My own observations tell me the truth of this article : What makes the RSS a fascist organization? (Just like Hitler and his Nazi Party)
Its fascist rhetoric: The RSS’s fascist rhetoric has been analyzed by many scholars, and was noted as early as 1963 in Donald E. Smith’s India as a Secular State.
Rhetoric the RSS shares with other fascist movements: Strongman leader: They valorize a strong leader who they think will make the Hindu nation “great again” (sound familiar?)
Theory of racial and cultural superiority: They describe Hindus as a “glorious Race” and all others as “inferior”; their presumption of superiority is used to normalize the caste system, which they use to oppress Dalit-Bahujans they claim to want to “bring into the Hindu fold”.
Highly exclusionary nationalism: RSS nationalism excludes religious or ethnic minorities from their ideal “Hindu” nation.
Language to stigmatize and dehumanize minorities: Describing minorities as animals, vermin, diseases, etc to justify their violent mistreatment or elimination. Calling them enemies and traitors, terrorists, or claiming that they aren’t loyal citizens.
Defending the majority: They present India’s Hindu majority as a victim by stoking fears of being outnumbered one day, and claiming that Hindus are under threat and attack from the country’s minorities. They use this pretext to justify violence and exclusion as ‘self-defense.’
Appeal to past glory through the use of highly charged symbols: The RSS uses Hindu myths and symbols selectively to authorize their fascist and totalitarian version of India’s history, such as wielding Ram’s defeat of Ravana (a conflict of good versus evil) in some versions of the Ramayana as a victory of Hindus over Muslims, Ram’s saffron flag, Sanskrit texts, etc.
Its fascist tactics: Front organizations: The RSS operates primarily through front organizations, allowing it to operate throughout all areas of Indian social and political life. It uses religion to influence everything from education to national elections.
Infiltration: Through its fronts, the RSS is able to install its members in influential positions. With the BJP in power, they have been able to infiltrate important government councils like the Indian Council of Historical Research, which allows them to rewrite India’s history to exclude Dalits, Muslims, Christians and other cultural and religious minorities.
Militarism: The RSS is a paramilitary organization that recruits and trains young men in its shakhas to use weapons and physical force. These shakhas are to the RSS what youth camps were to the SS in Nazi Germany.
Intimidation and Provocation: They use offense to provoke minorities, in order to carry out a premeditated attack on them. About this, A.G. Noorani writes, “Two features stand out in all the riots — RSS men deliberately march in a procession through Muslim areas shouting offensive slogans and the slightest response is seized as a pretext to launch pre-planned attacks.
This explains why Ashok Singhal of the VHP said, in the presence of Advani, in New Delhi on April 4, 1991: ‘Our shobha yantras (religious processions) should pass through every locality.’ This was the technique used by fascists in London in the 1930s when they would march through Jewish areas [to threaten and instigate violence]”.
More important things to know: Hindu fascism’s roots in White supremacy: The RSS draws its inspiration from right-wing, fascist European groups and their leaders, including Hitler and Mussolini. Its long-time chief, M.S. Golwalkar, openly admired Hitler’s “final solution” and wanted to apply the same approach in India to eliminate the country’s minorities.
Its casteist ideology: The RSS was founded and led by Brahmins on Brahminical values in its ideology and practice, and it actively promotes Sanskritised Hindu and Brahminical cultural traditions to maintain power over oppressed castes.
The RSS is an extremely patriarchal organization: It’s membership is exclusively male. RSS leaders have argued that (Hindu) women should be mothers only and should not work. Their members have used rape and other forms of sexual violence to attempt to subjugate Dalits and other caste-oppressed people belonging to cultural and religious minorities.
An RSS member assassinated Mahatma Gandhi: Nathuram Godse shot and killed Gandhi in January 1948. Godse was a right-wing Hindu nationalist who was a member of the RSS and the Hindu Mahasabha, a political party connected to the RSS.
Its fascist rhetoric: The RSS’s fascist rhetoric has been analyzed by many scholars, and was noted as early as 1963 in Donald E. Smith’s India as a Secular State.
Rhetoric the RSS shares with other fascist movements: Strongman leader: They valorize a strong leader who they think will make the Hindu nation “great again” (sound familiar?)
Theory of racial and cultural superiority: They describe Hindus as a “glorious Race” and all others as “inferior”; their presumption of superiority is used to normalize the caste system, which they use to oppress Dalit-Bahujans they claim to want to “bring into the Hindu fold”.
Highly exclusionary nationalism: RSS nationalism excludes religious or ethnic minorities from their ideal “Hindu” nation.
Language to stigmatize and dehumanize minorities: Describing minorities as animals, vermin, diseases, etc to justify their violent mistreatment or elimination. Calling them enemies and traitors, terrorists, or claiming that they aren’t loyal citizens.
Defending the majority: They present India’s Hindu majority as a victim by stoking fears of being outnumbered one day, and claiming that Hindus are under threat and attack from the country’s minorities. They use this pretext to justify violence and exclusion as ‘self-defense.’
Appeal to past glory through the use of highly charged symbols: The RSS uses Hindu myths and symbols selectively to authorize their fascist and totalitarian version of India’s history, such as wielding Ram’s defeat of Ravana (a conflict of good versus evil) in some versions of the Ramayana as a victory of Hindus over Muslims, Ram’s saffron flag, Sanskrit texts, etc.
Its fascist tactics: Front organizations: The RSS operates primarily through front organizations, allowing it to operate throughout all areas of Indian social and political life. It uses religion to influence everything from education to national elections.
Infiltration: Through its fronts, the RSS is able to install its members in influential positions. With the BJP in power, they have been able to infiltrate important government councils like the Indian Council of Historical Research, which allows them to rewrite India’s history to exclude Dalits, Muslims, Christians and other cultural and religious minorities.
Militarism: The RSS is a paramilitary organization that recruits and trains young men in its shakhas to use weapons and physical force. These shakhas are to the RSS what youth camps were to the SS in Nazi Germany.
Intimidation and Provocation: They use offense to provoke minorities, in order to carry out a premeditated attack on them. About this, A.G. Noorani writes, “Two features stand out in all the riots — RSS men deliberately march in a procession through Muslim areas shouting offensive slogans and the slightest response is seized as a pretext to launch pre-planned attacks.
This explains why Ashok Singhal of the VHP said, in the presence of Advani, in New Delhi on April 4, 1991: ‘Our shobha yantras (religious processions) should pass through every locality.’ This was the technique used by fascists in London in the 1930s when they would march through Jewish areas [to threaten and instigate violence]”.
More important things to know: Hindu fascism’s roots in White supremacy: The RSS draws its inspiration from right-wing, fascist European groups and their leaders, including Hitler and Mussolini. Its long-time chief, M.S. Golwalkar, openly admired Hitler’s “final solution” and wanted to apply the same approach in India to eliminate the country’s minorities.
Its casteist ideology: The RSS was founded and led by Brahmins on Brahminical values in its ideology and practice, and it actively promotes Sanskritised Hindu and Brahminical cultural traditions to maintain power over oppressed castes.
The RSS is an extremely patriarchal organization: It’s membership is exclusively male. RSS leaders have argued that (Hindu) women should be mothers only and should not work. Their members have used rape and other forms of sexual violence to attempt to subjugate Dalits and other caste-oppressed people belonging to cultural and religious minorities.
An RSS member assassinated Mahatma Gandhi: Nathuram Godse shot and killed Gandhi in January 1948. Godse was a right-wing Hindu nationalist who was a member of the RSS and the Hindu Mahasabha, a political party connected to the RSS.
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