The Borders of Genre: The Glorification of Fascism Within Alternate History

[Coiler]

The issue is more you don't get there without genocide. The only really scarcely populated parts of Africa in the late 19th centuries, such as southwestern Namibia, Somaliland, Mauritania, were nonetheless not exactly terra nullius

I figured as much.

 

[Warthog]

I can understand and forgive Turtledove for writing Guns of the South the way he did, but that doesn't change the icky pro-Confederateness of the book itself.

The issue again is notsomuch the confederate victory itself but that the protagonist (Lee) is a slave-owner, and dislikes the anatagonists (Bedford Forrest and the AWB) for being more cruel to slaves than he is. It's a Lee-stan honourable confederate sanitisation

And we get no slave POV.

 

[Gary Oswald]

I'll ask the people who know a lot more about Africa than me (ie you and @Gary Oswald for one): Would an "African Argentina" (ie, state with a majority descended from European immigrants that got that way almost completely through voluntary immigration) even be slightly plausible? From my limited perspective, it doesn't seem like there were that many Europeans willing to go there compared to the Americas, and you'd have to have them all settle an implausibly limited area, and other objections I haven't even thought of...

Part of the problem with attracting immigrants is America already exists. It's much more developed, and much safer thanks to a much earlier genocide, and so going to suck in a lot of immigrants who don't want to rough it in Windhoek.

You certainly could get more European immigrants than happened, Rhodesia famously refused to take most white immigrants who applied, but fundamentally as Warthog says, those people need to go somewhere and need to get land off someone and like if you put a million germans in Namibia where the Herero and Nama still claim control over all the land, well we know what happened when you put 6,000 Germans in that situation and that is they become so frustrated about not having land that they called for the genocide of those who did have land.

If you have a million whites, that is still going to happen and the genocide/land grab is either going to go ahead, or they're going to go home frustrated.

 

[Japhy]

The question, I suppose, is what do we want to "allow" in stories about Nazi Germany? It should be *possible* to tell stories where Germany does better in ww2 without actually being a Nazi or an apologist. Is it worth the risk? Maybe not in most cases.

I do wonder if something like Das Boot was written now, would you get some people saying it was apologism, because it doesn't portray the crew as evil enough or similar?

Its not really about allowing obviously. There is no control mechanism. As for if it's possible to tell a story about a victorious Germany without being apologist? Of course it is.

I just don't think it's something that almost anyone in the AH Online Community is capable of.

 

[Warthog]

I just don't think it's something that almost anyone in the AH Online Community is capable of.

The problem, I think, is that those who properly understand the horror of such a victory are much less inclined to write about it.

@SpanishSpy 's recent vignette being an interesting exception, as have a few other vignettes been on this place over the past few years

 

[ChrisNuttall]

The issue again is notsomuch the confederate victory itself but that the protagonist (Lee) is a slave-owner, and dislikes the anatagonists (Bedford Forrest and the AWB) for being more cruel to slaves than he is. It's a Lee-stan honourable confederate sanitisation

And we get no slave POV.

Given that Lee basically cheated his inherited slaves out of their freedom - IIRC, his father (?) had mandated they be freed upon his death - its hard to see him as a decent man, certainly not by modern standards.

 

[Arthur_Phuxache]

Likewise I think it's worth noting that Turtledove, the number one exponent of alternate history for a long time including several Nazi victory stories, is himself Jewish.

As is Stephen Fry, who wrote one of the more convincing Hitler Gloder wins TLs in novel form.

EDIT: well, Jew-ish, he lost relatives in the Shoah anyway.

 

[Japhy]

The problem, I think, is that those who properly understand the horror of such a victory are much less inclined to write about it.

@SpanishSpy 's recent vignette being an interesting exception, as have a few other vignettes been on this place over the past few years

Its more basic problems then that tbh.

Edit: And while I don't mean any offense to Alex I don't think that story was successful in being an exception.

 

[SpanishSpy]

The problem, I think, is that those who properly understand the horror of such a victory are much less inclined to write about it.

@SpanishSpy 's recent vignette being an interesting exception, as have a few other vignettes been on this place over the past few years

Since it's been mentioned twice in this thread - the story being referred to is And Never to Be Written - figured I'd save y'all a few clicks, plus making the conversation easier to read in hindsight.

 

[Ricardolindo]

for all that Estado Novo wasn't militarily allied with the Nazis, the ideology was fascist

The definition of fascism and which dictatorships can be considered fascist is an incredibly hot debate but I wouldn't consider the Estado Novo fascist. Salazar was much more a Catholic conservative or reactionary than a fascist.
Salazar disliked the strong personality cult in fascism and
actually criticized Mussolini as too authoritarian.

 

[SenatorChickpea]

The definition of fascism and which dictatorships can be considered fascist is an incredibly hot debate but I wouldn't consider the Estado Novo fascist. Salazar was much more a Catholic conservative or reactionary than a fascist.
Salazar disliked the strong personality cult in fascism and
actually criticized Mussoini as too authoritarian.

Of all the hills to die on....

 

[Ricardolindo]

The issue is more you don't get there without genocide. The only really scarcely populated parts of Africa in the late 19th centuries, such as southwestern Namibia, Somaliland, Mauritania, were nonetheless not exactly terra nullius

Somaliland is completely out of question because the extremely hot summers are incredibly unattractive for Europeans.
What is your definition of "southwestern Namibia"? How often did the Herero and Nama visit the Skeleton Coast? The area is one of the least hospitable coasts in the world.

 

[Ricardolindo]

The definition of fascism and which dictatorships can be considered fascist is an incredibly hot debate but I wouldn't consider the Estado Novo fascist. Salazar was much more a Catholic conservative or reactionary than a fascist.
Salazar disliked the strong personality cult in fascism and
actually criticized Mussolini as too authoritarian.

Of all the hills to die on....

I just wanted to clarify. There are a lot of online questions as to whether Franco and Salazar can be considered fascists. They were horrible far-right dictators but at least in the case of Salazar, I would argue he was not a fascist.

 

[Charles EP M.]

What is your definition of "southwestern Namibia"? How often did the Herero and Nama visit the Skeleton Coast? The area is one of the least hospitable coasts in the world.

That's an exception that proves his point, surely: an unpopulated part of Africa is unpopulated because it's horrible and nobody wants to live there, so why would Europeans settle on it? They want to live somewhere nice, and somewhere nice is going to have locals living in it

 

[Japhy]

I just wanted to clarify. There are a lot of online questions as to whether Franco and Salazar can be considered fascists. They were horrible far-right dictators but at least in the case of Salazar, I would argue he was not a fascist.

If you don't want people to call you out on this when they very clearly think you're in the wrong about all of this you aren't obligated to keep pushing it.

 

[Japhy]

The notion that Nazi ATLs get us inevitably and inherently tied up into Nazi ideology is clearly overegging it.

Nope. Once you start playing around with the death cult of Fascism living you're tied up in the nonsense of slaughter.

 

[varyar]

Nope. Once you start playing around with the death cult of Fascism living you're tied up in the nonsense of slaughter.

That's absolutely wrong. You can depict something without approving of it.

 

[Jared]

Nope. Once you start playing around with the death cult of Fascism living you're tied up in the nonsense of slaughter.

Respectfully, I disagree. An author's views are not necessarily the same as the work they depict. Nazi victory stories need to be depicted with extreme care given the obvious sensitivities, but there's no inherent reason why they can't be told.

My objection to Nazi victory stories (and WW2 AH in general) are two-fold, in that such care is often not taken, and in that they've been depicted so many times that the field is stale and it's hard to find anything new to explore. But in principle they can be written without condoning Nazi ideology.

 

[Japhy]

Respectfully, I disagree. An author's views are not necessarily the same as the work they depict. Nazi victory stories need to be depicted with extreme care given the obvious sensitivities, but there's no inherent reason why they can't be told.

My objection to Nazi victory stories (and WW2 AH in general) are two-fold, in that such care is often not taken, and in that they've been depicted so many times that the field is stale and it's hard to find anything new to explore. But in principle they can be written without condoning Nazi ideology.

I'm not saying it's condoning. But it's playing with fire. See TNO and the fact it has a loving Nazi fan base.

 

[Doctor Sulemain]

I'm not saying it's condoning. But it's playing with fire. See TNO and the fact it has a loving Nazi fan base.

As I recall, so does American History X. There's playing with fire, but there's also the issue that fascists and their ilk will throw gasoline on it anyway, and supply their own matches. Or not just the far-right; look at all the American Conservatives who seemingly never actually listened to the lyrics of Born In The USA.