I think the piece that has yet to be tested is elections. As of now, we still live under the pretense that we will have a fair election.
The case can be made that the voter suppression tactics from the far right are eliminating the possibility of a fair election. Or that Elon Musks involvement has led to fraud, or at least, massive corruption to our electoral system. But at the end of the day, we still have a collective idea that the fix for this is an election that will remove them from power.
When the midterms come, that will be the real test.
Alphane_Moon@lemmy.world 1 week ago
It pains me to see the US go down this path. I am well aware of how bad things are going in the US (I have close friends who live there). I agree with you regarding nationalism, street arrests by security, demonization of minorities and so on.
However, I am comparing my experience living in russia (as an expat who happens to speak russian fluently), my experience living in the US under Obama and US as it is today.
US still has competitive elections. The US centre right opposition is not a formal front for the regime. Compare that to russia were elections are a formality and the so called “opposition parties” get direct orders from the regime and exist as circus performers. US isn’t at that stage yet.
Same with the US judicial system. It is definitely corrupt (and this was true even before Trump) and it is getting even more corrupt. However, the US judicial system has some level of independence and at least on some level you can have your rights be respected. Again, compare that to russia were the judicial system as such does not exist and has no authority whatsoever.
Security services in the US are increasingly becoming unhinged and acting more like crooks, but it’s no where close to russia where they have zero liability beyond not respecting key regime interests.
US still has a measure of political de-centralization. You can elect mayors and governors and they have a measure of independence. While russian does have some regional independent power centres, they are still all aligned with the regime and its ideology.
I know, comparing your local political system to russia isn’t really a sane approach. But I do think it is important to note that the differences do exist.
spankmonkey@lemmy.world 1 week ago
Fascism and other authoritarian systems aren’t a measuing contest though. Just because somewhere else has been doing it longer or is more effectively doesn’t mean somewhere else isn’t doing or trying to do the same thing.
A benevolent dictatorship is still a dictatorship for example. While the Republicans have enacted widespread voter suppression that didn’t guarantee winning an election, that doesn’t mean they aren’t working on the steps to guarantee it in the next election. Fascism doesn’t require complete and total success to be fascism.
Alphane_Moon@lemmy.world 1 week ago
I completely agree. I don’t mean to imply it is a competition. As I said, being better than russia is not much of an achievement.
But I do think the correct term for the US as it is today is proto-fascist. It’s also important to not ignore the transition into full scale fascis.