How was fascism seen before WW2?
mite b cool
It made socialists completely seethe and many thought it was a pretty neat concept as Italy in the 20s looked very promising. It didn't turn into a widespread phenomenon though, fascist parties never gained large-scale voter support. It was too revolutionary (and explicitly marketed itself as a revolutionary political movement), therefore it attracted people in societies in turmoil and even there it was never more than 10-20%, lefties were more attracted to the Bolshevist style of socialism and rightists were more into old-school patriotism, religious platforms and monarchism.
>>18243737read up on sansepolcrismo and futurismlenin was mad mussolini left the socialist party
>>18243737not like the other commies
>>18243737Churchill praised Mussolini pre-WW2. So did Gandhi funny enough
>>18243985Hitler was initially praised as a great world leader who saved his country from economic collapseHe was once TIME magazines Man of the YearHe prolly wouldn't be viewed as "literally most evil man ever" if he didn't invade most of Europe like a retard
>>18243737Fascism was just a cool, new European trend before the war! Everybody was into it.Mussolini in Italy made the trains run on time and got everyone doing cool salutes, so people thought it was super efficient and patriotic. Hitler was seen as a strong leader who fixed the economy and gave people pride. Tourists went on fun bus tours to see the big rallies, it was all very impressive and modern. Lots of serious newspapers in other countries wrote articles saying he had some good ideas.Basically, most folks just saw it as a strict but fair type of government that was tough on crime and made countries powerful again. Nobody really knew about all the bad stuff... that all came as a total surprise later.It was just a different political style, like Democrats and Republicans.
>>18243737The middle ground. A lot of middle class and upper middle class people came to see figures like Mussolini and the ideas he promoted as the sensible alternative to Capitalism, which was blamed for the economic failures of the 20s and 30s, and Communism, where the only example they had to go off was the Russian horror show.
>>18243737Depends on who you asked. The Left obviously hated it and viewed it as an apocalyptic threat (they were right), the traditional ruling class viewed the fascists as "useful idiots", basically as group of uncivilized up-jumped peasants who could be given a few crumbs of power in order to use them as a weapon to crush the uppity working class, but that surely wouldn't use those crumbs to seize complete control of the government and could easily be done away with once their usefulness was over. The Liberals viewed them as "enemies" but more in the sense that their politics needed to be "moderated" and they could achieve "bi-partisan solutions" via electoralism and that sometimes you had to compromise with them to fight the commies. Fascism in general was most popular among the "middle class" especially small business owners who viewed themselves as having been betrayed by liberalism as it had promised them that they through the wonders of "meritocracy" they would be successful unlike the lower people "who deserved it" that they could lord over, but now with WW1 and the Depression were losing their livelihood, and Fascism offered them scapegoats and promised that everything would go back to the way it was.
Most people didn't see Fascism as purely evil. Many people (especially elites) viewed it as a strong, modern, anti-communist solution to post-WWI chaos. However, others already considered it violent and anti-democratic, but they did not yet know its worst crimes. Only after WWII did fascism become universally condemned.
>>18243737By whom and when?Generally, Italian Fascism and Mussolini were seen much more positively outside Italy after they got into power (the blackshirt militias were seen as thugs but the view was that Mussolini cut back on those radical elements and established order in Italy). The Nazis by contrast were seen much more negatively from the start, they were seen by mainstream politicians outside Germany as warmongerers (Hitler was often compared to the Kaiser, which was the shorthand at the time that he someone is an evil warmongerer) and un-Christian. The Catholic Church for example denounced National Socialism way before the war, just after signing the Lateran Accords with Fascist Italy. Liking Mussolini outside Italy was fairly normal (and if you were really mad about him, you were probably a commie), while liking Hitler marked you as a kook. A modern comparison: Mussolini was seen like Modi, the Nazis were seen like the Taliban.
>>18244166>He was once TIME magazines Man of the YearRead the actual TIME article about that. It called him "the greatest threatening force that the democratic, freedom-loving world faces today"Man of the Year is not an endorsement, it just means the most impactful persone of the year. You can be that by being the most harmful person too.
>>18243737progressive and scientific
>>18245529>and viewed it as an apocalyptic threat (they were right)Nah man, the remaining two fascist states fell in '74 and '75, listen to me when the rain's coming down.Meanwhile, the Commies held on til 89.
>>18247608Post-Euromaidan Ukraine is a fascist state though. It’s ran by corporatism, heavily invested in militarism and the like and seeks to reclaim its lost past (Stepan Bandera).
>>18244166Lmao the TIME article that had a cartoon of him playing an organ of corpses?
