Stop Reproducing Lies: A Brief Introduction to Fascism

This blog post is sort of a part two of my last post, where I shared how tired I am of navigating online and seeing people practicing dehumanization through language by using the word "fascist" or "nazi" as an insult against those they disagree with. This technique was initially created by Stalin, but largely used and amplified by Goebbels.

Labels become shortcuts for not reading, not listening, not remembering history, but creating narratives.

If we go back to its origins, fascism was born in the collapse of liberal optimism and in movements that were openly anti-bourgeois. Its early language borrowed heavily from revolutionary syndicalism and from the belief that workers’ organizations, not parliaments, could forge a new civilization. There was a mix of anarchist impulses, nationalist myths, and a desire to smash the existing order.

Mussolini did not emerge from conservative drawing rooms. He was formed inside socialism, lived most of his intellectual life as a socialist, and even died claiming that identity, despite breaking with Marxist orthodoxy. He was deeply influenced by Georges Sorel, especially the idea that myth, action, and moral force could move history when rational debates failed. From this background came fascist corporatism, an attempt to organize society through syndicates under state coordination, rejecting both laissez-faire capitalism and classical Marxism.

None of this is an apology. Fascism later allied itself with traditional elites, destroyed independent unions, and hardened into an authoritarian machine. Those facts are essential. So reducing fascism to a vague synonym for "people I dislike" is intellectually shallow. When we repeat simplified lies, we lose the ability to recognize how dangerous ideas actually emerge, and manipulation becomes easier, no matter how virtuous we believe our side to be.