Why does nazism still have followers after its defeat ?

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Thanks for the anecdotal evidence. Natually, communism is a far more complex idea than Nazism, which refers to a particular group. However, do you think it would have gone as well if she said she was a supporter of Stalinism?

Ah, yes, a conspiracy. I would expect nothing less from you. You might be surprised to learn that an "obvious paid agent" is an oxymoron. The idea is these agents are not known.

I would expect nothing less from you.

And I would expect you to be defending Commies. I guess my professor at Yale (a former CIA officer) who described Karl Marx as an "obvious paid agent" (handler Tory MP David Urquhart!) was abusing the language.

Thanks.

From a more general perspective, I believe that extremist ideologies thrive because they offer simple "solutions" to problems that are in reality much more complex.

Let's face it. If your life sucks, then it is probably because:

- The real estate market did A
- You didn't do B
- The company 3 blocks down the road did C
- The oil price did D
- An earthquake did E
- They called from school and told you that your kid got an F
- The stock market did G
- You were born with H
- A local warlord 3,147 miles away did I
- You *did* do J
- The summer weather did K
- A train going from Iowa to Nebraska did L
- A celebrity on Twitter did M
- You got sick with N
- The power company did O
- You really have to P
- Someone anonymous did Q
- Your boss did R
- A ship sailing through the Suez Canal did S
- You got in a fight with a guy called Mr. T
- s**t happened to U
- Your computer did V
- The government deficit did W

This is of course hard to grasp, so it is much more psychologically manageable to assume the following:
- Everything bad that is happening to you is because of evil group of enemies who exist solely to destroy your dreams and make your life a living hell (yes, you in particular) doing X. Luckily, a strong leader emerges and promises Y:

"In order to ensure our security and continuing stability, the Republic will be reorganized into Z, for a safe and secure society, which I assure you will last for ten thousand years."

Z it is, then.

Where is my defense of communism?

So, you had a top-notch education too.

I'm not sure. A stronger reaction would have been likely but probably still nowhere near as much as a self declared fascist would receive. I imagine there would still be a patrician smile and a wink from the more modern and fashionable leftist formations as there is to anyone of the "old left".

So, you had a top-notch education too.

They tried, but you know the saying: You can lead a Whore to Culture, but you can't make her Think

Stalinism? Are you serious? Even the Russians are beginning to distance themselves from Stalin. Given the rise of Neo-NAZIs, especially in Europe, it seems the right likes to give a wink or two as well.

Anecdotal again, but George Galloway comes to mind. While not exactly a "Stalinist", he's fairly hard left. He openly mourns the loss of the Soviet Union as few others ever would, particularly after the world learned the true deprivation endured by its citizens. He's a left wing fossil, in the nicest possible sense. You might argue that he has been shunned, as he was banished from the Labour Party, but he still has a fairly substantial media presence and was a regular on the msm until recently. His far right equivalents on the other hand - anyone insane enough to openly mourn the loss of Nazi Germany or another fascist state - could never have had a career such as George enjoyed. They are currently being banished from youtube, twitter, payment processors etc. George is under little pressure on that front and is involved in quite a few fundraising activities.

Thank you for the clarification that should have been obvious.

You are joking right? China's communist government has rounded up Uighur Muslims to be placed in Concentration Camps and are sterilizing Uighur women as we speak. If you guys don't believe that to be genocide then I guess it's useless for me to try and convince you of what the facts are.

Just because Nazis and Confederates were defeated on the battlefield does not mean that the reasons why they turned to their beliefs have been undone. Any defeated country or group can make excuses and what-ifs for how they could have won.

The Germans' Dolchstoßlegende arose to explain how their OBVIOUSLY superior nation could have POSSIBLY been defeated. The victors are painted as dishonorable and the defeated are victims of treachery at home. German nationalists blamed their defeat in WWI on supposed Jewish sabotage of the German war effort and the reluctance of German socialists and communists to support a pointless nationalist war. The German Revolution and Spartacist uprising added more fuel to nationalist propaganda.
Nationalism was much more quashed in Germany after WWII because the Axis's defeat was more brutal and crushing than in WWI. Germany was also rightfully shamed to hell and back by the allies for their atrocities and endured decades of division and occupation. Nationalist Germans nowadays have to speak in more hushed whispers and direct their open racism at non-whites while still despising Slavs, Celts, and "Mediterraneans". 'White identitarianism' is the new sanitized label because they know that white-on-white racism is less marketable than in 1933.

The South did not endure the same multinational occupation and humiliation that Germany did. Northern whites also quickly tired of occupying the south and wanted reconciliation. The South explained away their defeat by painting the Northern generals as butchers who relied on looting and swarm tactics. They romanticize the antebellum years--like so many other defeated nations. (cf: France after 1871). The liberated black American became a walking reminder of defeat and subjugation, so de facto and de jure racism have survived and thrived. It's 150 years later and they still have not learned and resent any implication that they haven't.

Nationalism is more shunned, even despite decades of Cold War propaganda, because nationalism explicitly calls for discrimination and genocide. Nominally capitalist and nominally communist nations are both capable of those things, but few capitalists or communists would defend genocide or discrimination. Most socialists do not hold up Mao, Stalin, or Guevara as paragons of their ideology for the same reasons most capitalists do not do so for Putin, Pinochet, Manuel Cabrera, or Suharto. I imagine you, like most capitalists, would say that capitalist regimes' genocides were carried out despite capitalist ideology--not because of it. I would say the same of regimes that call themselves socialist that commit genocide. Nationalist regimes, on the other hand, carry out genocide because of their ideology--not despite it.
We grew up in capitalist countries, and our understanding of history was molded by capitalist governments. This results in far more attention being drawn to communist atrocities than to capitalist atrocities. Nominal capitalists and communists can rationalize atrocities of any kind in defense of their ideology or national security.

I should have remembered to include that myself about Castro. I found it very offensive that Liberals on the internet who pretend to care about gay rights were praising Castro.

I'm somehow reminded of that scene from Family Guy where the Grim Reaper went on a date with an annoying hippy girl who says "You know? Animals are like people, except they don't have war." he responds with "What are you talking about? Animals fight each other all the time!" and she says "Not with guns or bombs."

If I were to rescript that scene on the subject of communism vs fascism it might go something like like this:

Annoying Hippy Girl: "You know? Communism is like Fascism, only they don't have genocide."

Grim Reaper: "What do you mean? What about the Uighur Muslims who are being persecuted by China or the gay men who were locked up in concentration camps in Cuba?"

Annoying Hippy Girl: "Yeah but at least they're not doing it with gas chambers."

Read up on the “Cultural Revolution,” and the “Great Leap Forward” of the Chinese.

Read up on the famines in the 1920s and 1930s caused by farm collectivization in the Soviet Union.

I already read a little about the forced starvation of the the Ukrainians under Joseph Stalin's reign which is indeed another really horrible example of genocide under Communist rule.