Concerned Citizen posted:

dumb and bad

Concerned Citizen posted:

I love poop

Mr. Horrible posted:

BIG DUMB POST INCOMING

When it comes to identity politics, I think one of the problems is that we are accepting the terms set forth by moderates and right-wing extremists. As an example, here's how one group of allies responded to Ted Cruz's comments wrt bathroom bills:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6ddblwBpvA

I don't mean to single these guys out, they're just the first ones I found with a handy bite-size clip of their coverage. But what are we actually getting here? Some head-shaking, some righteous indignation. Sometimes there's a bit of hand-wringing about how the LGBT community is being attacked so heavily by regressives. But what's missing?




1) Context. Did you know that there's a single law firm that has been pushing these bathroom bills? That many of these bills have language that is almost word-for-word identical to the text put out by this anti-gay organization? I'm trans and even I didn't know about this until ChickenArise posted the following URL to the trans megathread:

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/04/alliance-defending-freedom-lobbies-anti-lgbt-bathroom-bills

So in other words, these are not legislatures independently choosing to pursue this issue. This is a coordinated attack on transgender people, carried out by an organization working from the shadows. An organization headed by a man who wrote a book called The Homosexual Agenda. So let's call them what they are: a deep-pocketed hate group that's interfering in the personal lives of minorities. This is an opportunity to showcase how unelected but moneyed interests work behind the scenes to shape our national discourse. That should never be accepted, and should be called out at every opportunity.



2) A refutation of false claims. Transgender women are the victims of sexual assault, not the perpetrators. In fact I've been unable to find a single case of a transgender woman sexually assaulting anyone, much less in a bathroom. But so far, I've only seen a single news organization highlight this point:

http://abc11.com/politics/transgender-sexual-assault-victim-says-shell-defy-hb2/1296062/

Even then, they gave McCrory a pass when he said this was a "new issue." That is a boldfaced lie. The first transgender American to publicly discuss their transition fought in World War 2, and garnered a fair bit of attention and media coverage in the 1950s:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christine_Jorgensen

This is not a new phenomenon, but once again by failing to provide that context the news and even advocates are inadvertently giving legitimacy to their opponents. This issue is not "some people think you have to use the bathroom that matches your birth certificate because they think it will cut down on sexual assault," it's "a hate group is secretly workshopping its discriminatory legislation around to local and state governments to use as a wedge issue in a cynical attempt to get votes by pretending this is a strange new phenomenon, when in reality this issue is over 50 years old and should have been addressed a long time ago." And you can take it further from there: if we knew transgender people were a thing in the 50's, why didn't we start working on it? Why didn't they teach kids about gender dysphoria, so that we could identify the problem and get treatment before they killed themselves (something over 40% of all trans people attempt)? Why was this reality hidden from children growing up before the 21st century, and why did we as a society do nothing to address this very real issue?




How bathroom discrimination is discussed is part of a larger pattern in our national discourse, which is to keep falling for the Golden Mean fallacy. SMBC Theater had a pretty good parody video of this a few years ago:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGArqoF0TpQ

Right now, both sides of the debate are usually a regressive social conservative and a moderate liberal. Neither party is interested in discussing the money angle, because they both want the status quo. This framing of the national discourse as a dialog between the socially left and right wings of social conservatives is, obviously, a false narrative. Which is why when we discuss identity politics issues, we have to keep hammering home how important the role of money is in all of our political issues. Off the top of my head, here are some ways in which money plays a part in bathroom bills:

1) Money in politics is not only about bribery. The organization pushing this legislation has a wide reach because they can buy the time and energy required to get it in everyone's hands. And unlike the other side - the HRC, UCLA, etc. - they're doing it while hiding from the public. Why isn't it mandatory for the origin of this legislation to be disclosed to the public? Well, because moneyed interests from out of state know it's bad PR to be caught with their hand in the cookie jar. And in a country where bribery is legal, it was bound to happen that parties other than industry lobbyists would start sneaking around with pre-written laws for power-hungry pols to crib from.

2) Trans people are already handicapped economically, making it hard to fight back. Trans people have some of the highest rates of unemployment and homelessness of any group in America. Given that there is no protection against discrimination for employment or housing in many parts of the country, that's to be expected. And since many health insurance companies won't pay for any of our approved treatments - we're talking thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars - we're on average poorer than even people with the same take-home pay that we get. Without the support of non-profits, we'd be hard-pressed to defend ourselves from a bunch of rich regressives.

3) The only pushback that has made a real difference so far is from the 1%. If it wasn't for large corporations and rich artists boycotting the state, North Carolina would only have a handful of protesters on their hands. McCrory and company have been blindsided because they assumed they'd be able to push the trannies around with impunity, but they weren't counting on the capital class to take a stand (they usually don't, after all). In a country where wealth is concentrated into the hands of a few, the concerns of those few are the only ones that are seriously considered. Whether you're for or against bathroom discrimination bills, that should give you pause.




tl;dr - show the receipts, expose them for the lying amoral hucksters they are, then bring it back to class war

(feel free to pick this apart and show me why I'm dumb and wrong, by the way)

hemophilia posted:

I used to whine about identity politics a lot and honestly what has given me pause is how Bernie Sanders has handled the issue.

Believe me I still lament the theoretical single-issue identity politics person who may exist somewhere up the food chain making GBS threads up a larger movement for the sake of their own pet issue, but I'm not sure this actually exists much as I and others sometimes think it does. I think there are bigger fish to fry since it's reasonably easy to integrate the politics of identity into a larger progressive movement and there are much more malevolent forces that actively work to undermine progressive politics and I would rather focus on that than being an rear end in a top hat because somebody is trying to be a part of something while having needs unique to them and people like them.

Gene Hackman Fan posted:

And for what it's worth, they're making some great strides in overcoming some of the other hurdles with solar energy, where the SolarReserve field in Nevada can keep producing energy for 10 hours after the sun has gone down.


Even though molten salts are what they use at SolarReserve, I still think that molten salt thorium reactor would be a decent interim step-- waste with a half life of hundreds of years instead of thousands being what really caught my attention.

hemophilia posted:

Nuclear power owns but non-plutonium generating reactors should be deployed. Surely we have enough plutonium to end the world several times over, and a few alien worlds for good measure. A major problem with nuclear power is the waste and we need reactors that produce as little as possible. Ideally you have something with non-toxic or managable waste products. Something that with maybe one or two more processes is basically inert and non-toxic forever. I don't know if that's possible but that's the pie in the sky goal imo

Mr. Horrible posted:

Comedy option: petition the UN to step in and oversee our elections

NumberLast posted:

The 'new congress' part that skeeves me out more than anything is the concerted effort to run people that have never before held elected office. I don't really agree with that.

Concerned Citizen posted:

legislating is difficult. getting a bunch of progressives in office who don't know how to legislate would lead to bad policies that discredit the left. i mean i'm cool with replacing moderates with progressives in safe districts, but replacing the whole congress with loving randoms is not only unachievable but also a terrible idea in the first place.

Mr. Horrible posted:

If I read it right then they're only talking about replacing people who aren't on board with progressive policies. So Concern Trollizen is, once again, concern trolling.

And yes, I am 100% in favor of a Berniecrat Pledge of some kind. Norquist's Tax Pledge has been a huge part of the rightward lurch, the very least we can do is get people to sign a piece of paper saying they support progressive values. That's such a trivial, tiny thing that any person who won't do it even when promised money and votes is clearly not to be trusted.

Sheng-ji Yang posted:

the only way to turn the democratic party into a progressive, leftist institution is to destroy it

Concerned Citizen posted:

THIS ALREADY EXISTS

Concerned Citizen posted:

what the hell do you think pccc and dfa are, exactly? this is literally the purpose of their organizations.

quote:

During the lead-up to the 2016 elections, many progressive groups began campaigns urging Warren to challenge Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination for president, but the PCCC was notably absent. Citing Warren's statements that she would not run, the PCCC instead urged Clinton and the other candidates to adopt Warren's focus on economic populism, with a spokesperson saying it is "facilitating a race to the top on big Elizabeth Warren-style ideas".[10][15] It has stayed officially neutral in the Democratic primary but an aide to Clinton did meet with the head of the PCCC and the PCCC has applauded her campaign's policy proposals.[16][17]

Concerned Citizen posted:

IMG- 2012: why don't you run progressives and vote for them?
2016: you little shits.jpg

Obdicut posted:

There is practically no chance of a brokered convention.


Can you think of any other explanation?

My Imaginary GF posted:

MyIGF

He may not be the progressive you want; he's the progressive you deserve.

NumberLast posted:

Had the realization that that conversation was just as awful to read as it was to have .

And all you guys are awesome. Just had a day go to

C-SPAN Caller posted:

its sort of hilarious tbh that hillary's party line says bernie bros are awful people that shut hillary supporters down yet here we are

Quiet Feet posted:

I pondered getting a tattoo of Mjolnir until I found out that white supremacists have co-opted Norse runes and symbols as shorthand for "hey I'm a racist fuckstain."

I have Scandinavian roots and like Norse mythology, why'd they have to pick that to screw up?

THORIUM posted:

no it's cool, man, we've got Thorium now

NumberLast posted:

Nah, they're just pissed that he didn't stay pure and started to believe he could actually win. If you use their tactics you're no better than they are, and he used all the same tactics!

Classic Comrade posted:

lol i should've named this thread you_little_shits.jpg

Gene Hackman Fan posted:

Top City Homo posted:

big socialism fan here

NumberLast posted:

Something tells me this one's been done before

Breadallelogram posted:

every post in the bernie thread was full of high quality content

Classic Comrade posted:

he's already in the grassroots select list!

Concerned Citizen posted:

i don't really think it deserves criticism.

Classic Comrade posted:

https://twitter.com/JToscano/status/728646414989967360

kewl

NumberLast posted:

I'm gonna become an Idahoan in about a month. Pity me.

NumberLast posted:

Nah, I'm gonna be in Moscow. Home of Idaho Hempfest.

Classic Comrade posted:

yeah there are a LOT of threads over there like that now.

empireofcrime posted:

I wonder how prevalent this thinking is nationwide as far as trying to get Sanders-backing democrats elected?

https://twitter.com/LarryWebsite/status/742472844752367616

NumberLast posted:

Well he was pretty concerned.

In fairness he also talked about DFA which is pretty good. They're a little too conservative (in an actionable sense) for my liking though. I'm kind of all for DFA and more focused groups finding really quality candidates and BNC just running someone in every drat district.

That being said BNC's whole thing about finding people with no legislative background is poop and I really hope they just drop it.