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ahmeneeroe-v2yesterday at 6:21 PM4 repliesview on HN

de Gaulle would be considered insanely far right today. Many aspects of Bush (assuming GW here) would be considered not in line with America's far-right today.

Assume good intent. It helps you see the actually interesting point being made.


Replies

rkomornyesterday at 6:27 PM

They wrote "Bush was right wing" (unless it was edited), so what's your point in saying "Many aspects of Bush (assuming GW here) would be considered not in line with America's far-right today." ?

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southerntofuyesterday at 7:03 PM

> de Gaulle would be considered insanely far right today

As much as it pains me to say this, because i myself consider de Gaulle to be a fascist in many regards, that's far from a majority opinion (disclaimer: i'm an anarchist).

I think de Gaulle was a classic right-wing authoritarian ruler. He had to take some social measures (which some may view as left-wing) because the workers at the end of WWII were very organized and had dozens of thousands of rifles, so such was the price of social peace.

He was right-wing because he was rather conservative, for private property/entrepreneurship and strongly anti-communist. Still, he had strong national planning for the economy, much State support for private industry (Elf, Areva, etc) and strong policing on the streets (see also, Service d'Action Civique for de Gaulle's fascist militias with long ties with historical nazism and secret services).

That being said, de Gaulle to my knowledge was not really known for racist fear-mongering or hate speech. The genocides he took part in (eg. against Algerian people) were very quiet and the official story line was that there was no story. That's in comparison with far-right people who already at the time, and still today, build an image of the ENEMY towards whom all hate and violence is necessary. See also Umberto Eco's Ur-fascism for characteristics of fascist regimes.

In that sense, and it really pains me to write this, but de Gaulle was much less far-right than today's Parti Socialiste, pretending to be left wing despite ruling with right-wing anti-social measures and inciting hatred towards french muslims and binationals.

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throwaway132448yesterday at 6:27 PM

Bad assumptions are just another form of stupidity.

lm28469yesterday at 9:03 PM

No one can assume good intent with such question, at best it's bait.

But then again people on this very forum will argue Sanders is a literal communist so we circle back to the sub 70iq problem