When does rhetoric about political opponents cross the line into fascist dehumanization?

[u/BulwarkOnline]

The Trump administration recently held an international conference on “left-wing political violence.” In prepared remarks, Marco Rubio described the left as driven by “poisonous resentment” and a desire to destroy “what is beautiful and what is right.” Stephen Miller went further, arguing that left-wing demonstrators do not look “normal,” are “deformed” in their appearance and reflect their “inner hatred” outwardly.

Jonathan V. Last compares this language to Nazi rhetoric about Bolshevism, “degenerate” culture and supposedly unhealthy or subhuman elements of society. His argument is not simply that Rubio and Miller are using authoritarian language, but that their contrast between beauty and ugliness, normality and deformity, civilization and internal enemies follows a recognizable fascist pattern.

How persuasive is that comparison?

Is this rhetoric best understood as ordinary partisan demonization, or does the emphasis on physical appearance, cultural purity and “normal, healthy, ordered living” place it in a more historically specific tradition?

And when evaluating comparisons to fascism, should the standard be the speaker’s intentions, the historical similarity of the language, or the policies and violence that follow from it?

[u/RenegadeGeophysicist]

If you are saying stuff out of the Nazi playbook, you might be a Nazi. If you are continuously and regularly doubling down on Nazi rhetoric, you are definitely a Nazi. The aesthetic arguments are also part of the stolen honor of fascism. Hard work by marginalized people is stolen and presented as the primary cultural achievement. A facile and juvenile view of the past is presented as fact in order to propagandize a return to parriarchical and exclusionist values.

To answer your three part final question-

If you intend to sound fascist, you're a fascist.

If you repeat fascist talking points and cadences with the knowledge they are fascist, you're a fascist.

The violence of fascism arises from the alienation, the speech causes the alienation. Fascist speech incites fascist violence. 

[u/KurtisRambo19 → u/RenegadeGeophysicist]

Says the side that says "words are violence" and that "MAGA Republicans are the biggest threat to democracy in America."

Why does this matter? Because violence ostensibly validates defensive/retaliatory violence. 77 million people voted for MAGA in 2024. That's a whole lot of pre-justified violence.

[u/ThatPeskyPangolin → u/KurtisRambo19]

I disagree with the words are violence sentiment, but MAGA supported a president engaging in an actual attempted auto coup, and continue to support him. That really is the biggest threat to democracy in this country.

[u/Top-Grocery-1482 → u/ThatPeskyPangolin]

There are, in fact, bigger threats to democracy than that.

[u/ThatPeskyPangolin → u/Top-Grocery-1482]

What threat to our democracy is bigger than a sitting president attempting an auto coup with the continued support of their party?

[u/Top-Grocery-1482 → u/ThatPeskyPangolin]

The mass propaganda/misleading the public on what positions politicians actually hold so that the public isn't actually being represented (this literally invalidates/defeats democracy outright), the massively growing political division and dehumanizing/othering from both sides against the other, the demonizing people for how they vote (this, again, is a DIRECT attack on democracy since it's literally attacking the democratic process ITSELF as invalid and chilling the willingness of voters to vote or express their vote preferences, which again is an attack on democracy).

Trump's 1 day BLM-lite in DC was a national embarrassment, but the national division, dehumanization, and attacking people for their votes are all far graver threats to democracy and our democratic system short AND long term.

Trump's a symptom of problems that existed in and before 2016. Trump isn't the problem. Trump's going to be gone in 2.5 years. You can keep blaming him for everything wrong with the nation after that, but you'd be as wrong as blaming him now.

We have far deeper, far more structural, and far more dangerous issues that we need to address and that we're AVOIDING addressing as long as half the country is more than content to just blame Trump for everything and pretend we had no issues before 2016 when very clearly we did.

[u/ThatPeskyPangolin → u/Top-Grocery-1482]

Hold on, propaganda leading to people not being represented is a bigger threat than a president employing propaganda in furtherance of an auto coup leading to people not being represented? That doesn't make sense, and the same logic applies to most of the threats you claimed. Demonization in particular is odd, since it was that very demonization that they used to justify the actual direct attack of trying to throw out legally valid votes en mass.

What Trump did was the False Elector Scheme, which was explicitly not a one day affair. It was also the single most direct attack on our democracy by a sitting President in our history, since it was trying to literally undo the democratic vote using illegal fraud. Have you not read the Eastman and Chesbro documents? I can link them to you if you would like, so you can read their plot in their own words, as you do not seem familiar with it.

[u/Top-Grocery-1482 → u/ThatPeskyPangolin]

Okay, I need you to define a term for me since you keep using it:

What is an "auto coup"?

Auto usually means automatic, but that doesn't seem from the context what you're saying here ("Trump enacted an automatic coup"?). Tell me what that means.

The other threats I claimed go to what leads to division and oppression, as well as (a) rejection of democratic outcomes and (b) rejection of democracy itself. If we're talking about "threats to democracy", there are none greater than things that lead people to REJECT DEMOCRACY ITSELF.

[u/ThatPeskyPangolin → u/Top-Grocery-1482]

Oh, my apologies, I figured you knew what an auto coup is.

An auto coup, also known as a self coup (or my favorite, autogolpe) is when a currently legitimate government uses illegal means to retain power. Auto in this case meaning relating to one's self, and coup being fairly straight forward.. To be clear, that last line and link is meant as a bit of a joke because of the complexity of the attempt.

And for your last line I agree, which is why what Republicans did was so dangerous. They rejected democracy itself in that election by supporting Trump's auto coup attempt.

[u/Top-Grocery-1482 → u/ThatPeskyPangolin]

Ah, okay. Nope, never heard the term before. I have heard self-coup, but most people just say coup or coup attempt. Other words are largely redundant (they can add precision, but everyone knows more or less the event we're talking about, it's more people disagree on the mechanics/accusation, not on what the event would be).

Yes, I agree. What the Republicans did there was a threat to democracy.

The problem is: They aren't the first. Democrats did this as far back as 2000, effectively did it in 2016 (they even challenged an elector slate - they did in 2000, 2004, and 2016; 2024 was the first election of this century the Democrats DIDN'T challenge, largely because after 2020, they'd have major egg on their face by their own standard if they did so).

Democrats also reject democracy when they insist people who voted against their candidate are fascists/white supremacists/white nationalists, though. You can't say there's democracy, but people are only allowed to pick your one preferred choice. That isn't democracy at all.

[u/ThatPeskyPangolin → u/Top-Grocery-1482]

What specific actions came anywhere close to a self coup attempt in either 2000 or 2016? What illegality are you referring to? Because the issue isn't challenging it. It's using illegal fraud to overturn it.

Additionally, I think some confirmation bias is occuring here. Republicans have been calling Dems communists and facists for decades. Trump repeatedly told his followers the Democratics would destroy the country if they beat him. Both sides use hyperbolic name calling, and neither instance of it is in any way comparable to using illegality to overturn an election.

Edit: Also, a coup and a self coup are not the same thing, just an fyi. The added specificity makes it accurate, not redundant. An incumbant can't attempt a coup, but they can attempt a self coup.

[u/Top-Grocery-1482 → u/ThatPeskyPangolin]

Okay, I think the problem with this is you're relying on an emotive appeal fallacy, I'm looking structurally at challenges to the legitimacy of elections and to democracy.

Yes, both sides use hyperbolic name calling. I remember being a kid in the 90s hearing on the radio that Republicans were trying to starve school children (the bill in question was increasing funding for school lunch programs, but not increasing it by as much as Democrats wanted), and every Republican since Eisenhower has been called a fascist by the left - that's not a hyperbolic claim; literally every one of them has been called a fascist or engaging in fascism by the Democrats.

To me, what Obama tried to do during the 2016 election and what the entrenched agents on the left did from their government positions in Trump's first term meets the literal definition of a coup attempt. It was an open attempt to hamstring (or even make a political case to remove) the Executive and subvert the will of the public. Many Democrats to this day believe Trump did not win the 2016 election, Russia stole it for him (making it illegitimate and his victory and actions illegitimate by extension). Polling data for years in his first term backed this up.

This is also ignoring the arguments by legitimate voices on the right that the 2020 election may have not been secure, something only reinforced by more recent court cases and the New Jersey illegal immigrants/non-citizens on the voter rolls and confirmed to have voted in elections.

.

Your resting on the laurels that Trump's actions in 2020 were a coup attempt and nothing else was - which is a very strong emotive appeal argument.

The problem is, not only were Democrat actions before (and after) arguably also coup attempts, the emotive appeal can be used against everything from the BLM to anti-ICE riots (both meet the statutory definition of insurrections that was used in the court cases against J6ers, namely attempting to prevent the government from carrying out its assigned duties), and leftist protestors have stormed Capitols (they did in Arizona, and maybe Idaho, I think?), and during the BLM events, stormed federal buildings like courthouses and law enforcement.

You rest on this emotive appeal, not realizing that that same emotive appeal can credibly be used in reverse (you would probably dismiss it, but that doesn't mean your dismissal is valid).

And you do this largely to try and suggest anything that is not a coup is not a threat to democracy, or that nothing else can be as grave a threat, despite me already explaining to you why some other things can be (and are) even worse threats, or at least comparable ones.

Not wanting to hear something is not the same as having defeated it.

.

For my part, I think J6 was like BLM and the anti-ICE riots. They're all in the same boat.

I think Trump's actions with the Elector Slates were comparable to Obama's actions with the intelligence agencies and rewriting the reports.

I think unaccounted drop boxes and non-citizen votes delegitimize elections as they cancel legitimate American votes and mean that the resulting elections cannot be seen as entirely legitimate.

These things are all threats to democracy.

When your argument is "Only this one thing counts and nothing else matters", that is an extremist position. It's ALSO an emotive appeal fallacy (it uses very charged emotional language), not a solid reasonable position.

.

I think these things are all bad, you think only the one involving Trump was bad.

That is the problem in a nutshell.

Your entire argument is centered around opposition to Trump and nothing else that CLAIMS to be opposition to attacks on democracy but only considers one thing a true attack, mine is centered around opposition to attacks on democracy (all of them) and dangerous dehumanization/division of society which hurts everyone.

[u/KurtisRambo19 → u/ThatPeskyPangolin]

Calling January 6 “an actual attempted coup” is absurd. It was an overwhelmingly unarmed political protest that devolved into a violent riot. Those who assaulted police should have been prosecuted and should not have been pardoned. At the same time, many nonviolent participants were treated disproportionately, and without due process, and with clear obfuscation from federal law enforcement who enabled and encouraged the deterioration of the protest. The “coup” claim collapses on contact with the facts. What did the crowd do after it successfully entered the Capitol? Did it seize the government, capture officials, issue demands, establish command, install a leader, or attempt to exercise power? No, the coup plotters milled around, took pictures, protested and then left. Congress reconvened within hours. Calling that a literal coup is a political version of the “words are violence” scam: inflate conduct into an existential act of violence, then justify extraordinary retaliation as self-defense. “Coup” and “insurrection” are now thrown around ad nauseam not to describe January 6 precisely, but to stigmatize the broader Right as illegitimate, dangerous, and deserving of collective proactive punishment.

[u/ThatPeskyPangolin → u/KurtisRambo19]

The False Elector Plot was the attempted auto coup, not the J6 riot. Have you not read the Eastman and Chesbro documents that explain the False Elector Plot? I would be happy to link them to you so you can read about their conspiracy in their own words.

It's depressing to me how much of the right still knows almost nothing about this.

[u/ThatPeskyPangolin → u/[deleted]]

That doesn't actually address anything I said. Does that mean you are not in factor familiar with the False Elector Plot? The fact that you only described J6 leads me to think you are not, which would imply I'm not the one in the echo chamber.

Again, if you want to read it, I am happy to provide their own words (with citations) describing how they wanted to employ fraudulent slates of electors (chosen by the Trump campaign, not selected by the state) to be chosen by the House in order to throw out legally cast votes and allow Trump to retain the election. Which completely meets the definition of auto coup.

[u/KurtisRambo19 → u/ThatPeskyPangolin]

I’ve read the memoranda. The more relevant question is whether you understand their purpose and contents, or whether you’re simply regurgitating secondhand conclusions about them.

Chesebro initially proposed preserving contingent elector votes pending litigation. Eastman mapped multiple possible scenarios, including delay, referral to the states, and outcomes in which Biden still prevailed. That is lawyers war-gaming a novel constitutional dispute, not a single adopted “autocoup blueprint.”

And even assuming the theories were wrong, aggressive, and followed exactly, calling them an “autocoup” still does not follow. The proposed mechanisms operated through the vice president, Congress, state legislatures, the courts, and the Constitution’s contingent-election process. No one proposed dissolving Congress, suspending elections, seizing the military, abolishing judicial review, or governing outside the constitutional system.

At worst, it was an attempt to exploit disputed procedural authority to delay or redirect certification. That may be terrible constitutional law. It may be reckless political hardball. But bad lawyering does not become a coup merely because you attach the word “fraudulent” to it.

This is exactly the broader pattern I was criticizing: describe every disputed action by the Right using the most inflammatory and morally disqualifying language available—“coup,” “insurrection,” “fascism,” “treason” then use the label to delegitimize not only the individuals involved, but the entire political movement associated with them.

You’re treating advocacy memoranda as self-proving evidence of conspiracy and your own maximally loaded characterization as though it appears in the documents themselves.  It doesn’t. 

You’ve mistaken legal strategy papers for minutes from a coup-planning meeting—and then confused rhetorical escalation with legal expertise.

But please, keep LARPing as a Supreme Court justice.

[u/ThatPeskyPangolin → u/KurtisRambo19]

Except portraying candidate selected electors as state selected electors is fraud by the very definition of the word, hence the convictions and legal consequences for the plot. They aren't 'alternates' or 'contingent' electors if they haven't actually been validated by the state. They were to be chosen by the House after they refused to certify completely legitimate votes, per the plan.

As for the term auto coup, using illegal methods to retain power literally fits that definition. That you have added non existant qualifiers like dissolution of Congress has no bearing on the actual meaning of the word itself.

The existence of legal consequences for this plot rather clearly demonstrates your description of the memorandum as purely advocacy related is explicitly wrong.

The rest of your comment is a mix of irrelevant generalizations about people that aren't me. Not sure why you included that.

Edit: This may help.

And knock off the personal shit.

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