Not Without Consequences
By Steven J. Grisafi, PhD.
“The audible chants in the video footage included “Nazis out,” apparently an allusion to Russia repeatedly labeling Ukrainian authorities as fascist, and words to the effect of “get lost, you’re living at our expense.” This quote is from “Leipzig: Outrage over verbal attacks on Ukrainian refugees” published October 11, 2022 on the Deutsche Welle website.
Despite the fact that King Vittorio Emmanuel III had the authority to remove Premier Benito Mussolini from office, and did so, the word “fascist” has come into use within the English language as being indicative of an authoritarian dictatorship. Why is that? One cannot call someone a dictator if that person remains under the authority of another who can remove that person from office. I can understand this usage by the Germans of the DW website, partly because English is not their primary language, and partly because they want to diminish the memory and use of the word “nazi.” But the Germans are not responsible for this adaptation of the word “fascist” to imply an authoritarian dictatorship. That responsibility falls almost entirely upon the British and the Americans of Anglo-Saxon ancestry.
I have no doubt that those two demographic groups promulgated this distinction through their contempt for both Italians and Catholicism, which they equate within their own minds. They choose to ridicule Catholicism with their parody of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster through association of the primary consumption staple of the Italian people, spaghetti. The word “fascist” has become a slur word similar to the uses of the words racist and nigger. When one considers the origin of the word fascist, as it lay within the history of Ancient Rome, one can understand that the contempt the use of this word conveys springs forth from an envy the user of the word has of those ancient times. This is abundantly clear to anyone with a knowledge of history. When one recognizes that those same Anglo-Saxon Americans who promulgate the false meaning of this word decorated the walls of their Capitol building with images of the fascisti, the bundle of rods indicating the authority of Ancient Rome.