AnarchoNinaWrites
Not to disparage anyone because I strongly agree with the message to "mask up" in a country about to find a way to even MORE aggressively pretend Covid is over...
but RFK is just a fascist. Calling him an ecofascist sorta ignores the reality that he walked back every environmental position he ever hold and became a climate crisis denier in exchange for his role as Trump's lapdog.
Words mean things; there's nothing "eco" about RFK's fascism anymore.
AnarchoNinaWrites
Also, on a related note:
I honestly don't think the term "ecofascist" has much value in our discourse. At the end of the day, even Hitler's inner circle featured several naturalists and the part where ecofascists argue that all the non-white people need to be wiped out to preserve resources for the pure Aryan race is mainstream Pig Empire environmental policy. Pretending "nazis who like camping" is a wholly functional ideology is giving them credit for something they don't represent.
AnarchoNinaWrites
(for those of you who will quibble with part of this, before you do please keep in mind that I have watched something like 6 consecutive COP conferences where Pig Empire leaders have pledged to plant more trees than we have ground to plant them in so they can keep doing fossil fuel capitalism. Our CURRENT plan is to create vast sacrifice zones full of carbon sinks and man, the people in those zones aren't gonna agree to just perish and those zones ain't gonna be "where white ppl live.")
The Banished Dragon Alephwyr
@AnarchoNinaWrites This ignores people who are broadly leftist except for believing in ecologically motivated exterminationism. The point of the term ecofascist is to warn against entryism I would think, not so much to define a subcurrent within mainstream fascist movements.
AnthonyJK-Admin
If I can recall my library rat days, I did learn that there were some tendencies of core Nazi ideology towards elements of ecology in the name of representing racial purity and "cleanliness", even as Nazism still relied on increased dirty production and heavy industrialism of their time.
Not so sure RFK2 would qualify with that today; he seems to me to be more of a classical antivaxx/homeopathic crank leaning on right-wing backlash against Big Guviment.
AnarchoNinaWrites
@Alephwyr Except that's literally not how anyone uses it; case in point, the person who brought this term up in reference to RFK; is he "broadly leftist?" Media called the Buffalo supermarket shooter "ecofascist" - was he "broadly leftist?"
All genocidal fascists hide their intentions behind (what they consider) "noble purposes." And plenty of fascists claim to have "broadly leftist" positions; except you know, they're just fascists.
AnarchoNinaWrites
@Alephwyr I'm factually certain it is impossible to be "broadly leftist" while arguing for genocides and eliminationism. Malthusianism is not a left wing ideology.
AnthonyJK-Admin
The only times that I have ever seen the term "ecofascist" bandied about, it's almost always by wingnutters and anarchocapitalists as a smear term against actual Leftist environmentalists who use the full powers of the state to prevent the former from profiting from fouling up the land and water for everyone else.
Also, plenty of fascists in general cosplay "broadly leftist" positions in order to mask their other culturally reactionary worldviews.
AnarchoNinaWrites
@AnthonyJK @Alephwyr I mean I'm literally writing about a guy, out here, this afternoon, using the term to describe RFK.
All the more reason why I'm not sure how much value the term has in our discourse.
Personally, I think mainstream capitalist policy is pretty "ecofascist." Another person in my replies thinks it's narrowly certain fascist cults. Alephwyr thinks it's about entrism. You're saying it's used by wingers to smear the left.
Sounds like a muddy term.
AnarchoNinaWrites
@AnthonyJK @Alephwyr (which to be clear, I'm not saying DON'T use it, I'm not the boss of you. I'm just questioning how valuable it really is - most of the people I see described as ecofascists can just as accurately be described as "fascists" or "Malthusians."
But again, I'm not telling people how to speak - I'm just questioning how valuable the term really is, given that most ppl seem to think it means fascists what like camping and those who done have wildly variable definitions.)
AnarchoNinaWrites
@AnthonyJK @Alephwyr I DID kinda agree with the one person who said it accurately described a couple of very narrow fascist cults and their leaders. But again, MOST people, even in the mainstream, are just using it to mean fascists who put a veneer of environmentalism on as justification for doing fascism and eliminationism.
AnthonyJK-Admin
Point well taken and acknowledged.
Context does indeed matter.
AnarchoNinaWrites
@AnthonyJK @Alephwyr The definitions discussed here, broadly speaking, are more or less how it appears to be being used in mainstream discourse:
https://today.uconn.edu/2022/09/a-darker-shade-of-green/
And well, quite frankly there were people in the Nazi Party who made similar arguments, particularly about finite resources and the need to eliminate the underserving to preserve them. I don't think anyone would say "Hitler's inner circle was ecofascist" so I'm not sure the term, as it's being used broadly, has much value.
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