this post was submitted on 06 Nov 2024
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It doesn't matter.
Europeans know the history of fascism much, much better than Americans do and they're electing right-wing leaders too.
There's "knowing" on a theoretical level, and knowing having experienced it. As the generational knowledge of people that have experienced fascism dies off the younger generations have to learn the hard way. Seems to happen every 100 or so years.
The idea of "European exceptionalism" is no different than the idea of "American exceptionalism". People are fundamentally the same regardless of where they live -- we all have the same base instincts, the same hard-coded tribalistic tendencies, and the same fears. Every population on the planet is susceptible to fascism because it preys on the aforementioned.
i'd argue that there's knowing how things were and there's an undertanding of it. i went through the higher tier of the segregating west german school system under the supervision of very humanist engaged teachers. and yet that system was far from being able to deliver the second.