW2. But even he abandoned the party after W. Bush and voted for Obama. I am just happy he passed away before this election cycle. I can understand that. I don't have very warm feelings for my grand parents, but I really hope they don't live a day when MLP would access the presidency. They would really suffer from seeing those people and those ideas getting back to power after all that time.
I have spent quite some times trying to rationalize how can My Little Pony become French president, because you were clearly not joking here!
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On March 11 2017 05:50 opisska wrote:Show nested quote +On March 11 2017 05:44 Biff The Understudy wrote:On March 11 2017 05:05 Plansix wrote:On March 11 2017 05:00 Biff The Understudy wrote:On March 11 2017 04:49 Plansix wrote:
The question is if the party and La Pen have changed in significant ways or if the voting public is so far removed from the rise of fascism that they see the party differently. It is likely a mix of both, but the makeup of that mix is almost impossible to tell. My grand parents are EXTREMELY right wing, but absolutely loath Le Pen and would see their house burn rather than vote for her. It just happened they lived the war and under a regime that had the same root ideology than the FN and they don't have great memories of it. My grandfather was a hard line US Republican since WW2. But even he abandoned the party after W. Bush and voted for Obama. I am just happy he passed away before this election cycle. I can understand that. I don't have very warm feelings for my grand parents, but I really hope they don't live a day when MLP would access the presidency. They would really suffer from seeing those people and those ideas getting back to power after all that time. I have spent quite some times trying to rationalize how can My Little Pony become French president, because you were clearly not joking here!
Well Trump in the US, My Little Pony in France and all is well !
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
I'm sure a lot of the internal mechanics of the FN are the same. It also sends a bad message to keep both the name FN and run a Le Pen. But the party apparatus does outwardly appear to be different and perhaps that may be meaningful. Though perhaps not. It sucks when your main voter base is heavily populated by racists because you can't really run away from that.
Problem is, though, a lot of terms like "racist" and "fascist" are overused into meaninglessness. And few can say that those terms weren't misused in a "boy who cried wolf" manner in the past. Simply because being perceived as racist is so bad that you want other people to believe any opponent is actually racist.
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of course not all the voters are literal fascists or racist, but intolerance and tolerance are asymmetrical. A small amount of intolerant people can determine the cause because they are inflexible while the tolerant are flexible, that's why everybody in the US drives automatic cars or how monotheist religions drove out everybody else.
So I don't think the distinction is that important. If you rally behind a core of racist voters just because you're frustrated you're empowering them all the same and they get to decide the course. This can also be seen in the AfD which has moved to the right at a ridiculous speed, it didn't matter that the party also got new members out of the frustrated middle-class, they have nothing to say.
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On March 11 2017 08:41 LegalLord wrote:
I'm sure a lot of the internal mechanics of the FN are the same. It also sends a bad message to keep both the name FN and run a Le Pen. But the party apparatus does outwardly appear to be different and perhaps that may be meaningful. Though perhaps not. It sucks when your main voter base is heavily populated by racists because you can't really run away from that.
Problem is, though, a lot of terms like "racist" and "fascist" are overused into meaninglessness. And few can say that those terms weren't misused in a "boy who cried wolf" manner in the past. Simply because being perceived as racist is so bad that you want other people to believe any opponent is actually racist.
In my experience the really big problems are not the voters, but rather the party itself. The voters are not my favourite french people but when you do 25%, you have very diverse folks. But the people engaged in the party, from the local politicians in rural area to the leaders are simply pond scums. You can't get an idea of the FN by looking at them on the TV, you have to meet them and see what they do when they get anywhere near to power. It's ignorance, stupidity and meanness taking decisions.
I have had the priviledge to know a family of real FN people in the late 90's. They were making comments about arabs every other sentence. I am all for not crying wolf, but when someone tells you that arabs are thieves and arabs don't want to work, and arabs are like vermins that invade the country, you might start to think that "racist" is an adequate term.
We have FN neighbours in the countryside. When they drink a bit and start talking, it's just horrifying. You have the impression of being in 1935.
As for the fascism, that's where they come from. Again, it's not Trump or the alt right. It's a party that has a perfect continuity with historical, actual fascism. It was founded by people who supported Vichy and Pétain, French Algeria and the colonies, who hated democracy etc etc, and despite a gigantic PR effort to appear acceptable and normal, they have never really deviated (apart on minor stuff like the economy, because they don't have a clue and don't give a damn. They can go Milton Friedman into hatrdcore left wing in a matter of months and nobody even notices.)
It's time to stop being naive. Some people are nasty, some political forces are truly horrifying. The FN is one of them. It's a concentrate of everything wrong with France. And if it gets to power, it will be a historical disaster, and I am not being hyperbolic.
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You are being hyperbolic though. You need to point people to specifics, because there's hardly a soul left in the world who hasn't been called a fascist by politically illiterate college activists in this day and age. The more people like you hollow out these words the more likely it is that people will fail to recognise real fascism when it comes.
I mean, in the US you literally have 'antifascists' enacting political violence on people peacefully exercising their individual liberties.
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Norway28690 Posts
Lol? You follow up 'you are being hyperbolic' with 'there's hardly a soul left in the world who hasn't been called a fascist by politically illiterate college activists in this day and age'?
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Fascism is already slowly being implemented across the western world under the guise of so-called anti-terrorism and anti-child porn laws. From mass surveillance of online activities to penalties if you are caught outside without the proper documentation.
I was stopped once by the police while going to the supermarket. I had only brought my phone (the phone case also holds my debit card) and didn't have a legitimate ID with me. The cop didn't fine me but absolutely could have - that Muslim grandpa was cuffed and brought to the police station for going to the mosque without his ID, iirc. I suppose he had at least done something wrong though (cycling on the wrong side of the road, probably to prevent having to cross the road twice over a short distance). The reason why I was stopped? There had been a suspected terrorist activity in a village nearby which turned out to be nothing. I didn't break any laws for the cop to have a reason to stop me (which is why people said it was fine to implement that law - cops wouldn't go out of their way to stop law-abiding citizens).
Why is it OK for the government to enforce keeping logs of all our activities? From visiting websites to traveling on public transport? And as cars become ever-more connected to the internet, I'm sure it won't be long before they start tracking that shit as well. Would it be OK if the government made copies of each letter that was sent through the mail "just in case"? Would it be OK if the government kept a log of every house you entered? Every shop you browsed in? Not only that, people keep talking about wanting to ban encryption, while intelligence agencies that are supposed to keep us secure won't even report security bugs to software maintainers because they want their backdoors. How is that keeping any of us secure from identity theft or other crooked online activities that harm citizens?
Lets talk about fascism. Everything we do online in our ever-increasing digitalized lives is being logged, and now, across the western world, people are supposedly voting in fascists (from Trump to Le Pen to Wilders). How will that turn out? The liberals are setting up semi-fascist laws, and now we're voting in a bunch of far right people. How fucking stupid are we as humanity?
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