Fascist is a very concrete definition, as it is a comparison to a concrete existing historical movement. It's kind of the same as with Nationalsocialists. It is a term for a very concrete party, but is sometimes used as a slur.
From EB;
> There has been considerable disagreement among historians and political scientists about the nature of fascism. Some scholars, for example, regard it as a socially radical movement with ideological ties to the Jacobins of the French Revolution, whereas others see it as an extreme form of conservatism inspired by a 19th-century backlash against the ideals of the Enlightenment.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definitions_of_fascism
[1]: https://www.britannica.com/topic/fascism
[2]: https://x.com/esjesjesj/status/1786062622531477707?s=46&t=rr...
It’s used as a catch-all slur to mean “evil thing I don’t agree with”, they can mean any of the competing definitions or none - I doubt if they could come up with what they actually ascribe if challenged and not in front of a computer to look up one of the definitions to find something objectionable within that.
Which is my entire point really, not really getting what yours is here though. That it has a clear definition? I mean, I don’t think it does but it doesn’t matter. It’s not clear in practical use what people refer to.
If, by "very concrete definition" you mean "party name invented by Mussolini" [1], then yes. Otherwise, absolutely not. I can't tell from your comment which you're trying to imply.
Using the word in reference to a modern political movement is essentially just a lazy, dumb way of flinging a slur that invokes someone bad in history.
[1] Per Britannica: "[Mussolini] took the name of his party from the Latin word "fasces", which referred to a bundle of elm or birch rods (usually containing an ax) used as a symbol of penal authority in ancient Rome."
Yes exactly that's what I meant with "concrete existing historical movement". I thought that would be unambiguous, what else do you thought I've implied?
It is however not exclusively used as a slur. What I hear more often from the mouth of politicians, is calling something fascistic, which means that is compared to it, so saying that X is using something from the playbook of the fascists.
This is why I am glad, that calling someone a Nazi is sue-able in my country. This means that we now have court decisions both for that someone is not a Nazi, it was a slur, and that this was punished, and also that someone is indeed a Nazi and is officially documented as such.
> as a symbol of penal authority
And this is actually a good description of what fascism stands for. I'm often astonished of how good self-labels actually are in defining and arguing against ideologies.
I personally think the laws against calling someone a "Nazi" are antithetical to free speech -- and invocation of "Nazi" is always useful to quickly illustrate that you're arguing with an idiot -- but lately my eyes are getting sore from rolling so much, so I have sympathy for such a law.
