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based on the op's definition of leftism is it considered a Grand Heroic Leftist Uprising to rush the courthouse where a black dude is on trial for raping a white chick and drag him outside and
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Dec 12, 2016 19:52
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Good OP, OP. Centrists can't inspire people because their entire ideology isn't inspiring.
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Dec 12, 2016 19:52
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Before the invention of work for pay humans were crippled by a sense of disempowerment and since we invented it everyone's been really happy.
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Dec 12, 2016 19:53
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also it's silly to make the simultaneous arguments "people want to feel in control of their own destiny" and "without some task imposed upon them people would naturally sit around doing nothing"
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Dec 12, 2016 19:53
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No; this demonizing of "centrism" is the wrong direction. Nobody who puts any amount of effort into thinking about it ascribes to being a "centrist," but putting forth a "you are either 100% with us or you are a piece of poo poo" argument smacks of a certain speech by GWB after 9/11 in 2001. It's language of exclusion. The problem isn't "centrism;" it's a weak-rear end and corrupt Democratic party that lost the keys to the kingdom that they had as soon as they ran that fatass Gingrich out of town and poo poo all over the hard-right "Contract with America." They've blown it ever since. "Centrism" has nothing to do with it. It's incompetence and corruption. So-called "centrism" isn't "the Right in disguise," as you indicate. "Centrism," which isn't even a real political theory in the US, is nothing more than "the portion of voters that don't blindly ascribe to a certain political category to the exclusion of all others." You say "centre" a lot. This leads me to believe that you are not a US citizen. Please correct me if I'm wrong. An outside view of American politics and the perceived positions of the parties or political categories has no correlation to those parties or political categories as they exist everywhere else. The US is a VAST nation with incredibly diverse populations, regional ideologies and biases, and an entrenched two-party binary stranglehold on the government. You can forget about "the left" and "the right" in the terms of the rest of the world, and that these "centrists" are those that believe in "compromise." It isn't the case, at all. Don't confuse "The Left" in America with anything approaching a real political power philosophy. It isn't. The Democrats are not "The Left." The Democrats are not "Centrists." They (as in the elected Democrats) are useless, directionless, wishy-washy and spineless people incapable of leading and have no real conviction, unless they are a single-issue leftist. The Democrats as a party consistently fail to engage any white people, period, and by choice. This is important, because the Republicans do. the words "Liberal" and "Progressive" are epithets hurled at all Democrats by the Right, but that's mere meaningless invective. The Democratic party is thoroughly useless - Obama won the White House twice because people like him - because white people like him. He isn't exactly "the left," but he has done more good for progressive and leftist causes than anyone else since the Carter era. Also - not a Democrat party-line hack. His party choice was a vehicle, not a religion. Most elected Democrats have no capacity to inspire or lead whatsoever, and are far too timid to deal with actual problems: the disappearing middle class and loss of American prosperity, climate change, hawkish interventionism, and corrupt capitalism, for example. This is why you can't take a "you're with us or against us" approach to so-called "centrists," at least as the word applies to voters. These "centrists" are voting R because the Democrats are busy doing things that do not affect the day to day lives of the "centrists - " who would be loving thrilled to vote for a non-Republican, non international-incident level embarrassing ticket if the Democrats would grow some balls and actually address things that directly affect the majority voter. "The Right" is pretty much as you describe, but do not make the mistake of believing that everyone who votes "R" is a bigoted, racist, homophobic, tranny-hating xenophobe that hates welfare queens and believes that the bible is science. "The RIght" is a distinct minority - even among white people - but they have a stranglehold on the reins of power in the Republican party and the good fortune of generally running their terrible candidates against noodle-limp Democratic candidates. The Left has nothing like this sort of power with the Democrats. This is very important: the white vote matters. White people matter in elections. The Right exploits this with the knowledge that all they have to do is keep talking about gays ruining the boy scouts and Muslims instituting Sharia law in Oklahoma. Yes, the bigots concentrate here, but it's not a real representation of the party or the party's voters. The Right is Republican today, but the situation was completely flip-flopped at various times throughout US history. And the Right has always relied on the white vote. Today's Democrats don't even try - it really is as if they go out of their way to demonize whites. Look - I know that isn't the intention; that's just how it looks when heard in conjunction with the Republican bullshit. I am in no way claiming that the Left is trying to "oppress" the whites. They just ignore them. It's a losing strategy. When you talk about "centrists" as "the Rights in disguise," (and I know I'm paraphrasing there), you are not really understanding the role of race in an American election cycle. A lot of the people you are talking about, and seem to be angry at, are whites who vote Republicans into office. You're directing your anger at the wrong people. The Left can engage the majority white voter, and if they did so, they would get poo poo done - local, state, and national level. If they'd also pay attention to the electoral college and how it differs from the popular vote (which does not matter), they might have won the White House in 2000 and 2016 - but it wouldn't have done much good, because they still got slaughtered on every other ballot. The Left, as a "political force" in the US, are fringe-issue voters that only vote once every 4 years - they ignore local and state elections and somehow believe that their vote for President is "the big one" that matters. This is why "the left" consistently fails - the "centrists" have nothing to do with it. The Left is also way too lazy to even approach the energy of the Tea Party - that was a racial issue to a large degree. Occupy Wall Street was the closest the Left has come to that kind of "movement," but they lacked staying power. Sanders could have harnessed the power of the "centrists," but he wasn't given an opportunity to do so because "Hillary's Turn." "Centrists" are not politically minded. Their vote will default to an "R" or a "D" if they are not led to vote for a real, inspirational candidate. The "centrists" are not the enemy of Leftism, Progressivism, or Liberalism in the US. Telling centrists that they are the bad guys is how you end up with Herr Gropenfuhrer as President. "Centrists" aren't the problem. You can instead look right at the Democratic party leadership and elected officials. These are not "centrists," they are just farcical incompetents. KaiserSchnitzel fucked around with this message at 20:09 on Dec 12, 2016 |
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Dec 12, 2016 19:58
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Paradoxish posted:Right, so how do you do this? Like, if those jobs literally don't exist or it's cheaper/more efficient to outsource or automate them then how do you create this sense of empowerment? If you're creating good jobs through subsidies or protectionism then you are for all intents and purposes pushing more power onto employers, who are now employing people only because they absolutely have to. You're just talking about a form of welfare where people are now reliant on government assistance for their continued employment status. I honestly don't know. I know the problem but I can't pin a solution.
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Dec 12, 2016 20:44
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OwlFancier posted:Before the invention of work for pay humans were crippled by a sense of disempowerment and since we invented it everyone's been really happy. I never said working at Walmart was empowering, but for many I'm sure it's at least slightly better than being unemployed. But whatever, keep putting words in my mouth.
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Dec 12, 2016 20:50
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I'm going to go out on a limb and say that if being unemployed didn't mean I would starve I would be pretty happy not working at a big store, actually. I can't really think of any single, conceivably attainable thing in the world I would rather have than the ability not to go to work.
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Dec 12, 2016 20:53
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Gio posted:I never said working at Walmart was empowering, but for many I'm sure it's at least slightly better than being unemployed. Now ask yourself why
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Dec 12, 2016 20:55
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Gio posted:I honestly don't know. I know the problem but I can't pin a solution. Drastically reduce hours and create an insane social safety net and automate as much as possible that participating in the economy is a choice (or at least not necessary to do for so much of the week) so that the majority of workers' relationships with work are "to provide for others and obtain a little luxury" instead of working solely to survive in a system that cares about no one.
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Dec 12, 2016 20:57
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NewForumSoftware posted:Now ask yourself why gently caress, thanks.
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Dec 12, 2016 21:08
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Wall-E, the new leftist utopia, apparently.
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Dec 12, 2016 21:11
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Also the entire concept of utility as worth basically says that the disabled and any out-group who doesn't "fit in" to the rest of society is Not Productive, and therefore barely human. It's not good!
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Dec 12, 2016 21:13
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Gio posted:Wall-E, the new leftist utopia, apparently. why do you believe that people would sit around doing nothing forever unless a taskmaster gives them a pupose
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Dec 12, 2016 21:23
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Also why do you think sitting around doing nothing is worse than working until you die? Isn't the whole supposed goal of work that you do it for a while so you can later sit around and do nothing?
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Dec 12, 2016 21:24
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Talmonis posted:Wage slavery isn't a goal of centrists. Education of the populace leads to a better world for all of us, and is pretty universally revered among centrists I've met. From what I can tell, wage slavery isn't a goal of most centrists, but they are often relatively ambivalent towards it (or at the very least unwilling to make any significant sacrifices to eliminate it). If there's one thing I find most common among a certain common breed of centrists, it's the belief that educated, rational people should be making decisions based upon the data. While I technically agree with this, in practice I find that these people have a huge blind-spot caused by the fact that they believe "experts who make rational decisions based upon the data without much bias" exist in the first place. What these people call "unbiased" is generally just a bias in favor of the status quo, and this is often due to the fact that they personally benefit (or at least aren't harmed by) the status quo themselves. Honestly, I'm not sure if it's really a solvable problem, since I think that pro-status quo sentiment and a lack of empathy for the disadvantaged is a natural result of being a happy, financially secure person (obviously there are exceptions, but as a general trend).
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Dec 12, 2016 21:25
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Gio posted:Ok, I'm talking about "work" as in "fulfilling a useful role in society," not specifically wage labor, in reference to basic income as a solution to decreased labor force participation and rising inequality caused by automation. The basic assumption inherent in your position is that working at Wal-Mart qualifies as "fulfilling a useful role in society", because you're assuming that any work that people get paid for is necessarily useful to society (and vice versa). What about volunteering at a homeless shelter? It's not a job, and people don't get paid for it - does that mean it's less useful to society than stocking the shelves at Wal-Mart?
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Dec 12, 2016 21:27
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OwlFancier posted:Also why do you think sitting around doing nothing is worse than working until you die? I think it's better just based on personal experience. I'm sure many agree and some disagree, the latter of whom would do nothing in the future automated volunteer utopia. Main Paineframe posted:The basic assumption inherent in your position is that working at Wal-Mart qualifies as "fulfilling a useful role in society", because you're assuming that any work that people get paid for is necessarily useful to society (and vice versa). What about volunteering at a homeless shelter? It's not a job, and people don't get paid for it - does that mean it's less useful to society than stocking the shelves at Wal-Mart? Nope, not at all.
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Dec 12, 2016 21:37
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Gio posted:I think it's better just based on personal experience. Why do you think people retire?
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Dec 12, 2016 21:38
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"Compromise in a democracy is evil! EVIL! Also I want power to the people. " --the OP
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Dec 12, 2016 22:11
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This poster loves police brutality, but only when its against minorities!
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Gio posted:I honestly don't know. I know the problem but I can't pin a solution. For what it's worth, I think this is why you get so many people on the left saying that we need to make an active effort to change how we engage culturally with the concept of "work." The goal isn't to permanently place people on welfare so much as it is to separate a basic standard of living from employment. Not currently working? No problem, you don't have to be destitute while you look for a new job, go back to school, or otherwise figure out how you're going to deal with your situation, and ideally no one will be forcing you back into the labor force to keep your benefits. I think concepts like wage insurance are a good step in this direction too. Basically, the point of most strong forms of welfare (including things like UHC or a UBI) should be to put workers in a stronger bargaining position vs. their employers by allowing people to choose unemployment over a bad job. The fact that a strong safety net can help smooth over issues like automation is a bonus. In any case, I mostly brought it up because the welfare state is something that I've never seen associated with centrists before. Democratic centrists in the 90s and early 00s were actively trying to dismantle the welfare state and focused heavily on pushing people back into the labor force, which mostly just had the effect of pushing people off of welfare and onto SSI.
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Dec 12, 2016 23:34
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OwlFancier posted:Before the invention of work for pay humans were crippled by a sense of disempowerment and since we invented it everyone's been really happy. Only problem with this thought is that people actually had to work to take care of themselves before the concept of work for pay. Like as much fun as it is to imagine that everybody would transform into a self-driven artist in the post-work/basic income world, most of the people would be deeply unhappy unless they also had strong family/community ties to occupy their time. Working at Walmart isn't fun or exactly fulfilling but it's something
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Dec 13, 2016 00:29
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Call Me Charlie posted:Only problem with this thought is that people actually had to work to take care of themselves before the concept of work for pay. Like as much fun as it is to imagine that everybody would transform into a self-driven artist in the post-work/basic income world, most of the people would be deeply unhappy unless they also had strong family/community ties to occupy their time. it's not hard to find or build community ties. like few people are going to discover their passion as a stained glass window maker or whatever but plenty of people are going to end up volunteering their time just to find something to do. like litter would be a thing of the past, the elderly wouldn't die alone and bored in nursing homes, every little league team would have two coaches for every player, public libraries would drown in free labor etc.
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Dec 13, 2016 00:39
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boner confessor posted:it's not hard to find or build community ties. like few people are going to discover their passion as a stained glass window maker or whatever but plenty of people are going to end up volunteering their time just to find something to do. like litter would be a thing of the past, the elderly wouldn't die alone and bored in nursing homes, every little league team would have two coaches for every player, public libraries would drown in free labor etc. That would be downright utopian. Of course, then people would be at the mercy of the government so we have to make sure our future is filled with millions of factory jobs for us all to work endlessly at, lest we loose what little power we have.
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Dec 13, 2016 01:31
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By the way, if you guys want to watch an amazing documentary about how much of a disasterous Plague Centrism and Feaux-Liberalism is, I highly, HIGHLY reccomend you watch Adam Curtis's 'Hypernormalization' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fny99f8amM it's super depressing and frightening. Al-Saqr fucked around with this message at 01:44 on Dec 13, 2016 |
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Dec 13, 2016 01:38
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boner confessor posted:it's not hard to find or build community ties. like few people are going to discover their passion as a stained glass window maker or whatever but plenty of people are going to end up volunteering their time just to find something to do. like litter would be a thing of the past, the elderly wouldn't die alone and bored in nursing homes, every little league team would have two coaches for every player, public libraries would drown in free labor etc. It kinda is depending on where you live and your willingness to work with faith based organizations. (And that's ignoring the elephant in the room where all the automation is privately owned which means all your local money is getting funneled away from your community to multinational corporations with no allegiance to anybody)
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Dec 13, 2016 01:49
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boner confessor posted:it's not hard to find or build community ties. like few people are going to discover their passion as a stained glass window maker or whatever but plenty of people are going to end up volunteering their time just to find something to do. like litter would be a thing of the past, the elderly wouldn't die alone and bored in nursing homes, every little league team would have two coaches for every player, public libraries would drown in free labor etc. It's loving soul destroying.
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Dec 13, 2016 01:52
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OwlFancier posted:Before the invention of work for pay humans were crippled by a sense of disempowerment and since we invented it everyone's been really happy. Before the invention of work for pay humans were hunter-gatherers or subsistence farmers and were much more directly in control of their own destiny and that of their community. The purpose of the "jobs are empowering" section was to say that people need to be and feel empowered, and jobs are one of the ways in which that can happen, as opposed to welfare. It's not that it has to be jobs, just that welfare is not the answer to this problem because it's only enough to fulfil the money part of having a job. Ocrassus has the right idea in that if you just can't supply jobs to people you need to change things to give them some control over their lives somehow. The point is to give people ownership over their own lives. Under liberalism in all current governmental models this means the only real way to even get close is with a job and a strong job market. Anything else is going to fail to deliver because an economic system based entirely on giving the fruit of society to those who create it is diametrically opposed to welfare. You can (and should) give people money so they don't starve, but you do so by going against the very fundamentals of the economic system. You can do welfare in a system built from the ground up to revolve around everybody receiving a share of society's wealth, but the current system is nothing like that. In the current system the right is correct in attacking welfare and the capitalists will always attack welfare because the very economic system we use compels them to do so. The answer to the right is not to plug our ears and say no welfare is good and makes sense in a capitalist system, the answer is to change the system so that either welfare makes sense or is unnecessary. Or alternatively/additionally we can try to change the way government works so that people have much more power over the entity that decides their welfare. Talmonis posted:Distributive and executive power absolutely should be held in the hands of educated representatives, that have been voted on by the people. Tyranny of the majority is a monstrous thing, and would absolutely result in horror for those in the minority. Self determination is important, but making decisions that effect others should require education and ethics, rather than a simple majority opinion. But the difference between the educated and the uneducated is merely education. There's no reason why the masses today are uneducated but that the system is set up that way. If we're going to have a huge number of unemployed and underemployed then they have more than enough time for education and having more power and responsibility within the process of running things. I have no problem with the idea that people need to be educated before they can be allowed to rule, but the next part of that idea is not "so the masses can go jump" it's "so we have to educate the masses until 'the masses' ceases to be a relevant distinction". Also increasing education just by itself increases employment, especially if we moved away from the model of hundreds of students to a lecture you get in popular/first year courses. KaiserSchnitzel posted:You say "centre" a lot. This leads me to believe that you are not a US citizen. Please correct me if I'm wrong. Yep. This was never simply about America though following the fight within the Democratic party definitely inspired me to write it and is why Obama/Hillary vs Bernie were the examples I went with. When I speak of right/centre/left I'm making an essentialist argument. The right/centre/left in America is not at the same place as those in other places, but the dynamic essentially revolves around the same principle of empowerment. I've been following American politics very closely since the mid 90s to the point that I'd say I was more familiar with American politics than Australian politics until a couple years ago actually. I don't really care about national borders and America has a huge influence on the rest of the world (and our Liberals are unfortunately prone to follow in your footsteps) so American politics are very relevant to me. So I'm not completely ignorant of how things are over there. I've read what you wrote and I wouldn't say anything is fundamentally inaccurate but I still contend Centrism is a big problem. You can think of it as moderates, or careerist Democrats loving things up, or whatever. I think of those things as being under the banner of centrism and contend that it having no real ideological footing by itself leads to this political malaise the west has been suffering under for at least the last couple decades. Because it's not just America. The Democrats are not the only "to the left" mainstream party that has been gutted by centrism. A lot of people who vote for centrists are not politically minded like you say, but they are being mislead by career centrists in politics and the media into thinking it's a good way to vote. Things like wage slavery and welfare being disempowering are not things that centrist voters necessarily think about, but they vote with an ideology that allows these things to perpetuate because the ideology does not critically engage with the systems it's dealing with. Part of the "it's a lie" point I was making. Centrists are not bad people following an evil ideology because they like the consequences of the ideology, but because the ideology itself does not critically examine its own consequences. Kinda like a lot of voters in the right, when you get down to it, don't actually want the consequences of their ideology, they just think that their ideology will deliver better outcomes than it will. Centrism as a movement is basically intellectual laziness given form and then turning around to act like it's the adult in the room. But it's not the adult in the room; it's not in the centre because it's above the fight; it's in the centre because it doesn't understand the fight. And the politicians that follow centrism are incompetent and impotent because they follow a lazy and heavily flawed ideology. Centrism needs to be dismantled so that the left can try and reach the voters in the middle that centrism currently makes very difficult to reach. I'd be willing to say the centre is as or possibly even more responsible than the right for America's extreme rightward shift from the rest of the west. Oh and keep in mind I'm not trying to demonise people who vote centrist. I'm taking aim squarely at the ideology itself and the people in power who peddle it.
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Dec 13, 2016 02:12
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Higsian posted:Before the invention of work for pay humans were hunter-gatherers or subsistence farmers right there i stopped reading cause jfc whenever someone writes that as a beginning to thier screed it doesnt go anywhere good I'm gonna go against the grain and say the OP sucks and it's yet another post about how great life would be if only the true leftists came to power and then brought forth the next golden age. And like, I don't even exactly disagree with it, it's just... Like what's your point? Seriously? All of you True Leftists who have made shitpost upon shitpost here, what is your point? What should we do? I hear a lot of populist rhetoric of "we need actual leftists not neoliberals" (Drain the swamp!) but while that's all well and good, what you're suggesting is basically a daydream. All of your rhetoric hinges on the idea that the far-left would have total control of the government, that they would totally fulfill all their promises, that people would not be resistant to the proposed changes and so on. For instance, y'all assume two things about Bernie: 1) That he would beat Trump (very brave assumption) and 2) That he would not be cockblocked by any old white fucks who have ever uttered the word "communism". And I'm not even gonna mention third party candidates because  My issue with your giant rear end OP is that your idea of a leftist revolution is "either we get what we want or we go home" which is why you and yours will never have any power ever. If you want to win, you need to start working with center-left and centrists. I don't give a flying gently caress what your thoughts on imperialism or on the War of Iraq are. The simple fact is that the Republicans have a rock solid voter base and they are more than willing to work with detestable elements in the name of votes. That's why we have an actual nazi in the white house now and republicans control all branches of government. The sooner the left learn they need to mend bridges with leftist allies, the sooner we can actually do something positive. Or we can keep doing this whole circular firing squad and leftist dick measuring. up to you
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Dec 13, 2016 02:29
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My other issue is that the US is more of a capitalist than a socialist society. Always has been, probably always will be. Your ideas are considered nontraditional and are unlikely to be accepted by people in the country. You need to climb that particular hurdle before you can even hope to have your ideas, let alone your party, to be accepted. The US has always glorified business and corporations, that's why Obama simply cannot take a stance on DAPL. You can't demonize your allies whenever they don't lay political shuffleboard the way you want them to. Especially since there's a good reason he doesn't.
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Dec 13, 2016 02:34
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SSNeoman posted:Like what's your point? Seriously? All of you True Just pointing how defeatist this is and how funny the parallel is if you imagine this point being made in October by somebody that supported the Romney/McMullin faction of the Republicans. Al-Saqr posted:By the way, if you guys want to watch an amazing documentary about how much of a disasterous Plague Centrism and Feaux-Liberalism is, I highly, HIGHLY reccomend you watch Adam Curtis's 'Hypernormalization' Thanks for posting this. I'm about 30 minutes into it and it's actually grabbed me unlike every other Adam Curtis project I've attempted to watch. Call Me Charlie fucked around with this message at 02:56 on Dec 13, 2016 |
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Dec 13, 2016 02:50
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SSNeoman posted:right there i stopped reading cause jfc whenever someone writes that as a beginning to thier screed it doesnt go anywhere good You should keep reading past the hunter-gather point as I drop the point very quickly because I don't give a poo poo about it and only address it because the post I was replying to asks specifically what existed before work for pay. Far left is a bullshit point. From the OP I made it very clear that left-right is a continuum and that leftism comes in many forms. The problem with the "left" in America is that a lot of it is not left at all. This is not a left factional argument like I'm some trot arguing against an anarcho-syndicalism. I very specifically avoided giving specific answers because that is a problem in the left. In fact it's probably a companion problem to centrism; the left is too busy arguing specifics within the struggle while the centre is busy missing the struggle entirely. The problem I'm addressing here is not that the left can't agree on specific answers, but that the centre cannot contain answers. When right-left is a question of people having control over their own lives what the gently caress would an actual middle position look like? How can we restrict power to the few while also giving power to everyone? It doesn't work and it's why the actual centre we have doesn't work along those lines. It believes that power should be in the hands of the elite, just like the right. The centre is essentially the right with a dash of sympathy. It's the mugger that gives your license back to you because they know it's a pain to replace it. The solution is to focus on empowerment. To actually join the left in attacking and dismantling the barriers to power erected by the right. And abandoning the false choice offered by centrism. The left needs to come together and pull to the loving left, actually work together to empower people. We can quibble over specifics when we're no longer under the threat of losing it all to overly-entrenched power. Grab whatever part of the line is closest to you or prettiest to you and pull. I'm not going to give you specifics here because specifics are much less important than the essential argument and also because that's a massive quagmire as anyone who knows anything about leftist politics is well aware. I have specific ideas like anyone else who thinks enough about politics, I'm not just talking out my rear end about solutions that I don't even think exist, but I'm not arrogant enough to believe I have the answers so I don't want the central point of the OP to be derailed by people attacking any and all specifics I provide. Which they would. You know they would. Futuresight fucked around with this message at 03:02 on Dec 13, 2016 |
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Dec 13, 2016 02:56
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jBrereton posted:Have you ever worked in care? yeah, my first job was in the laundry of a hospice and i also assisted the CNAs with menial tasks for dinner. tell me all about my own life experiences, friend 
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Dec 13, 2016 03:12
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Call Me Charlie posted:Just pointing how defeatist this is and how funny the parallel is if you imagine this point being made in October by somebody that supported the Romney/McMullin faction of the Republicans. Exactly. And yet, here we are.
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Dec 13, 2016 03:25
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There's a folly in expecting leftism to take hold in the US that's akin to those who think that democracy would take root in the Middle East if they just had the chance. It's not a lack education or opportunity- the people understand leftism, and largely they reject it. It's not our cup of tea.
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Dec 13, 2016 04:00
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General Dog posted:There's a folly in expecting leftism to take hold in the US that's akin to those who think that democracy would take root in the Middle East if they just had the chance. It's not a lack education or opportunity- the people understand leftism, and largely they reject it. It's not our cup of tea. Wait what the gently caress are you saying here? that the middle easterners dont want democracy? Please, inform me oh General, why the middle eastern mind is too savage for democracy and why all those people who suffered and died over there in the last five years to change their regimes and have a shot at democracy have no desire for it. I cant wait to hear you analysis.
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Dec 13, 2016 04:06
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SSNeoman posted:Exactly. And yet, here we are. Exactly. The extremists on the right - the same people the establishment republicans tried to demoralize and speak down to - refused to accept the status quo and now they control all three branches of government. Sections of the country that both parties wrote off as the blue wall ended up giving Trump the election. Because he actually realized that his message resonated there and that those people could be reached. Now the overnight change that centrists on both sides said could never happen is coming. So when a person like you comes in and goes 'well, hey, we have to go along with the third way wing of democrats because if we don't the right will line us up against the wall!' it rings kind of hollow. There is a path for change but the left is so beaten down and divided they won't take it. Every call to reach out to the common man and primary out centrists that put us in this situation will be ignored. And, ironically, the Trump faction of the Republicans is now co-opting the popular planks of what use to be the Democratic party. So even if the Berniecrats gain control of the party, it's probably be too late. The window is closing on us fast. (That may sound defeatist but we don't really have the luxury of time the tea party/alt-right had to grow) General Dog posted:There's a folly in expecting leftism to take hold in the US that's akin to those who think that democracy would take root in the Middle East if they just had the chance. It's not a lack education or opportunity- the people understand leftism, and largely they reject it. It's not our cup of tea. Except Trump broke with a number of traditionally conservative ideals and that won him the election. boner confessor posted:yeah, my first job was in the laundry of a hospice and i also assisted the CNAs with menial tasks for dinner. tell me all about my own life experiences, friend Great. Now would you assist CNAs if you didn't earn any money while doing it? Would you kiss the wife on the forehead, wave goodbye to your kids and care for (whatever group) for no other reason than to help them out? How long would you do that before you decide 'eh, gently caress it. i'd rather just drink a beer and watch some netflix'? What's the bare minimum you'd have to give back to society before you felt like you had given enough?
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Dec 13, 2016 04:31
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Call Me Charlie posted:So when a person like you comes in and goes 'well, hey, we have to go along with the third way wing of democrats because if we don't the right will line us up against the wall!' it rings kind of hollow. I give you a year before it stops being so hollow. Tops. Call Me Charlie posted:Every call to reach out to the common man and primary out centrists that put us in this situation will be ignored. This is a bullshit right wing talking point and I hate, hate, hate that the True Leftists spout it.
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Dec 13, 2016 05:05
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Call Me Charlie posted:Great. Now would you assist CNAs if you didn't earn any money while doing it? Would you kiss the wife on the forehead, wave goodbye to your kids and care for (whatever group) for no other reason than to help them out? How long would you do that before you decide 'eh, gently caress it. i'd rather just drink a beer and watch some netflix'? What's the bare minimum you'd have to give back to society before you felt like you had given enough? not every day, but working there plenty of volunteer groups, church groups, youth groups like boy scouts etc. came through to spend time with the residents, especially around the holidays. they'd probably do so even more if they didn't have to spend so much time just working to survive i mean i get it, you're cynical and you have a dim view of humanity and you don't like that i disagree with you but you're going to have to try harder than that to demonstrate that given nothing better to do people would just spend 12 hours a day or whatever drinking alcohol and watching tv. generally people do that because they're tired from working and don't have the time to do anything more active. people's capacity for leisure isn't infinite
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Dec 13, 2016 05:08
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"Hey guys! One of the major parties that has recently got its rear end kicked by Pretty Much Literal Nazis is only sort of left! Let's burn it down so that we can get full communism going!! That won't make us seem fractured and won't backfire at all!"
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Dec 13, 2016 05:11
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