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Mid-Life Crisis posted:I believe collapse is necessary first. Voice of the people has gone downhill since Reagan, cemented as impossible since Citizens United. Everything since has been a predictable race to the bottom. Just finish it off already. Accelerationism is a lazy, immoral and unrealistic ideology only seriously espoused by contemptible pieces of poo poo. Do you know what the reality of a post "collapse" existence entails? Why do you even think a second Trump win would lead to something approaching a collapse, instead of simply further solidifying authoritarianism and repression in ways that are difficult if not impossible to mend or reverse? When has a "collapse" (specifically not revolution, collapse) actually led to anything getting better, historically? How do you go from the bottom you mention to a world where people now magically have a voice because everything got so bad it's now wrapping around or whatever stupid bullshit you believe? Mid-Life Crisis posted:Liberal judges think they make laws. They are just as problematic as the corporate sellout ones. You want to expand on this one? e: awful snipe
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Dec 10, 2023 01:56
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Kagrenak posted:Accelerationism is a lazy, immoral and unrealistic ideology only seriously espoused by contemptible pieces of poo poo. Do you know what the reality of a post "collapse" existence entails? Why do you even think a second Trump win would lead to something approaching a collapse, instead of simply further solidifying authoritarianism and repression in ways that are difficult if not impossible to mend or reverse? When has a "collapse" (specifically not revolution, collapse) actually led to anything getting better, historically? How do you go from the bottom you mention to a world where people now magically have a voice because everything got so bad it's now wrapping around or whatever stupid bullshit you believe? Usually countries write songs about when they did so. But pretending there’s a difference between collapse and revolution is just bad faith to justify the personal attack.
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Dec 10, 2023 02:16
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Why do you think your side will win the ensuing civil war?
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Dec 10, 2023 02:21
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the people will surely rise up to support my exact political beliefs any day now!
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Dec 10, 2023 02:27
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Gnumonic posted:Biden administration uses emergency authority to sell tank shells to Israel The Biden administration may be continuing to arm the IDF, but it's put the brakes on efforts to arm Israeli settler militias with American guns. Even if you think he's drawing the line in the wrong place, it's pretty unlikely that Trump is going to be drawing any lines at all. He'll love brutal extremist settler pogroms rampaging all over the West Bank. Gumball Gumption posted:I just don't feel like "genocide there but not here" and "genocide there and here" are real choices. They are real choices. They're the two real choices that we have. You may not feel that "kill fewer people" and "kill more people" are very different, but "kill nobody" isn't a choice on offer here on America, mostly because "killing terrorists" is widely popular here.
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Dec 10, 2023 02:29
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It’s just hard to comprehend the idea that they are going to avoid giving small arms to settler terrorists while also continuing to give much larger weapons for killing scores of civilians in Gaza with impunity
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Dec 10, 2023 02:32
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Mid-Life Crisis posted:I believe collapse is necessary first. Voice of the people has gone downhill since Reagan, cemented as impossible since Citizens United. Everything since has been a predictable race to the bottom. Just finish it off already. Lotta the same arguments you're making were made by leftists back in 2000. Now we have Citizens United thanks to them. Strangely it hasn't made Democrats better... but it's killed a lot of Iraqis and made our lives worse. And the process of crawling out of the hole is harder now. I regard this intellectual branch with about the same level of credibility as Reaganomics. It's been tried enough times and refuted enough times by example it's baffling people still parrot it.
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Dec 10, 2023 02:34
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Mid-Life Crisis posted:Usually countries write songs about when they did so. But pretending there’s a difference between collapse and revolution is just bad faith to justify the personal attack. Collapse would be the transition from a capitalist bourgeoisie republic to a fascist authoritarian government. That’s ya ain’t seen nothing yet territory. You lack the imagination to think of the things a fasicst US would do.
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Dec 10, 2023 02:36
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Bar Ran Dun posted:Collapse would be the transition from a capitalist bourgeoisie republic to a fascist authoritarian government. Yeah to say that a collapse into authoritarianism or disorder is the same as a revolution is extremely loving wrong and ahistorical.
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Dec 10, 2023 02:38
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If we're looking to shame and blame people let's throw it at anyone who chose Biden in the primary, with his extensive history of championing military interventions that kill hundreds of thousands. There were other options- candidates without that history of causing untold bloodshed. Candidates who could have been reasonably certain not to be cheerleading active genocide. "You must actively support this genocide enthusiast because the alternative is worse" will never be persuasive to some people and no amount of scolding will change that. Scold those who actually had some agency to prevent this. Bodyholes posted:but it's killed a lot of Iraqis By "it's" I assume you mean the AUMF Biden championed in the Senate? He's the one smiling in all the photo ops of the signing ceremony. FLIPADELPHIA fucked around with this message at 02:41 on Dec 10, 2023 |
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Dec 10, 2023 02:38
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FlamingLiberal posted:It’s just hard to comprehend the idea that they are going to avoid giving small arms to settler terrorists while also continuing to give much larger weapons for killing scores of civilians in Gaza with impunity It's not really hard to comprehend at all. America has historically been very accepting of bloody colonial oppression waged by professional militaries in anti-terrorist operations against an anti-colonial insurgency, even if it causes considerable collateral damage against civilians. On the other hand, random bands of private citizens forming openly racist ad-hoc militias and engaging in random ethnic violence without even pretending there's a hint of self-defense or military necessity to it? As a general rule of thumb, American elite and media culture officially disapproves of that, at least north of the Mason-Dixon Line.
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Dec 10, 2023 02:46
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I think accelerationism is also a symptom of bad times, honestly. Like obviously it's espousers aren't blameless because they're usually self-proclaimed intellectuals but it makes sense: during the Trump years it's hard to shake the idea that, for a leftist, things were coming to a head. BLM exploded, we had some of the biggest turnout we've ever seen. And then of course you have the frankly pornographic dream of the would-be revolutionary. It has a lot in common with people who fantasize about the zombie apocalypse; any day now, the right is going to consolidate their power, and we on the left are going to organize around a principle of revolutionary spirit, and the fight will go to the streets, and stakes will be clear and immediate. We live in a world of frustrating idealogical mundanity, with most people willing to wake up, and go to work, and continue voting Democrat rather than taking to the streets to oppose the Stormtroopers or whatever. Accelerationism gives into the fantasy that if we simply abandon the status quo, our enemies will take their masks off and we can finally have the battle we've been avoiding. Why these same people never seem to be at the heart of a current, existing revolutionary movement I find confusing and dishonest. If you think the only way to change the world is through direct action against a despot, than surely you believe we're close enough already. It's almost as if there is some reason why revolution is difficult, but this is shrouded in a cynical, condescending undertone that they, the accelerationists, want everyone else to see how bad things can get without them before they step in to save them which is laughably stupid, they have no structure or organization. They know this; deep down they're hoping that the super-charging of fascism will make a revolution suddenly materialize when all it will do is make organizing more difficult than it is now.
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Dec 10, 2023 02:46
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Mendrian posted:I think accelerationism is also a symptom of bad times, honestly. Like obviously it's espousers aren't blameless because they're usually self-proclaimed intellectuals but it makes sense: during the Trump years it's hard to shake the idea that, for a leftist, things were coming to a head. BLM exploded, we had some of the biggest turnout we've ever seen. And then of course you have the frankly pornographic dream of the would-be revolutionary. It has a lot in common with people who fantasize about the zombie apocalypse; any day now, the right is going to consolidate their power, and we on the left are going to organize around a principle of revolutionary spirit, and the fight will go to the streets, and stakes will be clear and immediate. We live in a world of frustrating idealogical mundanity, with most people willing to wake up, and go to work, and continue voting Democrat rather than taking to the streets to oppose the Stormtroopers or whatever. No. The only thing preventing revolution is the majority belief that the status quo is safer. That these politicians are earnestly working hard with their constituents in mind. Pull down the curtain and the illusion is gone. It’s a straw man to portray collapse as decades of fascist nightmare. You have leftists and rightists that will never agree on anything other than setting up a political system that can’t be so easily bought by the bourgeois again. The US lasting as long as it has is the exception. Huge exception. It had some things right, but it’s long overdue. Technological advancements keeps bailing it out.
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Dec 10, 2023 03:15
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FLIPADELPHIA posted:If we're looking to shame and blame people let's throw it at anyone who chose Biden in the primary, with his extensive history of championing military interventions that kill hundreds of thousands. Great post, you nailed it. A good reminder that Biden isn't the lesser of two evils, he's one of the main architects of America's Middle Eastern policy in the 21st century. He has a significant amount of blood on his hands. More than Trump, surely.
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Dec 10, 2023 03:20
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Kagrenak posted:Yeah to say that a collapse into authoritarianism or disorder is the same as a revolution is extremely loving wrong and ahistorical. I think what’s happening now is similar to before 18 Brumaire.
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Dec 10, 2023 03:28
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The notion that the left is destined for successful revolution when it can't even manage to get votes is a comforting fantasy that absolves one of actually having to care about political outcomes. i.e. there's a lot of bullshit floating around to ignore the glaringly obvious fact that with president HRC we'd still have Roe vs Wade.
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Dec 10, 2023 03:45
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Even if Biden were worse than Trump on Middle East foreign policy (I strongly disagree), there are other issues at stake in a United States election besides Middle East foreign policy.
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Dec 10, 2023 03:48
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Also remember that "Obituary for the Sanders Left" article from a few months ago, where it turned out the leftists were right and after the squishy centrists got their victory with Biden they immediately stopped caring about any form of social justice or economic improvement, and now CRIME is the number one concern. If the Dems win the centrists go back to sleep, if the Dems lose the fascists start killing. If you win for decades you can maybe get what you want, but I live in Kentucky so winning is impossible for literally everything except governor. I love the republic, I love democracy. TheDeadlyShoe posted:i.e. there's a lot of bullshit floating around to ignore the glaringly obvious fact that with president HRC we'd still have Roe vs Wade. No, we wouldn't. The Republican who won in 2020 after covid-19 killed an unprecedented 100,000 Americans would've gotten to appoint the same seats since Mitch kept them vacant. There's no anti-Trump wave in 2018 with no Trump.
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Dec 10, 2023 03:59
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TheDeadlyShoe posted:The notion that the left is destined for successful revolution when it can't even manage to get votes is a comforting fantasy that absolves one of actually having to care about political outcomes. That is a comforting speculation, that conveniently ignores the reality that there were already calls not to confirm any of Clinton's nominees. Maybe Clinton would have thrown Roe under the bus to get anyone through the confirmation process.
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Dec 10, 2023 04:04
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They would have just kept the court smaller than allow those seats to be filled.
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Dec 10, 2023 04:07
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Mid-Life Crisis posted:I believe collapse is necessary first. Voice of the people has gone downhill since Reagan, cemented as impossible since Citizens United. Everything since has been a predictable race to the bottom. Just finish it off already. Glad you're willing to shovel vulnerable people like me into the furnace. Great leftism, just fantastic.  Aktion T4 on the right, acceptable losses to the left.
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Dec 10, 2023 04:29
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Ms Adequate posted:I didn't really mean it as a moral condemnation and if it came across as such that's my bad, just an observation that highlights why not voting for Biden is unlikely to play any part in giving us a better system with better candidates. It won't be interpreted as "Supporting genocide is absolutely politically unacceptable" it'll be interpreted as "We need to move more to the right, given that someone far to the right of Biden just beat Biden." And I think that would be totally the wrong lesson to draw, but it's kind of like the border; has Biden done enough on it? Not by a long shot. Is direct or indirect support for Trump next year going to suggest that Biden is too tough on the border? Also not by a long shot. I personally believe you're working on the faulty assumption that the Dems don't want to move right in the first place. They know why they lose. There are countless analysts paid good money to do postmortems about what drove voters to or away from candidates after big elections, and leftists aren't exactly quiet about why they don't support Biden, plenty of op-eds and tweets and videos explaining that at length. When the Dems look in the mirror and say "We gotta get more racist.", it's because they were already planning on it and were just waiting for the excuse.
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Dec 10, 2023 05:06
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Agents are GO! posted:Glad you're willing to shovel vulnerable people like me into the furnace. Great leftism, just fantastic.  one.I suspect MLC is just a younger moderate (soft-socialist, its kinda hard to tell?) who is extremely conflict averse and has bought into some very shallow isolationist messaging without understanding the political roots of that ideology, its implications across economics, or just how evil a sudden shift to inaction could be. Yes you can be a moderate and a socialist you just have to be VERY ideologically shallow. Its vibes based politics baybeee.
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Dec 10, 2023 05:23
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Mid-Life Crisis posted:The US lasting as long as it has is the exception. Huge exception. It had some things right, but it’s long overdue. Technological advancements keeps bailing it out. Our education system really failed this goon. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Dec 10, 2023 05:36
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the_steve posted:I personally believe you're working on the faulty assumption that the Dems don't want to move right in the first place. For every one of your votes that is on the table their is 2.5 broke brained moderates who cant make up their mind but express political opinions identifiable to pollsters as more than random white noise that dems adorably think will come into the fold if only they thread the needle between fiscal progressive and social conservatism hard enough. And so long as the boot isn't on their neck about 60% of last elections voters were cool with a bit of milk-toast racism. Never forget that their is a huge section of this dumb party who are minorities looking to, if not pull the ladder up, make sure no one else gets a easier time of it. You cap out at another 4-6% of their vote total, the dumb moderates they think they can get cap at between 15 and 20 (this is grossly unrealistic but being bad at stats is a political passtime). The Overton window in this hellhole sucks. https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/11/09/stressed-sideliners/ https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/11/09/outsider-left/ Barrel Cactaur fucked around with this message at 06:54 on Dec 10, 2023 |
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Dec 10, 2023 06:16
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Barrel Cactaur posted:MLC is just an accelerationist, by their own description. But they appear to have confused the right wing accelerationism, where the fascists just keep blowing poo poo up(literally) and breaking society to paralyze liberalism as a viable structure of governance, with left wing accelerationsim, the position that the final position of social development will inevitably make capitalism either outmoded or irrelevant as the driving force of society by some unpredictable mechanism that will result in true liberation and equality. He belives he is doing the left version but is doing the legwork for the right wing version, which is the I’m not against capitalism. I’m no leftist. Capitalism needs checks and balances and they’ve been captured. You tell me how to fix that otherwise? If only Democrats had supermajority they would prioritize term limits and voter reform so they could lose all that power in two years? I’m not that naive
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Dec 10, 2023 06:30
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I'm really not confident that the enthusiasm for Biden is there for 2024. Mostly I just find it hard to believe he's really running again. I know 80 year olds and I wouldn't want to be in a car driven by them, but one being in charge of the most powerful country in the world is okay? (yes I know Trump is almost as old.) The dems had 3 years to groom a successor and place them in the public eye and they just haven't done that? If they somehow scrape out a win this time, I can't see them winning 2028. and what exactly are their plans for the supreme court? If they won't commit to impeachment or adding more seats, what is left? Are they really just going to continue to allow the status quo to continue and more evil poo poo to happen? Koburn fucked around with this message at 08:23 on Dec 10, 2023 |
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Dec 10, 2023 06:46
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Mid-Life Crisis posted:I’m not against capitalism. I’m no leftist. Capitalism needs checks and balances and they’ve been captured. You tell me how to fix that otherwise? Oh my God, it's been a long time since I filled out my "babbys first political beliefs" bingo card from one post. Like,
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Dec 10, 2023 06:53
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as someone in a state that had strict term limits and then voted to get rid of them, they don't work. turns out a continuous influx of people learning how government functions and then leaving just as they start to develop institutional knowledge sucks for actually getting any poo poo done at best you're leaving everything to the civil service, at worst you're leaving it to whoever will line their pockets
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Dec 10, 2023 06:57
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TheDeadlyShoe posted:i.e. there's a lot of bullshit floating around to ignore the glaringly obvious fact that with president HRC we'd still have Roe vs Wade. Byzantine posted:If the Dems win the centrists go back to sleep, if the Dems lose the fascists start killing.
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Dec 10, 2023 07:15
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the_steve posted:I personally believe you're working on the faulty assumption that the Dems don't want to move right in the first place. Matt Yglesias Substack posted:The table below summarizes the 2012 and 2020 platforms’ economic planks. The shift on corporate taxes arguably just reflects a change in the underlying policy status quo, but in other areas, you see clear ideological and policy movements in a more ambitiously progressive direction. More in the post which doesn't seem to be paywalled. Misunderstood fucked around with this message at 07:29 on Dec 10, 2023 |
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Dec 10, 2023 07:21
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Misunderstood posted:Oh no, they have a whole little fan fiction about why it wouldn't have made a difference, I've asked. (e: Oh, way beaten, by somebody actually unironically sharing it) Thinking that Mitch would suddenly appoint HRC's picks to the Court is greater fanfiction than anything anybody else is posting. Misunderstood posted:Boy I hope they win then! Yeah, fortunately it looks like spite is holding things together, even if a better world was a foolish dream.
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Dec 10, 2023 08:16
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Making a better world just to be an rear end in a top hat.
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Dec 10, 2023 08:20
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Agents are GO! posted:Making a better world just to be an rear end in a top hat. Ending hunger in America, for all, to make the chuds cry. It's sort of inspirational, I guess? Has the same kind of tone as "oh he's an rear end in a top hat, but at least he's our rear end in a top hat".
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Dec 10, 2023 08:23
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Mid-Life Crisis posted:No. The only thing preventing revolution is the majority belief that the status quo is safer. That these politicians are earnestly working hard with their constituents in mind. So which radical revolutionary groups do you belong to? EDIT: Like, obviously you're not going to tell me, but if you are correct and it's a foregone conclusion that collapse will bring about revolution, the only moral thing to do is prepare for revolution, in the hopes you can steer the course of change. And like, I'm extremely doubtful that you are. Most accelerationists just hope, like zombie survival fetishists, that the end will bring about change, but they have no ambition to bring change. Forgive me if I'm wrong, but that does seem pretty standard. Mendrian fucked around with this message at 08:43 on Dec 10, 2023 |
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Dec 10, 2023 08:40
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Wayne Knight posted:“I refuse to vote for the lesser of two evils” is not wrong, but functionally indistinguishable from “my moral purity is more important than the harm that will befall targets of a second trump administration” The "lesser of two evils" in this case is still supporting a genocide which is pretty loving evil. Biden and many other Democrats continue to support an apartheid regime that is currently systematically murdering the friends and families of Americans who voted for them. Honestly, the lack of a red line when it comes to this frightens me and it should frighten anyone from a marginalized community.
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Dec 10, 2023 09:38
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theCalamity posted:The "lesser of two evils" in this case is still supporting a genocide which is pretty loving evil. Biden and many other Democrats continue to support an apartheid regime that is currently systematically murdering the friends and families of Americans who voted for them. The US was built on genocide and the bones of marginalized communities, the lack of a red line isn't some kind of new revelation. Bellmaker fucked around with this message at 13:11 on Dec 10, 2023 |
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Dec 10, 2023 13:01
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100% of accelerationists are upper middle class whites who have never experienced poverty living in a gated community in suburbia who think they will never actually see the bad parts of the collapse they advocate for because they're sheltered morons anyone advocating for accelerationism should be mod challenged to post their yearly income so that they can be made fun of for being a rich bougie rear end in a top hat instead of pretending there's any merit to their bullshit Iamgoofball fucked around with this message at 13:58 on Dec 10, 2023 |
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Dec 10, 2023 13:32
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I’m not voting for Biden or anyone who supports genocide in 2024. If my 1 vote drives the country into a fascist hellhole that ends up doing more genocide? Boo loving hoo that means 50% of the country supported that and at this point why are we even one country?
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Dec 10, 2023 14:06
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Google Jeb Bush posted:Setting aside for a moment the fact that the Biden admin is in fact doing things, this is a wildly, wildly inaccurate statement. Annual US aid to Israel is somewhere in the realm of $3.5-4b, which is about 4b too much. It is also 7% of our annual foreign aid budget and 0.1% of our federal budget. $4b IS a vast sum of money. Maybe not when compared to the budget as a whole but $4b spent on humanitarian purposes within the US would do quite a bit of good.
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