The National Party

mikethecop

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122144659#Comment_122144659

https://www.irishtimes.com/crime-law/2023/01/23/significant-increase-in-assaults-last-year-as-levels-of-violence-surge-in-south-dublin/

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-41318566.html

https://www.thejournal.ie/garda-annual-report-2022-assaults-6211175-Oct2023/

no ,

no it isnt ,

its a general rise in violence . lgbt and immigrants aren't a special protected or "prescribed species . theres the down side of inclusivity for ya

concerned_tenant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122144664#Comment_122144664

You'll need to provide a citation for the "fact" that National Party polling has "gained support" in this country.

If it's a "fact", you should be able to supply that polling data.

Or is it a case, as I described before, that this is a phantom threat that doesn't exist in the real world outside social media echo-chambers.

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122144590#Comment_122144590

Here's a direct assault on a woman by someone proudly proclaiming to be far right

https://www.irishtimes.com/politics/2024/05/15/green-party-councillor-attacked-while-hanging-posters-in-dublin/

Can't wait for Pepper's video on this.

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122144085#Comment_122144085

This is absolute nonsense. There is no expiry date on fascism. They are fascists.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122144657#Comment_122144657

The number of votes he got is of absolutely no relevance as to whether he is a fascist or not. It's his views and utterances and actions.

If he got 5000 votes would you be willing to admit he was a fascist? It's a nonsensical claim on your part that electoral failure makes a fascist not a fascist somehow.

concerned_tenant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122145100#Comment_122145100

That's not what the user claimed.

Of course extremes along the political axis engage in acts of senseless violence. Of that there is no doubt. But the user made a specific claim about the murder of immigrants and transgender people by members of the National Party.

There is no evidence to substantiate that baseless claim.

Nor is there evidence to sustain that claim that support for the National Party is rising. I asked for evidence for that, and evidence there came none.

Whilst I'm all for condemning the National Party and even ridiculing it, it doesn't mean that baseless claims can be made at the same time.

downthemiddle

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122145227#Comment_122145227

For someone who claims to condemn and ridicule the National Party you are spending a lot of time defending them.
You have defined fascism within narrow, time bound ,parameters to support your argument.
It’s all rather strange.

concerned_tenant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122145374#Comment_122145374

I'm not "defending" the National Party.

I made a very elementary point — namely, that the threat from the National Party is being deliberately exaggerated.

This exaggeration is often made through false, misleading, or embellished statements:

• We were told that members of the National Party are engaging in the murder of immigrants and transgender people.
• We were told that support for the National Party has risen.

I merely requested evidence that support these claims because unless we want to believe anything anyone says without evidence, then we need to see the evidence. If you want to believe the above two statements without a shred of evidence, that is your right. I'm going to wait until the evidence actually surfaces before believing those claims.

And to request evidence for a claim isn't to defend the target of the claim. That is fallacious reasoning.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122144085#Comment_122144085

Fascism existed long before and long after the time frame you mention.

What you have here is a list of characteristics of a specific fascist regime - the Nazi regime in Germany - rather than the broader characteristics of fascism.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122144638#Comment_122144638

He killed Hitler to be fair. Also, his dog, if accouts are accurate.

This is one of the arguments against the death penalty: if Hitler is responsible for deaths he ordered even if he didn't carry out the actual killing himself, so is every judge who ever handed down a death-sentence.

concerned_tenant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122145554#Comment_122145554

As is often the case, I think George Orwell had it right when it comes to the post-war use of the term "fascism" (and other political language):

Many political words are similarly abused. The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies ‘something not desirable’. The words democracy, socialism, freedom, patriotic, realistic, justice, have each of them several different meanings which cannot be reconciled with one another. In the case of a word like democracy, not only is there no agreed definition, but the attempt to make one is resisted from all sides. It is almost universally felt that when we call a country democratic we are praising it: consequently the defenders of every kind of régime claim that it is a democracy, and fear that they might have to stop using that word if it were tied down to any one meaning. Words of this kind are often used in a consciously dishonest way. That is, the person who uses them has his own private definition, but allows his hearer to think he means something quite different. Statements like Marshal Pétain was a true patriot, The Soviet press is the freest in the world, The Catholic Church is opposed to persecution, are almost always made with intent to deceive. Other words used in variable meanings, in most cases more or less dishonestly, are: class, totalitarian, science, progressive, reactionary, bourgeois, equality.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122145591#Comment_122145591

This is just opnion though - and to a certain extent, I agree with him - but none of it is relvelant to the defintion of the word "fascism". He's just commenting on the useage of it.

FWIW - I think the NP stops short of fascism for now - but I'd well believe them to be capable of it if they ever got into power. Thankfully, it's not something we're ever likely to find out.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122145645#Comment_122145645

The mental contortions not to admit that Fascism is an active force in the world today. I would argue that Trump has set out an agenda for American Fascism in his declarations regarding another term in office. This is what the Republican party has been steering towards right back to Bush Senior and his penchant for associating with fascistic groups who he willingly allowed to campaign for him (until they were found out). They cloth themselves in the cross but scratch the surface and they are white supremacists with an authoritarian theocratic agenda. The worst thing is that they are financing right wing groups across the world and even here in Ireland.

Fascism is an ever present threat to democracy and life.

eightieschewbaccy

It's a bit weird when the thread is getting to a point of being picky about neo Nazi versus Nazi etc. Regardless, they represent a worship of fascistic and Nazi ideals.

ancapailldorcha

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122145736#Comment_122145736

It's the usual strategy. Defend fascism without admitting to defending fascism. I've seen various attempts at this and they're all laughably pathetic.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122145736#Comment_122145736

I just like to the terms right :) -just because someone isn't a nazi or a neo-nazi doesn't mean they're therefore NOT a fascist. Very important disctinction that needed to be made.

Someone mentioend Trump and the rhetoric he's coming out with a the moment is certainly heading that way.

concerned_tenant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122145645#Comment_122145645

FWIW - I think the NP stops short of fascism for now - but I'd well believe them to be capable of it if they ever got into power. Thankfully, it's not something we're ever likely to find out.

That's all I am arguing.

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122146083#Comment_122146083

So , do we wait for them to become full blown Nazis before getting concerned or do we seek to ensure that never happens now by not allowing them to pretend to be something different to garner electoral support??

Given the recent immigration protests etc. there is a cohort of people that may not be Nazis but are open to the idea of a strong anti-immigrant viewpoint so if we allow the National Party to claim that ground we are giving them the chance at an electoral foothold.

That needs to be prevented , simple as that.

There are many ways to do a better job with Immigration that don't involve giving xenophobic proto-Nazis a chance at getting elected.

francois

This makes me laugh, what a pathetic man

concerned_tenant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122146149#Comment_122146149

The only way to stop the National Party claiming the immigration problem is by addressing the immigration problem itself.

In the UK, the BNP were the original receptacle for voters concerned with immigration. When a more moderate party came along, in the form of UKIP — without the extremist, racial dimension — it bled the BNP of their voter base and they went into decline. The BNP, through exposure on Question Time, further discredited the party as they were exposed for what they are and voters reacted accordingly.

I suggest we react in the same way with the National Party i.e. reclaim the migration issue by actually reacting to voter concerns and second to that, to allow the National Party to discredit themselves in the same way the BNP managed to do.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122146161#Comment_122146161

The BNP effectively ceased to exist back in the 1990s, it had nothing to do with UKIP.

concerned_tenant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122146278#Comment_122146278

You're wrong.

The BNP were wiped out in the 2014 European Elections, securing only 1% of the vote — down from 6% in 2009. UKIP destroyed the BNP and discredited it. When a reasonable party exists to address voter concerns, those voters stop opting for the most extreme parties.

If the same mistake is made in this country, it will inevitably lead to an increase in the vote for the National Party.

I certainly do not want that outcome, hence my argument that migration as an issue must be handled now — not later, when the NP vote rises.

Annasopra

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122144085#Comment_122144085

Yes. The National Party does have all of these features.

a dictatorial leader / centralized autocracy (Barrett/Reynolds making diktats)

forcible suppression of all political opposition parties (Barretts violent past from Youth Defence, Michael Quinn assault on Izzy Kamikaze, John Tate involvement in Dublin Riots)

militarism / positive view of violence in political pursuits / expansion of the nation into empire (Amassing Gold)

belief in a master race / racial superiority (Racist abuse of Hazel Chu)

economic self-sufficiency / autarky (Amassing Gold)

concerned_tenant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122146515#Comment_122146515

It absolutely does not.

That's not even stretching definitions; it's flat out ridiculous.

Annasopra

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122146520#Comment_122146520

It does.

Here's one or two examples. I can easily find more.

a dictatorial leader / centralized autocracy (Barrett/Reynolds making centralised diktats)

forcible suppression of all political opposition parties (Barretts violent past from Youth Defence, Michael Quinn assault on Izzy Kamikaze, John Tate involvement in Dublin Riots)

militarism / positive view of violence in political pursuits / expansion of the nation into empire (Amassing Gold)

belief in a master race / racial superiority (Racist abuse of Hazel Chu)

economic self-sufficiency / autarky (Amassing Gold)

Their Party Vision fits into these features too

An Páirtí Náisiúnta is an Irish nationalist party dedicated to the fulfilment of the Irish national idea. We believe in the Irish people, our right to exist as a nation and our right to defend and lay claim to our homeland. We seek an Ireland united, Irish and free.

We stand against the criminal financial institutions which have enslaved future generations of Irish men and women to debt without end. We stand against the corrupt and amoral establishment who push replacement level immigration which will in time completely destroy Irish nationality. We stand against the project of a federated European Superstate which is explicitly anti-national and therefore anti-Irish. And most of all we stand against the decay of national spirit at the heart of our society.

The men and women who died for Ireland fought always against that most insidious of enemies, the enemy within; the corruption of the national spirit by foreign ideas, interests and outlooks, all of which are in evidence today in that assembly of traitors called Dáil Éireann. What the men of 1916 saw as the coarse grubby materialism of the British Empire is at large in our own time in the form of international liberalism which infects the whole western world.

Each nation must choose for themselves whether they will stand against the tide of national dissolution, which sweeps away peoples, homelands and traditions. Will Ireland live or die, endure or vanish? That question will be answered in this generation. As long as there is an Ireland to defend and love and unite, the fight must go on.

concerned_tenant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122146541#Comment_122146541

I could list more, but these two are the absolute worst:

militarism / positive view of violence in political pursuits / expansion of the nation into empire (Amassing Gold)

economic self-sufficiency / autarky (Amassing Gold)

Comparing militarism and expansion of nation into empire and national economic autarky with the National Party's weird accrual of gold suggests to me that this is a desperate attempt to squeeze the National Party into the definition of fascism no matter how absurd the comparison.

ancapailldorcha

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122146278#Comment_122146278

It acted as a deflection for UKIP. Any time they'd be accused of racism, which was often and with very good reason, they'd argue that they weren't as bad as the BNP. UKIP ended up becoming the new BNP.

mayordenis

This is a really boring circular argument, the definition of fascism is multi-faceted and a sort of continuum. Are you really honestly arguing that the National Party do not at least aspire to be a fascist party? Down to their iconography they are so very clearly courting a likeness with the nazi party. Whatever else about trying to semantics-around a technical definition of fascism that can sort of be defended, it takes the complete denial of the evidence in front of you to argue they are not fascist.

Annasopra

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122146557#Comment_122146557

There's no desperate attempt at anything. The National Party fit into your defined features of fascism.

AndrewJRenko

Are you still convinced about Pepper's videos @Beechwoodspark ?

https://twitter.com/trickstersworld/status/1790989082278949294?s=46&t=3l1OhjvjsuAh4w9RMjlH8g

downthemiddle

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122145539#Comment_122145539

This is a completely disingenuous post. The language you are attributing to others are your words. There is nothing elementary about your narrow definition of fascism and your attempts to deflect from the fascist tendencies of the National Party. You claim not to be defending them yet use language such as "exaggeration", "false", "misleading" and "embellished" to describe people criticising them.

Like you they have strong anti immigrant beliefs. They are your fellow bedfellows. Own it.