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Comment by james1071 | Hacker News Reader

The Nazis were not Socialists. They came to power by opposing Communists and Socialists, who were seen as a threat to middle class Germans and their property. The Nazis and facists in Italy operated a dictatorship for the benefit of corporations.

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for the benefit of corporations.

It’s true that some corporations did very well under those regimes, but it’s not accurate to say that enriching corporations is why they did what they did. Hitler never thought “starting a war is the perfect cover for making my buddies in the private sector rich”, he wasn’t angling for a lucrative post-political career as a board member or a lobbyist or after-dinner speaker.

I did not say that every action was done for the benefit of corporations.

every action was done for the benefit of corporations

Corporate interests were pretty low down the priority list in those regimes. German corporations would certainly have been more competitive and profitable if they had kept their Jewish workers and been permitted to use "Jewish science". The Nazis merrily hamstrung the corporations in their territory for the sake of their overarching ideology, they totally subordinated economic interests to serve the State.

Here is a good reference. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economics_of_fascism

It's oversimplification. Socialists and communists also struggled with each other. Communists actually labelled social-democrats as "fascists" for some time. Nevertheless, they have a lot in common (used to have even more in those times) - I don't think someone could argue with that. With communists/socialists national socialists shared their contempt to "outdated society", capitalist democracy ("plutocracy"), and they competed for attention of poor, and disappointed, and all embraced strict regulations. It's really depends on what you see as a core part of socialism, but similarities are plenty, both in goals and methods. That's why, for example, Zhelyu Zhelev's historical research on fascism was prohibited across all socialist countries as it was too easy to see parallels.

"Nazi" is a derogatory abbreviation for (the German equivalent of) "national socialist". It's what they called themselves.

This may be the single comment of mine where I'm most mystified as to why it was downvoted. What gives?

I suppose it's because most people already know that 'fact', and pointing it out doesn't meaningfully add to the discussion (other than possibly imply that calling yourself a socialist automatically makes you one).

It seems pretty directly relevant in response to the claim that "the Nazis came to power by opposing Socialists".

As far as the implication you mention, I wouldn't say that calling yourself a socialist automatically makes you one; I would say that to determine what "socialist" is supposed to mean it is informative to look at what people calling themselves "socialist" believe; but I would especially say that it's unlikely for the "national socialist workers' party" to have come to power by opposing "socialists".

> "In general, the manifesto was antisemitic, anti-capitalist, anti-democratic, anti-Marxist and anti-liberal.[49] To increase its appeal to larger segments of the population, on the same day as Hitler's Hofbräuhaus speech on 24 February 1920, the DAP changed its name to the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei ("National Socialist German Workers' Party", or Nazi Party).[50][51] The word "Socialist" was added by the party's executive committee, over Hitler's objections, in order to help appeal to left-wing workers.[52]" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_Party)

I am not too familiar with all of this, but surely it's not such a weird thought that a party might call itself socialist even if it opposes the actual socialist? A bit like how a despot might call his party or country democratic.

Nazism was an explicitly socialist project, with society defined very narrowly, and everyone outside society othered into subhumanity. As long as you were the right kind of person, there would be a place for you in the fascist scheme.

The opposite of socialist isn't capitalist; it's individualist. Nazis were not interested in promoting diversity in society. Exactly the opposite: conscious and explicit elimination of diversity.

The essence of fascism is teamwork. A feeling of togetherness is its binding emotion, subsuming your identity into something bigger than you. (Only by understanding this can you understand why it's so appealing.) The bundle (fasces) that's tied together won't be broken. The problem is that whomever wields the bundle now has outsize power, and whatever is not part of the bundle is garbage to be swept away.

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