Hitler's Socialism

[Daniel Balan]

I highly recommend this video for understanding that National Socialism was in my eyes a skewed form of Socialism. Not to be confused with mainstream stage Green Socialism. National Socialism was in deed far right in regards to everything except the socialist economic control and ideological framework of racial unity and state dominance.
I've read Leo's blog post https://www.actualized.org/insights/was-hitler-far-left-or-far-right and although I agree with 99% I disagree in the association between national socialism and capitalism. 
I've put both the blog post and the transcript of the video in an AI chat and I asked it to compare both. Here is what it says.
 

Here's a concise fact-check of the statements from the second text based on the long transcript:

 

Claims from Second Text:

Hitler was a far-right ultra-nationalist.Fact-Check: Correct, but the transcript argues this nationalism was tied to socialist economic control.

Banned German Communist and Democratic Socialist parties.Fact-Check: True, but also noted that Hitler aimed to replace them with his form of socialism.

Ended democracy in Germany.Fact-Check: Correct, aligning with the transcript's point on totalitarian state control.

Hitler viewed Marxism as a Jewish plot.Fact-Check: Confirmed by the transcript, which shows Hitler's anti-Marxism was part of his anti-Semitic and anti-capitalist stance.

Nazism as extreme nationalism.Fact-Check: True, but the transcript emphasizes this nationalism included socialist economic policies.

Nazis held traditional conservative values.Fact-Check: Partially true; however, the transcript argues these values were used within a socialist framework for state control.

Businesses in Nazi Germany were privately owned.Fact-Check: Nominally true, but the transcript explains this was under state control, not free-market capitalism.

Some industries were privatized.Fact-Check: Correct, but the transcript clarifies this was state-guided "privatization" for control.

Heavy state control for nationalist goals.Fact-Check: Correct, this is central to the transcript's argument of socialist control.

Industrialists made huge profits.Fact-Check: Profits existed, but heavily taxed and regulated by the state according to the transcript.

Banned independent labor unions.Fact-Check: True, the transcript discusses the creation of the German Labour Front as state control over labor.

Hitler divided the world by ethnicity.Fact-Check: True, with an emphasis on racial socialism in the transcript.

Nazis were anti-pluralist.Fact-Check: Correct, the transcript underscores this through the elimination of minorities.

"Blood and soil" slogan.Fact-Check: True, highlighting racial and socialist ideology.

Holocaust denial as right-wing.Fact-Check: The transcript does not directly address this but implies that denying Hitler's socialism aids Holocaust denial.

Nazism's gender roles and anti-egalitarianism.Fact-Check: True, but within a broader socialist control narrative per the transcript.

Nazism was anti-intellectual.Fact-Check: True, but the transcript frames this within state control over education and culture.

Nazism opposed democracy and liberal values.Fact-Check: Correct, aligning with the transcript's description of totalitarian socialism.

 

Conclusion:

The second text accurately describes many political and social aspects of Nazism as right-wing, but the long transcript adds nuance by arguing that these were implemented through socialist economic control, making National Socialism a unique blend of nationalist, racist, and socialist policies. The transcript refutes the idea that Nazi economic policy was capitalist, emphasizing state control and ideological socialism.

[Daniel Balan]

Also as a side note, @Leo Gura often said that on the spiral fascism and nazism are at the lower end of blue. My opinion after knowing this model for 6 years, I realized that everyone is actually 2 stages below I firstly assumed. Having said that, I think fascism and nazism are actually stage purple, why? Their belief in mysticism! How animalistic and how brutal they behave against people that they view as inferior, the notion of Lebensraum, which is about taking living space in the east, in my mind it depicts a very stage purple image, Leo also said that Christians are stage blue, which I also believe that are actually at stage purple, I see the elements of stage blue in them but to me that is just the coating, which hides underneath a very dense core of purple. It might seem total BS what I just said here but that is what my intuition is telling me after seeing reality only just through my own lenses. 

[Daniel Balan]

I want to know what you think of this guys

[aurum]

@Daniel Balan I don't really see a contradiction here.

We already knew that Nazi Germany was a heavily authoritarian regime under state control. Obviously it was not libertarian.

56 minutes ago, Daniel Balan said:

Also as a side note, @Leo Gura often said that on the spiral fascism and nazism are at the lower end of blue. My opinion after knowing this model for 6 years, I realized that everyone is actually 2 stages below I firstly assumed. Having said that, I think fascism and nazism are actually stage purple, why? Their belief in mysticism! How animalistic and how brutal they behave against people that they view as inferior, the notion of Lebensraum, which is about taking living space in the east, in my mind it depicts a very stage purple image, Leo also said that Christians are stage blue, which I also believe that are actually at stage purple, I see the elements of stage blue in them but to me that is just the coating, which hides underneath a very dense core of purple. It might seem total BS what I just said here but that is what my intuition is telling me after seeing reality only just through my own lenses. 

I'd say this is also wrong within the context of spiral dynamics.

Mysticism is not just found at stage purple. You can easily have mysticism at stage Blue.

And of course Blue will treat people as inferior! Their entire perspective is that they have the absolute Truth, therefore all others must be flawed. 

[Leo Gura]

By it's very nature a totalitarian dicatorship can appear like "socialism" because it is a government that seeks to control everything and everyone top-down. This is always justified as "for the good of the people" and hence has a "socialist" vibe.

Rather than taking their self-professed labels at face value you should just look at whether the regime is dictatorial or democractic. The problem isn't the socialism, it's the top-down dictating.

Rather than asking, Is it capitalism or socialism?, first ask, Is it dicatatorial or genuinely democractic?

Edited December 13 by Leo Gura

[Daniel Balan]

@Leo Gura National Socialism was as totalitarian and authoritarian as a regime can get, on a slider of totalitarianism national socialism it's at the maximum limit on that scale! But we have to make distinctions here! I argue that what you said here in the blog post is misleading:

• Most businesses in Nazi Germany were privately owned. Private property existed.
• Some industries were denationalized and privatized
• Hitler allowed German industrialists to earn huge profits
• Independent labor unions were banned. Worker rights and strikes were suppressed.

Those affirmations above may induce a sense that Nazi Germany had a capitalist economic system. Which is wrong.

Businesses were part of state-controlled cartels, and their operations were dictated by state policies, not market forces. The state had the power to intervene in every business transaction, making private ownership in name only. 

State-Controlled Privatization: What was called "privatization" was more about state control through nominally private entities. The state often nationalized businesses first and then sold them to individuals or entities aligned with national socialist ideology, who were then subject to extensive state control. This was not privatization in the capitalist sense but a method to enhance state control over the economy.

Profit for State Benefit: While industrialists could earn profits, these were heavily regulated, taxed, and could be confiscated under various pretexts. In 1941, industrialists were complaining that 80 to 90 percent of their profits were being taken by the state. Profits were seen as a means to fund state objectives, not as an end in themselves.

Although independent labor unions were indeed banned, they were replaced by the German Labour Front (DAF), which was a state-controlled entity. This was part of the socialist policy of state control over all aspects of life, including labor. 

I do emphasize the fact that we should see that national socialism should be seen as the enemy of capitalism because as you said in your blog post

• Hitler’s nationalist agenda was similar to Christian Nationalism and Project 2025.

That means that we are living in times where history repeats itself and if we are not careful we might mistake the fascist movement that is going on world wide with something that is improving capitalism, which is FALSE! Fascism is the Kryptonite of capitalism, of free markets and Democracy! FASCISM is deeply illiberal and controlling. And my critique with this post is that one should never put FASCISM and Capitalism in the same sentence -because that is the mistake that led to the second election of Trump. If people realised that Ultra - Nationalism, creating a ethno - Christian state only serves to the destruction of capitalism and the rise of Fascism which at it's core is totalitarian authoritarian socialism.

 

Edited December 13 by Daniel Balan

[Daniel Balan]

@aurum @Leo GuraI do believe I am not wrong here! My understanding of blue is as follows: 

• Discipline and obedience to authority.
• Rigid thinking and us vs them mentality.
• Order and structure and deep respect for the ethnicity of one's group.

In general for me blue is living life in conformity and discipline. 

Here is what purple means for me:

• Herd mentality and irrational belief in the Christian God above everything else.
• Barbarism and tribalism!( My ethnicity and my view of the world trumps others, Only my way is correct! Others are wrong)
• Close mindedness. 
• The ultra focus on traditions, rituals, mysticism and the forever commemoration of the forebears.
• The glorification of violence and conquest for the greater good of the community! Defeating adversaries that have different beliefs than myself.

I know what the Spiral Dynamics model is contradicted by my assumptions but I believe one of the greatest mistakes we can make is to think rigidly inside the already defined model(Spiral Dynamics). To me I see that the model overestimates the amount of development that humans have achieved so far. From my direct experience everyone is 2 stages lower. For me what you call Green I call Blue. For me there are 3 Tiers of development. 

Purple and Red are tier 1. Blue, Orange and Green are tier 2. And Yellow and Turquoise are tier 3.

Spiral dynamics in my eyes fatally places Christianity as stage Blue. I live in Romania, and here after living for 24 years in a Orthodox Christian society, I completely grasped that Ortodox Christianity falls in the definition of purple I laid above. To me stage blue is a stage where for the first time in history the human starts to behave more like a rational being than a lame ape. And what I see around me is ignorant apes everywhere. 
I think you guys under appreciate the amount of development that is required to even reach blue! And in my eyes mankind is mostly at purple and red! Our political and societal situation is the biggest proof that what I said above could be at least partly true!

[Leo Gura]

Calling Nazism Purple is a big mistake in my opinion.

[Leo Gura]

3 hours ago, Daniel Balan said:

That means that we are living in times where history repeats itself and if we are not careful we might mistake the fascist movement that is going on world wide with something that is improving capitalism, which is FALSE! Fascism is the Kryptonite of capitalism, of free markets and Democracy! FASCISM is deeply illiberal and controlling. And my critique with this post is that one should never put FASCISM and Capitalism in the same sentence -because that is the mistake that led to the second election of Trump. If people realised that Ultra - Nationalism, creating a ethno - Christian state only serves to the destruction of capitalism and the rise of Fascism which at it's core is totalitarian authoritarian socialism.

I explain this difference as the difference between Blue and Orange.

Nazi Germany was Blue-Red and current America is Orange-Blue. Blue is a collectivist stage and Orange is an individualist/libertarian stage. This is why capitalism will manifest differently at these stages.

I see no risk of America actually becoming a Christian nationalist state. That would be too unpopular and too low in development. America is not going back to solid Blue. But America can go hyper toxic Orange. Which is where we are headed now.

The real danger is not a Christian theocracy but a hyper-capitalist oligarchic technocratic dystopia.

Edited December 13 by Leo Gura

[Daniel Balan]

@Leo Gura And don't you think that going hyper toxic orange can actually regress the whole society back to a less developed stage? I think that going hyper capitalistic can also cause a big backlash like what happened in Nazi Germany prior to 1933. In my opinion in the aftermath of this ideological war the society will be less developed that before the Trump era back in 2016. So after all this shit show is over we will be no were near the point we were before all this began. 

[Daniel Balan]

@Leo Gura

18 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Calling Nazism Purple is a big mistake in my opinion.

Why? To me all this Aryan master race BS screams PURPLE. Even the swastika is a pagan symbol. You talked about symbolism in your Stage Purple video. And I do not strictly refer to Nazism, I mostly refer to fascism and Orthodox Christianity, which in my eyes have a coating of blue, but the core is stage purple! Purple is the one who adores their dead forebears and adheres to the most dumb traditions! To me the most stark example of purple is Ortodox Christianity! I admit that I have a very skewed view of the world and of Spiral Dynamics. But through my experience religion is mostly stage purple BS. I admit myself that I am at stage red, where I deeply rebel against religion.

[Daniel Balan]

36 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Calling Nazism Purple is a big mistake in my opinion.

@Leo GuraAgain, you probably assume that because you believe that stage purple cannot build nations, which is correct, that's why you need the stage blue coating, but let's imagine that stage purple can built a nation of the extent of Nazi Germany, once it accomplishes that, what is this nation's objectives? Given their purple level of development? Isn't it exactly what the Nazis actually did between 1933 and 1945? To me it is!
Only a stage purple nation will aim to destroy the "Subhumans" which are other tribes aka nations that undermine their survival. So that's what the nazis did! They went on a quest to destroy the tribes that opposed their agenda and to take their land. If this isn't something that you yourself have talked in your stage purple video that tribes want to conquer neighbouring tribes to take their resources then I admit being wrong. I think that here is just a difference of scale in case of 20th century fascism rather that stage of development. The reason that more classic stage purple tribes in the Amazon forest haven't done the same horrific evil as the fascists of the 20th century is simply SCALE! At the core, in my eyes, there is no difference! The level of development of nationalists and tribes from the Amazon IS THE SAME!!!

Edited December 13 by Daniel Balan

[Leo Gura]

@Daniel Balan Nationalism is a Blue phenomena, not a Purple one. Purple is tribal and clanish. Purple does not have a concept of "nation" or even "race" because it is too tribal.

[Leo Gura]

1 hour ago, Daniel Balan said:

@Leo Gura And don't you think that going hyper toxic orange can actually regress the whole society back to a less developed stage? I think that going hyper capitalistic can also cause a big backlash like what happened in Nazi Germany prior to 1933. In my opinion in the aftermath of this ideological war the society will be less developed that before the Trump era back in 2016. So after all this shit show is over we will be no were near the point we were before all this began. 

I don't see that happening unless maybe a nuclear war.

[vibv]

5 hours ago, Daniel Balan said:

 but let's imagine that stage purple can built a nation of the extent of Nazi Germany

It can't. There's a lot of evolution necessary to even build a civilization - as we understand it - at all.

That's what spiral dynamics is! A model of our collective development. Stage purple is not developed enough to have societal structures of that scale.

Edited December 13 by vibv

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