Why Trump’s 2025 USA Is Not Fascist: An Anarcho-Communist Analysis

From The Polar Bl@st

In 2025, as Donald Trump re-enters the White House, a familiar discourse reignites across left-leaning and liberal spaces: “Trump is a fascist.” For many, especially in the mainstream, it’s an emotionally satisfying shorthand for what they experience as authoritarian, cruel, and dangerous leadership. And to be fair, much of what the Trump regime has done—both in the past and now in its return—has been undeniably authoritarian and reactionary.

But for anarcho-communists, accuracy in our analysis matters. We don’t water down our politics for respectability, and neither should we inflate our terms for rhetorical gain. Labeling Trump’s administration as “fascist” not only misdiagnoses the true nature of the capitalist state in decline—it risks obscuring the unique threat that actual fascism poses, and the ways in which we resist it.

This article makes the case that, while Trump’s administration is authoritarian, nationalist, misogynist, and deeply committed to the preservation of capitalist class power, it is not fascist in the historical or materialist sense. Understanding that distinction sharpens our analysis and strengthens our struggle.


What Is Fascism? Historical Lessons from Capitalist Crisis

Fascism, as it emerged in 20th-century Europe, was not simply about authoritarianism or nationalism. It was a specific reactionary political formation—an emergency measure by capital in crisis.

Whether Mussolini’s Italy or Hitler’s Germany, fascism involved:

  • The destruction of the organised working class and leftist parties.
  • Mass mobilisation of the petty bourgeoisie and lumpenproletariat into paramilitary movements (e.g., the Blackshirts or Brownshirts).
  • A corporatist alliance between capital and state, with the aim of re-stabilising capitalist production through extreme nationalist myths, war economies, and repression.
  • A cult of personality, mythologised history, and violent racial ideologies, all tightly integrated into state functions.
  • Totalitarian structures that attempted to eliminate the distinction between civil society and state power.

In short, fascism is not just “a right-wing government you hate.” It is an anti-communist, counter-revolutionary strategy that the capitalist class deploys when bourgeois democracy becomes unworkable and mass uprisings threaten the system itself.

Fascism is class war—launched from above and with boots on the ground.


Trumpism and Authoritarian Capitalism

Donald Trump is not a fascist. He is a right-wing populist demagogue whose politics are steeped in racial resentment, anti-immigrant hysteria, and capitalist opportunism. He doesn’t seek to overthrow the liberal capitalist order but rather to capture and manipulate it to serve the interests of a particular faction of the ruling class. He doesn’t challenge capitalist democracy so much as stretch and distort it.

During his first term (2016–2020), Trump’s administration engaged in authoritarian posturing—targeting immigrants, stacking the judiciary, encouraging white supremacist rhetoric, and undermining public institutions. But it lacked a coherent ideology or organisational base to transform the state into a fascist apparatus. His policies were largely shaped by corporate lobbying, personal grudge, and electoral expedience—not by a totalising fascist vision.

Now in 2025, many fear a more organised and dangerous Trump. And yes, this time, the authoritarian tendencies are sharper. But even with more experience and more loyalists, this administration still lacks the defining characteristics of fascism.

Let’s examine why.

Trump’s 2025 Administration: What’s Authoritarian, What’s Not

  1. Bureaucratic Purges and Schedule F

Trump has revived his plan to reintroduce Schedule F—a policy that would allow mass firing of federal workers deemed disloyal or opposed to his policy agenda. This is not small potatoes. It’s an overt attempt to politicise the civil service and fill it with sycophants.

But this move is not fascist. It’s a bureaucratic power grab to consolidate executive control. There is no mass movement behind this; no street-level militia enforcing loyalty. It’s palace politics—deeply dangerous, but still operating within the framework of capitalist statecraft.

  1. Rollback of Civil Rights and DEI Programs

In early 2025, Trump signed executive orders dismantling diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives in federal agencies and public education. He has also targeted trans rights and reinstated anti-LGBTQ+ military bans.

This is reactionary policy-making aimed at placating a socially conservative base. It’s cruel and dangerous—but again, not fascist. These are symbolic culture war victories, useful for political mobilisation, but not tied to a paramilitary or totalitarian project.

  1. Tax Cuts and Economic Populism

Trump’s current proposals include eliminating federal taxes on tips, overtime pay, and Social Security benefits. His goal is to sell himself as a champion of the working person—without ever challenging the economic order that exploits them.

This “pro-worker” branding is classic right-wing populism. Like all populists, he offers crumbs to the working class while ensuring that capital remains supreme. There is no fascist corporatism or total war economy here—just neoliberal tax cuts dressed in patriotic clothing.

  1. Immigration Crackdowns

The Trump administration continues to push an aggressive anti-immigrant agenda: deploying the National Guard to the border, ending asylum eligibility for irregular entrants, and proposing mass deportations.

This nativist scapegoating is central to Trump’s political identity. But it’s not unique to fascism—it is foundational to settler-colonial states like the USA. Obama deported millions. Biden built more border tech. Trump just strips away the liberal veneer.

  1. No Mass Party or Paramilitary Movement

Perhaps most significantly, Trump still does not lead a mass fascist movement.

Yes, he has a fiercely loyal base. Yes, elements of his following (like the Proud Boys or Patriot Front) flirt with fascism. But there is no mass street-level organisation with the capacity to seize power or crush the left. January 6 was not a coup attempt in the fascist mould—it was a riot. A dangerous one, but not a revolutionary seizure of power.

Fascism requires a fusion of state, capital, and mass mobilisation. Trumpism lacks that third leg.


Why This Distinction Matters

You might ask—why split hairs? Isn’t “fascist” just a useful shorthand for “very bad”?

But for anarcho-communists, this distinction isn’t academic. It’s strategic.

  • If we call everything fascism, we dilute the term and misdirect our energies. We start treating liberal capitalists as anti-fascists, despite their active role in maintaining racial capitalism and empire.

-If we understand Trumpism as authoritarian capitalism, we can organise resistance that targets the root system—not just the rotten branch. We don’t fall into the liberal trap of defending the state from Trump; we fight both.

  • If actual fascism arises, we must be able to identify it. Real fascist movements—rooted in the streets, backed by capital, and bent on exterminating revolutionary opposition—require different tactics than those needed to resist a corrupt authoritarian president.

Trump is an authoritarian, racist capitalist oligarch—not a fascist. Treating him as such blinds us to both the strengths and limits of his regime.


The Role of Liberalism in Confusing the Discourse

Let’s be clear: the liberal class loves to call Trump “fascist” because it masks their own complicity.

Biden has backed genocide in Gaza. Obama built the deportation machine. Clinton helped write mass incarceration into law. Yet these figures are painted as defenders of democracy against Trump’s tyranny.

Calling Trump “fascist” allows liberals to pretend that the real problem is authoritarian style, not capitalist substance. It turns the problem into one of personality, not politics. And it invites us to rally behind the very institutions—cops, courts, prisons, borders—that enforce state violence every day.

Anarchists don’t play that game. We don’t choose between Trumpian violence and liberal violence—we fight to abolish both.


Conclusion: What We Fight For

Trump’s USA in 2025 is not fascist. It is the advanced stage of a decaying capitalist empire—authoritarian, paranoid, and violent. But it still operates within the framework of bourgeois democracy, reliant on electoral spectacle, media manipulation, and liberal complicity.

This is not a call to minimise the danger. Trump is a threat—to migrants, to workers, to queers, to women, to the climate, and to anyone outside his imagined volk. But to defeat that threat, we need to name it correctly.

He is not Hitler. He is a real estate con man with an aging fan club and a dying empire behind him.

Our task isn’t to restore democracy. It’s to build dual power, abolish the state, destroy capitalism, and create a world rooted in mutual aid, solidarity, and liberation.

Let’s stay sharp. Let’s organise, not moralise. Let’s not mistake the mask for the monster.

Comments

anon (not verified) Sat, 04/19/2025 - 10:23

Dunno where to start... this denialist crap is so full of half-truths that, aside from the Leninist Dual Power statement, reeks of same-old Marxist allowance -if not defense- of fascism. Think of the recent Zizek's honeymoon with Jordan Peepee as well as depicting Trump as the first true "post-modern" POTUS.

NZ ancoms look like a clusterfuck of paradoxical positioning, not unlike the UK ones tho not as funny as the OZ ones. They could join the Especifismo orgs of Latin-America for that matter.

anon (not verified) Sat, 04/19/2025 - 10:45

In reply to by anon (not verified)

If you dunno where to start, you could always not comment instead of rambling on without substance like you have here. Dual power not making sense as something anarchists would want to build doesn't make your own comment any more coherent. Two people can be wrong at once.

anon (not verified) Sat, 04/19/2025 - 12:38

This statement is quite useful, largely accurate, and a real breath of fresh air, especially when contrasted with the usual Harry Potter fan posturing endemic to what gets called anarchism in the United States.

Dual power isn't some diabolical Leninist scheme; it is what organically asserts itself time after time in periods of mass revolutionary or potentially revolutionary upheaval. Dual power existed in the Republican-regions of Spain from July 21 to Sept. 1936; the revolutionaries failed to see this and act accordingly. People who never crack open a history text and who never venture outside of a hermetically walled-off subculture aren't going to grasp the historic significance of dual power.

anon (not verified) Sat, 04/19/2025 - 12:42

"Our task isn’t to restore democracy. It’s to build dual power, abolish the state, destroy capitalism, and create a world rooted in mutual aid, solidarity, and liberation."

And to be unmistakably clear about this, destroy capitalism means abolish wage labor, money and commodity production, unlike the hokum advocated by Bakunin, Malatesta and Tom Wetzel.

Wayne Price@ (not verified) Sat, 04/19/2025 - 15:09

The statement is correct that this is not the classical fascism of Hitler or Mussolini. But neither is it just another round of bourgeois electoral politics, Republicans following Democrats following Republicans, etc. It is deliberately on the model of Victor Urban of Hungary, of Modi of India, or (on the "left") of Maduro of Venezuela. Staying more-or-less within the forms of a limited representative-constitutional democracy, it hollows out the forms, steps "over the lines," and aims to transform the system into a capitalist dictatorship in the form of a traditional representative democracy.

I don't know whether Trump and his minions will get away with this (Poland had a reversal of the process). The super-rich as a whole have no reason to support a dictatorship. They have been doing just fine under the previous set-up! And dictatorship looses some advantages of bourgeois democracy (such as being able to use elections periodically to get rid of presidents if they are stupid, incompetent, and unstable). The police might go along but would the military?

There is a growing rebellion, still being channeled into the Democratic Party, but a revolutionary anarchist wing might have a decisive impact if it develops. We will see.

anon (not verified) Sat, 04/19/2025 - 16:19

To 14:48: Lenin had an opinion about it, so it must be his private property. You have my vote for designated intellectual at the next SF Bay Area Bookfair.

anon (not verified) Sat, 04/19/2025 - 20:10

In reply to by anon (not verified)

Okay, so which earlier non-Marxist authors talked about Dual Power TM? Dual Power as defined by Lenin & co amounts to just being a proto-state; not an anarchy.

GiggyMantis* (not verified) Sat, 04/19/2025 - 17:35

Fascism ***is*** the end state of capitalism. Stating that “Trump is not a fascist” is wrong because every fucking American leader for 50 years has been a fascist, and nobody in the mainstream noticed.

lumpy (not verified) Sun, 04/20/2025 - 09:28

In reply to by GiggyMantis* (not verified)

^this. 1000%

this writer's takes are absolutely trash, to the point where you just wonder about the agenda behind being so completely wrong, it feels extremely shady as well as stupid af. suspiciously stupid.

any serious antifascist scholar would be familiar with this definition of fascism that giggy mentioned. it's one of the more accessible and flexible takes, not perfect but good enough!

the fascists get brought in by the capitalists as they lose control because of their own greed and mistakes, then the rich lose control of their running dogs, sometimes get purged along with everybody else. their temper tantrums about needing to control everyone and punish disobedience reaches its final form in genocide. not that hard to understand, especially for anyone claiming to be an anti-authoritarian communist?! this is jackson hinkle levels of snake oil on sale here

SirEinzige Sun, 04/20/2025 - 13:55

In reply to by GiggyMantis* (not verified)

This is just leftist eschatology in the same line of nonsense like 'late capitalism'. Also, there has never been a Fascist head of state in the US. Not even the Tangerine Turd. As others have pointed out he represents a geopolitical authoritarian turn in the same illiberal mode as Modi and Orban among others.

Here's a good video by someone who actually has scholarly historical knowledge on the subject matter.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVnNvKpIIa4&t=154s

SoreEgregore (not verified) Sun, 04/20/2025 - 14:15

In reply to by SirEinzige

SoOooo truuuue, my radical centrist ego anarch egregore brOther! These leftist eschatological cucks have NO UNDERSTANDING of that nonsense that is late capitalist geopolitical authoritarian retardation like we egregorical anarch do! Based Youtube to teach them YEEES! No more nonsense cuckmode on our beloved Anews for AT LEAST 10,000 years post-analysis! UnnNnnnh!!

anon (not verified) Sat, 04/19/2025 - 21:22

I remember Lawrence Jarach harumphing at stupefying length about dual power many years ago in 'Anarchy: A Journal of Desire Armed.' Of course he couldn't be bothered to find out what he was talking about before forming and sharing his ill-tempered opinion.

anon (not verified) Sat, 04/19/2025 - 22:19

What Lawrence Jarach's pose of implacable anarchist playground pedant exclusively in safe settings adds up to was really showing that time! What he is/was about has so little to do with life outside of his very small hermetically sealed cocoon that he hasn't heard about what burning black churches has actually been about in the actual world we live in.

EmmaAintDead Sun, 04/20/2025 - 09:08

In reply to by anon (not verified)

Burning black churches has been a right wing endeavor based on antiblackness, sure... But it can just as easily be an anarchist endeavor based on combating European dominance. The rejection of the christian order should not stop at racial lines. If we are serious about combating white supremacy we cannot leave its strongest tools of racial and ethnic assimilation and domination in place. The black church exists solely - yes, solely - as a tool of white domination. 

Saying that the burning of black churches in the US is solely the arena of the right is shortsighted and counterproductive. The burning of ANYTHING in the US is the domain of the right, simply because the right has a better track record of putting their money where their mouths are. Attacks on power grid infrastructure, communications towers, government buildings, prisons, institutions of education, police infrastructure, centers of commerce... All fields dominated by the right. To say we therefore cannot engage in those venues is downright silly. We have cause to oppose all of them. 

Stop letting the right win by default. 

anon (not verified) Sun, 04/20/2025 - 07:16

sigh. rumor mills. he didn't say burning black churches. he said that the church is an oppressive institution, and when there was pushback, he said, "yes, even black churches". 

not really controversial for anarchists (except of the liberal variety), but of course people who weren't there like to add the drama. 

EmmaAintDead Sun, 04/20/2025 - 09:58

I do not believe the majority of leftists truly believe trump to be a fascist. If they did, I would expect them to act with an urgency they currently lack. It is too business-as-usual for me to take seriously as a threat.

If the left truly believed trump is uniquely a fascist and a New American Holocaust is on the horizon, then the way the left is responding (unremarkably. that is, identically to bush, Obama, biden) is inadequate and the left is a failed resistance from the word go. If the left does not truly believe trump is uniquely a fascist, as I believe is the case, then this is the loudest crying of wolf so far and should be taken as the doomsday politicking it is and nothing more. Either way, these people cannot be looked to for the effective resistance to the fascist order that they have spent the past 2 decades declaring they exist for.

lumpy (not verified) Sun, 04/20/2025 - 10:30

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

wait ... so, you start your post by saying "i do not believe[...]"

then you get to the accurate assessment of reality here

"the way the left is responding [...] is inadequate and [...] a failed resistance from the word go."

so your brain is clearly doing the work but apparently you just don't want to believe what you already know? trust yourself emma!

EmmaAintDead Sun, 04/20/2025 - 20:38

In reply to by lumpy (not verified)

I do not believe the left truly thinks this is fascism because they are not acting as though they believe it. I haven't decided on whether or not I think they WANT to believe this is fascism and are lying to themselves to will it into existence so they can prove they were right/relevant or if are they just openly lying to everyone they are speaking in an attempt at recruiting liberals who are terrified of their own authoritarianism in any other hands, but I do not believe they actually believe this is fascism in either case. 

anon (not verified) Sun, 04/20/2025 - 21:04

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

Fascism :
1. a populist political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual, that is associated with a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, and that is characterized by severe economic and social regimentation and by forcible suppression of opposition

2. a tendency toward or actual exercise of strong autocratic or dictatorial control

OooOoooh!

SirEinzige Sun, 04/20/2025 - 21:30

In reply to by anon (not verified)

My nigga Roger Griffin lays it down pretty well as palingenetic ultra nationalism. Trump has some of the characteristics but not all.

Those 2 points lack any kind of definitional specificity. Those points can be applied to Lenin and Stalin and while they were acute faggoty authoritarians, they were not fascists.

Pete Verhovensky (not verified) Sun, 04/20/2025 - 18:02

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

Trump, that petty little celebrity narcissist, I MAKE HIM LOOK LIKE A CHOIR BOY!! My sEEthIng is sooOoo intEnse thAt I gRInd mY tEEth whEn I eaT fAIry flOss!!

Spencer Thayer (not verified) Sun, 04/20/2025 - 22:39

You don’t get to play neutral while the house is catching fire. The author of that analysis, whatever their intent, is not clarifying—they’re muddying the waters. When a political movement walks, talks, and organizes like fascism, insisting it doesn’t quite “fit” because it lacks the proper boots or insignia isn’t careful, it’s complicit. This is the voice of someone who sees the storm gathering and chooses to debate the shape of clouds instead of warning the people.

We don’t have the luxury of academic purism. The oppressed don’t need semantic games—they need clarity, urgency, and strategy. From where we stand, deep in a settler-colonial empire saturated with racialized violence, Trumpism doesn’t need to mimic 20th-century fascism perfectly to pose the same threat. Fascism is not a historical artifact. It is a function—a response of the ruling class to crisis, revolt, and instability. It is a weapon unsheathed when capital feels endangered by the very people it exploits.

Fanon taught us to look not only at the brutality of the colonizer, but at the psychic mechanisms of domination—how language, law, and political discourse are manipulated to dull the senses of the oppressed, to delay revolt. That is what this argument does. By claiming Trumpism isn’t fascism, it obscures the nature of the enemy at the exact moment we must sharpen our vision.

Trumpism is not merely “authoritarian capitalism.” That phrase flattens the terrain. This is a movement with the clear intent to centralize power, purge bureaucratic resistance, escalate violence against targeted groups, and stir a base willing to carry out acts of political terror on its behalf. That is not just authoritarianism—it is fascism adapted to the American landscape. It grows not by copying old blueprints, but by exploiting the specific historical tools the U.S. already provides: racial hierarchy, carceral governance, settler violence.

Look at the plan to gut the federal workforce through Schedule F. This is not “palace politics.” It’s a strategic step to hollow out the administrative state, removing even the most modest internal constraints on executive power. A fascist movement doesn’t begin with the creation of an all-powerful state—it begins with destroying the mechanisms that could resist it. That’s what this is.

Look at the attacks on trans people, queer communities, Black studies, reproductive autonomy. These are not “culture war” skirmishes—they are targeted campaigns to dehumanize, isolate, and terrorize. Fascism builds itself around internal enemies. It doesn’t just vilify—it makes examples. It conditions the public to accept cruelty as governance. It tells the “real” people that they are victims and must strike back.

Look at the economic rhetoric—dripping with “anti-globalist” populism, soaked in nostalgia for a white, industrial past. It mimics concern for the working class while serving capital’s deepest desires: deregulation, privatization, and the crushing of labor. This is the classic fascist trick—nationalist language as a mask for class war from above. That’s why the Chamber of Commerce doesn’t fear Trump; it fears workers organizing.

Look at the border. While both parties have upheld a regime of dehumanization and militarized control, Trumpism turns this violence into a theater of cruelty. The goal is not just policy—it is spectacle. It’s a performance of dominance, designed to harden the nation’s collective psyche, to make mass expulsions and indefinite detention feel like patriotic duty.

And no, Trump does not command a brownshirt militia in the traditional sense. But he doesn’t need to. He has the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, and a legion of lone wolves radicalized online, fused together by grievance and armed to the teeth. January 6 wasn’t just chaos—it was a test. A convergence of state actors, street-level fascists, and political opportunists attempting a violent transition to illegitimate power. It was a glimpse of what’s possible when the leader calls and the base answers.

This is why the distinction matters. To say Trumpism isn’t fascist is to suggest it poses no unique threat. That misjudgment isn’t just wrong—it’s dangerous. It lulls us into complacency. It pretends this is a storm we’ve weathered before, when in reality we’re heading into far more violent terrain. We’re told that using the term “fascism” plays into liberal hands, that it strengthens their narrative. But this is backward. Liberals use the fascist threat to rally support, yes—but only to preserve a system that gave birth to it.

The liberal state cannot defeat fascism. Because fascism is not its opposite—it is its logical endpoint when democracy becomes inconvenient for the ruling class. The liberal state gave the police their guns, the corporations their loopholes, and the surveillance state its teeth. Now it wrings its hands while Trump threatens to use them more directly. That’s not opposition—it’s complicity.

To treat Trumpism as just another expression of bipartisan rot erases the material escalation it represents. Yes, the state was violent before him. Yes, Democrats are stewards of empire. But Trumpism seeks to concentrate and unleash that violence without apology, without restraint, and with a popular movement behind it that welcomes the bloodshed. It is the transition from covert repression to open rule by force. And that matters.

Fascism never begins with concentration camps. It begins with rhetoric, with scapegoats, with slow legal changes, with purges, with tolerated street violence. It begins with making us question whether it’s fascism yet. It is process, not event. The author fails to grasp that timeline, and in doing so, fails the moment we are in.

We are not debating definitions—we are fighting for survival. Anarcho-communists must be the clearest voices in this moment, not the most cautious. We don’t dull our analysis to avoid helping liberals. We sharpen it to expose the entire system—Trump’s movement and the order that lets it rise.

We must see what’s forming: a fascist project rooted in settler-colonial violence, powered by capitalist crisis, and evolving rapidly. Waiting for it to complete its metamorphosis before naming it is cowardice. The shape is clear enough. The intent is declared. The movement is mobilized.

And so must we be. Through mutual aid, direct action, revolutionary education, and community defense. Through solidarity that crosses borders and smashes hierarchies. Through the construction of dual power that renders both Trumpism and liberalism obsolete.

Fascism doesn’t wait for permission to act. Neither should we.

anon (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 08:15

In reply to by Spencer Thayer (not verified)

you're acting like the word fascism is magical and will make people who resist magically gain super powers and super motivation. 

and the point of definitions is EXACTLY about being strategic. about picking the correct tools to fight what is going on. 

that said, i don't think the article has good advice about how to fight, and also "fascism" is a notoriously mutable construct. but you don't have good advice on how to specifically fight either. and "no nothingism" has a fucked up history as well. 
 

lumpy (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 08:43

In reply to by anon (not verified)

no, they're not "acting like a word is magic". they're thumping on the nuance button and leaning in the correct direction, if you ask me

as you say, words are tools and locating your goals with your own values and position is how you decide to use the tools. OR you could spend forever bickering with bad faith trolls about semantics if you're just looking for that next dopamine hit lol

lastly, the reason "fascism is notoriously mutuable" is because it always works backwards from its own conclusions like a belligerent narcissist. this is much easier to do than holding to a core value like the beautiful idea. fascism argues and justifies in little circles of foregone conclusions in the muck, while the beautiful idea is the sky above our heads that we rarely reach and can't seem to stay for long

Spencer Thayer (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 10:27

In reply to by anon (not verified)

You’re right, “fascism” isn’t a magic spell.

My point isn’t that shouting “fascism!” automatically empowers us. It’s that accurate analysis shapes effective strategy. Calling it fascism isn’t about boosting morale through semantics; it’s about identifying the specific nature of the threat. If you misdiagnose the illness, you prescribe the wrong medicine. If we treat this as just “bad politics” or standard “authoritarianism,” we might rely on strategies (like appealing to courts, institutions, or bipartisan decency) that are bound to fail against a movement actively dismantling those very things and operating outside those norms. Naming it signals the need for a different kind of fight – one rooted in mass mobilization, direct confrontation (violent or otherwise), building autonomous power, and understanding that the state itself is becoming the weapon, not a potential referee.

You and I agree that definitions are, in fact, strategic, which incidentally is the crux of my argument. I contend that refusing the label despite the evidence (purges, dehumanization, paramilitary mobilization, anti-democratic intent fused with capital) is strategically poor. It underestimates the enemy and risks leading us down dead ends. The label “fascism” helps clarify what needs to be fought: not just policies, but a counter-revolutionary project aiming to crush opposition entirely and restructure the state for open reaction. That clarity should inform our choice of tools.

I am not entirely sure what you mean by, "no nothingism," but if you meant this as a warning against empty sloganeering or nihilistic destruction without a constructive vision, I hear that. The struggle against fascism can’t just be reactive; it must be pro-revolutionary. It has to be about building the world we want – based on solidarity, autonomy, and meeting needs – even as we fight the horrors unfolding. The urgency isn’t reactionary, mindless opposition; we must defend the possibility of a different future and the communities under immediate attack.

EmmaAintDead Mon, 04/21/2025 - 08:38

In reply to by Spencer Thayer (not verified)

If the proud boys and oathkeepers are the modern brownshirts then we are all going to be fine. These are boys clubs and support groups with a penchant toward occasional loudmouthing. Unless I missed the historical significance of the brownshirts being college age drunks who routinely get their asses beat whenever they show up in public. You might as well make the claim that since the hammerskins exist and also hate the same people trump does that they are his paramilitary force. These groups are jokes.

The rest of your post seems to be making the argument that this is fascism because trump WANTS it to be fascism. I think that's very generous of you, but trump has a lot more work to do before it is actually fascism no matter how much he might want it to be right now. I want a 5'2" 135lb femme catboy with neck-down alopecia and a case of hyperspermia that needs constant maintenance to follow me around on all fours everywhere I go, but wanting that doesn't get me any closer to being truly happy, does it? Hell, after all, is chocked to the gills with people wanting ice water. They cannot be described as quenched.

Saying trumpism isn't fascism isn't saying it isn't a threat, it is saying it isn't the same threat you are describing. It is a different one that is in many ways not nearly as severe, and because it is a different one you can't be so sure the same old tricks that failed in the 30s and 40s will somehow prevail this time. We will need something more creative than solidarity and mutual aid this time around. They've got drones nowadays. 

lumpy (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 08:47

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

of course the brownshirts were drunk and lost fights in the streets ...think maybe you need to brush up on the weimar republic portion of the history?

...also the part about the catboy was a bit TMI but you do you

EmmaAintDead Mon, 04/21/2025 - 08:54

In reply to by lumpy (not verified)

Is the argument that we are in an immediate precursor to full blown fascism - as the argument has been made nonstop since Nixon - or is it that we are currently on full blown fascism? It seems to me the argument is that fascism is here right now in force, not that we are reliving the death throes of the Weimar republic. The two arguments are very different conversations, and the Weimar one does not seem to be the one the author is discussing. 

The catboy portion of the above comment is quite possibly the most important thing I have ever written. I am doing my part in fighting fascism by embracing entartete kunst as an everyday practice. This is my antifascist calisthenics. Opposition to it is fascist sympathy.

lumpy (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 09:01

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

... again, you do you, i'm moving on from that

this author's writing is a pile of stinking trash in the hot sun. as for where we are currently in history, i've played the game of semantic debate too many times so i don't particularly care which analogies you're comfortable making. as that other commenter said, i would only wonder about the intentions of anyone stubbornly refusing to see how dire the current situation is.

the best case scenario there is that they're just liberals who can't emotionally process what's happened: that their stupid bullshit democracy for the select few, has been stolen and used as toilet paper by even more awful people than they are

EmmaAintDead Mon, 04/21/2025 - 09:18

In reply to by lumpy (not verified)

Their stupid democracy bullshit wasn't stolen, though. It was won in a landslide. The democracy machine worked as intended here. The argument can be made, maybe, that Harris was just such an unappealing candidate that the majority of the electorate voted trump through gritted teeth, I guess, but that's still not theft so much as it is willful surrender.

The whole thing certainly feels familiar. We have seen it before. From 2002-2008, specifically. You can find precedent for a whole lot of the unprecedented shit happening right now a lot closer on the timeline than you are letting on. Draconian border policy? Bush. Mass deportation and redefining terms of citizenship? Bush. Targeting specific minority ethnicities with clearly prejudiced law enforcement? Bush. Consolidation of political power and militarization of executive control? Bush. Sabre rattling over Gaza and impossible positioning in russian expansionism? Bush. Jingoistic nationalist cult of personality that ignores rule of law within its own system? Chene- I mean bush.

We have yet to see something as impactful as the patriot act pass through Trump 2. Maaaayyyybe the resurrection of the alien enemies act? We will see... Regardless, if you're looking for the historical parallel you don't have to reach way back to Weimar. If we didn't succumb to full blown fascism in October 2001, the prospect of doing so now seems silly. 

lumpy (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 09:38

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

why would anarchists care about the legitimacy of the capitalist democracy? i mean, i could have a long argument with you about that whole chris wylie, cambridge analytica rabbithole? but that doesn't interest me

long story short, whatever "democracy" used to be, it hasn't been the same since big tech grabbed the wheel awhile back. anyway, you can be part of whatever "we" you seem to think you are, i sense we are on very different pages! good luck processing whichever parts of reality you can handle!

EmmaAintDead Mon, 04/21/2025 - 10:11

In reply to by lumpy (not verified)

I don't think anarchists have much of a reason to care about the legitimacy of capitalist democracy in general, but whether or not trump's power is the result of theft certainly plays into whether we are living in/under fascism. He neither seized power through force nor was he appointed to power outside of the established process, as is generally the case with fascists. Step 1 of the litmus test for "is this fascism" is therefore failed - the democratic process has not ceased its function nor has it been meaningfully subverted. All indications are that he won a "free" and "fair" election, the same as any other president. Except bush. Hey, wait, that guy actually DID steal his election... Hmm... Ah well, Weimar Weimar Weimar. 

lumpy (not verified) Tue, 04/22/2025 - 09:10

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

" the democratic process has not ceased its function nor has it been meaningfully subverted."

^ oh really? lmfao

look, this weird little game you seem to want to play doesn't interest me but you're pretty much continually proving you're not an anarchist by arguing as if there's "free and fair elections" under capitalism.

might want to stop embarrassing yourself like this? don't know why you'd be on about this except as some sort of fash-curious edgelord or pathological contrarian? it's bizarre and a terrible look. have the brainworms made it past your last defenses? i'm sad for you

SirEinzige Tue, 04/22/2025 - 10:21

In reply to by lumpy (not verified)

And as usual you're wrong and retarded. The democratic process is still very much in play. What you don't seem to get is that democracy has a LOOONG history with authoritarian rule clear on back to Greece slavery and all. What you are seeing in the US is the historical norm as far as democracy goes.

What changed democracy and gave it the illusion of freedom was liberal universalism. Democracy, however, is not contingent upon LU. Most of historical democracy has existed without it. Trump is part of a series of authoritarian leaders who utilize democracy for authoritarian ends.

Many of the liberal elective antifas want to save democracy when in actuality what would be more important to either save or at least help out is liberalism as much as it may pain some to admit this. For all of its societarian flaws liberalism is preferable to democracy. What is needed is a global libertarian anti-authoritarian movement to counteract this wave of geopolitical authoritarianism. Pop antifa can and does get in the way of this imperative. Fascism is at most a junior partner in this epoch of authoritarian madness.

He's not a contrarian, your just an idiot as usual.

Spencer Thayer (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 10:34

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

To dismiss the street gangs and militias – the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers – as mere “boys clubs” getting their teeth knocked out is to fatally misunderstand the insidious nature of creeping political violence. It is precisely through such seemingly disorganized, performative brutality that the boundaries of acceptable force are shifted, that the public psyche is acclimated to the spectacle of terror directed against designated enemies. Like the settler militia testing the waters before the army rolls in, these groups function less as a disciplined corps and more as the chaotic edge of reaction, softening the ground, normalizing hatred, creating the very incidents that a future, more consolidated authoritarian power will use as justification for total clampdown. Their efficacy lies not in their battlefield prowess, but in their capacity to inject fear into daily life, to atomize dissent, and to provide the violent theatre that bonds a reactionary base, turning neighbour against neighbour while the real structures of power orchestrate from above. They are the symptom festering into a cause, the street-level manifestation of a deeper rot eating away at the social body, preparing it for a more malignant domination.

EmmaAintDead Mon, 04/21/2025 - 11:00

In reply to by Spencer Thayer (not verified)

Okay, they aren't doing any of that though. There is no population living in fear of the proud boys nor of the oathkeepers. They are only tenously household names and only because of their repeated high profile embarrassments. If they are akin to settler militias testing the waters before a full scale attempt is made, something directly contradictory to your prior statement that Trump doesn't need brownshirts given the presence of these groups, then the temp check is in and it is not in trump's favor whatsoever. You are creating a worthy enemy where there isn't one. Imagining a level of activity that isn't there. You are, frankly, creating an image of the proud boys and the oathkeepers that they could not actually achieve themselves, and it borders on propagandizing for them. They are useless rejects and failed at every attempt to be anything but. They are not gathering steam, they are not swelling in strength of numbers or in force. They have not turned neighbor against neighbor. they are wasting away under the weight of their own fuckups and have been forgotten about by everyone who isn't deafened by the leftist declarations of awe of their fearsome might. It has been over half a decade since either of these groups has even approached being a viable threat. Fearing them in 2025 is the product of hallucination.

Spencer Thayer (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 12:23

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

To claim that these formations instill no fear is to inhabit a world dangerously detached from the lived terror of those marked as enemies, those whose very existence is deemed illegitimate by the rising tide of reaction. It is a dismissal whispered from the presumed safety of the unmarked, ignoring the chilling reality faced by immigrant communities, by Black and Brown bodies, by queer folk who see not merely embarrassing "boys clubs," but the gleam of state-sanctioned menace in their eyes. When groups like the Proud Boys openly volunteer their services for deportation campaigns, or when leadership figures within the state's deportation machinery hold private strategy meetings with known associates of these gangs to discuss mass removals, the distinction between street thuggery and official policy evaporates. This is not mere loudmouthing; it is the normalization of vigilante violence woven into the fabric of state repression, a psychological colonization where the fear of the random blow is amplified by the knowledge that the uniformed agent may well share the vigilante's hate, breeding an atmosphere where the perceived protection of law becomes just another mask for arbitrary power.

To dismiss these groups as "useless rejects" based on their past failures or public image is to mistake the visible symptoms for the underlying pathology, ignoring the deeper, symbiotic relationship forming between decentralized reaction and the hierarchical state. The danger lies not only in their independent capacity for violence, but in their integration into the state's repressive functions, serving as force multipliers and ideological shock troops. Reports detail border militias actively seeking formal enlistment for ICE raids, and leaked documents reveal a significant overlap between Oath Keeper membership and personnel within ICE and Border Patrol, underscoring a frightening convergence. This isn't about creating a "worthy enemy" out of failures; it's about recognizing how the capitalist state, in its authoritarian decay, begins to absorb and utilize these seemingly peripheral elements, transforming them from embarrassing fringe groups into extensions of its own coercive power. The scattered nature of these groups, their reliance on stochastic terror rather than disciplined columns, is not necessarily a sign of weakness, but potentially a feature of fascism adapting to the fragmented, networked terrain of 21st-century control, leveraging existing structures of domination rather than relying solely on recreating historical forms. Their perceived weakness lulls the unwary while the tendrils connecting them to state power grow stronger while no one is looking.

EmmaAintDead Mon, 04/21/2025 - 13:01

In reply to by Spencer Thayer (not verified)

I am not sure what queer you're speaking for, but it sure ain't for me. I can only imagine the feeling that "black and brown" people have when they're referred to as "bodies." Dehumanizing as hell, that. 

As far as your sources cited, you are certainly adding a whole lot of meaning to PR stunts and tenuous alliances. Proud boys saying "we want to help deport people" is not the same as them actually doing so, a chicago right-wing activist attending a proud boys event is no more a significant tie than the RCP attending literally anything the left sets up, militias saying they would like to be deputized as border agents does not make them border agents, and there is most assuredly an overlap between oathkeepers and the police at all levels - that is the whole point of the oathkeepers. You seem insistent on hyping up their propaganda. It MUST be as bad as they say it is because they're the ones saying it! If the NBPP actually killed a white baby every time they said all white babies must be killed, it sure would be a scary world. But there's 12 of them and not a single white baby has been killed. This isn't a view of what's coming for white babies any more than the college kid breakfast cereal "gang" (police word, yuck) is of the future of "black and brown bodies" or queer safety.

You seem to have identified yet more people wanting to be a thing but not actually being that thing. 

 

Spencer Thayer (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 14:34

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

To dismiss the documented convergence between state agents and fascist paramilitaries as mere “PR stunts” or “tenuous alliances” is a dangerous act of political illiteracy at best, but is starting to read more like deliberate gaslighting.

You're ignoring the material reality of how power organizes itself for repression. When figures like Tom Homan strategize directly with militia-aligned sheriffs eager to act as “force multipliers” for mass deportations, this isn’t idle chatter; it’s the state apparatus coordinating with its auxiliary arms, blurring the lines between official violence and mob rule – a classic feature of fascist consolidation.

Your attempts to minimize the significance of Proud Boys volunteering for deportations or the deep infiltration of police forces by Oath Keepers is not the sophisticated analysis you seem to think it is. Instead, your refusal to see how the state cultivates and legitimizes these groups is almost as if you're being willfully ignorant.. Your insistence on treating these organized threats as impotent failures, as if past embarrassments or limited numbers nullify their potential for violence, mirrors the fatal complacency historically shown towards rising fascist movements. Someone so concerned with history should certainly be able to recognize this.

So why this concerted effort to downplay the threat? Why are you so hell bent on assuring us that the organized reactionary forces merely want to be death squads but have no chance of being death squads? You are, intentionally or not, attempting to disarm the alarm and discourage mobilization precisely when these forces are integrating with state power and preparing for intensified violence against targeted communities. It is almost as if you want people to ignore the threat until it is too late.

What is your motivation here?

anon (not verified) Wed, 04/23/2025 - 05:46

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

Only "over half a decade"? That's not a lot. Besides it could be said that official state agencies like ICE (and or other such law inforcment personel) are taking over those roles, even before 2025, especialy in places where MAGA politicians were (s)elected. Also if there has been moments where a chilling effect has taken place, many like you may not have noticed, in which case, at the time, there would have temporarily been no need for the fascists street fighters to show up. But that all seems to be changing now with the Hands Off protests, MAGA bullies are starting to show up again.

Spencer Thayer (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 10:38

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

I am not arguing that this regime will achieve fascism because Trump merely wishes it so. He isn't some wizard capable of turning a dystopian fantasy into a being. Such a focus on the leader’s psychology, or mocking his followers’ inadequacies, obscures what is happening right now.

Fascism emerges not from personal desire alone, but from the decomposition of the old political forms under the immense pressures of capital in crisis and the desperate need of hierarchy to defend itself. It is a tendency inherent in the state itself when faced with its own contradictions, a concentration of power drawn from the poisoned wells of nationalism, racism, and patriarchal resentment – forces deeply embedded within this society’s foundations. Recognizing this trajectory is not about granting Trump undue credit; it is about confronting the objective danger that arises when state power, stripped of its liberal pretenses, fuses with mobilized reaction and the logic of extermination. And yes, the tools of repression evolve – drones patrol the skies where once only boots trod. But this technological escalation does not render solidarity obsolete; it makes the cultivation of dense, autonomous, directly democratic communities – grounded in mutual aid and collective defence – more profoundly necessary than ever.

EmmaAintDead Mon, 04/21/2025 - 11:25

In reply to by Spencer Thayer (not verified)

Given your terminology of "will achieve" and "trajectory" as well as some future-tensing upthread it does seem to me that you agree with one of the main assertions of the article but are not admitting to it. Namely, that fascism has NOT been achieved and where the US is situated in that trajectory has NOT crossed the threshold. That you are discussing a future potential of this administration, not a current condition. The conversation the author seems to be engaging with is happening in the present tense. That fascism has arrived. It is confusing to me why you would so adamantly oppose this article and liken it to fascist collusion, but speak of fascism as something on the horizon. Is it here, or is it not? If it's something that may arrive (future), what fascism could the author possibly be colluding (present) with?

Spencer Thayer (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 12:02

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

To speak of fascism as merely a future potential is to obscure the violence already unfolding, to miss the chilling resonance between present strategy and past catastrophe. Yes, the final seizure, the complete overturning of the existing state machinery into an overtly fascist apparatus, has not yet been consummated. But January 6th was no mere riot; it was the bloody rehearsal, the failed first act in a drama of authoritarian consolidation. Now, witnessing the deliberate, methodical sabotage of civil institutions, the purging of dissent within the state bureaucracy, the calculated erosion of checks and balances – this is not drift, it is trajectory. It is the classic, almost textbook preparation employed by fascist movements historically: weaken the body politic, paralyze its defenses, normalize the exceptional, before the final move to consolidate total power. To treat this calculated dismantling as anything less than the present work of installing fascism is to succumb to a dangerous political anesthesia.

This methodical preparation, this hollowing out of existing structures and the simultaneous cultivation of paramilitary currents and dehumanizing ideologies, is not some secondary aspect or “potential” of the administration; it is its primary agenda, its central animating principle. The error lies in waiting for the culmination before recognizing the process. Fascism does not spring into existence fully formed; it is cultivated, nurtured within the decomposing soil of a crisis-ridden capitalist order, feeding on the deep roots of hierarchy, racism, and patriarchal domination endemic to the society itself. The author of the original piece, by insisting the threshold hasn’t been crossed yet, performs a semantic sleight-of-hand, focusing debate on the completion of the coup while ignoring the active, present-tense work being done to make that coup inevitable. It is an analysis fixated on the arrival lounge, refusing to acknowledge the plane is already taxiing down the runway with a hijacker in the cockpit.

Therefore, the question “Is it here, or is it not?” demands a nuanced, dialectical answer that grasps the nature of process. A President demonstrably committed to fascist ideology and methods, actively using the levers of state power to implement the preparatory stages for authoritarian consolidation, is the arrival of fascism as a clear and present political force, regardless of whether the final transformation of the state superstructure is complete. The charge of collusion, then, arises precisely from the act of denial during this critical phase. To declare flatly “Donald Trump is not a fascist” while he engages in the systematic work of becoming one, while he implements the known playbook, is to provide cover, intentionally or not. It disarms critique, fosters complacency, and obscures the terrifying reality that the seeds of fascism are not merely dormant; they are being actively watered and cultivated from the highest office in the land, threatening to choke out any remaining possibility of freedom or ecological sanity.

EmmaAintDead Mon, 04/21/2025 - 13:16

In reply to by Spencer Thayer (not verified)

"To declare flatly “Donald Trump is not a fascist” while he engages in the systematic work of becoming one, while he implements the known playbook, is to provide cover, intentionally or not."

Aside from the political convenience of being able to label all who disagree with this statement as fascist sympathizers, this is utterly ridiculous. If he is becoming one, say he is becoming one. If he is one, say he is one. We do not call med students "doctor" because they may be working to become one. Enlisting in the air force is a big step toward becoming an astronaut, but it don't mean you're going to the moon. 

There is no sleight of hand here. The distinction is between preparation and enaction. If fascism is here there is a very different method to survival for those "bodies" you seem so concerned for than if it's not here. But, again, I don't actually believe YOU believe it is here, and I know you see a great difference between "approaching" and "has arrived" based on the urgency being solely rhetorical. The very real people who you are identity-politicking into homogenous groupthinkers are put at a disadvantage with your all-or-nothing alarmism and willingness to cast good faith contributors to collective understanding as fascists so simply for saying "nah, it could actually be a lot worse." If now is the time for solidarity, you're doing a shit job of showing it, what with the creation of enemies out of friends and all that.

Spencer Thayer (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 14:13

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

Let's be very clear: Trump is a fascist. The superstructure is not fascist. Trump is systematically implementing fascist methods – state purges, paramilitary incitement, legal persecution of opponents, rampant nationalism, dehumanization of targeted groups – to destabilize the superstructure.

When the instruments of state power are actively being seized and reshaped to crush dissent and enforce brutal hierarchy in the service of capital, the label isn’t a future prediction, it’s a present-tense description of the political project underway. Arguing that the concentration camps aren’t fully built yet, or that total control hasn’t been achieved, is to offer comfort to the architects of reaction and confusion to its victims. This distinction between “preparation” and “enaction” is academic nonsense when the preparation is the enaction – dismantling democratic facades, mobilizing reactionary forces, and conditioning the populace for dictatorship are precisely how fascism takes power. Calling this process by its name isn’t alarmism or creating enemies; it’s recognizing the enemy who has already declared war on popular sovereignty and human dignity, a necessary clarity for any serious materialist analysis and effective resistance. However well-intentioned, those who obscure this reality objectively run interference for the forces driving us towards open authoritarian rule.

EmmaAintDead Mon, 04/21/2025 - 14:51

In reply to by Spencer Thayer (not verified)

You understand how you're re-stating the logic behind "not voting is a vote for trump" but with a hammer and sickle instead of a donkey, right?

The distinction between preparation and enaction isn't a distinction I am making for trump, it is one I am making for the bodies you mentioned. What these people do to survive looks very different in one situation vs the other. If anything I have said thus far has been academic nonsense, I think it would have to be the catboy thing.

The camps are built and they've been built for quite a while. Bush made sure they stayed full and Clinton made sure they were modernized and Bush made sure they stayed full and Obama made sure they were modernized and Trump made sure they stayed full and Biden made sure they were modernized and here we are. 

If your idea of "state purges" is the gutting of federal jobs and elimination of federal agencies, you won't find me shedding many tears for the long unemployment line at the BLM/DOE and a bottomed out enrollment in the AFGE. If your idea of paramilitary incitement rests on the proud boys and oathkeepers, I am not swayed. The rest listed is either identical to or lesser than the same under Bush Jr. 

Did we enter fascism under Bush Jr? Is/was Bush Jr a fascist? If so to either of those, did we exit fascism under Obama? Did Obama maintain fascism? If not to the original questions, what is the substantial difference between Trump 2 and Bush Jr that makes Trump a fascist who is creating/doing fascism and Bush Jr not a fascist? 

The author is very clearly not a fascist, but you try to conflate the author with fascism often. Is it so easy to become a fascist that all one has to say is "this isn't fascism"? If so, do you understand that you are manufacturing fascists with this position? By your metric, I am aiding and abetting fascism by disagreeing with you, and the only way to not be a fascist collaborator is by agreeing with you. Why is this a winning strategy in your mind?

lumpy (not verified) Tue, 04/22/2025 - 09:18

In reply to by anon (not verified)

you think you need to go to school to learn how to run the goal posts around and be a loudmouth contrarian? you can learn that shit by being around a toxic asshole for a few hours or less, it's easy to the point of lazy

Spencer J Thayer (not verified) Tue, 04/22/2025 - 08:53

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

You're straining here, trying to equate recognizing a real fascist danger with liberal electoral manipulation (“not voting is a vote for Trump”) is a category error. Your false equivalence is muddying the waters. We are not discussing participation in the capitalist state’s electoral charade; we are identifying a specific, virulent form of authoritarian reaction that I am identifying as "fascism." You can disagree that consolidating state power to crush all organized opposition and ethnically cleans America is not fascism, fine, but don't get into the kind of bullshit argument you would with a liberal. No one here is shilling for one faction of capital against another. I am naming a very specific escalation of class war organized by fascists. The working class and oppressed communities will not find solutions in liberal institutions, and no one is suggesting that. Clarity here is essential for revolutionary strategy, not for herding votes.

The insistence on a sharp divide between preparation and enactment is academic detachment bordering on the absurd when discussing state terror. For the communities targeted, the preparation is the enactment of violence. I've said this before, but purging state agencies, mobilizing paramilitary gangs, unleashing racist and nationalist propaganda – these are not abstract preliminaries. They are concrete acts that restructure power, instill fear, and dismantle the capacity for resistance now. Survival depends on confronting this process as it unfolds, not waiting for some historian to declare the threshold officially crossed. This is material reality, not word games.

I do not deny that the repressive state apparatuses, such as kids in camps, the surveillance state, the militarized police, have deep roots, nurtured by both ruling-class parties. This infrastructure is a testament to the inherent violence of the state and capital. But fascism does not merely use this apparatus; it repurposes and intensifies it, stripping away even the flimsy legalistic and bureaucratic constraints, fusing it with a mobilized mass base, and directing it towards the explicit goal of eliminating internal enemies and establishing unrestrained hierarchical rule. Acknowledging the bipartisan history of repression doesn't negate the qualitative shift represented by a movement actively seeking to perfect and unleash that machinery without apology.

To equate Trump's planned purges with the escalation of the bureaucratic police state under Bush, or to dismiss the open alliance between state elements and armed reactionary gangs and militias, is to willfully ignore the mechanics of fascist power consolidation. What Trump is engaging in is a political weapon aimed at ensuring ideological conformity within the state apparatus, removing any potential for internal opposition to authoritarian decrees. The paramilitaries are functioning as shock troops, normalizing violence, intimidating dissenters, and creating the conditions for further state crackdowns – their coordination with elements of law enforcement and ICE leadership is documented and strategically significant. Bush Jr. oversaw a brutal expansion of the security state, yes, but within a framework that Trump actively seeks to demolish in favor of personalized, arbitrary rule backed by mob violence and aimed squarely at internal dissent. This is the crucial difference: an assault on the very foundations of bourgeois legality itself, the superstructure, not merely its methodologies.

Finally, let's address your absurd claims regarding how fascists come to be. I am not the fascist-stork. I don't fly down from high and deliver newborn reactionary racists to arm Trump's movement. Critiquing an analysis for its objective political consequences is not "manufacturing fascists." It is engaging in a necessary political struggle over meaning and strategy. When an argument, regardless of intent, serves to minimize a clear and present danger, obscures the enemy's nature, and dampens the urgency required for effective resistance, it functions as cover for reaction. Pointing this out is not a personal attack but a political assessment of the argument's role in the class struggle. Fascism thrives on confusion and complacency. An analysis that fosters either downplaying the threat or insisting on semantic distinctions while the apparatus of repression is being assembled, objectively aids the enemy. Solidarity is built on shared clarity and a commitment to fight, not polite silence in the face of dangerous illusions.

EmmaAintDead Tue, 04/22/2025 - 14:30

In reply to by Spencer J Thayer (not verified)

Declaring the author a fascist collaborator is in no way, shape, or form a "critique" based on "objective" anything. It is a public identification of an enemy - an enemy you have manufactured by merit of application of the label "fascist collaborator" to the author in a public forum, not by delivering the author to an ideology the author does not hold but by intentionally misrepresenting the ideology the author is expressing as something different from what it is. Opposite from what it is. You are publicly stating intent. This author is helping the fascists, and everyone know what we do to fascists. You are saying, "comrades, let's do that to this author, too!" You are saying to everyone who is not this author, "this is what happens to people who disagree. They become fascists. You don't disagree with me... Do you?"

You are not creating real fascists, you are creating imaginary ones that only you can see and you are demanding participation in this hallucination under penalty of badjacketing. And you are STILL losing when you try to fight the fascists you fingerpainted into being.

When I say you manufacture fascists, I do not at all mean you add to the (small and not rapidly growing) ranks of fascists in any way. I am saying that you warp the definition to include whoever is making you Mad On The Internet and distort any real measure of fascism with junk data. Heaping spoonfuls of false positives. These people you declare sympathizers are not finding their new solace with trump, they are just finding it somewhere you arent. When I leave this conversation I still won't be a fascist in any way, but I am sure you will count me as one. When I interact positively with another group in the future, you will surely see that group's affiliation with me - a fascist you have imagined - as an endorsement of the fascistic views you have hallucinated me having. The number of fascists that exist in your mind has now multiplied significantly without a single fascist actually existing anywhere in the process. The threat is so much larger than you had ever imagined. How did fascists get so good at infiltrating anarchists and recruiting them in droves?! They havent. You've just gotten ~really bad~ at identifying fascists. 

You haven't driven anyone into their arms. Only away from your own. 

The world must be fucking lonely and horrifying for you. Every potential friend, every accomplice in spirit or action, all of the people opposed to fascism... They're all brimming with fascist potential if all they have to do is say "guys calm down" in order to carry the fascist banner. A mass of Himmlers in waiting, primed to throw on a red armband and goosestep right over you at any moment. It is so insanely convenient for authoritarian leftists that the world ~must~ work this way, otherwise they'd run the risk of being something so mundane as fallible. That wouldn't be very good for recruitment, fallibility. 

"What Trump is engaging in is a political weapon aimed at ensuring ideological conformity within the state apparatus, removing any potential for internal opposition to authoritarian decrees."

"Fascism thrives on confusion and complacency. [...] Solidarity is built on shared clarity and a commitment to fight, not polite silence in the face of dangerous illusions."

Christ deliver me from the irony of this person saying fascism thrives on confusion and solidarity is built on clarity while intentionally identifying an ancom as a fascist in an effort to create political and ideological uniformity that definitionally cannot be challenged. God grant me the fucking serenity. 

alex (not verified) Tue, 04/22/2025 - 14:50

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

man even with the resident egoist brainlet in this dog shit "conversation" you're somehow the stupidest one here, impressive. at least he has an analysis of some kind!

Spencer Thayer (not verified) Tue, 04/22/2025 - 21:29

In reply to by EmmaAintDead

Let's cut the performative outrage and manufactured victimhood. Critiquing an argument's political function is not the same as declaring someone an ideological enemy ripe for purging. To deliberately misrepresent a political analysis of consequences – arguing that minimizing the fascist threat objectively aids fascism – as a call for violence or bad-jacketing is a disingenuous deflection tactic. It seeks to shut down necessary, urgent debate by crying "bully" when confronted with the uncomfortable political implications of one's position. No one is "manufacturing" fascists by pointing out that certain analytical lines serve to pacify resistance and normalize reaction. I am not concerned about personal animosity or ideological purity tests. All I care about is the material consequences of ideas in a period of intense class struggle and rising authoritarianism.

The paranoia you project reflects a refusal to grapple with the harsh realities of political struggle, where ideas have weight and missteps have victims. To label those who point this out as creating "junk data" or "hallucinating" is itself a form of gaslighting, attempting to invalidate clear patterns by dismissing the evidence. Fascism does thrive on ambiguity and complacency. Challenging analyses that foster these conditions is not some reverse authoritarianism nonsense; it's a basic requirement for collective liberation. True solidarity isn't a fragile pact based on avoiding disagreement; it's forged through honest, sometimes sharp, debate grounded in shared principles and a clear-eyed assessment of the enemy. Your attempt to paint necessary political critique as a mechanism for enforcing uniformity reveals more about your discomfort with accountability than about any supposed authoritarian tendencies of those warning about the fascist threat.

We don't build power by indulging analyses that obscure the danger; we build it by confronting reality, naming the enemy, and organizing accordingly. Refusing to do so is not a sign of intellectual independence; it's an abdication of responsibility.

SirEinzige Mon, 04/21/2025 - 09:10

In reply to by Spencer Thayer (not verified)

The authors are not muddying the waters or playing neutral. The former is what you elective antifa retards do by not properly defining what fascism actually is.

One can say Trump is not a fascist and still see what danger he poses. The scholar I linked above argues that what Trumpism actually is is even worse.

The urgency of your last 2 paragraphs is not affected by whether Trump as a whole is fascist or not. What we’re dealing with is deconstructive authoritarianism in the context of a metacrisis. That’s plenty enough urgent a requires the things you speak of at the end.

Spencer Thayer (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 11:02

In reply to by SirEinzige

Your paltry attempt to dismiss those actively confronting fascism as "elective retards" reveals more about your detachment than about the nature of fascism or the agenda of Trump. Your retreat into name-calling, coupled with a fastidious concern for the correct academic label – whatever the fuck "deconstructive authoritarianism" means, perhaps, sourced from some scholar you have a hard on for – is just spectacle without substance.

You're more concerned with your own intellectual posturing than with the boot on people's necks right now. You're treating the analysis of systemic violence as a game of definitions while spitting contempt at those in the streets. You betray the very essence of revolutionary thought. You cheapen the necessary work of understanding power by reducing it to a classification exercise performed from a safe distance. People like you give Egoism a bad name. Johann would spit in your face.

SirEinzige Tue, 04/22/2025 - 11:03

In reply to by Spencer Thayer (not verified)

Fascism is a junior partner in this authoritarian rise and treating it as the dominant authoritarian tendency simply shows bad analysis which will lead to bad practices of resistance. Deconstructive authoritarianism is more apt to describe this moment as people like Steve Bannon have talked about deconstructing the federal government. We live in a post grand narrative ideological age more geared towards fracturing identity structures so seeing authoritarianism as more deconstructive makes more sense. The left and the right are both in their deconstructive phase. Funnily enough DA is not something I academically sourced. It's an organic concept that comes from my own thinking. There was one other poster on postleft reddit that also came up with something similar(deconstructive fascism). My style is more autodidactive than academic.

My concern is being intellectually correct and not hamstrung by outmoded 20th century analysis that does not aptly describe what is going on right now. Revolutionary thought can be authoritarian as well btw. It's you and other elective antifa types who lack the understanding of power. This is not about playing it safe but playing it correctly.

anon (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 13:01

good essay. does the current thing exactly mirror the past thing enough to use the word for past thing? important question

anon (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 13:58

A purist fascist would note Mussolini's blueprint, the State sactioned corporatist structuring similar to the 19th centuries East India Company's bureaucratic management system with its private armies protecting assets and infrastructure etc, Just the modernization and appearance give modern capitalism the appearance of freedom, yet the underlying work-wage/ chaingang analogy holds. What one must look at is the zeitgeist's of the global masse's tendencies, and these haven't really changed. In tandem with religious dogmas, generational warfare, border reinforcement, technological/mass production labour diversities, and the dumbing down education curriculums teaching history as a logical narrative, all these things combine into a dreary repetitive slavery to an elite ruling class obsessed with rank, hierarchy and prestige. Trump is just another variety, an orange narcissistic moron with a messianic complex.

alex (not verified) Mon, 04/21/2025 - 16:00

every good american knows america will not have become fascist until they (the good american) personally are killed, heroically probably. only idiots see a bullet point list like this and think hmmm

-The destruction of the organised working class and leftist parties: accomplished through the cooperation of US capitalists, "organized crime," and bureaucratic unionists in the interwar period, particularly through the disappearance, deportation and murder of anarchist and other "radical" labor organizers
-Mass mobilisation of the petty bourgeoisie and lumpenproletariat into paramilitary movements (e.g., the Blackshirts or Brownshirts): has always been a feature of american political life but, contra the pollyanna say-nothingisms of some commenters here, the militias are most operative not in their "fight clubs" or whatever the fuck but their rank-and-file grasp on police and military formations
-A corporatist alliance between capital and state, with the aim of re-stabilising capitalist production through extreme nationalist myths, war economies, and repression: see famous communist thinker President Dwight D. Eisenhower on this one
-A cult of personality, mythologised history, and violent racial ideologies, all tightly integrated into state functions: this is our bread and butter! this is what we do, nobody ever done it better
-Totalitarian structures that attempted to eliminate the distinction between civil society and state power. freedom isnt free! everyone who has ever hurt an american soldier is actually a degenerate slave to Authoritarianism

SirEinzige Tue, 04/22/2025 - 16:10

In reply to by alex (not verified)

Cause nothing specifies it like that Umberto Eco derivative nonsense.

Here’s the thing Lex, I can define it down to one word, palingeneticism. That’s it. Ultranationalism is usually what goes with it palingeneticism is the essence of what fascism is.

Your bullet points, as usual, lack specificity. You’re 3rd to last point, for instance, could easily apply to FDR. Stop echoing the Eco.

anon (not verified) Wed, 04/23/2025 - 03:38

In reply to by SirEinzige

Semantics aren't the point. Neither is giving some mind-blowing original perspective on the meaning of fascism.

Alex hit the nail on the head about one thing: austerity measures, whether Dubya-style, or all-the-way, full on fascism, can only happen because the working class wholly lacks combativity and unity. Every time we've seen authoritarian movements and elites ascend quickly to state power it's been during periods where poor people were struggling the hardest financially and also lacked combativity.

Even if you don't agree that the proletariat has revolutionary capabilites, or is even a thing, there doesn't need to be a "class" analysis behind this. By the time the bully has bloodied your nose, you're already on the losing side. Healthy resistance movements preemptively bloody noses.

There's also the question or consideration of what arena and terrain the combats happening in, and who has 'home turf' advantage. But that's a tangent

NO U! (not verified) Wed, 04/23/2025 - 09:54

In reply to by SirEinzige

You are like every Xitter mouth-breather tweeting "well ackshully ...!" at scientists about the flatness of the Earth because "look into the sCIeNCE, rEtArds!!".

For you to even attempt to include yourself in a conversation about fascism with Eco (not to mention you slipping in your name along side all the post-left authors that *actually* have written things, and who give you a gross postie boner, at every opportunity) who actually had to endure actual fucking fascism and who excelled in his analysis of fascism through all his groundbreaking masterful writing over decades and decades, is wholly laughable.

Just because the internet have given literal CHUDs like you a platform does not mean you should take your ego so seriously, Ziggy. You embarrass the (entirely online, mediated, corporate, consumerist) anarchist space. You embarrass yourself.

SirEinzige Sat, 04/26/2025 - 10:03

In reply to by NO U! (not verified)

Why do you think that people with good or coherent ideas have to be known exactly?

Eco's accomplishments intellectually in no way prevent the fact that his idea of fascism is quantitative and non specific. I have presented a counterpoint and a counter thinker who is accomplished in his own right in regards to a proper definition of fascism(palingeneticism) Just becase Eco endured fascism does not mean he nails the definition.

The reason I include post-leftist thinkers is for reference, reverence and acknowledgement you moron. If anything because the ideas of the zine scene are fading we need more people who happen upon these ideas directly or indirectly to reference them and bring them to a new niche upstream radical audience. Hell some of these names are now bad mouthed by you retards because of supposedly sinful acts determined by a now irrelevant moral faggy milieu. I do my part to be an amoral counter to this.

Why shouldn't I take my ideas seriously. We live in global authoritarian times and idiots like you have ideas that are woefully unequipped to deal with these times.

anon (not verified) Wed, 04/23/2025 - 21:29

wow, just found this site. time to go. lol this is some sophistry. Literally a billionaire in office with a cabinet of billionaires and "it's not fascism" wow. just wow, they let you publish this. Ya got to go find some real left dialog

anon (not verified) Thu, 04/24/2025 - 07:43

In reply to by anon (not verified)

The opinion in this shit opinion piece written by some populist ancom in... New Zealand (lol)... are not representative of the admins or this site's user base (or at least some of it).

Having a bunch of billionaires does not directly equates to a fascist regime. A banana republic dictatorship, SURE. But fascism means something a little more specific.

As for the claims by people like Roger Griffin of Trump's regime being an "illiberal democracy", well that's a bit ingenuine... as even Mussolini and the Nazi regime were based on democracy in some way, and were brutally illiberal. So it's like saying "no, Trump's not a fascist regime... even if it equates to what fascism is exactly about".

Like you're not seeing Superman, but "a flying man with a red cape and "S" sign on his chest who's got some god-mode superpowers but is oddly allergic to kryptonite". This man might be from Krypton... But maybe not Superman!

lumpy (not verified) Thu, 04/24/2025 - 08:05

In reply to by anon (not verified)

yeah, have we not been making this clear enough? are we not being mean enough?

here, let me try again: i wouldn't even wipe my ass with this writing because i'm worried my butt would catch radical centrism somehow. this writer is credible as an anarchist communist just like elon musk is totally the savior of humanity with a totally normal and functional dick

remember that prompt - what would you have done during the rise of fascism back when?

apparently, this jackass at "polar bl@st" would have been WELL ACKTUALLYing people at a party for attention, until even the pity validation dried up and the folks with bad boundaries stopped talking to them too

anon (not verified) Sat, 04/26/2025 - 10:41

In reply to by anon (not verified)

It's amazing that Ziggy seethes and shouts from his dungeon that the actual dictionary is wrong about the definition of fascism but then references Wikipedia as his evidence. The Selective Science (the SS!) is sOo radical!

SirEinzige Mon, 04/28/2025 - 09:00

In reply to by anon (not verified)

To demonstrate and display the stupidity of one of anews' resident retards. Radical Centrism and fascism are both contested and continuing terms that are not adequately defined by a dictionary.

SirEinzige Mon, 04/28/2025 - 09:06

In reply to by anon (not verified)

RC is a continuing and contested term that can at least be tweaked and improved upon. Obama and Macron are, I agree, basic bitch centrists. The concept of radical obviously needs to be fleshed out. There's also the reactionary center which is every bit as real of the radical center but for some reason does not have a wiki entry.

Again, though I think RC is a legit term and the reason I linked it, again, was to display how stupidly one of the resident retards of this site was using the term even in its most broad sense.

anon (not verified) Sat, 04/26/2025 - 18:58

In reply to by anon (not verified)

You must be new here, but about 10yrs ago lumpy signed as Lumpy the Troll, full admission of his roll and content parameters, aaaand it hasn't really changed much, only more abtuse.

anon (not verified) Thu, 04/24/2025 - 14:16

In reply to by anon (not verified)

Technically billionaires are NOT fascists. I have on one occassion won a consideral amount of cash on a lotto, and this did not negate my anarch values or placed me into a "fascist" state of consciousness or behavior. I remained "nice guy" with a "free flowing benevolent and generous anti-authoritarian disposition". I didn't donate my entire wealth over to a charity organisation, nor did I participate in the capitalist workforce.
Anarchs are "ideologically neutral" neither left nor right, and you should read more about it before you come on this site and talk shit. Read some Stirner.

SoreEgregore (not verified) Sat, 04/26/2025 - 10:14

In reply to by SirEinzige

SoOo true, my radical centrist ego anarch egregore brother knight! This is NEEDED! It's tOotally not a possibility for any non-retardcuck to reach fascism through an experiential/material nurturing! Oh course we must first anal-ize fascist tendencies over a span of AT LEAST 10000 years before we can reach based radical centrist egregore approved conclusions! Excelsior!

anon (not verified) Sat, 04/26/2025 - 17:56

In reply to by SirEinzige

Thankyou Sir, yeah, and I've noticed that just living amongst indigenous folk and psychologically evolve to their non-materialist values in relationship to social exchange and reciprosity at all levels of interaction have brought about a phenomenal reversal and negation of the fascist process of thinking and evaluating ones place in the world/environment.

Waldemar (not verified) Wed, 04/30/2025 - 05:07

They are as fascistic as is possible in the current context. Therin, definitions become dicertations, lacking distinctions (or rather such seems to be the case, from the uncertain perspectives of everyday life).

anon (not verified) Wed, 04/30/2025 - 08:28

In reply to by Waldemar (not verified)

and anarchists are as anarchistic as is possible in the current context???
is that why they are typically so lame, shallow, reactive, and addicted to their phones?

anon (not verified) Wed, 04/30/2025 - 09:20

In reply to by anon (not verified)

haven't been here since yesterday morning, when i sometimes check in a couple days a week, but ok, if the "24/7" thing fits your little brain, go for it. and if you need to do the played-out internet trend of calling things "embarrassing", again, reveal your lameness even more. but you do you. have a great day! i'll be out in the real world eating radishes and greens and planting seeds.

Waldemar (not verified) Wed, 04/30/2025 - 13:44

In reply to by anon (not verified)

Are they lame, shallow, reactive, and addicted to their phones? I have no idea what you mean by that. Seems perfectly resaonable each would want to be as anarchistic as possible. No idea what you're on about.

anon (not verified) Wed, 04/30/2025 - 15:39

In reply to by Waldemar (not verified)

Yes, it's to do with siezing human energy supply, and ruthlessness is less demanding and accumulates social power, thus hierarchies evolve which deny the formation of neutral power relationships. * pirouettes and leaves the stage*

Waldemar (not verified) Wed, 04/30/2025 - 06:49

Fascist, 21 centry-American style, amidst the back-drop of exelerated climate and resource depletion crises, no? I mean if the black shirts or brown shirts time traveled into present-day-USA, they'd likely fair no better. Corresponding players on the historicle stage are never exact duplicates, rather more the products of current developments and influences, excreted from a yet more recent context. The twine that fails to bind the fasc may be unraveling, yet remains nontheless.

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