When the Emperor Is a Void (2020) | Hacker News Reader

When the Emperor Is a Void (2020)

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34 pointsrntn27 comments

It's tempting but generally unwise to use Mishima as an example of anything but his own tortured soul. From day one, his writings have been suffused with longing for a "beautiful death" (his autobiography Confessions of a Mask has a striking scene where he describes having his first ever orgasm when he sees a picture of St Sebastian pierced by arrows), and the military trappings he acquired towards the end of his life seem to merely have been stage decoration for his own suicide.

Reminds me a line in the song "Lucky like St. Sebastian" about the desire to be a martyr - "Scenes like this give sadomasochism a bad name". In it he laments that his unrequited love is not as "divine" as Dante's trip into the inferno and says "The tragedy is no ones dying!"

For what it's worth, the best attempt to define fascism that I know of comes from Umberto Eco (who actually enter adolescence under fascicm): https://www.pegc.us/archive/Articles/eco_ur-fascism.pdf .

I think that we should all read it before calling each other fascists :)

That's a good definition, but it's just one among many, many, many others.[1]

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definitions_of_fascism

Good point.

It's still the best definition I know, though.

I always felt like (lifelong socialist and therefore not exactly unbiased) Umberto Eco had to tack on 2 or 3 extra bullet points to his definition of "ur-fascism", so it wouldn't just fit to totalitarian communism just as easily. Which isn't surprising when you look at the political career of Benito Mussolini.

> Nazism was decidedly anti-Christian and neo-pagan

Such an odd statement considering "Gott mit uns" (God with us) was the official motto of the Wehrmacht. If by that he meant differing substantially in doctrine from other Christian denominations, it's worth pointing out that many Southern Baptists often consider other denominations not "true Christians" and will happily explain why they will all end up in Hell.

From what I've seen, Nazism simply didn't want authority diluted between the church and the Fuhrer. The Fuhrer for them was the ultimate arbiter of truth and righteousness as defined by their notion of the Christian God.

Does it make logical or theological sense? Not much about fascists does, so why should this be different? (See: essay's point #4)

I figure it's actually rather complex: certainly the area most unanimous in their support for the Nazis (Bavaria) is also the most deeply religious. The simple explanation is that the Nazis were a big tent coalition that had a fetish for appearing ultra-unified - so you often get loads of conflicting and contradictory policies, together with an almost hysterical presentation of the mess resulting as the product of a unified vision of a unifying figure.

It's chimes with the article, actually. Just like Hirohito, Hitler was a void.

Eh, Hitler was a politician who regularly made rousing speeches. Hirohito was never seen in public, and the gyokuon-hōsō was the first time the public had heard any emperor's voice. On a regular basis, Hirohito would sit through entire meetings without speaking. If Hitler was a "void", it was definitely in a different sense than Hirohito was a void.

Well, Hirohito is from a tradition of leadership where he's supposed to say nothing. Hitler is from a tradition where he's supposed to be a genius from which all policy flows. This obviously makes it a much more contentious assertion in Hitler's case, and it's compounded by the post-war political conveniences about who was and was not responsible on the German side.

The analogy in my head is Trump- Trump had a lot of opinions, strongly-held opinions, even, and he would broadcast them at every opportunity. However, at its base, there wasn't a coherent world-view there. He didn't really have a grand political project that his positions stemmed from. Most of what Trump did was simply to try and please his audience, whoever that was. That's unlike, say, Nixon, or Carter, Wilson, or Obama.

Japan were on the other side in WWII and all, but nothing in TFA and nothing I've seen elsewhere constitutes a convincing argument that they were practicing "fascism". Nationalism, monarchism, traditionalism, colonialism, imperialism? Sure, all of that, both in the early part of 20c and in Mishima's attempt to revive that era. There was never the violence against the social order that has been an important aspect of all fascism, from 1920s Italy onward. Fascists are not ideologically coherent enough to do more than pretend to care about "tradition" etc. Their enemies are in the present. Confusing this issue benefits fascists and harms the rest of us.

I think debating the definition of fascism is a bit beside the point when it comes to judging political movements. Fascism is dangerous because of its emphasis on violence and dehumanization of opponents (among other things). If a movement hits all of the worst aspects of fascism or even a significant subset of them, well then it’s bad, whether or not it can be labeled fascism.

> dehumanization of opponents

What do you think the "facist"-namecalling ist? Yes, its bad.

(2020)

Added. Thanks!

Facism was a political movement in Italia a century ago. Stop calling every random whacko you dont like a facist.

Even Wikipedia has realized it has barely any substance left and is now mostly used as a smear word:

> Since the end of World War II in 1945, few parties have openly described themselves as fascist; the term is more often used pejoratively by political opponents.

I'd like to point out that "used pejoratively" means "slur" in progressive thinking.

The first paragraph on the facism Wikipedia page seems like a decent working definition. It's always a shame when people use such important terms thoughtlessly or in bad faith, integrity in the meanings of things seems like an important part of a healthy civilisation.

I think most people use it as a label for Nazi Germany under Hitler, or at least after the transformation from progressive socialist party to authoritarian regime.

The term Nazi has become meaningless slur for political opponents of any kind. After Putin used it to justify his war with Ukraine I wonder if anyone else wants to use it publicly.

And I wander what the next equivalent will be and how quickly it will become devaluated by being used indiscriminately by everyone against the people they don't agree with.

Charlottesville continues to be a strange sticking point. It is emblematic of the lack of political influence these groups have. The statue in question has since been removed, so they don't even have enough influence to defend one non-descript statue in wherever Charlottesville is.

Trump's total condemnation of the white nationalists somehow transformed into a ringing endorsement. Lets just underline that a few times - the only political support the protesters seem to have gotten was largely imaginary and devised for cheap political points.

It's unfortunate the author approached this with so much bias, of which I'd make an educated guess based on rhetoric, stems largely from ingesting media of only one slant. Would have been an interesting read if objective.

I see most tendency towards fascism coming from the ultra-progressives of late. The conformance to groupthink and the shutting down of speech which 'offends' and 'othering' of people is not something to take lightly.

Not that I'm excusing the far right, they do it too but not so broadly.

The bigger problem I see really is the pointing of fingers at 'the other team' as the fascists, rather than addressing it and working against it wherever it appears.

Everyone has rights or no one has rights.

Fascism isn't the correct word, totalitarianism is a lot more appropriate, in the Arendt sense of the word.

The hallmarks of such totalitarianism is an aggressive internal witch hunt enforcing acceptable thoughts, ideas, behaviors. There is only one correct ideology, and while nobody is quite sure what that is today, the only thing you do know is that you really do not want to be out in the cold, so you better show you are on the right side by gathering a mob of other likewise scared people and lynching someone accused of disloyalty to the cause.

It's important to realize that this isn't some power trip, everyone involved in this sort of dynamic is steeped in profound isolation and terror. They know they may be next.

The dynamics are fairly similar that of religious a cult only at a much larger scale.

You can flip the "being offended" coin around and see its individuals with no resilience. Dissent makes them uncomfortable, so they form self-affirming groups and fight the others.

This whole situation also makes sense, people dont "learn" resilience when they live a easy life, and life in the western world has been very easy and comfortable for the last 20-30 years.

Although I agree that the radical left is probably on a par with radical right in their "if your're not with us, you're against us" attitude and deafness to any criticism, the correct work here is not fascism, even though some of these attitudes were common to fascists.

The conservatives just recently fired a teacher in Mississippi because he read a funny book with the word 'butt' in it.

Republicans have already passed laws in several states that ban the teaching of material that could make people feel uncomfortable (e.g. that slavery was a thing).

And for an example of groupthink, look no further than Qanon to really see some textbook behavior.

Ultra-progressives are bad for this, but the ones doing the most and have the most power to do the most are regular conservatives.

The desire to control other people is not fascist vs communist, left vs right, but authoritarian vs libertarian.

See the Political Compass [0] for a way better explanation than I have.

There are authoritarians on both left and right. Shutting down speech is authoritarian, so there are people doing it for both progressive and nationalist reasons.

[0] https://www.politicalcompass.org/

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