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Elizabeth Sandifer

Elizabeth Sandifer created Eruditorum Press. She’s not really sure why she did that, and she apologizes for the inconvenience. She currently writes Last War in Albion, a history of the magical war between Alan Moore and Grant Morrison. She used to write TARDIS Eruditorum, a history of Britain told through the lens of a ropey sci-fi series. She also wrote Neoreaction a Basilisk, writes comics these days, and has ADHD so will probably just randomly write some other shit sooner or later. Support Elizabeth on Patreon.

14 Comments

  1. Dadalama
    February 20, 2016 @ 1:46 pm

    I think Umberto Ecco’s definition of fascism is the only modern one that makes sense.

    Reply

  2. Tom
    February 20, 2016 @ 1:47 pm

    Mightn’t it be easier to call it the political instrumentalisation of sexual repression? That pretty much covers everyone from Mary Whitehouse to the Japanese Red Army. Eco’s definition doesn’t allow a way to address the problem of moderate fascism (since all these individual points may be harmless – not radically harmful at least – or politically universal “in moderation” (socialist Yugoslavia, say) whereas (as I seem to recall) Marcuse’s theories of sexual radicalism make for a broader picture of the necessary persistence of repression and the problem of excess repression.

    Reply

  3. Max Curtis
    February 20, 2016 @ 2:51 pm

    Loved this section of the book, and using Eco’s definition is a savvy choice. My only issue is you talk about “staring down a thirty-item bulleted list” and then a few paragraphs later include a fourteen-item bulleted list.

    Reply

    • Dadalama
      February 20, 2016 @ 3:00 pm

      still not as bad as two chapter fives!

      Reply

    • Jarl
      February 20, 2016 @ 3:09 pm

      I’ve checked his math, Phil, he’s right. This book is a halfway measure! We’re gonna need at least 16 more bullet points if we’re gonna fight fascism.

      Reply

    • Elizabeth Sandifer
      February 21, 2016 @ 4:53 am

      Ha. Yes, I suppose I should have numbered it.

      Reply

      • Jeff Heikkinen
        February 21, 2016 @ 10:55 pm

        It would have made the subsequent discussion a bit easier to follow. That seems like a much better reason than the arguable appearance of hypocrisy, which is more of a mildly amusing side note than a serious criticism.

        Reply

  4. Ozyman.Jones
    February 22, 2016 @ 5:00 am

    Sure… but that definition would include a lot of other ideologies considered outside Fascism… 3rd Wave Feminism would tick ten or eleven of these, depending on how you define the terms.

    Reply

  5. Shannon
    February 22, 2016 @ 5:31 pm

    It’s really disturbing how many of these the Trump Campaign ticks – I counted at least 11 of 14.

    Reply

  6. Zammo
    February 23, 2016 @ 7:17 am

    Any political movement that was backward-looking enough to genuinely reject modern culture would be necessarily a bit harmless- it’d look like the Amish. In Jeffrey Herf’s book “Reactionary Modernism”, he writes well about the problem with Nazi Germany- a culture with a reactionary ideology but using the very latest gadgets, weapons, media, bombs etc.

    Reply

  7. John
    December 23, 2023 @ 12:03 pm

    This is probably the dumbest thing I have ever had the misfortune to read. I assumed it was a parody, and some joke would greet me towards the end, but alas. I only came across this because I was looking for academic literature on the fascist psychology of the dog (the oft-repeated cold take that dogs are a fascist animal vs. cats). I’m not even going to make fun of you for using Eco, however I must include that his writing is pointless and reductive (the “14 bullet points” describe every state since 10000 BC) and you really should be using actual scholars of fascism like Adorno, Marcuse, and Evola.

    I am going to make fun of you for trying to claim that some book boycott awards show thing is fascism, and that the Hugo awards are “real democracy”??? Holy shit, is this what decades of pop culture “fascism” “research” have resulted in? No wonder morons think Trump (a centrist bonapartist) is a fascist. I suppose when they tell you that invading Iraq is in service of democracy it strips the word of all meaning. I look forward to the article declaring the Oscars to be the true democratic movement citing Seiyes while the TomatoMeter obviously constitutes a thermidorian reaction. (In case it wasn’t clear, I am saying it is inherently ridiculous to ascribe any such designation to these irrelevant things, I am not actually saying that rotten tomatoes is “democratic”). This feels like it was written by a second grader trying to justify why his opponent in the line-leader competition is actually Hitler and hates recess and why you should definitely pick me, Ms. Fairfax.

    Oh, just saw that this is Elizabeth Sandifer. That’s why the writing is so juvenile. I rest my case.

    Reply

    • John
      December 23, 2023 @ 12:06 pm

      Would that you had written this about actual dogs! Even that topic is somewhat tongue-in-cheek and would not deserve this histrionic diatribe.

      Reply

    • Elizabeth Sandifer
      December 23, 2023 @ 12:10 pm

      Genuinely delighted that this seven year old article can piss you off this much.

      Reply

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