Mussolini started out his political career as a socialist, but he never fit it well, and soon changed his tune. Claiming that he was really a form of socialist is like today's Republicans claiming that they're really the pro-black party because their distant ancestors freed the slaves in the 1860s. Yes they did, but things have changed a bit since then, in case one hadn't noticed.
"Nazi" is actually short for "National Socialist", and, in one of his rare interviews, Hitler was asked, why "Socialist", since he was so totally opposed to Socialists tout court? His rambling answer was that "Socialists" weren't real socialists. So Nazis, or for that matter other fascists, are only socialists by Nazi redefinition of the word to mean something other than what everybody else uses it to mean.
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Date: 2017-01-31 04:56 pm (UTC)Mussolini started out his political career as a socialist, but he never fit it well, and soon changed his tune. Claiming that he was really a form of socialist is like today's Republicans claiming that they're really the pro-black party because their distant ancestors freed the slaves in the 1860s. Yes they did, but things have changed a bit since then, in case one hadn't noticed.
"Nazi" is actually short for "National Socialist", and, in one of his rare interviews, Hitler was asked, why "Socialist", since he was so totally opposed to Socialists tout court? His rambling answer was that "Socialists" weren't real socialists. So Nazis, or for that matter other fascists, are only socialists by Nazi redefinition of the word to mean something other than what everybody else uses it to mean.