Fascism as an Analgesic

Coping with the desecration of the past

The desire to restore a glorious past is a common theme throughout history, as old as Homer and as biting as Dante, depending on the season of the soul.

With the acceleration of the passage of time and the acceleration of change in the modern world, the resurfacing of Fascism as an ideology of discourse could seem inevitable to some, particularly as it bubbles up while having been made more durable by being the object of such focused repression.

In this ideological context, Fascism is often nothing more complex than a desire to heal and reclaim one’s identity. This is why it is so closely identified with irredentism, a return to traditional values, and a desire to accelerate the development of the human condition along materialistic lines.

Fascism ultimately poses a threat to out-groups and those that the core defines itself in opposition against, but the pain and injury of perceived injustice is ultimately what drives the most unforgiving forms of this ideology.

By the same token, the efforts of liberal society to repress Fascist thought has invited a decline in discourse on its own. It is a current obsession, a watchword, a bugaboo, a reason to freak out about jeans, the simplest way to challenge existing authority without having to appear like it: overly sympathetic, cooing, dull.

The appeal of Fascism today is in part its call to the rugged individualism of the past, something which in a technologically advanced, socially complex and bureaucratic society, begins to feel increasingly out of reach with the passing of weeks, months and years.

This is from whence the urge to martialize, to militarize, to codify the states of being in society comes. Fascism becomes appealing in a context where there is no perceived order, this much is obvious from sociological study, but it is driven by its desire to impose a new form of chaos, one more unforgiving and rude than the chaos of excessive sympathy (indulgent left-liberalism). In it’s wake, in the path of its destruction, order may follow.

The emotion of Fascism may be of the most obvious benefit: it provides the opportunity of pre-existing groups to heal, so long as in their healing they do not destroy themselves.