Fascism & Tradition

This thread was sparked by a brief, cut off conversation in the Telegram which I’d enjoy seeing discussion on.

It started with St Codreanu and the Legion of the Archangel Michael being mentioned in the context of Fascism, despite the fact that I can’t find a single reference of Codreanu calling himself or his movement Fascist, and indeed he was critical of Fascism despite seeing Fascists and any nationalists as friends or allies or co-strugglers.

I contest the common consensus that Fascism represents some kind of traditionalist revolution. Many eould say it is traditional just in the sense that it was opposed to various Leftist progressivist movements of its day. But that is not enough. In fact, Fascist movements had a lot of modernism going on; most affirmed sufferagism and supported women having rights to vote and even be political leaders. I believe Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists to be the worst in this regard, blatantly progressive but just from a slightly right wing perspective that still included nationalism (or perhaps more appropriately imperialism?) and light antisemitism (“SOME Jews…”). For the purposes of this thread we can consider German National Socialism as well, even if some would argue it is distinct. There was an abundance of women’s lib stuff going on in Germany too. And the point of these observations isn’t some cartoonish intent to “oppress women”, for I promise not to shitpost on the forum like I do so enjoy doing on telegram, but to demonstrate a very ‘modernist’ ethos going on in these movements, because these ideas were completely foreign and even near sacrilege in truly traditional societies; and after all, traditionalist Christians should attempt to emulate traditional society.

Some would also say, and did effectively tell me on telegram, that being authoritarian and/or wanting to revitalize a national spirit is traditionalist. It sure sounds like it, but that’s not altogether true either. Mao Zedong and Vladimir Lenin were very authoritarian. So was Franklin Delano Roosevelt. But you should agree these figures are antithetical to tradition. Moreover, even most Communist countries quickly gave up Marxist ideals of global proletarian revolution and quickly became more or less nationalist regimes, which thrived on national spirit, while modernizing and secularizing the people. So that itself cannot be inherently traditional either.

The worst bit of Fascism (or any modern ideology), however, is the secularism. Most fascist leaders were nominally pro Christian, because they were populists who had to appeal to the people, but there wasn’t really any piety there for the most part, except in a few lesser known cases. I know Italian oriented people say Mussolini is in heaven - but I’m speaking of his earthly life, not after-the-fact tradition. As I recall, Franco was religious and Codreanu was exclusively religious (if we consider him Fascist), and the short-lived Austrofascist movement and Belgian Rexists were explicitly Roman Catholic. But usually what we see is nominal support of whatever the dominant religion is, and tolerance of other religions except those that might be involved in treasonous activity like Jehovah’s Witnesses which are often utilized by United States intelligence operations.

This is antithetical to a traditional worldview. Sacrality is THE building block of ethnic and cultural unity. There is no ethnicity and certainly no empire without common worship & ritual, alongside common heritage and language. If you try to have the latter without the former…behold Sweden today. And do not mistake me: ancient societies did have religious plurality. The Roman imperium tolerated, for a time, second temple ‘Judaism’ and Zoroastrianism and the Greek mystery cults which were similar to but not identical to the religio Romana with its collegium pontificum, and while there was persecution of non-Muslims in many islamic societies there were also tolerant iterations. But it’s worth noting these examples are empires which are by definition multi-ethnic and multi-linguistic if not also multi-cultural but with a dominant culture. A small tribal kingdom would collapse without sacral religious unity. The very notion of secularism is pretty blasphemous to any religion, not just ours, and a secularist attitude to politics is, in my view, incompatible with our religion. We must always have an explicitly Christian agenda.

None of this is to say there were no traditionalist fascists. There definitely was a traditionalist wing, and it was the best of the bunch. But it was forced to coexist with futurists and oligarchs that wanted authoritarianism but secret sex parties and creepy modern art et cetera.

In conclusion I think if a traditional christian it to utilize Fascism as such it must be made explicitly in the traditionalist form, such as the superfascism ofJulius Evola or the Legionarism of Codreanu who said fascism and national socialism were preoccupied with the body and clothing but left out the soul. The cross must always be front and center, with a crown following closeby. And so if we join fascist groups it must be our directive to struggle to purify them of the undesirable elements and baptise them.

I myself am nostalgically fond of fascism and national socialism, especially ecofascism and ‘superfascism’, but I haven’t been really able to call myself one in a few years partly because of what I’ve covered in this post and hope to cover in replies.

For reading material related to this I suggest For My Legionaries if you haven’t, and “Fascism and Tradition” which is a compilation of Evola’s essays about fascism and NS which are actually fairly critical which makes it ironic that internet fascists like cherrypicking other works of his to intellectually masturbate with.

I’d like to hear what anyone has to say about this and discuss further.

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Firstly, I’d like to start off with clarifying that Saint Codreanu was indeed a Fascist. Saint Codreanu specifically referred to his ideology as Christian National Socialism in For My Legionaries. Fascism and National Socialism may both differ in regards to the two as applied political theory/science, but it’s important to remember that Fascism is an idea that developed over multiple decades and it is much more than what you would read just in the Doctrine of Fascism. I tend to agree with the notion that Fascism is an ideology before it is a political theory, and that the particulars of governance are less important. So from the perspective that Fascism is a philosophy or Ideology then I would indeed say that figures like Hitler or Codreanu were fascist.

I feel like you are conflating Fascism with modernism or progressivism because of its Futurist elements but I don’t really see it that way, Fascism absolutely rejected the enlightenment, materialism/marxism, and liberal democracy and these were core tenants of this broad global movement. It re-asserted the core values of the nation but with new ideas. It was backwards and forewards, returning to their pre-enlightenment roots while understanding that the past is the past and that we cannot simply reconstruct the culture and the mindset of the people in those times. In this sense it is traditional, but there is a difference between following and respecting the traditions and attempting to rebuild certain things already lost to time. A cultural Ship of Theseus I suppose.

I get a lot of this perspective from Zoltanous’ reading list on Fascism and particularly Sternhells “The Birth of Fascist Ideology”, which I highly recommend. I am not a particularly well read intellectual, so it is entirely possible I am just blowing hot air and really like phonk edits. But from the few books I have read this is what I have come to.

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To further clarify: Codreanu’s university youth movement, the league of national christian defense, was referred to in doctrine as being “Nationa-Christian Socialism”, and by the time of the Legion of the Archangel Michael, “Legionarism” was a purified, intensified form of ideology or philosophy of Codreanu, which was no less religious than his NCS but far more active, and militaristic, but para-political as the Legion did not allow members to run for office or take money under any circumstances, but did announce support for some good politicians.

I think ultimately it is moot whether or not we call St Codreanu fascist. If he was fascist, he represents arguably the most traditionalist wing of fascism and is set apart from the rest thereby, and distinguishes himself from the rest in his own writings. If he is not fascist, he is further right (in the true traditional sense of right) than fascism and an example fascists should seek to emulate either way.

Fascism is an idea that developed over multiple decades, and let’s not forget its origins in Marxist Revisionism (Georges Sorel for example). I am not equating it to marxism by any stretch, but those are its roots, and it is indeed birthed from the same dissatisfaction with the Liberal status quo but inability to really go back to what was Right before the takeover of the enlightenment. It seems apparent to me that despite attempting to buck the enlightenment, fascism still emulates the same thought processes. Only instead of ‘the individual’ as the subject, as with enlightenment liberalism, or ‘the (economic) class’ or ‘prolerariat’ as with Marxism, now the subject is either ‘the state’ as such or ‘the folk’. But like the former two takes, it is an incomplete, un-holistic way of looking at the world or even just geopolitics, even if it is preferable to the former.

To be clear I think there is a lot of good in Fascism, but it has to be put through a strainer to get rid of extraneous baggage, and arguably a traditional ideology should be grounded first and foremost on sacred tradition besides and not mere philosophy.

We absolutely should utilize what is good in it but we also absolutely must throw out the bad and replace it with better.

I am not too well read on Zoltanous. Isn’t he, alongside Fascifist, a sort of fourth position (fourth political theory) fascist? I

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I think I mostly agree with this post, Codreanu is surely the highest ideal of a fascist from the perspective of a Christian and wringing out all of the Nietzschean elements in fascism is necessary. This is, to me, the purpose of specifying a “Christian Fascism”. But I wanted to push back on the idea that Fascism is not a traditionalist movement because despite claims from Evola that they may or may not have failed I think the intent is what is important. We say developed in the past tense but really Fascism as an idea could probably continue, there is no shortage of post-war fascist writings after all.

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One thing we should remember, (and I hope I am not straying to far off topic here) is that Fascism is a fluid ideology. As explained in Mario Palmeri’s “Philosophy of Fascism” Fascism at its core means “United we are stronger” and that unity is found through Christ.
I do believe the Integralists and Codreanu probably did it best as we are aware Vatican-Italian state relations have been severly damaged since the birth of Risorgimento.

I think I agree with this post as well now, glad we got to hash this out in the forums and take our time.
I am going to link a very high quality channel that I’ve loved for years.

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I would like to continue this thread as I have been learning more about Austria’s Clerical Fascism, and while it can be argued that there was some economic issues under Engelbert Dolfuss, perhaps we can agree that the “Nation” the people and government built was quite beuatiful.

And besides, look how far the Austrians have fallen…

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Thoughts on anschluss?

Hitler was being a sussy baka. In my opinion, while the goal of the Nazi Party was the Unification of German peoples, the Anschluss was unjustified considering the seemingly cultural superiority of the Austrians. And of course, the unified staunch Catholic Faith.

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Intent does matter, but if it doesn’t make it to execution stage then it was for nothing. If I intend to be the godliest man alive but whack off to porn every day and kill a man I hate thinking myself justified in so doing, that intent was dead on arrival at best. Extreme example not exactly applicable but if we only judge by intent and not results etc, then we’d probably think some of the worst people alive today are actually pretty cool and relatable since they do think their own cause is just and all that.

Fascism failing to outlast Communism and Liberalism in war doesn’t make it inherently wrong or inferior, but maybe it failing to live up to its own ideals should raise some eyebrows.

Another writing on the subject which I think I forgot to mention is Ivan Ilyin’s “Fascism Viewed From the Right.”

I approve of the anschluss overall. Being ethnically German but removed from both Deutschland and Austria by my family moving to the US to get away from brother wars I enjoy impartiality about both countries and despite criticisms of both simply would like for my racial group to be more unified in general. Also being Orthodox I do not care about the Protestantism-Catholicism competition in the matter, and I am a monarchist in principle but don’t see Masons as legitimate, nor Habsburgs that sell out their own people time and again for international diplomacy etc