Talk:Nazism

Edit request from WTSherman1864, 23 February 2011

{{edit semi-protected}} I would like to edit this sentence from the original article to make it accurate: "Nazism presented itself as politically syncretic, incorporating policies, tactics and philosophies from right- and left-wing ideologies; in practice, Nazism was a far right form of politics.[11]"

My edit: Nazism presented itself politically syncretic, incorporating policies, tactics and philosophies from left-wing ideologies; in practice, Nazism was a far left form of politics.

Reason: Nazism was a thing solely of the left-wing. It is a common modern error to state that Nazism was a far right form of government. A far right form of government, as an example, would be the one established under Franco in Spain. Franco was a dictator but he did not micro-manage the economy of Spain. As long as one did not defy the government in political protest, one was relatively free to manage one`s own affairs. Not so with Hitler and the Nazis extreme socialist and statist methods. Again, Franco was a harsh dictator but Spain under Franco WAS NOT statist. Note that that the Nazi Party was a SOCIALIST party devoted to state control and genocide. Note also that it was Mussolini who founded Fascism and it was Hitler who adopted this idea of Fascism as the base for the Nazi socialist form of government. Note also that the Nazis had much more in common with Communism in the Soviet Union under Stalin. It is a disservice to the internet community to provide what is indeed misleading information. And my edit above is the result. What I have presented above is the truth. Verifiable, but not as easily as one would like. The truth is neutral by nature. And in this case there are no gray areas. Black is black and white is white.

WTSherman1864 (talk) 00:26, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

You would need a source that says that scholars generally consider Nazism to have been far left. Articles must reflect scholarly opinion, not the opinions of editors. TFD (talk) 00:51, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Indeed. WTSherman1864's unsourced, non-academic, "historical" revisionism has no place on Wikipedia. Bryonmorrigan (talk) 13:47, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

You also need a mix of sources from across the political spectrum. Is a book like "Liberal Fascism" considered academic or historical? Considering that a few people on this board seem to have argued against dictionary definitions as valid authorities, I'm going to guess there will be some cherry picking, inevitably. Why there's such drive to include diffuse and controversial terms like 'right' or 'left,' despite the inevitable disagreements is beyond me.--Ryan W (talk) 05:57, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

A book like "Liberal Fascism," written by a journalist with no historical credentials, and completely debunked by many of the most well-respected authorities on the histories of Fascism, Nazism, and WW2, has no place as a "source" of scholarly information. Here are some articles by REAL historians, showing why the book is nothing but "pseudo-historical" propaganda, with no basis in fact: [1]; [2]; [3]. Bryonmorrigan (talk) 14:39, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for those links, BTW. Good reading and they will, I'm afraid, probably fall on deaf ears for some on this thread. "Credentials"? "Scholars"? Don't you know those are code words for far-left liberalism (i.e. Nazism/Fascism) that seeks to obfuscate the truth? Oh well. I will track down the books written by the actual experts in this field provided in those links. freshacconci talktalk 17:56, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Not at all, though I've been slow in responding since I seriously injured my foot and am behind in my work. You can leave the poor strawman alone, sir. First source has an interesting point regarding lack of sources on certain key assertions, though he makes some rather horrendous gaffes. He seems confused by the notion that FDR put people in internment camps. I know of people with High School diplomas who would not make that mistake. I had a point by point about a third of the way written for one of the articles about what seemed reasonable and what was falacious. I'll finish it up after I attend to the work I'm personally responsible for. Though your response seems to begrudge what should be an obvious point; if you don't provide sources from scholars across the political spectrum, the result will inevitably be POV. --75.83.82.224 (talk) 01:07, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

The Socialist Party of the United States opposed the internment of the Japanese and the New Deal, and compared both of them to Nazism and fascism. TFD (talk) 04:38, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

That's absurd. Your assertion that we must, "provide sources from scholars across the political spectrum," when those "sources" are nothing but opinion by people who have no education or training in the subject...is like adding sources who are Holocaust Deniers to the page on the Holocaust as "credible" sources. What you are trying to do is called "Newspeak," and is a deliberate distortion of the historical record, solely for propaganda purposes...and is most certainly NOT "scholarship." Bryonmorrigan (talk) 15:16, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. As per The Four Deuces, all information in Wikipedia must be verified by reliable sources. Qwyrxian (talk) 03:32, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Gottbegnadeten list

Maybe someone could also mention the Gottbegnadeten list, which was of vital importance in the period after the war with the Allied denazification targeting those on it? --Anonymous

My Take On The Issue Of Left/Right

First of all, I find this love for "historians" a bit silly. If one writes a book on the issue of history, it simply needs to be on issues that actually took place, as in are valid and/or well documented, not how 'well respected' the historians are. That's really helping those who want to see this all as propaganda a lot more than it's hurting them. Also, education being part of the state, there are many de facto court historians; also it's not a minor point just how much of the theory of how history plays out in academia is often Marxist in nature, and so of course something like Nazism, or anything disliked, is going to be seen as distancing itself from Marxism. Also, please no just calling me "glenn beck" or whatever, it's just a fact, two of the biggest philosophers of history are Marx and Hegel, and either of those perspectives, since the respected version of Hegelianism is Marxism (as Marx is seen as the revised, "scientific" Hegelian) is going to get one a rather Marxist view of history, and that's going to give one a clouded view of the Nazis. In short, a historian is just as likely biased and patently wrong on an issue of history as is somebody not a "historian" who writes history (though I'm not sure how one who writes on the subject of history isn't a historian by definition in the first place, but no matter), and it is silly to pretend otherwise. In fact, I think the Nazis are a great case of this; how about those court historians for the Nazi Party, and academia under their reign; I'd much rather somebody without the PhD title of the court historian under the Nazi Germany were this circa 1940. Also I'm in a state such that I just got over a migraine, so if there are any silly typing mistakes like saying "against" when I mean "again" or something I do apologize.

Also, Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek, and Hannah Arendt are respected by any measure of the term. If The Origins of Totalitarianism or The Road to Serfdom or Omnipotent Government are not academic history, I'm not sure what is, and not sure why one would say they aren't aside from a dislike of its conclusions, those being that the Nazis were on the Left. It is also common for historians to not know a great deal of economics, so I find Mises and Hayek particularly insightful, to the contrary of their not being "historians" according to some posters. In my experience, Left and Right can mean one of two things. The first type of right wing means in the fashion of the French Revolution's seating arrangements, which I grant is where we get the terms in the first place, that the left is the revolutionary ideas while the right stands for the old status quo, for the privilege of the ancien regime and etc. Taking this to mean privilege and aristocracy it's all but a pointless idea since capitalism took root in the west where whatever is to come, I don't think we need to fear monarchy, because I don't hear anybody upholding it. Meaning simply one who upholds status quo, well then it shifts depending on what the status quo is, so it becomes a meaningless term, not to mention the Nazis were steadfastly against any status quo; if the Nazis were anything to the Germans, they were certainly different. Also, Frederic Bastiat sat on the left with Pierre Joseph Proudhon, and in modern discourse Bastiat is right and Proudhon left, so that brings me to the second meaning of Left/Right, and that's the economic dichotomy, left being communist and the right being capitalist. As the page says, and I hope the reader would grant, the Nazis despised capitalism, so they can't be "far right" by either definition. They also referred to themselves as a third way, between something like a Catholic Center Party and the International Communists. So, again, how one who is between two common ideologies can be on the fringe of the right is beyond me. Yes, they despised communism too, but it seems to be the case they hated communism the way a Christian may hate a Muslim or vice versa, ie infighting. The Communists were Marxist Socialists, who were of course hated by the Bakuninite Socialists and Lasallean Socialists, and the National Socialists. There is also the point of the Nazis not caring for economic interpretations of the world. This is true, in my reading the ways the Nazis differed from the Marxists were mainly on the issues of: 1) they believed in a recognition of private property (though, let it be qualified, not in any true sense of the term, just nominally, because they felt it produced more to give to the state; as in it was seen as the better way to get what somebody like a Lenin or Stalin would want done, not that Hitler was John Locke; also the Nazis could take over an industry at any time they wanted, and those industries certainly answered to them) as opposed to outright government ownership. 2) Nationalism as opposed to the internationalism of the Communists because they felt that solidarity needed for the socialist paradise was more common between nationality than between those who had the same economic status, as in the Communists felt the workers were cosmopolitans because all workers everywhere shared the same plight, the Nazis felt they were Germans because they could feel solidarity with other Germans, and so both of these are collectivist and ideas for a certain army of brethren to bring on socialism. 3) The Nazis preferred their own befuddled conception of a Nietzschean, or perhaps better understood for historian types, a Hegelian conception of history, that is great men drove history, not the economic forces. I say befuddled Nietzschean because they tended to also feel aesthetic good, beauty, is to be valued over moral good, virtue, and that Mussolini's whole ideology was rooted in an attempt of a dull Marxist trying to perfect Marxism by adding in Nietzsche as he saw fit with the poor interpretation one may expect from such a dull figure (as an intellectual, I mean) as Mussolini, or a Hitler, and one can say there is a fourth of the Nazis being a bit more militaristic, but that is debatable, and if so again the reasons for fascists loving the military was because of its coordinating function of society, it's just statist collectivism. I take this rather long digression to say, yes, indeed the Nazis did not like economic conceptions of history, but we are not Nazis, and obviously they were a state with an integrated economic ideology (it being the state's may already be such as to call them Left), and we're the ones using the left/right dichotomy which only makes any real sense economically. The vast majority of points of the 25 points of the Nazi Party on matters of economics, most of the points found in 10 through 25, are leftist in nature, and that's not to dodge the ones before 10, they're just rather simple nationalism/racism. Though, also, let it be noted what nationalism actually means, which is not just 'patriotism.' Nationalism is the opposite of states' rights, the "nationalist theory of the union" is the theory as to the nature of those United States, or any other nation, taken up by those like Abraham Lincoln, as well as Adolf Hitler(and hopefully nobody will be so weak as to try to claim I'm upholding slavery when I'm obviously against the Nazis and all enslavement by any serious reading of this text) which says the nation came before the states making it up, and that therefore, the power should be centralized, and for someone like Hitler, the states should be gotten rid of all together. This is also why they were National Socialists (a whole section of Mein Kampf is dedicated to states rights and Hitler's views against them), and I think we can agree the Communists centralized power, and in this sense of the word were just as much National Socialists. For contemporaneous texts placing the Nazis as left wing, see Nazi Sozi(written by Goebbels himself) and Hitler Over Europe by Ernst Henri. It was my understanding the Nazis saw the Communists as socialism corrupted by Jewry, one can still see this in the crazed rantings of somebody like William Pierce, and that we need a pure anti-jewish German socialism, which of course, it still socialism, and still the Left.

I do feel the wikipedia article is highly POV, and at the least should mention both sides of this argument, if not scrap the more opinionated, blurred opinions over the Nazis being "right wing" all together, or perhaps scrap any mentioning of whether or not this is left/right. Of course, any serious criticism of my points is fine and welcome, and I hope one can talk about these things without descending into the author of a history text not having enough letters after their name or into my perverse motives and how often I must watch fox news (which I dislike) or slavery (which I dislike a little more) or something. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 132.198.239.65 (talk) 10:32, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

I think you completely miss the point of Wikipedia. This is not the place for _opinions_ without citations from reputable, academic, sources, preferably with the letters "P," "H," and "D" after the authors' names. Your theory of "Left=Communism" and "Right=Capitalism" is laughable, and not supported by any current or historical evidence. Also, the fact that you think that books of economic philosophy (like Hayek and von Mises) are "academic history," then you are woefully mistaken. They are as much "academic history" as are the works of Ann Coulter or Al Franken. Your perspective is quite OBVIOUSLY clouded by many hours of the "Glenn Beck Pseudo-History Hour," since everything you just wrote sounds exactly like a transcript of his show, and is what we call on Wikipedia "Original Research," and therefore unworthy of inclusion in an encyclopedia article. Also, next time: Write less. Bryonmorrigan (talk) 14:01, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Also, Mises, Hayek, Arendt and the Communist propaganda writer "Ernst Henri" (not his real name) did not actually make the claims you attribute. TFD (talk) 15:08, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Well I wish you hadn't done exactly what I took a rather long post to try and stop, but I can't say I didn't predict it, Bryon, all the very definition of ad hominem. Whether or not somebody is a "reputable historian" is a matter of whether or not the history they speak of is valid and well documented, not the title after their name; wrote that already, and you know this. Telling me I don't understand how history works when apparently the Nazis with the PhD title are better historians than Hannah Arendt; it just all seems very silly. Can you do something better than the ad hominem over somebody not having a PhD in history, and whether or not their history is valid or invalid? Can you do something better than slander somebody with Glenn Beck, who I tried to make quite clear I have nothing to do with, don't even own a tv to watch his crap if I wanted to do so. It's unnecessarily combative and it does not address anything. I also can't imagine somebody of Beck's intellect handling Mises or Nietzsche, not to mention the neoconservative movement loves Lincoln a nationalist theory of the union to justify war. Regardless, Mises and Hayek are reputable; if they are not, show their claims to be false, or point to where somebody did such. Also, yes they did make the claims of Nazism being of the left. Hayek and Mises both had the central claim of the Communists and the Nazis being part of the same movement, and Arendt's claim is the same. If you think otherwise, you have not read them. This was not simply armchair opinions nor was it original reserach either, this was my understanding of the history as written by sources such as Arendt and Hitler. I did not say copy and paste what I wrote into the article either, obviously, I was claiming the article should rethink its ideological bent in light of such information.

I felt i had quite a few respectable sources. Mises and Hayek and Arendt are respectable, I'm not aware of where their history is a fraud, and since whether or not the Nazis were a leftist philosophy or a rightist philosophy is of course a philosophical question, as long as the history is valid it seems valid for a philosopher to comment on the issue. Goebbels and Hitler themselves were also sources with Nazi Sozi and Mein Kampf respectively.

All but this paragraph is addressed to the lack of response that was Bryon's. Thanks for the interesting information TFD. Though, I must be a bit curious, what claims did I seem to be making about Henri other than Nazism having a leftist economic ideology in the book Hitler Over Europe? What you post is indeed interesting about Henri, but since the very origin of the idea of fascism as "right wing" is with the Soviets, it's interesting he did not categorize them as such, and explained the Nazi economic ideology as one of government intervention and nationalization (ie, socialism) to get the business owners against the workers and vice versa. It also addressed more his lust for drawing connections between people when one shouldn't have done so, than it does his economic analysis. Of course this might be wrong too and I can respect calling it into question, but still find it striking because it goes against the grain of Communist ideology where any opposition is evil capitalism, and since most opposition is going to be slightly to their right unless Bakunin came back it's superficially plausible as "right wing," but that gets overthrown when Stalin calls Trotsky a "fascist" for opposing him. It's also interesting you took on Henri, which if that claim of his is shown to be false fine by me, whatever to get closer to the truth, but that you dodged completely Nazi Sozi. Bryon's response was rather paltry, so thank you for something more tangible and that information about the writer, maybe there will be something there I hadn't noticed before.

I also explained quite well why left = communism and right = capitalism, calling it laughable is not saying anything about the claims. With fear of being a broken record, left/right either means radicals/old privilege and status quo, which is irrelevant to this discussion since status quo changes with the conditions, and the old nobles' privilege is dead, also the Nazis were certainly radicals, or it means something plainly economic. The most basic political spectrum test on the web will show you it's a common interpretation of left/right to be communism/capitalism for clarity's sake. Now maybe you feel it should be more muddled than this, but that's why I also said perhaps mentions of left/right should be scrapped in the article. Can you name me something the Nazis did which is "right wing" that the Communist governments of the world, no doubt on the left, didn't do also? If it's all based on their love of the German language or something it seems a weak claim.

It also seems interesting that there is all this obfuscation over left/right not being an economic ideology when the Nazis' left wing economic ideology is brought up. Perhaps I'm being foolhardy in judgement, but that seems to be granting the point of their left wing economic ideology, which would be cause to say, whatever the supplementary conditions one wishes to claim exist for being labeled left or right, that they can't be called "far right." It seems hard to believe that one can be on the edge while being the "middle way" of fascism simultaneously. These seem legitimate quandaries.

So please say why my claims are wrong, which I have no problems with, all for learning, not why I didn't cite enough court historians. A reputable historian only is reputable if his/her history is valid, seems obvious enough to me. Thanks for the reply. --132.198.239.65 (talk) 07:41, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Wow. For someone who types so much, you present so little information. As I pointed out before, Hayek and von Mises were NOT historians, nor did they claim to be. Both were economists and political theorists. It's amazing that you can't see this. Ann Coulter has a law degree...but her books are not "academic" in the slightest, nor would they be considered "reputable" sources for Wikipedia, particularly on the issue of history. Furthermore, Hayek, von Mises....and apparently you as well...concentrate solely upon economic issues, when the main goals of National Socialism were aimed at social, not economic, ones. Left and Right still mean the same thing as they always have...and trying to redefine the argument based on a "Capitalism v. Communism" is as false a dichotomy as ever existed. Under that ridiculous argument, Left-Wingers like John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Thomas Paine were all "secret Communists." Leftism has always been strongly in favor of Egalitarianism, a concept which was strongly opposed by the Nazis in every possible way. Say what you will about the Soviets, but they still promoted Egalitarianism, albeit through Totalitarianism. The Nazis hated everything to do with the "Jewish" concepts of Marxism and Communism, and any attempt to state otherwise is nothing but Revisionism and "original research." Your hatred of historians, academics, and reputable sources is duly noted. Once again, please try to be more succinct in your ramblings, rather than filling up the page with this nonsense. Bryonmorrigan (talk) 12:48, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

The IP still has not provided any sources that Mises, Hayek or Arendt considered fascism part of the Left, and in fact none of them claimed that it was. TFD (talk) 17:24, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

As I said before, a "historian" does not have a monopoly on history, and why you think historians are ones to interpret economic and philosophical questions about history any more than say, economists and philosophers, seems silly. Ann Coulter has nothing to do with anything, try refuting Mises or Hayek or Arendt, but bringing her up is my point her having a law degree doesn't give her a monopoly on truth. Matters of history depend on whether or not the history talked about happened, not who wrote them, this is kinda the whole point behind ad hominem being a term in the first place. Being "not historians" doesn't say anything, are they right or wrong. Already addressed all of this; yep, the Nazis didn't care for economic concepts of history, but we're not Nazis, and we're the ones trying to decide whether they were on the left or right, which has little coherence taken outside the economic sphere. Name me what the Nazis did that was "right wing" that the Soviets didn't, the list seems paltry. And nope again, how many strawmans are you going to build up, Bryon, what does "secret communist" have to do with anything, the point in the very first place is fascism was a movement of the left; that does not mean anybody who is on the left is a communist by definition, since they could be a fascist, or a myriad of whatever else, the point is that the communists are on the left and capitalists on the right, not that on the left are only communists, hur dur.; nope, for instance, they could be a fascist, for instance, or a. It's a gradient, and you know that, and lol at claiming Paine as left wing, you haven't read him either. And sorry but history and economics alike is a matter of cause and effect not hopes and intentions, to say the Soviets promote egalitarianism through a government with secret and special privileges over a starving population is quite sad. You're just repeating bromides, the Nazis had as much wish for egalitarianism, if you call egalitarianism the Marxist economic conceptions, which the Nazis had plenty of even if decrying the internationalism; for instance, the platform of the Nazi Party 11) That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be abolished. or 18)18. We demand that ruthless war be waged against those who work to the injury of the common welfare. Traitors, usurers, profiteers, etc., are to be punished with death, regardless of creed or race. Those seem pretty "egalitarian." Please, bryon, quit with the strawmen, actually address the point. I do not "hate" historians, but slander the competition as you will, you "hate reputable sources" all the same since Hayek and Mises knew the economic ground where the Nazis took root, ie the German Historical School, quite well. Your whole post was 1) but those aren't historians! (addressed already), 2) But left and right aren't economic! (addressed, again) 3) you think everybody on the left is a communist! (simply no, the very essence of the point is fascists are on the left, and inb4 you try to claim i'm saying the left is all fascists and commies or something to bring the argument down further), 4) Well you're just a hater because you think history is about what happens not who says what happened (simply dumb). My posts are long because it's obvious you guys do this, bryon, because it's going to be down to attacking me and not the points made and/or questions raised, I have to qualify everything knowing it won't be people with spines, it will be people like you. Notice my posts are shorter when not trying to combat strawmen and lazy bromides. Already showed the whole point about viewing Marxist socialism as jewish, and their socialism as the German socialism, maybe the disdain over the length is because you won't read it.

Yes, I did provide a source for them each. The Road to Serfdom, Omnipotent Government, and The Origins Of Totalitarianism. Let's take it from wiki itself, on the Road to Serfdom, Hayek "analyzes Naziism's roots in socialism" and the whole of the website dedicated to Mises seems to be aware of these claims, eg http://mises.org/daily/1937 Arendt has Naziism and Soviets as both movements of totalitarianism, ie as part of the same movement. Mises and Hayek both felt that Naziism was an outgrowth of the German Historical School, with its Romanticism and volkisch law, the disdain for economics, and more positivist outlook of economics, and, surprise, its socialism. In fact, both point out how much of the origin of the hate of jews from their association with capitalism, and thus "the right" --132.198.239.65 (talk) 23:40, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Your need to show that Hayek, Mises or Arendt called fascism "left-wing" and so far you have failed to do so. Your belief that Nazism "was an outgrowth of the German Historical School" undercuts your theory, since the School was right-wing. TFD (talk) 00:52, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

I've decided it's pointless trying to talk to this guy. He's confused as to the purpose of Wikipedia, does not understand the difference between political opinion pieces and reputable sources, and just responds with rambling, incoherent, arguments in giant wall-o-text format. Bryonmorrigan (talk) 13:55, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

I will note that the funniest part of his manifesto is this sentence, "It's a gradient, and you know that, and lol at claiming Paine as left wing, you haven't read him either." LOL. Thomas Paine was actually a key figure in the French Revolution, having been elected to the National Convention, and the term "Left Wing" itself was coined during this period to refer to those who supported the Revolution. (He also advocated a kind of "proto-Socialism" in his treatise, Agrarian Justice...) Paine was probably the single MOST Left Wing figure in the entire American Revolution, and to say otherwise proves a complete lack of scholarship. Bryonmorrigan (talk) 17:10, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

According to the John Birch Society, we are mistaken about the French Revolution. The deputies who sat on the right and supported the king were actually left-wing, while the deputies who sat on the left were right-wing. So Thomas Paine was far right, while Louis XVI was far left. TFD (talk) 00:17, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

LOL. Robespierre was a Conservative? That's almost as funny as Jonah Goldberg's "scholarship!" Bryonmorrigan (talk) 11:40, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Are you kidding that haven't shown Hayek, Mises, and Arendt called it left wing? Hayek "analyzes Nazism's roots in socialism" - Wikipedia's own page on the Road to Serfdom. Is socialism not left wing? Mises - "Marxism and National Socialism, agree in opposing the Liberalism and reject the capitalist social order. Both desire a socialist form of society." - Socialism: An Economic and Sociological Analysis (he echoes the same sentiments in the introduction, and there's a whole bloody chapter of "National Socialism and World Socialism" Omnipotent government is just more of a book on history as such, and traces the Nazis from its roots in Bismarck on, so I gave that one, and here's a quote from it to show it taking the same attitude "The essential ideas of Nazism were developed by the Pan-Germans and the socialists of the chair in the last thirty years of the nineteenth century," not to mention an entire chapter in the section of what led to Nazism is about the Social Democrats in Imperial Germany; if you don't think Mises or Hayek see Nazism as left wing and the German Historical School as left wing, again, you have not read them, or did a poor job of it. http://mises.org/etexts/mises/og.asp http://books.google.com/books?id=dPkB7AiURigC&printsec=frontcover&dq=socialism+an+economic+a&hl=en&ei=H4qnTZ7BBcidgQev4uXzBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=book-thumbnail&resnum=1&ved=0CCoQ6wEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

I said why I cited Arendt already as well, the Origins of Totalitarianism is showing Nazism and the Soviets being parts of the same movement. Since the Soviets are left wing, it seems to follow.

Obviously didn't read what I've written, since already noted where left wing comes from, that being the Revolution, and why it's not what it means today (and if it were what it meant at the convention, and to restate since apparently it wasn't read, as in left meaning simply opposing the Old Order, well then the Nazis are left wing by that definition too, but that's too context dependent of what the old order is/was). Frederic Bastiat ("The Bastiat Prize is a journalism award for politically right-wing, Libertarian commentators"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bastiat_Prize) sat on the left too (http://books.google.com/books?id=6sisXMv_AecC&pg=PA62&lpg=PA62&dq=bastiat+sat+on+the+left+of+national+assembly&source=bl&ots=BHzJz-S3r8&sig=VtLecDYwraUzmaO83TYNVlb_H44&hl=en&ei=UYunTZj3IMHVgQfp08HzBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBQQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=national%20assembly&f=false), and he'd be put on the right of today without question, as would Thomas Jefferson(inb4 'LOL he says Thomas Jefferson was at the National Convention' to dodge the rest of what is said, not saying that), and as would Thomas Paine. It's quite natural for somebody on what we today call the right as being part of the American Revolution, to be for the furthering of liberty against monarchy, and support the French Revolution as well, certainly before any derapage, and said people for the revolution would've sat on the left, that isn't at all confusing to me. Socialists like to call Paine part of the left because he wrote some things like the government should give people 50 dollars, that's not exactly public ownership of the means of production, the guy was for limited government in the American style all the same. To say Paine was the most left of the american revolution says nothing when they'd all be considered right wing for wishing to conserve British liberties and free trade. Also try not to brush aside the fact you said rather stupidly I think anybody on the left is a communist while I'm arguing that the non-communist fascists are on the left. A better question than Paine is if FDR is on the left, as per your labeling, which he was, why FDR praised Mussolini and vice versa? The only way to rebut seems to be some type of lame appeal to intentions instead of actual cause and effect, or to draw a harsh difference between social and economic spheres and say Mussolini was on the right socially but with FDR economically (which, nonetheless, being a mixture, means it doesn't make sense to say "far right"), and that still draws the challenge which has not been met; what did the Nazis (and fascists) do (lets put an emphasis on do, as in actually did) that was so "right wing" that the Soviets didn't do?

And don't try the "it's fruitless to talk to this guy," when it's obvious you did not read what was written, and have done nothing more but claim I'm wrong ex cathedra. Try harder.

Also never got a response as to whether this: http://www.archive.org/details/GoebbelsJoseph-DerNazi-sozi-FragenUndAntwortenFuerDen is a valid source http://www.archive.org/stream/NaziSozi/Nazi-Sozi#page/n11/mode/2up for the English --132.198.239.65 (talk) 23:24, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Again, this is original research. Hayek et al placed conservatism on the right and libertarianism in the center. See for example Hayek's "Why I am not a conservative". Certainly conservatives adopted policies that Hayek called socialism, e.g., State Socialism, Tory Socialism. Red Toryism. as did liberals. Bismarck was a right-wing conservative. Herbert Spencer called the Liberal Party's move to interventionism "The new Toryism". Ironically, the socialists were the last political group to accept this type of socialism, which they called "state capitalism". They saw the welfare state as an attempt by the establishment to concentrate power in the state and undercut the power of workers' organizations. And no, Goebbel's writings are not a reliable source. TFD (talk) 01:42, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

First off, it says my take, as in why I feel the legitimate queries are out there because it seems like those who bring this up often do not get any serious response outside of dismissal; secondly, it's not original research, I am not Mises or Hayek, or Goebbels, and there's a whole page on this very site about FDR and Mussolini, and Paine is not a matter of original research either. Where Hayek placed conservatism or libertarianism is not the matter, it's that to both Mises and Hayek fascism's roots were in socialism, and socialism is left wing. Not 'adopted policies' but their very roots, as says in wikipedia's own article citing Hayek's own text, and as Mises would say from what I linked, this should be emphasized. Also, as a side note Hayek is far more appeasing in his nature, he's the most Tory in Spencer's sense of the Austrian School, if you will; I doubt Mises had such a spectrum (Rothbard felt Hayek's Nobel Prize was for Mises, but they made sure to wait until he died to give it to somebody more palatable). Both Mises and Hayek call Nazism, economically and historically, socialism.

Calling Bismarck right wing seems more a case of psychologizing, what he actually did was appease the socialists and invent the first welfare state, 1883 introduced state run healthcare, so it seems reductionist to call him "right wing," and nonetheless I was just trying to encapsulate Mises' work without copying and pasting the entire book, not say anything about Bismarck as such. I said from Bismarck on is the chronology of the work, not that Bismarck was a social democrat or anything, but that within that chronology Mises shows Nazism's roots in socialism, one can follow the link and see how the chapters of Mises' work are set up. Herbert Spencer and Murray Rothbard both have great essays about how left and right have switched meanings and become convoluted, essentially by, at first, one using the means of the other, it's one of the reasons to me it seems vacuous to count left and right as anything but economic divisions when that's mostly what they've become if one wishes to make any sense of them. Regardless, Spencer's point was that the liberals (meaning classical liberal, think Bastiat or Jefferson or etc) had moved toward socialism, probably shown best in someone like John Stuart Mill, so, yes those that called themselves "liberals" are now statists, or to use a Misesian term Etatists. That strikes me as a point for fascists being on the left, as left came to mean not "radical" but "interventionist." To say it wasn't left wing enough for those furthest to the left doesn't make it any less a part of the left; and yes it's common for those on the left to call their leftist opponents capitalists, Stalin did it with the fascists, and with Trotsky. And it seems like one could make a pretty good argument that, even taking the older meanings of the word left, if Germany had a national convention in Weimar the Nazis would've sat to the left; that is to say "far right" is at best foolhardy. "undercut the power of workers' organizations" has a superficial plausibility as anti-left, but the Soviet Union just as much undermined those for nationalization's sake (as did the Nazis), so I don't see that as in itself particularly right wing. At least, it requires clarification.

I feel a bit at loss why Goebbel's writings aren't primary sources of Nazi thought, this was before he was propaganda minister. Surely Mein Kampf is a source of Nazi doctrine, this seems just the same; at worst it shows how the Nazis sold themselves, and it's a dialogue with such things as (paraphrasing) "So your answer to the failings of the Marxian socialism is a new, German socialism? Exactly!' which certainly shows the Nazis selling themselves as socialists, again, at worst (as a source). It seems also pretty telling to me, of course, maybe I'm all wrong, but it's striking, that so much of fascist doctrine comes out of syndicalists (who are certainly left wing), Sorel probably being the most obvious. If the document (Nazi Sozi) is indeed genuine, which was more my question, seems to follow it tells us something, no?

Also, I'd be interested in how you guys feel about Wolfgang Schivelbusch as a source, since FDR has been granted as left wing, a historian who sees the New Deal as fascism, and thanks for the response, Four Deuces

--132.198.239.65 (talk) 09:29, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

You still need sources that support your conclusions, otherwise it is synthesis. Rothbard and others btw use a similar analysis as yours but see modern socialism as developing out of conservatism and therefore arguably right-wing. "Most Socialists (Fabians, Lassalleans, even Marxists) turned sharply rightward, completely abandoned the old libertarian goals and ideals of revolution and the withering away of the State, and became cozy Conservatives...."[4] And yes, Goebbels may be used as a primary source, but there are limits on how those sources may be used. Wolfgang Schivelbusch's writings may be used as a source, but WP:WEIGHT applies when describing his opinions. And no FDR has not been granted as left-wing, he was a centrist if on the left of the mainstream American spectrum and is described in a recent biography by Conrad Black as a conservative. TFD (talk) 11:58, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Leftist use of the term before nazism

Why is there no mention of the use of the term National Socialism before the Nazis, especially by socialists. Examples include the National Socialist party of the UK from 1916 to 1918, Robert Blatchford's Britain For The British and Merrie England and the writings of the utopian socialist Edward Bellamy in the US.

Obviously this has nothing to do with the later fascist and racist uses of the term, but I think it is well worth mentioning. Jamesmcm (talk) 07:32, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

It has no connection with the NSDAP. In fact many parties have attached the term "national" to their name. It usually means the party is organized throughout the nation. In the same sense we do not mention all the parties throughout the world that have been called republican in the article about the U.S. Republican Party. TFD (talk) 22:50, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Sure but National Socialism redirects to this page, whereas Republicanism does not redirect to the US Republican party. Jamesmcm (talk) 07:32, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

You would need to show that reliable sources writing about the NSDAP find this trivia relevant. 11:45, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

[5] appears to be an RS indicating whay the term was used (tracing it to the Austrian party pre WW I (1913), and to Rudolf Jung et al). Decidedly antedates the NSDAP name change and I wonder if Hitler was well aware of the movement while living in Austria. At least it appears reasonable that he would have been familiar with the small party. Collect (talk) 12:04, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

I was more thinking that perhaps the history of National Socialism as an ideology should have a separate page to the NSDAP party itself, covering the history of the term and it's usage by other parties, etc. Jamesmcm (talk) 21:31, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

I suspect the Austrian usage was very close to what Hitler knew - does anyone have cites for him being versed in politics of other nations in Europe? Collect (talk) 21:47, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

I could be wrong, since I don't know much about these earlier groups you mention (other than what I see on their Wiki pages), but I think there is a distinct difference between "National Socialism" and a "National" organization composed of "Socialists" where the words come together in the title. National Socialism is not really "Socialism" at all, as the primary word is "National," relating to "Nationalism." (Technically, in German, the words are not even separated, as in "Nationalsozialismus.") This is quite different from an earlier English organization that called itself the "National Socialist Party," as it appears that Nationalism had nothing to do with the party's platform. Really, since the "Socialist" part of Nationalsozialismus is directed at the People supporting the State, rather than the State supporting the People, (as in "regular" Socialism), it really has nothing at all to do with "Socialism" per se. As I like to point out, National Socialism had as much to do with "Socialism" as the German Democratic Republic had to do with "Democracy" or "Republicanism." (In other words: Nada.) Another example is the Far-Right (and somewhat Neo-Nazi) German National Democratic Party, or Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands. There's a distinct difference between what they call "National Democratism" and say, the "National Democratic Party" of the USA or "Democratic National Convention." Linking some Left-Wing group that had nothing to do with the Nazis to this page, simply because of the name similarity (in English no less, but not German)...is like linking the Jains to this page because the Jain flag also has a swastika on it...and I question the motives of anyone stating otherwise. Bryonmorrigan (talk) 23:30, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Well I agree with you, Edward Bellamy's "Nationalism" movement referred to nationalisation, not xenophobia, as he saw socialism as simply being the necessary role of government to truly protect life and liberty. I'm not trying to link them to the Nazi party but I think the other usage of the term should be mentioned, just as National Communism has its own page. My point is more that National Socialism is broader than just Nazism, and this should be mentioned, so that people reading Edward Bellamy's books, etc. can understand that with the archaic use of the term. Jamesmcm (talk) 11:10, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Add a link for Bellamy then, possibly with a note as to "earlier, unrelated use of term 'national socialism.'" Collect (talk) 13:39, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

The Austrian group mentioned appears fairly close to the Hitler version. I doubt he knew anything about any British parties, but he pretty much had to have heard of the Austrian one. And it did, indeed, pay some lip sevice to socialism in each case. Collect (talk) 00:03, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

This source shows that the term "national socialist" was used in pre-war Austria. The National Socialist Party (UK) adopted its name during the war (after Nazis had begun using the term), but it is unlikely they would have heard about the small Austrian party or would have knowingly copied their name, since Britain was at war with Austria. While a comparison between the two groups would be interesting (socialism, nationalism, anti-Semitism, militarism, marches), we would need a source for the comparison. TFD (talk) 14:00, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for repeating the precise cite I already gave. Collect (talk) 14:07, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

link to parasitism

Is that link a joke? The article the link connects to is a ecological article, while the intended meaning is a derogatory term towards flexibility. The Nazi claim has nothing to do with ecological parasitism, as Judaism in no way harms anything it supports. 173.183.79.81 (talk) 03:25, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

German-English translator needed

As you can see here: A-Z category of Nazi Party members on German wikipedia

the coverage of the Nazi party and its members is a great deal more comprehensive on the German Wikipedia than the English one. It would be great if we could find a fluent German-English speaker who could translate pages for some of these historical figures. For instance, it is rather embarrassing that the English Wikipedia does not have pages for some of the leading members, such as Karl Steibel, or some of the Commandants of concentration camps, such as Franz Reichleitner.

If one or two Wikipedia users could approach the translation process as a specialized task, that would be ideal.Hoops gza (talk) 02:57, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Expert Categorizers

Why is there no mention of the fact that Nazis were particularly great categorizers? They excelled in identifying various things and writing about them and putting them in their proper places.