Fascism (epithet)

Before and during World War II, many individuals and groups openly described themselves as Fascist. The term is relatively uncontroversial when applied to individuals such as Benito Mussolini, Adolf Hitler, and their direct supporters, and to states such as Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany. After World War II, when Nazi atrocities such as the Holocaust were revealed to the world and many surviving leaders of the Axis Powers were placed on trial for crimes against humanity, the term Fascist was discredited in the eyes of most of the Western world. From then on, only a handful of fringe groups, such as the American Nazi Party, have openly described themselves as Fascist. For the most part, the term has been used since then as an epithet to refer to individuals, ideological beliefs, and activities that the user of the term feels are destructive to a free society.

History of Fascism as an epithet

As early as 1944, commentator George Orwell described the use of the terms "Fascism" and "Fascist" to refer to groups that did not consider themselves as such. [1]

It will be seen that, as used, the word "Fascism" is almost entirely meaningless. In conversation, of course, it is used even more wildly than in print. I have heard it applied to farmers, shopkeepers, Social Credit, corporal punishment, fox-hunting, bull-fighting, the 1922 Committee, the 1941 Committee, Kipling, Gandhi, Chiang Kai-Shek, homosexuality, Priestley's broadcasts, Youth Hostels, astrology, women, dogs and I do not know what else.