In short: sometimes things aren't falling apart.
For a few decades we enjoyed one of the great periods of peace and prosperity. That was surely doomed to end eventually, but I wish it could last a while longer.
Former colonies threw off their colonial yokes. Most of the "developing world" developed. Marginalized groups gained new civil rights. China and India rose to become great powers even as their former colonial masters, though declining, still enjoyed peace and prosperity.
Recognizing that there is still a lot of injustice and inequality in the world doesn't require denying all the progress that has been made.
> Former colonies threw off their colonial yokes.
While I don’t disagree that decolonization was progress, it ironically came at the cost of the peace that had been imposed on the colonies by their former colonial masters. Many of the world’s most conflict-stricken areas today are ex-colonies still in the process of stabilization.
The dirty secret of peace is that it is often imposed by a dominant power. Pax Romana, Pax Britannica, Pax Americana. These were peaceful times because of intense power asymmetry.
If it’s literally in the name it’s not a secret. Competition for monopolies on violence are bloody. When we can sidestep that contest, we get a lasting peace.
What is this "peace" you speak of? I think you want to take a closer look at the oppression that was endemic to colonization and occupation of foreign lands. One of the worse examples is Belgium's colonization of the Congo:
https://www.nationalgeographic.org/thisday/feb5/belgian-king...
If an African laborer didn't produce rubber (for example), it was common to chop off a hand (his own or a family member's) to encourage him to work harder.
Congo may be on the worse end of the spectrum of colonization, but it is hardly a singular example.
And recognizing that we've made process shouldn't make us believe that we've done enough. Recognize what we've (or they've) achieved, be proud about it but never loose focus on making "it" even better.
(I'm just adding to your comment, not disagreeing)
Hard times make strong men
Strong men make good times
Good times make weak men
And weak men make hard times.
Also the political perspective, what the left would characterise as good times the right would probably characterise as bad, and visa versa. At that point its no longer strong and weak men, but men of one camp and men of another.
It's pretty much the definition of fascism - a delusional paternalistic idiot infecting everyone around him with his own neuroses and narcissism, in the name of "patriotism" and "respect."
Strength is the ability to apply force, it's the quality of solidity, the potential for resistance, etc.
E.G: it takes strength to not act on fear and hate. Gandhi is considered a man of great strength.
The terms fascist and nazi seem to have lost all meaning nowadays…at least to the far left.
Fascism is a collectivist authoritarian system with regulated commerce rather than direct state control, often co-occurring with systemic racism.
The reason people don’t want to be honest about the definition is that it’s the platform of modern Democrats, who are gaslighting by calling everyone else a “fascist”:
Democrats are collectivist authoritarian.
Democrats are pushing for regulated commerce.
Democrats are rebuilding systemic racism, from rationing healthcare [2] and government aid [1] based on race to attempting to repeal civil rights laws in WA [4] and CA [3].
Democrats took to the street in acts of arson, violence, and murder to terrorize the public ahead of an election — the modern Brownshirts. [5]
Democrats are fascist.
Sources:
https://nypost.com/2021/06/15/farmers-upset-with-bidens-amer...
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/01/race-based...
https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_16,_Repeal_Pr...
https://ballotpedia.org/Washington_Initiative_1000,_Affirmat...
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/everybody-down-wha...
I'm italian, my grandfather was drafted in the balilla first at 14 and the fascist army later. And his stories of the time were all about the violence, the machismo, the open contempt for the gay, the jewish, any other minorities. That's fascism, no matter if it doesn't match your clinical idea of what fascism should or shouldn't be.
And yes, they were as silly and ridiculous as the tiki torches guys or the Jan 6 coup guys. Until they were fully in power. Then everybody stopped laughing, or wondering if they were really dangerous or not.
And to be quite honest with you, worry not - I think we'll find very, very soon how close those are compared to US democrats to actual fascists(tm).
Your link for this sweeping generalization is a single shooting in seattle months before the election of someone not old enough to vote.
That's the clearest definition of fascism I've ever heard. Where's it from?
If you read about fascism, their proponents viewed it as “Marxism 2.0” — where they could leverage the socialist ideas of collectivist authoritarianism without the problems encountered by the original Marxist revolutionaries with total state control of commerce.
A unified populace where “everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State.”
Mussolini himself said "Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power".
This makes for poor debates, where there is little nuance, fuzzy scales and hardly meaningful communication.
> "Strong men" make fascism, not good times.
They’re not even referring to any person or distinct group of people. The statement is so overly broad that it could cover BILLIONS of people.
You’re making a mockery of the atrocities committed by actual nazis and fascists. You know what those guys did right?
You would never tell an Auschwitz survivor:
“yeah, the strong males are just like the nazis!”
Imagine how fucked up that would feel from their side.
No idea how fucked up my gramps were, but by their direct account, yes that "strong males" attitude we're talking about was quite a fascist trait.
Wtf does “strong man” even mean? Is every blue collar worker, athlete, law enforcement, first responder, military personnel…etc a fascist to you?
Why not go a step further and just say all men are fascist? Are all the food eaters fascist too? I mean all the fascist ate food after all!
It's well documented by historians.
TheOtherHobbes is using the term correctly.
To the naysayers: I recommend you travel and visit museums.
That doesn't make water bad.
I wish for people to be strong, just like I wish them good health, because it's a quality that makes for a happier life.
If one has the strength of character not to be pressured to do bad things, you get less fascists, not more.
Original comment says:
> "Strong men" make fascism, not good times.
You’ve brainwashed yourself if you believe “Strong man” = Fascist.
You can see in modern Russia what decades of strongman rule, first in the USSR and then under Putin, looks like: Idiot conscripts hyped up on moronic propaganda getting blasted by an actual military fielded by a so-called "decadent" Western nation, with their ships being sunk by land-based weapons (and if you don't get why that's pathetic, you're not worth talking to) and their economy being destroyed by those "decadent" nations deciding to not buy from them anymore.
Strongmen create good times? Briefly, maybe, but get out before the piper demands to be paid, if anyone will have you.
I take it as hard times make it clear what’s important and inspire people to work towards that.
In good times people forget.
Take note of your own phrasing: it automatically excludes him from that group.
Search for this saying on twitter, for example. It's been co-opted as fascist propaganda.
Some real life examples I've pointed too are the ghurkas in WW2 or Russian hackers.
The "Defining a generation" section is fairly short and describes the theory, and the "Timing of generations and turnings" section maps the theory onto the past ~500 years.
(Edit: got the indentation wrong, I thought the comment I was replying to was on the quote, not the "it's BS" reply. I don't think this is BS, at least not completely.)
But let's move on: what do you mean with "strong men"?
If you mean some sociopath/callous/ruthless emperor or dictator capable of starting massive wars - it hardly constitute creating good times.
If you mean men that are successful in current society... then very very few billionaires came from a childhood of hardship and poverty.
If you mean men that are capable of taking good decisions while facing difficulties and the stakes are high... then you are describing good education and good mental health, which are does in now way comes from "hard times".
All modern pedagogy and psychology sciences indicate that hardships create a lot of broken people and a few hardened narcissists.
If you mean that affluent and decadent societies become self absorbed and weaken as a whole - then I would tend to agree... but the term "strong men" would be profoundly misleading.
Really depends on who you ask in the field of psychology. There have been several perspectives contrary to what suggest (e.g., humanistic psychology, positive psychology, post traumatic growth, etc) and I don’t agree that “all modern pedagogy and psychology sciences” suggests that hardships yield nothing but broken people and narcissists.
However, I generally agree with the idea that sayings like “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” are a bit silly (they ignore the fact that what doesn’t kill you can severely weaken you for life).
I just don’t think it’s particularly helpful to take things to the other extreme either.
We don't need strong men during good times and we don't need weak men during bad times.
Although now we are in neither a good nor bad time. What kind of men do we need?
You mean Ukraine? I would hardly say that the current situation threatens the post-ww2 peace. Compare now to ww2 and the differences are huge. ww2 claimed vastly more lives, in addition to Stalin and Hitler.
When Rome fell apart -> nothing much happened.
When Bizzantium fell -> nothing much happened.
When Nazi Germany fell -> millions of ppl died.
When Earth stops sustaining human life in quite a few areas -> billions of ppl will die.
Previously we had no big impact on Earth, now we do.