Is the First World turning to Fascism?

[The Dharma Bum]

so fecking weird this is

[Spider]

[eynon81]

[eynon81]

[wormwood]

[The Comrade]

the further back you go, the more and more people are related to one another. it's simply how genealogy works.

[The Dharma Bum]

[Ben Huh]

I am late to this convo (work sucks), but IMO the entire world is moving in general to more centralized and powerful governments, be it fascism (corporatism) or some form of communism/socialism. Basically, powerful people will use what benefits them most to get more power. If you are in a poorer nation, you'll use the plight of your poor to centralize industry and give them enough handouts to keep them happy and if the nation you're in is richer, you'll benefit from more corporate control. In the US, the Dems and Reps play this game to keep their bases in line and them in power. Do I think most people in need that are on welfare misuse welfare? Absolutely not. Do I think it benefits the Dems to have more poor people in the US and they know it too? You bet your ass. As a capitalist, I will gladly throw any corporatist under the bus as they are not a capitalist. Capitalism needs a strong middle class, an investing middle class to be successful and when businesses do things to become TBTF or even worse, become allied with the government to drown out competition, it is not conducive to anything to do with capitalism.

[The Dharma Bum]

I think it's more that some governments are trying to assert greater control in response to the trend toward decentralization because they wish to mitigate any loss in power and influence.

So while there has been the rise of the EU as a political entity or the rise of the security state in the US as recent examples of centralization and concentration of power I think both of these developments will ultimately be discarded as useless. You can't fight progress and as society becomes more and more complex ultimately a decentralized social protocol will prove more useful.

[Hyperion]