You Might Be A Fascist If....

(The women and children in the photo are the real victims of real Nazis.)

Has anyone else noticed how so many people now toss off the N-word at the drop of a hut? (That’s no misprint. “Hut” is Deutsche for “hat”.)

By N-word, of course, I mean “Nazi.” 

For the past two years, I have saddled up at my desk, galloped into cyberspace, and ridden headlong into left-wing protesters, members of the mainstream media, and even respectable Democrats throwing the tar of Nazism and Fascism at some poor thunderstruck fool who has shown the temerity to cross them, hoping the swastika smear will stick and thereby doom the evildoer, usually a conservative, to ruination or oblivion. Donald Trump and his supporters, lumped together by Hilary Clinton as a “basket of deplorables”; the staff at Breitbart News; social scientists like Charles Murray, Jordan Peterson, and Christina Hoff Sommers; professors who believe students are mature enough to select their own Halloween costumes; gun owners, hunters, and fishermen (fisher people?); Bible-belt Christians; libertarians; folks who favor charter schools; folks who prefer male and female restrooms (Women: have you ever visited a men’s public  restroom? And you want to share one with them?): the left routinely tags these citizens and many other Americans as fascists and Nazis. 

Yet I wonder. If we brought together all these different people, if we sported as many Nazis as some claim are living among us, surely we’d see jack-booted regiments goose-stepping down Constitution Avenue. Gather up all these Sturmtruppen, and that collection of Brownshirts would dwarf the Nuremberg Rally. 

So where are all these Nazis?

In the last few years, maligning opponents with the N-word has become so routine, so mundane an insult, that most of us who follow politics brush past the charges with a yawn. “Look, Lucinda, Senator Pureheart just called General James ‘Bulldog’ Mattis a Nazi. Isn’t Mattis the Marine who said, ‘Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet?’ Who knew he was a Nazi? Hey, you’re making omelets this morning? Could you throw in some ham with that cheese?”

Our plethora of perceived Fascisti raises another question: What in the name of Dachau and Auschwitz are the lefties thinking when they toss off these fascistic labels? Don’t they realize how they demean those who died at the hands of real Nazis? Are they serious or are they just too lazy to come up with a better grade of dirt? Do those student protesters really mean business when they wave their signs accusing some blindsided conservative speaker of being a fascist? Are we really supposed to believe the news commentator who tells us that Donald Trump is the new Adolf Hitler? That Ann Coulter is Eva Braun? What exactly is the leftist definition of Nazism?

There’s the rub. The octopods squirt out their poisonous ink without bothering to define their terms. They just pop out the words Nazi and Fascist without telling us what the words mean, debasing and trivializing in the meantime all those who were executed in Nazi concentration camps or who died battling real fascism.

My own definitions for Nazism and fascism are based on my reading of history and my grasp of reality. Rather than offer some long-winded critique of these political philosophies, I find that my Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary, published in 1975, contains more than adequate definitions. (Let me add that these definitions describe more accurately the mudslingers than those being smeared.)

Webster’s tells us that Nazism is “the body of social and economic doctrines held and put into effect by the National Socialist German Workers party in the Third German Reich including the totalitarian principle of government, state control of all industry, predominance of groups assumed to be racially superior, and supremacy of the fuhrer.” As for a solid definition of fascism, it is “a “political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government, headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition.”
           
These are accurate, classic definitions of Nazism and fascism. My wimpy online dictionary seems more in tune with our present times, offering these definitions of a Nazi: 1) a follower of Adolph Hitler; 2) a racist; and 3) a bossy person. The first definition makes sense: A follower of Adolph Hitler is a Nazi. But the second—“A racist is a Nazi”—is bogus and won’t fly. If you disbelieve me, track down some Black Panthers, call them Nazis, and see how far you get. (I mean how far you get literally, as in running.) As for the third definition—“A bossy person is a Nazi”—you’ve got to be kidding me. If such were the case, then Marine Corps drill instructors, some surgeons I’ve known, and most two year olds would qualify as Nazis.

At any rate, the historic definitions of Nazism and Fascism are clearly now as dead as the Third Reich. Even as dead, perhaps, as free speech on many American campuses. The present–day morons hurling such innuendo neither know nor care what makes up a fascist or a Nazi. They just thrust their hands into the bucketful of mud, throw a fistful of goop at an opponent, and hope the mess sticks.
           
This lack of mutually agreed upon definitions returns us then to the question: What do leftists mean when they start screaming “Nazi?” What are they intending when they pin a Schicklgruber moustache on someone they detest?

After considering the matter, I decided to solve the problem of definition by taking the Jeff Foxworthy approach. Foxworthy is the comedian who became famous for his redneck jokes. He never offers his fans a dictionary definition of a redneck, but instead employs connotation to make his points, defining a redneck by association and implication.  The jokes that made him famous were based on his comedic shtick “You might be a redneck if….” Foxworthy invented a pickup truck load of these suppositions: “You might be a redneck if your blood alcohol content has ever exceeded your IQ;” “You might be a redneck if you think a stock tip is advice on ‘wormin’ your hogs;” “You might be a redneck if a state trooper ever asked if you had an I.D. and you said ‘About what?’”

This, I thought, was a workable approach. By following Jeff Foxworthy’s example, by employing connotation rather than denotation to gain some insight, I might successfully create a composite figure of what a leftist considers a “Nazi” or a “Fascist.” 

So here goes. The list below is composed in no particular order. If you answer yes to 10 of these questions, well, sorry partner, but you are a borderline skinhead. Agree with 20, and to quote the “Soup Nazi” from Seinfeld, “No soup for you!” Anything above 25, and you qualify as a full-fledged, card-carrying, Sieg-Heiling member of the Gestapo.
 
You might be a Nazi if…

1. You supported Republican Ted Cruz or Democrat James Webb for president in the election of 2016.
2. You voted for Donald Trump for president.
3. You are a white male.
4. You are a stay-at-home mom.
5. You support the Constitution of the United States.
6. You own a gun. (Add one point for each additional gun owned.)
7. You are happy the police are patrolling your neighborhood.
8. You are a white female.
9. You support charter schools.
10. You homeschool your children.
11. You drive a gas-powered car.
12. You support Israel.
13. You think Islam condones terror.
14. You are a Christian.
15. You are a Jew.
16. You smoke cigarettes.
17. You eat red meat.
18. You eat meat.
19. You eat at MacDonald’s.
20. You prefer football to soccer.
21. You think the government spends too much money.
22. You think the government wastes too much money.
23. You think “diversity” has to do with stock shares.
24. You say Merry Christmas.
25. You say Happy Easter.
26. You consider XY and XX chromosomes indicators of sex and gender.
27. You think climate change is stepping into an air-conditioned Florida motel room in August.
28. You think Black Lives Matter is an organization trying to reduce the murder rate in the Windy City.
29. You read Chronicles, National Review, or some other conservative magazine.
30.  You regularly visit online sites like Drudge, Breitbart, Townhall, and Maggie’s Farm.
31. You attend church every week.
32.  There’s a Bible on the reading table by your bed.
33. You have more than 2.2 children.
34. You oppose abortion.
35. You believe Barack Obama was an incompetent president.
36. The irony of the words “The Affordable Care Act” leaves you breathless with laughter.
37. You find it astounding that nearly half the people in the country pay no income taxes.
38. You are baffled by such gender neutral pronouns as “ze,” “hir,” and “hirs.”
39. You claim to be reasonably adept at identifying men and women as men and women.
40. You oppose illegal immigration.
41. You find anything exceptional about America. Anything at all.
42. You stand at the ball game, remove your cap, and put your hand over your heart for the National Anthem.
43. You live in North Carolina with its baleful bathroom laws.
44. You live in a Red State.
45. You live anywhere in the South.
46. You are a business owner fed up with government regulations.
47. You are an unemployed factory worker upset about your job being shipped overseas.
48. You rooted for the American military in any war movie ever made.
49. You prefer Budweiser to craft beers.
50. You think craft beers are the brewskis you drink while building the kid’s racecar for the Pinewood Derby.
51.  You have ever told a friend to “man up” or “cowboy up.”
52. You idly wonder aloud why your university doesn’t offer a “men’s studies” major.
53. You are five years old and kiss a girl on the playground. (Your parents are Nazis.)
54. You are five years old. You pretend your right hand is a pistol and say “pow-pow” to a tree. (Your parents are Nazis.)
55. You think “toxic masculinity” has to do with old dudes drinking boilermakers in a Milwaukee bar.
56.  You think “zero tolerance” refers to the stance of the left on views other than its own.
57. You think a “safe space” is the basement during a tornado.
58. You think “trigger warnings” are what you say as you level your Mossberg 12 gauge at the intruder in your home.
59. You consider a “micro-aggression” an attack by chiggers.
60. You write a list like this one.

 
Oh, wait. 60 is such a meh number. Let’s add a few more. Those answering “yes” to the list below need not keep track of your points, as such self-assessment may cause psychological trauma. It’s like those soccer games you played as a kid: there’s no score and everyone receives a trophy.
 
You may be a Nazi if…

1. You scream down speakers on university campuses.
2. You put a ski mask over your face and beat the patoot out of your opponents.
3. You support thugs burning buildings and cars of people you don’t know to protest policies you don’t understand.
4. You are paid by George Soros to do such things.
5. You really believe that “we are the ones we’ve been waiting for.”
6. You buy the argument that all men are implicitly pigs.
7. You want to feminize all men.
8. You believe that white people are privileged, including that guy begging for quarters outside the convenience store.
9. You want white people eradicated.
10. You take to the streets on behalf of minorities while your parents hire Jose and Maria to mow the lawn you could have mown and wash the dishes you could have washed.
11. You consider yourself “pro-choice” but condemn women who choose a baby over an abortion.
12. You have made politics your god.
13. You believe that all those who disagree with you are stupid.
14. You believe that anyone living in a red state is stupid.
15. You believe that a degree from Harvard or Yale confers intelligence.
16. You believe that parents seeking a choice in education are stupid.
17. You believe that the federal government knows more about raising children than parents.
18. You regard American women as oppressed.
19. You want a centralized government (see dictionary denotation above).
20. You want state control of all industry (see above).
21. You want forcible suppression of all opposition (see above).
22. You regard certain groups as racially superior (everyone but white people) and others as racially inferior and “evil” (white people) (see above).
23. You’d like to see the Internet regulated by the government.
24. You unreservedly buy the stories put out through the mainstream media.
25. You are convinced that anyone disputing the data regarding climate change should be declared a criminal.
26. You think supporters of the Second Amendment should be locked up.
27. You think that only police should have guns while at the same time believing that the police are racists with trigger fingers.
28. You think certain people and groups should be denied free speech.
29. You claim the Constitution is a “living” document, when you actually mean it is dead as Dickens' doornail.
30. You advocate women’s rights, but turn a blind eye toward the oppression of Islamic women in the Middle East. Ditto on gay rights.
31. You believe that Evangelical Christians wish to oppress women, eradicate the LGBT population, and make the United States a Christian theocracy.
32. You don’t believe that some Muslims wish to oppress women, eradicate the LGBT population, and make the United States a Muslim theocracy.
33. You advocate for public schools and try to put charter schools out of business while sending your own children to an exclusive private school.
34. You don’t understand the meaning of the words “government debt.”
35. You advocate for a large minimum wage hike and are then shocked when private businesses either shut down or replace employees with robots.
36. You truly understand the old Communist saying—“You can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs”—but still want it applied to the United States.
37. You are a communist.
38. You are a socialist.
39. You are twenty years old and think the guy at the service station with the grease under his fingernails needs your help running his life.
40. You believe that human beings can be goaded and governed into a utopia.

 
Gee, that’s a lot of people. Lump all of us together, and we now have more storm troopers trotting around America than Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany combined.

​Who knew?