this post was submitted on 12 Oct 2026
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The belief that the country is on a downward slope fuels the appeal of radicalism.

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[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 5 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

The belief that the country is on a downward slope fuels the appeal of radicalism.

Because radicalism is good for the economy?
I don't think so, they should rather kick out Marine Le Pen and Front National.
That could do a great deal to create better stability and progress. Even if extremists manage to improve the economy in the beginning, they always end up ruining it, just look at Hitler and Putin, and then there are the ones like Trump that ruin it right from the beginning.

[–] killingspark@feddit.org 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

This is only a valid argument if you still believe that anyone is able to improve the economic situation.

Without that believe everything becomes a fight for pieces of a decreasing pie.

Which explains increasing formation of tighter in- and outgroups and the increased support for the political ideology supporting this kind of thinking.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 0 points 1 week ago (1 children)

This is only a valid argument if you still believe that anyone is able to improve the economic situation.

No it isn't, because the radicals will destroy the economy way worse, and that is what will make it a fight for scraps.

[–] killingspark@feddit.org 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

That argument only makes sense if you think the political centre would protect you from the fight for scraps that is already happening.

There is growing evidence that the political centre will throw even more parts of the population into poverty so that the rich can keep getting richer.

I am not saying the radical parties are necessarily the fix to that, certainly not the radical liberatarian and especially not the radical right.

I'm just saying the ~~radical~~ political centre is also not doing so great at making the economy work for everyone.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 0 points 1 week ago (1 children)

the radical centre

That's an oxymoron.

[–] killingspark@feddit.org 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_centrism

Nope, it's what many parties in western nations have become.

General policies

  • An overriding commitment to fiscal responsibility,[59] even if it entails means testing of social programs.[75][76]
  • An overriding commitment to reforming public education, whether by equalizing spending on school districts,[77] offering school choice,[78] hiring better teachers,[79] or empowering existing principals and teachers.[80]
  • A commitment to market-based solutions in health care, energy, the environment, etc., so long as the solutions are carefully regulated by government to serve the public good.[81][82] The policy goal, says Matthew Miller, is to "harness market forces for public purposes".[6]
  • A commitment to provide jobs for everyone willing to work, whether by subsidizing jobs in the private sector[83] or by creating jobs in the public sector.[84]
  • A commitment to need-based rather than race-based affirmative action;[85][86] more generally, a commitment to race-neutral ideals.[87]
  • A commitment to participate in institutions and processes of global governance, and be of genuine assistance to people in the developing nations.[7][88]

Edit: But if your point was, that I made a mistake there: Yes you are right, I meant the political centre not the radical centre.

[–] gian@lemmy.grys.it -2 points 1 week ago (3 children)

I don’t think so, they should rather kick out Marine Le Pen and Front National.

This only means that you are hiding the problems under the rug, it is like outlawing AfD: you maybe remove an immediate problem but you don't remove the people who think that Le Pen or Front National have the solutions, and more importantly, you don't solve the (supposed) problems that causes their rise.
And these people will come back to bite you sooner or later, and it will be far worse than whatever could happen trying to solve the problem now.

[–] rumschlumpel@feddit.org 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That's like complaining that putting murderers in prison doesn't stop people's murderous thoughts.

[–] gian@lemmy.grys.it 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I get what you are saying but to me this seems an oversimplification simply because voting is something act on, not only thoughts to do.
A more correct analogy would be "it is the same thing tha not putting murderes in jail and to pretend murderes do not exist and then complaining because the problem do not solve itself".

The fact is that Le Pen says something a certain quote of voters consider true (for whatever reasons and I am not judging it) and the only way to "remove" Le Pen is solve the problems she points out, it is the only real solution.

[–] rumschlumpel@feddit.org 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The issue is that far right propaganda is self-sustaining, as long as people are in that swamp they're not getting out of that. Banning far right parties is not enough by itself to drain that particular swamp, but it cannot be drained as long as these parties are legal.

[–] gian@lemmy.grys.it 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I disagree with your "The issue is that far right propaganda is self-sustaining" It is not. Or better, it is not at this scale.
Extreme parties always existed, now they are simply on the rise because the other parties simply stopped to care.
If these parties were illegal, they would already have been disbanded.
So the mere fact that they are still there means that they are not illegal, or at least it is not that easy to demonstrate that they are illegal. You cannot disband a party just because you think it is illegal or you don't agree with it.

We want to send back the extremist parties ? Good, what about fighting the cause instead of curing the effects ? Instead of continually draining the swamp, what about to avoid it fills up ?
The assumption is always that this parties exist because people are extremist but nobody explain how can be possible that an extremist population never voted (or never built) an extremist party up until now.

Cannot be that these extremist parties are an answer to the fact that the traditional (Left) parties decide to not care anymore about people ?
I mean, if the first thing Merz said after the AfD won the local elections was "we will continue this way", it means that he don't even try to understand why they had lost.
To remain in your swamp analogy, they don't even try to understand why the swamp if filling up, they are just trying to drain it using the wrong tools.

[–] rumschlumpel@feddit.org 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I didn't say that it's one or the other, both are necessary.

[–] gian@lemmy.grys.it 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

True, but it better to start avoiding the swamp to fill up and then starting to drain it then draining it when it is still filling up.

[–] rumschlumpel@feddit.org 1 points 1 week ago

Governments can do several things at the same time.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

it is like outlawing AfD

Although I agree that outlawing a party is not a good idea, this is a straw man argument, because I never claimed they should outlaw , but only that they should vote those fuckers way out of any influence.
But people are stupid, the average person is dumb, and 50% are even dumber. 🤷‍♀️

[–] gian@lemmy.grys.it 0 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Although I agree that outlawing a party is not a good idea, this is a straw man argument, because I never claimed they should outlaw , but only that they should vote those fuckers way out of any influence.

They already did it last time. And it failed for a simple reason: when you put together everyone with the sole common thread being that they don’t want someone specific to win, you will win in the immediate but then you fail big.
France should have learned what happen in Italy every two election cycle: the right win, then the left put together everyone to not let the right win, the left win and then they fail miserably exactly because there are too many people together that has not a common idea if not "[she/he/them] must not win", and with this and we end up with a new election cycle or a "technical" governement which in any case end with the right winning in the end.

But people are stupid, the average person is dumb, and 50% are even dumber. 🤷‍♀️

Calling stupid all the people who don't think like you or that say they had a problem is the best way to gift them to the right.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

No literally people are morons that don't think or care about what happens around them. It's not about disagreeing, it's also on simple facts of reality. Antivaxxers is an example. Fascists is another. But there are more than it is possible to state here. More than half the population are either ignorant or misguided about the simplest things.

[–] gian@lemmy.grys.it 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I agree. But just calling an antivaxxer or a fascist stupid do not solve anything, if not make thing even worse.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

Acknowledging the problem is the first step to solve it.
It doesn't help to call donkeys horses.