Oh What A Time... - [BONUS EP] #129 Fascism: The Story of an Idea by Dorian Lynskey and Ian Dunt

Episode Date: August 10, 2026

We're on our annual two-week summer break, but don't worry! Please enjoy these subscriber episodes from last summer while we're away!From August 2025, this is..#129 Fascism: The Story of an Idea by Dorian Lynskey and Ian DuntIt’s time for another (fairly bleak) book review by our resident bleak-book expert Elis James. In this subscriber special, El shares what he’s learned by reading ‘Fascism: The Story of an Idea’ by Dorian Lynskey and Ian Dunt. Plus, the unspoken positive about a 1984 George Orwell style society is: all the CCTV means more captured gaffes for You’ve Been Framed. If you’d like to email the show you can do so at: [e-mail] if you want more Oh What A Time and both parts at once, you should sign up for our Patreon! On there you’ll now find:•The full archive of bonus episodes•Brand new bonus episodes each month•OWAT subscriber group chats•Loads of extra perks for supporters of the show•PLUS ad-free episodes earlier than everyone elseJoin us at 👉 patreon.com/ohwhatatimeAnd as a special thank you for joining, use the code CUSTARD for 25% off your first month.You can also follow us on: X (formerly Twitter) at @ohwhatatimepodAnd Instagram at @ohwhatatimepodAaannnd if you like it, why not drop us a review in your podcast app of choice?Thank you to Dan Evans for the artwork (idrawforfood.co.uk).Chris, Elis and Tom x Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Hello and welcome to Oh, what a time, the history podcast that asks. Well, listen, I know that this idea has got terrible ramifications and could be abused, obviously. However, if we ever lived in a time when there was constant rolling CCTV in our houses, 1984 style, you would catch some good gaffes. For instance, I, about a minute ago, fell up my stairs.

And now there's water all over the water. all over the walls. But we're quite restricted for time. So I'm just going to start recording. No regard for gravity. It's a very odd thing when you fall up the stairs. Let's say you've been framed is 200 quid a pot. Yeah.

I reckon I'm looking at 600 quid a day. That's what I've been looking at. That's a more than a healthy day rate. Yeah, yeah. It's a living. Tom, do you think you could actually retire and just be creating you've been framed content all day long? Yeah. What's great about that, Chris, as well, you wouldn't need to be consciously doing it.

You wouldn't even be at work in any active sense. It would just happen. So you just live your life normally and then I'd whack my head and a cupboard and some beans would land on my forehead or whatever. And then I'd be, oh, there's John. Great. I wouldn't even need to do it. We wouldn't need to seek it out. Also, I'd say the older you get, the more gaffs you'd commit. Yeah. You'd be rolling in it as a pensioner. All your other friends are worried about the gas spills. Richel Tom Crean, the Gaffman. To be fair, I've got a Fort Knox-esque set up on my ring cameras at home.

And I'd say the majority of the times I use it is because I've done stuff like walking to the patio doors. Or, you know, just slipping on things. It's your own personal you've been framed. A very boring admin question about this, if we are trying to make money from filming everything during our days in our house. are you having a situation where you're tripping over, you're falling up the stairs, for example, and then you're having to write down in your phone notes what time that happened,

and then every evening you're clipping it up and sending it after you've been framed, or are you employing someone to watch at all times who will just clip those things up as they happen? Just go through the footage. They're on 10%. So you're losing some of the income. You're losing, let's say, 20% of your income,

but there's someone just sat there watching it all times And as soon as it happens, they'll turn it to it, they'll send it straight in for you. I've got horrible feeling that in a few years' time there'll be some AI app that just allows you to scroll straight to the gap. You'll be going through loads of just people at their desks working, doing the thing, people watching telly, whatever. And then suddenly, they fall in a big pot of custard or whatever. And that app will be able to predict Crane's gaffes and actually render them before Crane has even committed them. Like minority report. Yeah.

For a small subscription every month, you can get Crane's Gaffs five years ahead of everyone else. And then of course, because AI learns and it likes to please its musters, it will be setting at booby troughs for Tom of Crane. And he'll go from earning £600 a day to £6,000 a day, because it's just gaff after gaff after gaff. So let's talk about falling up the stairs, Anel, because I think it's one of the least dignified things a person can do. It is, yeah.

Because it hurts a bit as well, doesn't it? Because your shing is the coolest person on earth? That's a good question. Who is the coolest person on Earth? Tim Peek. He's up there, isn't it? That is such a middle-aged dad guess. John Bon Jovi?

Charlie X-E-X then. Yeah, okay. Charlie X-E-X. Charlie X-X fell up the stairs. You can't do it in a dignified way. Yeah. I've just done it. Tieri on.

Henri is very cool. And yet if he sprayed a little water on his walk because he'd fallen up the stairs, even Henri in that situation is going to look bad. Yeah. Are you clumsy, Chris? Because I think I've got worse. I think the older I've got,

the more I walk into things. I've got like falling downstairs, like hyperconjure. I don't know if it is hypercondure. But basically I fall downstairs, at least twice a year I'll have quite a bad fall down the stairs. And every time I do fall down the stairs, I think, is that going to finish me off in 20 years? Am I surviving that fall?

How long have I got surviving falls like that? I've got quite a weird setup in my house. My house is about 100 years old and there's a weird sort of half landing that peels off into like three different directions and I slip on that twice a year. What does? So your little tiny landing that goes off a different direction.

It's like a tiny mini half landing that goes off into three directions. I slip on that probably twice a year usually when I'm wearing socks and rushing. Right? So if I'm in my bare feet, I'm fine. But if I'm wearing socks, I will fall. And a couple of times, I have fallen the whole way down and been fine.

Yeah. The whole way down the stairs. And it was such a traumatic experience by in the house, because lots of stuff went wrong. We've always said... Your mini landing? Yeah, we've always said, right, I'm going to get bloody carried out this house in a coffin. I'm never moving again. But every time it happens, I think, is this, is this the killer?

And did I know all along? How tiny is it? This small... Uh, you can get it. a cat on it. Okay. When are my cats likes it? But not all four feet at once.

No, no, no. And my son likes to jump across it. Yeah, okay. And it seems to be lethal. I've got two questions about stairs that occur to me, which I've wondered are whether they're weird things I do. Sometimes when I'm feeling tired, if I'm going up the stairs, I will lean against the wall to take some of the weight. That's pathetic. That's the worst, that's the worst thing you've ever said.

Scraping your shoulder up the wall. That is a disdemeanor. At the end of a long day, I will go up. What, you, mate, have some pride. As the scuffs, like, develop and develop in my house if I were living with you, I would get more and more furious every day. If my kids did that, I'd be so disappointed. It's only the end of a very long day.

Let's say I'd be played for four. Oh, fuck off me. Come on. Toughen up. Then maybe that'll be it. The other thing I do is to, this is about efficiency of movement. Oh, yeah. As I go up the stairs, I reach a touch. top and I turn the corner at the top or the bottom, I will hook my arm on the newel post

and use the newel post to swing me around so I'm now facing the right direction. So I use that for sort of movement. I've got less of an issue with that one. I mean, I can't imagine an adult doing it. And when my wife sees me doing either of them, she takes me straight to bed. She's so excited by both of those incredibly sexy things. But the leaning against the wall is That's disgraceful. Do you really think that? But it's at the end of a long day. I don't care.

But I own the wall. You've got to be strong enough to walk up the stairs. You're able-bodied. I think the wall's there for a reason. Yeah, and that's not the reason. Do you know what, right? My dad said something to me that's really stayed with me. When I was about 13, we used to do cross-country in school.

You had to run at the back of the school, if you're from commandant, run out of the back of the old school. But I remember there, right? So you'd run out the back, and then you'd run to run. downtown Bernacle Terrace and then through town and then up sort of at Reservoir Road and it was about two and a half miles in total, okay? And I hated

cross country. I really really hated it. And I remember one day I thought, I'm just gonna come last. So I just walked it. I thought, there's nothing, you know, they can't make me run. Yeah. I can definitely walk it in the time of the, you know, we've got an hour's lesson. I can definitely walk it in that time.

Like I'm not going to be late for maths or whatever was after. But I will, my stand, My dead poet society sort of stand will be, I will just walk the cross-country route, right? And all of the, you know, I remember, I remember naming to my dad, all of the kids who I should have been beating, right? All of the kids who sort of hated sport and said,

and I came last, they beat, they, all of them beat me. And my dad said, why don't you have some pride? Oh. And I remember, I'm thinking, shit. Wow. Yeah. Absolutely.

Bite dad. And that is what I think of when you tell me stories like that. Well, how old your dad reacted to this? The only detention I had in secondary school was due to cross-country. We had to do two laps through down his wet hill and across a road and through a wood and all this sort of nonsense. And I hid in a bush during the first lap and then rejoin the cross-country. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I was spotted by Mr. Mann, our sports teacher, and I had to come in for his attention.

With the Mr. Men. For the part of the Mr Men. One of the Mr. Men? Well, Mr. Detention. Yeah, I was spotted by Mr. Mann. He used to play for Astavilla until he was about 19. That was quite cool. Oh, do you?

That's quite cool. What did he say? Did he say, Have Some Pride? He looked me in the eye and said, Have Some Pride, exactly. Oh, my God. Have some pride part. So there you go. I don't think is that weird.

If any listeners listening, also, when they're tired of going up the stairs, use the wall as body support. Do let me know. Let me know I'm not alone in that, because part of me thinks it's not that weird. I think it's an absolute discreet. I'm, I'm, I'm sickened. The worst stairs-based mishap, by the way, this is what you need CCTV for in your house, was when I was in primary school, I went to my friend, Ollie's house,

and we got a dinner tray from his mum's kitchen, and we went down the stairs on the dinner tray. Well, we say we, he did, he went first, and the one thing we learn is, that a one-yard stopping gap between the bottom of the stairs and the glass front door is not enough of a distance. Oh my God. And he slid straight through it. He went straight through the glass front door on a dinner tray. Wow. So that is definitely worth to be shattered.

Of course it's smart. It's impossible to go through a glass front door without it shattering. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I mean, was he badly hurt if it shattered? No, miraculously, he wasn't badly hurt at all. Gee, wow. That is worth 200 quid. I double that.

That's 400 quid, surely. That's good footage. All this talk of cross-country has made me realize I reminded myself recently of why I don't like rugby, which is that when I was like growing up at school, we used to do rugby in the winter. That was like the winter term sport.

And it would go over this frozen field with like our little rugby jerseys on, freezing, just bash into each other. And then because you're covered in mud, you had to go into the horrible changing rooms when you're like 13, icy water on you. Like to clean off and they go back to school just knackered and bruised.

And that stuck with me when I think about rugby. Yeah. Completely. I've got those memories of cold winter days. And the sports teacher telling me to run and tackle, like, there's studs and mud. Big hard kids. But fundamentally, and this is the big issue here, I don't care about getting that ball. Where's your pride?

Yeah. So you can keep saying I need to dive in and use my shoulder and put, I don't care whether I have that ball or not. and I don't care about the result. Well, it actually feels strangely fitting that I am leading today's subscriber special, and it is on fascism. Yeah. And obviously, Mussolini, for instance, wanted to create the new man, the new kind of Italian who was masculine and physically brave and strong,

and I think the three of us wouldn't have fitted in in Mussolini's Italy, because none of us like playing rugby in the winter, and Tom uses a wall to help himself up when he's tired at the end of a long day, not working at a cold mind, joke writing, a hard day at the laptop, and he uses a wall to help him get up the stairs. It's quite hard work mind-wise. It's quite a good at a brain. It's not a cold mind, as it is.

So, this book, the book I'm going to be talking about today, it's by Ian Dunt and Donie Linsky, and it's an origin story book, the story of an idea, and there are three in the series. that I've been sent. They're very, very good. I've read all three, actually. There's one on centrism,

sort of political centrism, things like Tony Blair and Bill Clinton. There's one on conspiracy theories, which is fascinating. I might do that next, actually. And then there's this one on fascism. Now, Dory O'Linsky, I knew as a music writer, he wrote 33 Revolutions Per Minute History of Protest Songs,

which is an excellent book. And I knew Ian Dunn, because he wrote a book about Brexit. I didn't know that they make a podcast called Origin Story, where they look at, you know, where ideas come from and they sort of drill down into what ideas mean. It's like a sort of primer into something that you probably know a little bit about or you might have heard about on the news. And to be honest, I like the book so much, I'm going to have to listen to the podcast because I think the books, the three books are great, right? So fascism, the reason I've chosen this one is, fascism is a word that gets bandied about an awful lot, especially on the left. For instance, when I was in my early 20s and just after things like 9-11,

during the one Afghanistan and one Iraq, quite often George W. Bush would be described as a fascist. Now, I don't think George, as much as I disagreed with a lot of what George W. Bush stood for, I wouldn't say that he was a fascist. But it is, you know, it's like if you look at something like the young ones, it's an insult that Rick uses all the time. He will refer to to people as fascists. And there's a great George Orwell quote, because he tried to define fascism famously.

And he said that he'd heard the word applied to not just political factions, but farmers, shopkeepers, social credit, corporal punishment, fox hunting, bullfighting, the 1922 committee, the 1941 committee, Kipling, Gandhi, Chiang Kai Shek, homosexuality, priestlies broadcasts,

youth hostels, astrology, women, and dogs. Yeah. It is, it is, it is, a word that gets chucked about a lot. And I think it's a word that is, I think, particularly relevant now because of Putin and people like Victor Orban in Hungary. I was flicking between the channels during the last American election. And I flicked onto Channel 4 and they had Alistair Campbell and Rory Stewart and Dominic Sandbrook. And one of the panel asked Dominic

Sandbrook whether they thought Donald Trump was a fascist. That's interesting. And he gave a long considered answer, saying I think he's an authoritarian, I think he's a populist, I don't think he's a fascist, I would be very intrigued to know if he's changed his mind based on what's happened over the last six months, because at the end of this book, they make quite a convincing argument, Dunt and Linsky, the Trump is a fascist, actually. But the thing with fascism is, and I apologize to our listeners because I think, even though our listeners love history and they're like learning new things, they also come to his podcast for a laugh, it is a tremendous bleak topic. And you can't really discuss it without discussing awful things. But I think one thing

with fascism is, you know what conservatism is, and you know what socialism is, and you know what liberalism is. So liberalism had John Stuart Mill, and conservatism had Edward Burke, and socialism had Karl Marx, right? There are no great intellectual contributions from fascism. There isn't really a sort of fascist guidebook. People have tried to create them. People have tried to work out as a little as a historian called Roger Griffin's trying to establish what he thinks fascism is. But like if you look at something like Mime Kampf, it's a, it's a deranged book of personal grievances. That is the book that you, it springs to mind when you think about it as a, you know. But I would, I'd also say that Hitler was a Nazi. Yes. And that's a sort of, that's a

branch of fascism. Like a lot of that stuff, Mussolini, for instance, who was a fascist, didn't agree with that. And Mussolini was different to Hitler. And the thing with fascism is it's fluid, it's opportunistic, it's contradictory, it's quite chameleonic. Like at the end of his life, Mussolini claimed to regret trying to ally with big, big business as opposed to the working classes. So you're like, bloody, but that would have changed everything if you've done it. And if you look at certain fascists, they're all quite different. Like Mussolini was a hypercundriac, sort of quite a frugal workaholic who had quite bad anxiety and a loner. He believed in astrology and superstition. Hitler was tremendously lazy. Yes. Yeah. Like he used to delegate a lot and he used to

love one getting up really late and watching films. And Mussolini didn't like Hitler. He didn't trust him. He thought he was a clown. Whereas Hitler really admired Mussolini and at one point described him as his best friend. Really? And the lengths he goes to to save Mussolini towards the end of the war, when his reign is overturned and he's imprisoned, the Nazis basically rescue Mussolini on Hitler's orders. Yeah. You know, so for instance, and I'm not defending Mussolini,

but I'm just pointing out the differences in regimes. Like he spent a lot money on social welfare and affordable housing and schools and hospitals, but also he believed that strong nations are the right to subjugate weak. ones, which is why he sort of conquered Abyssinia, which is modern-day Ethiopia. And he loved war as well, but also he didn't think Italy was going to be ready for a big European war until about 1942. So he was trying to dissuade Hitler from invading Poland until the very last minute, because he was like, we're not ready for this. But it's hard to define. I wonder it's also, interestingly, that it's fascism by its very nature ends up with leaders

who are the sort of people who are driven by their own selfish, egotistical want. because a lot of it is about power. Yeah, you have culture personality and you have demagogues. Castro was a demagogue. He wasn't a fascist. Chavez in Venezuela was a demagogue, but he wasn't a fascist. For it to prevail, what you need really is four things. So like apparent failure of the status quo and often a terrible economic crisis. So for instance, in Russia, in the 1990s, you had the really botched transfer to capitalism from communism,

which left an awful lot of Russians feeling very, very aggrieved, right? And in Germany, in the 1920s and 30s, a lot of Germans didn't think they'd lost the First World War because no foreign soldier had set foot on German soils. They were like, how are the... A lot of Germans are like, how are we the losers? Yeah, yeah. We haven't lost anything.

So they psychologically haven't accepted that they lost the First World War. And then the magnitude of the economic crisis in Germany is just important. impossible to imagine. Yeah. There are so many zeros in this. I had to Google it to work out what number it was. So in 1918, an American dollar was worth about eight marks. Okay. The German currency at the time, obviously. In December 1922, an American dollar was worth about 7,000 marks. By November 1923, an American dollar was worth 4.2 trillion marks. What? So hyperinflation, it doesn't... Wow. People say, oh, yeah, I studied hyperinflation.

school, when you really think about what that means for the economy. And that was a cash-based society. The size of the wallet you'd require at that point. But, you know, I remember from doing this from school, you know, people would be paid in wheelbarrows of cash and people stealing the wheelbarrows, you know. Yeah, absolutely, of course. Well, that's the famous images, isn't it? That's the famous images.

Around the Wall Street crash in that sort of time, there's wheelbarrows full of just a collapse. I remember there was a picture when it happened in Zimbabwe, someone of a trolley. full of cash to buy bread. Oh yes. Like millions and millions. I remember listening to a documentary about Zimbabwe and the economic crash there. I think it was real dictators and they were talking about how you'd go for a meal

and by the time you went to pay for your meal basically. Yeah, the price had gone up. Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah, completely. It was just constantly shifting and dramatic price changes within the time it would take you to finish your meal. So it can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. I've just found a definition. Shall I read a definition from what I found?

Yeah, yeah. Bashism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, and suppression of opposition. Kind of like me running this podcast. But militarism is an interesting one, because Franco had no interest in conquering other countries. Yeah.

There's a bit at the end of the book where they do like a sort of fascist checklist. But even someone like Franco, and a lot of British people went over and volunteered in the Spanish Civil War, and they thought they were fighting fascism. Yeah. Franco, there are a couple of points in the checklist that he wouldn't meet, right? He wouldn't satisfy those conditions. And then you look at, say, Putin, and Putin satisfies an awful lot of the conditions, but because of the historic context of Russia and the Soviet Union and how they fought the Nazis during the Second World War,

you cannot say you're a fascist if you're Russian. Yes. So he's said about when it comes to. the war in Ukraine, he said he's trying to denazify the Ukraine. Yeah, yeah. Because Stalin used to use fascist and fascism as an insult. So even though he meets a lot of the criteria, he would absolutely say that he wasn't fascist.

Saddam Hussein never claimed to be a fascist. He meets an awful lot of the criteria. So it's a really, really interesting thing. But it at heart, it's a sort of substitute religion, and it's a conspiracy theory, is founded on an apocalyptic myth of a decisive battle between good and evil. The nations tormented by a ruling crisis that democracy

cannot resolve. The race is in decline. It's undermined by enemies within. And then the only solution is a dynamic strongman who can purify and unite the chosen people and eliminate their foes by any means necessary. Now, for instance, if you're looking at modern fascism, for instance, because fascist parties and extreme right parties after the Second World War

tried to detoxify the brand. So they often said, oh no, we believe in democracy, for instance. And they stopped talking about race as much, so they would talk about culture, which is a euphemistic way of talking about race, really. So the reason say Mosley didn't succeed in Britain is that it was like a copycat version of German fascism and Italian fascism, whereas the countries that have successful fascist leaders, they have a very nation-specific brand of fascism. And it's relevant to what's happening there and then. So what nations do have successful fascist leaders that have...

Victor Orban, I would say, in Hungary is a good example. Is that fascist? Yeah. Well, but again, the thing with fascism, right, is that, obviously, I can't speak for other countries, but in the UK, you study Hitler and the Holocaust at year 9, so that you've definitely done it because you're allowed to drop history at GCSE. You do it in year 9, and then you'll do it at GCSE if you take history, GCSE, and then you'll probably do it again at A level if you take history A level

and then if you do a modern history degree like I did, you'll do it again. So I think because of folk memories of the Second World War and because of popular culture in Britain and because of the education system, I would say that most people know quite a bit or they have a sort of working knowledge of Hitler and the Nazis. And Nazi documentaries, World War II documentaries are still very popular.

Like if you watch the Discovery Channel, for instance, it's almost always... It's like the Ricky Javee joke. It's sharks and Nazis, isn't it, on the Discovery. out. So I think that most people have a kind of basic working knowledge of what Hitler stood for. I wouldn't say the same goes for Mussolini. I wouldn't say the same goes for Orban. I wouldn't say the same goes for Pinnachey in Chile. And then a lot of people, then they're like, well, but are they fascists, right? And I used to find it very distasteful. And I used to find it very irritating when

people accused politicians who clearly weren't fascists of being fascists, which used to happened an awful lot when I was a student, right? It's quite a big facet of student politics from my experience like 25 years ago. Because I used to think it was demeaning. I used to think it was sort of it cheapened the debate. But because it's such a chameleonic thing that changes, like there are aspects of modern fascists that Hitler would recognise in the aspects that he wouldn't. So for instance, modern fascism is very good at using social media. Hitler and Mussolini were great at using film. Yes. Like Hitler and Mussolini, they knew exactly. the power of cinema.

Yeah. And they knew exactly the power of, you know, big speeches projected to millions and millions of people. So there are aspects of modern-day fascism. And for instance, modern-day fascist, like they're not trying to build a new man who's like really virile and sort of masculine and warlike. That has kind of,

that's sort of gone out of fashion. And they often say that they believe in democracy. But there are things like a victim complex, as feeling of victimhood. And there are also things, I think, about the modern extreme right that Hitler would recognise for instance

Hitler played the free speech martyr in the 30s Yeah So he used to say well you know I'm not getting a fair crack of the whip Because elites are trying to keep me down right And there were assassination attempts on Mussolini But they strengthened his case Because people then were like

Bloody hell he's threatened by his enemies And he's protected by God This is the guy right It's very strange how there are parallels between say the fascism in the 1920s and 1930s and now and some things are very, very different. And this is the thing, like socialism and communism

at its heart hasn't really changed in the same way that fascism has. Yes. And neither has liberalism, because there are doctrines and set texts. And the thing with this book, the reason I like this book in particular so much by Ian Dunt and Dolly Lindski is that because it's a word that gets bandied about a lot,

and because most people have studied it at a school and they'll have some memory of it. This is only 159 pages. It absolutely nails what it was, what its practitioners believed in, and where it stands now. Okay. In 2024,

because this book was published last year. So it feels very, very current. It's quite an exhilarating read because you're like, oh, there are so many eyes get dotted and T's get crossed. Because one of the things I remember when I was watching the news as a little kid,

It's actually slightly different now because I think news websites allow for more of these explainers. So, for instance, during the troubles in Northern Ireland, a bombing would be reported on the news. And I would watch it, but they would never explain what the people who'd done the bombing wanted. Yes. That's such a good point.

I think that all the time. Like, I never knew what the troubles were. It took me until I was like 26 and I read about it. It was like, oh, that's what that was. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I used to sit there. And, like, I do, you know, on the news to a child, and I used to have a tea in front of the news,

they never explained that, like, Republicans were different to loyalists and that loyalists and unionists were effectively the same sort of thing. And they never explained the differences between the IRA and the UDA and the UVF and the UFF. It was just a load of acronyms. Yeah. And so you'd watch it be like, this is mental and it's happening in Northern Ireland. And now I think because of, if you look at, say, the BBC website, for instance, or the major news websites, they do these explainers.

I think that now if you're a kid, you might not feel as lost as I did watching the news in the 1980s and 1990s. And this book is a very, very good explainer on fascism. So what does it say? When you say it talks about the state of fascism today, how is it resenting that? Does it feel it's on the rise? What is the sentiment?

In terms of it adhering to the idea of what fashion actually is, I think it would be impossible to deny that it's on the rise. Yes. Because there are, even if it's not fascist, you've got extreme right parties doing well all over Europe and the world. One thing I would say is like, you know, is fascism on the rise? Unlike any other political movement, fascism is the one where you can't say I'm fascist. No one can actually say they are. And you would reject any accusation of it as a political movement.

Yeah, I think, for instance, if you're looking at modern day Europe, I think you would look at, say, what happened after 9-11, then the financial crisis of the financial sort of crash of 2008 has created economic dislocation and deterioration in living standards. And then things like the war in Syria create a lot of immigration. So they are quite similar to what was happening in the 1920s and 1930s when you had the Wall Street crash of 1929, which affected everyone's living standards

and you had what had happened to Germany after the Versailles Treaty and losing the First World War. So what you need is a crisis and in a crisis some people find it very attractive the idea of a strong man and it's almost always a man, not always but usually a man who says

listen, I'm going to sort this. Le Pen being a slight outlier there although she's strongly right wing whether she's fascistism but yeah. But exactly that's a thing. Like for instance at the end of the book, right? So Umberto Echo had a 14-point assessment of fascism, okay? And Griffin, he tried to define it.

So, for instance, most scholars of fascism come up with something along these lines. The absolute primacy of the group over other groups, a narrative victimhood, usually overlaid with a conspiracy theory, about the elite forces that have undermined the group. So, for instance, they were very worried about communists and a communist revolution in the 20s and 30s. even Trump talks about a communist revolution and communists in America. The idea, there is zero chance of there being a communist revolution in the US, in the United States of America.

Literally less than zero. Yeah, yeah. But they will also use woke as a sort of, you know, those two terms become quite interchangeable, I would say. The myth of national renewal, a belief that might is right, a love of violence, a hatred of one's opponents, and a disdain for compromise. a visceral contempt for socialism and to a lesser extent liberalism and a wary but pragmatic relationship with capitalism, total obedience to the leader, the rejection of democracy,

and the complete submission of the individual to the group identity, right? That's Russia and China, isn't it? That is like a literal description of those societies. But also things like January 6th and claiming that the election was stolen. It's felt like Gert Wilders has never done that. Le Pen has never done that. Yeah.

But ultimately what Ian Dunn and Doreenlinsky say at the end is it's a kind of vibe or it's a kind of mood. And whether you can, whether you say it's fascist or not, like Franco didn't want to conquer other countries, does that stop him from being a fascist? Certainly doesn't stop him from being a terrible person. Yeah. And because he wasn't a fascist and because he didn't want to conquer other countries, he lasted until 1975. If he's coming around for dinner, I'm not reassured by you telling me he's not technically a fan. I'm still thinking it, oh God. That is actually a very good way of putting it.

He's not technically, Fushes. Yeah, I've met him and I don't like him. Yeah, exactly. It's really interesting, isn't it? There's the sort of the narrowing down on the idea of the elites is a major thing that comes up time and time again, isn't it? The idea of sort of, sort of, Let's say Magabi did exactly the same thing.

Pol Pot, all of these people had exactly... There are these sort of things that come around each time. And what the populists do, and obviously not all populists are fascists, but what the populists do, it's a very, very simple story. It's the people of the goodies and the elites are the baddies. Yeah, completely. And I stand... I am a real person, and I'm one of the people, so you need to stand with me because the elites are out to get you.

Yeah. And the other thing, as you said, that is a definite fiction is that they're all bonkers, as it turns out at the end. That is always the case. And as much they try to suppress that at the beginning, in time, that wheel out. It's just really interesting because it doesn't have, there has been no great intellectual contribution from a fascist. Yeah. And because it's so chameleonic, because it changes with the country, or successful fascism changes with the country and changes with the country and changes with the tax. and it reflects the time and it's contradictory.

It occupies a quite interesting, what had hitherto been an untapped space of it was revolutionary and traditionist at the same time. Yeah. Which can be very appealing to some. It's kind of something for everyone. And we were talking about this, like when I studied this at school for the first time in year 9,

so that's, you know, the mid-90s and I'm 14. The mid-90s, obviously the mid-90s wasn't perfect, and there were still wars in the mid-90s. There was genocide happening in the mid-90s. But certainly in the West, you kind of felt that like it was a good time for the left. Yeah.

You know, you're like Bill Clinton, a Democrat in the White House, Tony Blair, Labor Party at number 10, for instance, and there was the Fukuyama book, The End of History, because his argument back then, which now seems absurd, was, yeah, we've won, it's fine.

Yeah. Liberalism has won. The wall has come down. Soviet, Union is over. The Iron Curtain is down. It's fine with the sort of capitalist democracy and social democracy is one. Everyone can chill out and it's going to be like this forever, right? Yeah. Now, even by the time I was doing my degree, that book was being laughed at seven or eight years later. And yet there was a weird time in the 90s where people became very, very complacent, right? Now, when I first

studied fascism, obviously it's horrible and it's harrowing and you read about the Holocaust and it's sickening. But I was convinced something like this would never happen again. So it was just intellectually very, very interesting, right? Now you read it and you're like, and you look at the state of the world and it was a much, even though it's very intellectually stimulating and satisfying to have something summed up so succinctly in 159 pages, I think the world is in a different place to when I first read about fascism and it was a much more chilling read. Yeah. And I think it's an absolutely great book.

And I would actually recommend the series. I've not listened to the podcast, but I think I will because the three books are fantastic. I think what's worrying about that in terms of a long-term view is whether, in basic sense, humans, are ever going to be able to get to a point where we're beyond the threat of war. And I think it'll never be the case. I personally think we will forever be in a cycle where everything is finally in balance and the kind of. You know, you might have these, you'll probably, it'll combust, it'll, it'll blast off into another World War and then you'll have a period where you go, oh, that can't happen again, that surely won't let that happen again.

Yeah. And then the same things will bubble up the same ingredients. And if you're looking at things like NATO and the UN and an international rules-based order, and even things like the European Union or the EEC as it was before that, that all came from a lot of politicians who remembered the first and second World War. Exactly, yeah, yeah. This comment I'm about to make is far too late in the podcast to make it. I'm going to make it anyway.

It's too much of a handbrake, what I'm about to say. But with the rise of artificial intelligence, I think we are three to four years away from maybe never having war again. Really? Think about it. Think about the revolution that is happening in artificial intelligence, the rise of superintelligence. We're on the cusp of humanity, no longer being the most intelligent species on the planet. Is there superintelligence really going to allow us to carry on fighting with each other? and what is the methods through which we will be stopped fighting?

I think it's coming. I don't know the answer. Chris, if you can make that rhyme and put it to a good melody, you've written a song that is going to be a hit worldwide, because what a message of hope that is. Thank you to our AI overlords for ending war. It's the Band-Aid for it's... I think it's coming.

For 2027. But intelligence isn't going to let us fight over, you know. I just can't see it. I don't know. Wow. But the problem is, though, we might be living in a time of global peace. But as podcasters, we will definitely be replaced by AI. Yeah.

Hey, this episode may already even be AI. But I want you to know, Chris, when World War III does inevitably kickoff in about five years and the three of us are hunkering down in a bunker, I'm going to play that bit back to you. And like you say, you couldn't have been more wrong. I think you're either very, very, very, very wrong or very, very, very right. But there's going to be no in between. When World War III kicks off and the nukes start flying, I'm going to think to myself, this is really embarrassing. And as you reach for your guitar and say, well, I did put it to music and he says, now's clearly not the time, Chris.

Now is not the time, you fucking idiot. I'll just text you. Sorry, lads. In a way, this is my fault You're still banging on about that? Look, Chris, I generally believe this Before we finish, I don't understand AI I can't get my head around it But I feel strongly that you're wrong

I don't know why Yeah, yeah, me too I believe deep down you're wrong Although I don't really understand The contributing factors Do you know what? We should do an article on the theories of superintelligence down the years

Oh, that's a great idea, yeah I could do that It was Stephen Hawking's last message to humanity before he died. It was a warning of what's coming. Well, the book is The Story of an Idea. Fascism by Ian Dunn and Dorian Linsky. It's an origin story book. Origin story is a podcast, and there are three of them.

There are three books in this series, one about centrism, what about conspiracy theories. The conspiracy theory one is fascinating, especially. And then this one on fascism. They're very, very readable. So I started reading this two nights ago, and I've already finished it. It's 159 pages.

I apologise if that was slightly garbled. It's just, we are meant to be an entertainment slash history podcast. You're trying to unblekify it. And then you end up talking about Hitler being lazy and loving to watch films. But that was genuinely fascinating. Yeah, it really was. I'll send you this book. Because I think, honestly, I've considered doing Hannah Rents the origins of totalitarianism,

which I read at university, but that's an absolute whopper of a book. and also again Megablique So balance things out next month I'm doing I'm going to read a book on the history of funny underpants when you're talking about that

for an hour cannot wait but no genuinely a generally fascinating book we'll put a picture of the book up on our Instagram feed for you to check it out if anyone wants to grab a copy

but thanks for that L that was fantastic thank you so much for listening thank you for being our favourite people thank you for subscribing if you know anyone who you think might enjoy this show do tell them, do spread the word

to encourage them to chip in for $499 a month because it makes the world of difference of this show, it really does. And we will be back with yet more history very, very soon. Thank you very much. See you soon. Bye-bye. Bye. Tadda. Oh, What a Time is now on Patreon.

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