What's with this weird tendency to portray Mussolini as ''not that bad''?
1. Because he's not Hitler
2. "he made the trains run on time" meme
3. because it's easy to pity the loser
>Mussolini literally gets praise for not being as antisemetic as Hitler
Because he's generally examined alongside cartoonishly evil people like Hitler and Stalin, which makes him seem decent in comparison.
I don't really know much about Mussolini though, what was so bad about him? I just know that he was politically repressive and his invasion of Ethiopia was brutal.
>>544568
>its easy to pity the loser
No its not. Im trying to romanticize sadam in a story im writing and its hard as hell. Its like he is the antagonist of a bad fanfiction.
>>544561
Because when the Japanese Diplomats pronounced his name it was, "Mussorinni", which made the others delegates laugh and lightened the mood.
>>544561
He wasn't that bad.
Mussolini did nothing wrong
>>544577
He's mostly hated for leading his country into destructive wars because it gave him a boner
did Mussolini ever actually routinely kill his own citizens or was he generally just very repressive and creepy?
>>544574
was he even antisemitic?
did the other axis powers even have a probleem with jews?
>>544660
He personally wasn't antisemetic but he began trying to repress it after Hitler basically told him to
>>544561
Mussolini seems much more human than Hitler.
>>544584
>Its like he is the antagonist of a bad fanfiction.
He has godly fighting powers when not fighting the self insert and starts wars because he wants to rape a specific person that happens to the the self inserts waifu?
>>544584
Saddam was a psychopath
Mussolini was a /fit/izen
>>544623
>routinely kill his own citizens
No, unless you count political enemies
>>544584
>Im trying to romanticize sadam
He wanted to free the Arabs from international gimmicks, but he had to play their game i.e. Persia had to pay
>>544623
Just repressive and creepy. Unless you count Libyans as citizens.
>>544561
The comical level of incompetence displayed by the Italians in WW2 makes it hard to view Mussolini as a threatening figure. Kind of how Kim Jong Un is viewed with amusement rather than fear.
>>544561
Because he used to be a socialist then turned to fascism only to get cucked by the newer insane version to the north which he made some efforts to resist, though he was still a dictator who sided with the Nazis and everything that goes with it this and his tragic end redeems him a little in the eyes of many.
He didn't care about nazi ideology and was a major force for promoting fascism in the early years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margherita_Sarfatti
It is political, if you turn Mussolini into a sympathetic figure then you can use him as an example, basically saying "not even moderate fascism works".
>>544866
Yeah, I really find his end kind of sad. By the time the Nazis "freed" him, he realized that he was a failure.
>In an interview in January 1945 by Madeleine Mollier, a few months before he was captured and executed by Italian anti-fascist partisans, he stated flatly: "Seven years ago, I was an interesting person. Now, I am little more than a corpse." He continued: "Yes, madam, I am finished. My star has fallen. I have no fight left in me. I work and I try, yet know that all is but a farce... I await the end of the tragedy and – strangely detached from everything – I do not feel any more an actor. I feel I am the last of spectators."
I think reading that it's hard not to feel just a little bad for him. He had a large ego for sure but he was doing what he truly thought was best for Germany and in the end it resulted in nothing but fucking up the country and turning it over to the Nazis.
>>544999
>anti-fascist partisans
>communist partisans
Why do they do this?
>>544584
Saddam Hussein was a glorious leader, but his son Uday was even better.
>>544660
One of his mistresses was Jewish so I would think not. There were a bunch of Jewish members of the Italian Fascist Party as well.
>>545028
Because people in the west didn't know how much of a horror show Soviet Union really was until mid 60s when dissidents who survived the gulags escaped to the west.
>>544879
Credit where it's due
Guy had style
>>544660
The Japanese were too busy hating all of Asia and local white men.
What's worth mentioning is when the Government visited Emperor Hirohito to officially declare a state of war, he read an excerpt of a poem by his grandfather(?), the gist of which was "Don't we know that all men across the seas are our brothers?".
>>544561
because he was incompetent. An incompetent enemy is easy to pity. A competent enemy - especially one that almost succeeds - is feared.
>>544561
because he wasn't really into persecuting Jews so much, and the people doing the portraying in Western media are usually Jews.
He looks like a schoolyard bully
>>545788
He was expelled twice for stabbing students.
>>544561
Mussolini literally invented multiculturalism. If he's bad then the EU is fascist too.
>>545800
That's so metal
>>544561
Because he's a multicultural fascist.
Saw no difference between races.
>>545807
Nope, just Italian.
He actually had a pretty good run in Italy between his rise to power and the war. He had a pretty good mind for economics (playing ball with both north and south Italy, unlike most of its PMs), laudable goals, and was a fair diplomat, appealing to the "western" (huge shows of diplomatic support for the US, washington/london naval treaties), "central" (Rhineland Pact, protecting Austria), and "eastern" (Italo-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact, Nationalist China support) worlds.
The large Catholic population here in /his/ would probably recognize his most important domestic achievement as the solution to the Roman Question with the Lateran Pacts, establishing a proper Vatican City. His largest non-religious accomplishment was definitely the foundation of the IRI, which had something to do with pretty much every single positive thing that happened for the Italian economy since its foundation.
He also started the "battles" for land and wheat, which, while not particularly successful in their intended goal (providing cheap food for impoverished Italians), had very positive long-term impacts as far as land usage in Italy went, with several new large towns from the era still surviving to this day.
Of course, with this all being done, Italy had little to invest as far as its military forces (most of its developments between '22 and '40 being "reorganizing what already exists") absolutely was not prepared for the second world war, which is why Mussolini came on with the assumption everything'd be over in a few weeks. That didn't go so well for him.
>>544561
It's mostly relative to his whackier allies.
Musso's fascism was also probably the most realistic model had it survived the war.
Lol good guy Duce
Because he generally wasn't as bad, until the 1940s, I'd recommend either of Denis Mack Smith's biographies of Mussolini of you're interested in learning more about the man
Mussolini's fascism varied greatly from Hitler's national socialism in a variety of ways, most noticeably social and foreign policies
Looking at Mussolini's racial policies, generally he took a very lax view on race as a whole, the old famous quote that pure races don't exist, and there was no doctrines stating how the Italians were gods chosen people and better than the rest, leading many to portray Mussolini as a non-racist
However contradictory to this is the Italian treatment of Slavic minorities throughout the regime, most noticeably the Slovene minority being persecuted under Mussolini's rule, and there is damming evidence to suggest the man did hold racist views against them. However until the 1940s no concentration camps existed in European Italy, with Slovenes deported to Yugoslavia, suggesting that the concentration camps were again a result of Hitler forcing Mussolini to introduce further racial laws
The African concentration camps are less of an issue when describing Mussolini as 'good' considering the British and French operated similar camps throughout their African Empires, dating back to the British in the 2nd Boer war
Too it must also be noted that concentration camps =/= extermination camps as its often taken to mean, concentration camps may make up extermination camps, but do not need to, officially a concentration camp is an interment camp, groups collected without trial and forced into manual labour, the same establishments used for Japanese-Americans
Secondly in foreign policy, there was no policy of 'lebensraum', yes there were territorial ambitions in Europe, but these were largely based on taking territories consisting of Italian minorities, and turning the remaining territories into client states, the only major exception being Albania which was annexed... cont
>>546060
...annexed directly to Italy, and established as an autonomous region under a personal union under Kingdom of Italy, there were no plans for any mass genocide of the Albanian people, only plans for future integration through encouraging Italian language teachings, and Catholicism to the largely divided Albanian people, and we too must remember encouraging integration was a policy that had long existed throughout the world whenever territories with significant minorities were acquired. Whilst also irredentism was and still is a common concept, countries demanding back territories that hold significant amount of their peoples, or even if they just held them previously and demand them back through proximity (Spain and Gibraltar, Argentina and the Falkland islands).
The bulk of Italian territorial ambitions were in Africa, against the British and French colonies in Egypt and Tunisia to create an Italian Empire in 'mare nostrum', this is where we have to remember colonial ambitions and desires to gain new colonies were not seen as evil or criminal, but were simply part of the times, think that for these colonies to even exist they were originally annexed by European powers from the natives who occupied the land, forcing them into their empires, imperialism against the 'lesser peoples' was an accepted concept until the postwar period, just that colonial conflicts between the great powers had failed to materialise into full out wars, mostly making up crisis' and minor colonial skirmishes, Italy's foreign policy was a sign of the time, to gain more resources by gaining more territory.
Mussolini by today's standards is no good man, and probably by the standards of the time he wasn't that great either, but before and even after his illfated alliance with Hitler, the two were incomparable in how evil they were, with Hitler leagues ahead.
Can't believe I missed it out earlier but Mussolini's regime was far more lenient on the Jewish people than Hitler's... cont
>>546098
...Hitler's regime. Until the Italian racial laws were introduced you had many Jewish members of the Italian Fascist party, many I'm high places and the Jewish population faced no more discrimination under the Italian Fascist reigime than what already existed under the previous reigimes with the Jews facing no major discrimination in Italy since the Papal states were reduced to only the Vatican. What is noticeable though, is that even after the racial laws were passed, French Jews still tried to flee from both German occupied France and the Vichy regime to the small Italian sector of France, despite the passing of the racial laws the Average Italian, Fascist party member, or Mussolini himself felt no ill towards the Jews, with the population only following the racial laws due to their status as las, and Mussolini only introducing them due to Hitler's demands (Jews made up less than 1% of the Italian population, there were more Slovenes in Italy than Jews).
And that's all I've got, Mussolini was go good boy who dindu nuttin wrong, but he was nowhere near the level of cruel dictator that Adolf Hitler was, this of course doesn't excuse his actions.
>>544879
>Italy
>SI
I like /his/. Some people here do their homework.
thanks for the explanation anon
>>546131
He's kinda like the Kronk of the situation, while Hitler is Yzma
>>544999
Samefagging but fuck, that's what I get for writing that right before going to sleep. Germany? What a waste of trips.
>>545812
Mussolini was the definition of a cultural fascist. He saw no difference between races but he absolutely saw differences between cultures.
>>545804
>Mussolini literally invented multiculturalism.
I seriously doubt this considering what he did in Libya
>>546426
this, he was multiethnical but not multicultural. He believed different ethnicities could live alongside eachother as long as they belonged to exactly the same culture.
>>546426
If you take the whole war thing out he was pretty based.
>>547320
this, he cucked hitler
>>547337
Fascist architecture gets me hard
>>547360
I came in my ideology
as an Italian i can say that a lot of us are fascists or at laest have some level of respect for Mussolini, personally i believe that he would have been a great leader had he not joined the war, he deeply loved Italy and it's people.
before you ask, no i'm not fascist.
>>547387
What do they teach about Mussolini in schools?
>>547395
considering that we study history in an extremely detailed way there is little room for opinions, we study everything there is to study about history and form our own opinions, usually it's those that did not study enough that hate him, they think that he was a racist maniac and believe that he did nothing worth considering even slighly nice.
>>544574
no one in Italy shipped their jews until Germany took over the North after Mussolini was executed
people equating fascism with racism seem to only think the German variant is the only form of it
>>547378
Futurist art is honestly the best, just a shame that the futurists were even more batshit than the fascists
>>547360
they built a car factory with the test track on the roof
>>547597
Fascism was supposed to be a futuristic ideology but the Germans had to get super romantic about the past.
Still, I like fascist architecture in general.
>>547607
>US federal reserve building is fascist
>>547607
to be fair the fascists did idealise classical rome quite a bit
>>544623
Yes but at that time there was basically a war between rightists and leftists both grabbing for a gun to turn it on the other
>>547628
It's overwhelmingly modern, the Nazis built more neoclassical works
>>544660
Interestingly enough, Admiral Horthy of Hungary was an anti-semite yet at the same time refused to deport Hungary's Jews.
Did he deserve to end the way he did though?
>>547466
Sorta this. I'm not a fascist cocksucker like you but in truth Mussolini's brand of fascism was supported by Italian Jews, who got betrayed by Hitler once Mussolini got deposed. Most people blame Mussolini for associating with Hitler rather than any specific racial policies he enacted. Its the people you associate with, not just your views or lack of them.
>>547658
>Drags Italy into a war they absolutely cannot win
>Gets bootyblasted by Allies and needs Krauts to bail him out
>King tells him to GTFO
>Hitler has to bail him out
>Takes over rump state even more unpopular than before
>Completely useless without tremendous Nazi support
>Eventually gets whats coming to him
But nope, Mussolini was a gud boy, he dindu nuffin wrong, he was rebuilding the Roman empire and even went to sunday school!
>>547658
Nope.
Strikes Italians as a cowardly bunch.
>YEAAAAH MUH MARE NOSTRUM.
>Italy is defeated
>Capitulates
>I-ITS THIS GUY'S FAULT.
>>544561
He kind of fucked up trying to take out the gays. But hay dem Italians, hard to tell.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8CrJpZqAhk
>>547710
>implying it wasn't his secret plan all along
>>547759
Rome v3 gaytopia edition
>>544660
he was not. matter of fact the amount of jews voting for him was disproportionally high, many people do not know this. only to gain hitler's favor did he later on openly speak out against jews.
he's still an asshole though.
>>544703
>unless you cont political enemies
and why would you ever NOT do that? is it okay if he Israeli government orders the Mossad to kill everyone who ever posted on /pol/?...
>>547658
No.
Well fascism wasn't all sunshine and lollipop guys i mean Mussolini did do /some/ bad things
>>547953
yeah but to libyans
>>547337
>he cucked hitler
are you retarded? if anything it was the other way around. cuck has lost all its meaning anyway, but still, bleh.
>>547785
lmao
>>547621
It literally looks like something Speer would have designed.
Replace the American flags with Nazi ones and nobody would think it looks out of place.
>>545044
it is true, there were a lot of italian jews who were fascists.
It is because, qith the birth of the State in 1860, they became citizen and stopped being cucked. They felt a very strong bond for the monarchy and they fought en masse in WWI.
Then a loto of them were fascist. But a loto of them were commuist/democratic/partisans.
And even those of had been strongly fascists, after the Racial Laws of 1938 they were persecuted. See, for example, Ettore Ovaza or the Turin based group La Nostra Bandiera.
source: I'm an italian historian
>>547395
in the last decades he was painted in a negative way, but usually with the meme "he wasn't that bad before joining Hitler".
But in reality he was a fierce dictator. He genocided Lybians and Ethipians (see Debra Libanos massacre for example). He used poisonous gas for the first time in human wars. He killed communist and democrats even before rising to power.
He was absolute shit
>>547466
but Mussolini blindly followed Hitler racial laws.
If he wasn't antisemitic, he could have avoid to follow HH in this path.
The reality is, Mussolini became racist and a lot of his Fascist Party colleagues were blatantly racist (see La Difesa Della Razza). But italians were not antisemitic. The regime was, but people wasn0t that much. Even Hanna Arendt agrees with that, after studying the persecution of jews throughout Europe
>>548299
I didn't know we shared a board Mr. Scaruffi. A loto of people would be happy to know you roam around here.
>>544660
no
Stefan zweig hearing upon some italian guy being sent to forced labor for 10 years , sent a letter to mussolini asking him to show leniency because the guy had a family and they were sad.
You know what mussolini did ?
He liberated him.
ABSOLUTE MADMAN
>>548333
you really think I'm Scaruffi?
I'm not him but I'm more expert in Music History than him topkek
>>544561
muh jews
>>548335
he did it because Zweig was famous. He was typical italian: strong with the weakest and weak with the strong
>>548317
but anon, mustard gas was used in WW1
if anything that makes mussolini much worse, since mustard gas was so fucking terrible that even the fiercest enemies agreed it should be banned. it's something you don't even wish onto your biggest rival.
>>548331
>If he wasn't antisemitic, he could have avoid to follow HH in this path.
truth is he did not much care about ideals and integrity, more about power and control, about good relations to germany
>Hanna Arendt
mein neger
>>548340
what's your favorite band pierro?
>>548351
still zweig was a jew , could have went worse if mussolini was legit antisemite
>>548354
yes I was confused.
Italy was the first to use Iprite vs Africans but in the first part of the colonization, well before Mussolini's rise to power. But, Mussolini used heavily chemical weapons against people in African colonies.
It is true, he was only interested in power. But in that period, a lot of scientist thought races were true. So it's not hard to believe he believed them.
Hanna Arendt, I quoted her because she can't be accused of loving fascist regimes, but she acknowledged that Italy (along with Bulgaria and Denmark) were the safest places in Europe for Jews during WWII
>>548359
he was not antisemite like Hitler or the Nazi Party or the Ukrainans, Croats and Polish peasants who slaughtered thousands of jews. But he had no problem in putting Italian Jews into gas chambers, so maybe he wasn't that antisemite if compared to Hitler but he surely wasn't philo semite as well
>>548356
this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I67A23zYwTY
this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiHWOWBOBZ0
and this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6_zsJ8KPP0
lel
>>547647
And yet in Vichy France, officials would happily offer Jewish men women and even children for what they well knew were death camps.
>>548400
torche is pretty cool
always liked cows, they have that no wave vibe going for them
don't fuck with slayer
I doubt you know much of anything about music theory
>>548414
we can talk about Magister Perotinus if you want, m8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KA6oq_UYbyA
>>547628
They used it as a cultural base and source of inspiration, but their cultural motion was clearly towards the future. Of course, you can't launch yourself at modernity without a solid foundation to spring off of.
>>544879
>day 27
>they still believe i am merely a building
>>544577
Was hitler cartoonishly evil? How so?
He's reprehensible and brutal, but did he do anything malicious for the sake of it? He actually seemed like a pretty nice guy at his core.
>>544561
Because he was not THAT bad. He was not bad at all. Most of the bad stuff that happened to Italy before WWII were a result of autarky imposed to Italy by foreign powers because he dared create colonies of his own.
Of course the whole cultural thing was retarded, but italians and plebs and somewhat liked it.
His mistake was joining Hitler and WWII, had he gone the Franco way and developed Lybia more things would have been danker.
>>547387
>as an Italian i can say that a lot of us are fascists
It's true that a lot of Italians do have respect for Bonito (I do myself), but a small percentage of those would declare themselves fascists
>>547395
Depends on your education. In my case we studied the historical events, confronted his regime with the ones of Hitler and Stalin plus Harendt and De Felice stances on fascism vs totalitarism.
>>551024
>Harendt
Hmm, sorry for that
After World War II, the usual Allied perspective of Italians was that of the bumbling fool who had little knowledge of what he was doing during the war. As anyone with half a brain would know, this is far from the truth.
>>550674
I think its not much that he was cartoonishly evil, but that certainly was the image given to him after the war: literally evil incarnate.
Mussolini wasn't actually the most extreme fascist floating around at the time, he seemed moderate in comparison. Compare him to the futurists
>>551102
Futurists were before the Fascists and the two are not strictly the same.
>>551127
but fascism was definitely the more moderate out of the two
>>551127
actually the futurists stuck around they just spent the rest of their time trying to suck up to the fascists
>>546060
>However contradictory to this is the Italian treatment of Slavic minorities throughout the regime
But not really. To Mussolini, there was no race, only the nation. The slovenes (and the lybians), by considering themselves not italian, defied that idea, so they had to be oppressed. If they just accepted to be italianized quietly, Mussolini would have treated them no worse than any proper italian.
>>544749
> free arabs from international gimmicks
> by allying US, France, UK and USSR and doing their bidding
>>548317
>He used poisonous gas for the first time in human wars.
Are you retarded? chemical warfare started being mainstream well before Benito was born.
>>544561
Closet racism and rightist circlejerking endemic in 4chan, particularly since /pol/ got fucked up.
>>550985
>developed Lybia more
More than he actually did? Like 90% of lybian infrastructure is still italian made from occupation times. Well it was before they tore everything down when Gheddafi died.
>>544561
>What's with this weird tendency to portray Mussolini as ''not that bad''?
Because he wasn't that bad. He was a dictator and he repressed his opposition, yeah, but he didn't destroy his country through his policies, he didn't genocide anyone, he actually kept pretty splendid international relations until the ethiopian crisis (and even that was far more the fault of the international community than his own, his behaviour was nothing outrageous in those years).
He was not a good man, but as far as dictators go? He really wasn't that bad.
Of course retards woh can't into context or refuse to see things beyond black and white get hissy fits when Mussolini isn't thought to be as 'evil' as Hitler, but that's because they're retards.
>>544561
I think it's mostly because he didn't attempt gigantic genocide and he didn't encourage his soldiers to rape Vietnamese women. He was evil as fuck, but seemed less evil than the others.
>>551602
Yeah he did a lot but much more stuff was built by Italians later on thanks to the efforts of Enrico Mattei and Eni. The fact that we Italians allowed the destruction of Lybia pissess me off so fucking much, we showed the world what a bunch of pussies we are when it comes to foreign policy.
>>548408
French were likely the most avid Hitler's collaborators which is rarely brought up for whatever reason.
>>544561
He was the only modern Italian politician that simply said "fuck you" to the mafia. That's why he's still liked there.
Other than that... let me thing
A socialist journalist who was "genuinely" anti-war became very patriotic and pro-war after British paid him.
Then he, as a pro-war 3rd-way guy got his veterans and took over Italy.
Which caused him to become anti-war(even when he was gassing niggers in Ethiopia).
Then he became pro-war again when he had to loose few thousand soldiers to claim that he fought.
And then, when he created Italian Socialist Republic he claimed that he's anti-war but he has to fight the invasion off.
On every single issue, from socialism-capitalism, through conservatism-progressivism to religious-anti-religious he went through similar stages.
Not to mention 3/4th of his mates were freemasons.
He's wasn't so bad when compared to Hitler, Mao or Stalin, not even close as repressive, but unlike them, he was some serious case of hypocrite.
>>551628
>He was evil as fuck, but seemed less evil than the others.
Animu tier considerations
>>545054
Dissidents who survived Gulag were in west by early 40's. You simply gave no shit.
>>551656
Last time Italy went against the international community it was forced into diplomatic isolation and an alliance with an extremely disagreeable party. Your politicians must still be traumatized.
>>551675
>he was some serious case of hypocrite
It was actually part of his political philosophy not to have fixed positions on issues, but just go with the current and the moods of the people.
To be precise, more than a hypocrite he was a side switcher.
>>547360
I saw that building in that Titus Andronicus movie.
>>547658
I mean he was a fascist so yeah basically.
>>551803
>tfw no glorious pan mediterranean foreign policy granting Italy energy security
>>547658
He was going to die sooner or later regardless, by that point he probably wanted to die anyway.
Fundamentally though, mobbing a guy's dead body and then stringing it up so you can stone it is a pretty cowardly thing to do
>>551989
Not to mention a pretty bad failure of discipline. The partisan leadership wanted a trial and shit, but some commie decided it was better to just beat him down and string him up.
>>544561
He wasn't genocidal. However, he was still a horribly repressive dictator.
>>544577
>stalin
>cartoonishly evil
I want reddit to leave
mussolini wuz a gud boi, he dindu nuffin
>>550625
topkek
>>551583
yes yesterday i was retarded and drunk.
what i meant, italian were the first in history to air bomb, and Benito followed Crispi's steps
what are you all missing about Mussolini is one important thing.
what was his job before taking the power?
he was a Journalist.
he knew how to hook on people feelings.
he was a media person, director of one of the most read newspapers in Italy.
He was a fucking journalist so he knew how to manipulate the public opinion. It is clear
>>544561
Because he wasn't not that bad
>>547647
Wrong. He let the deportations go on for months, and only decided to save the Jewry of Budapest to gain the Allies' favor for his attempt to switch sides.
>>544584
>Im trying to romanticize sadam in a story im writing and its hard as hell. Its like he is the antagonist of a bad fanfiction.
The Americans put him in charge.
