I forgot how fun these things can be when they actually go well
wtf does “level set” mean in this context?
Lemmy.ml for sure be like that. Bunch of sourpusses
They’re the two-percenters. I.e. registered Republicans who are also members of DSA.
I specifically haven’t been logging in much this week so that I don’t ruin anyone’s buzz.
I’m realistic, but also allowed myself to be happy yesterday. Life should be enjoyed. I’m mostly excited about my local elections, as there is a much higher chances of things changing for the better in my state and county.
I keep saying that this is just the start, but also as a Texan what a hell of a start.
Howdy, neighbor! It felt great to wake up in a blue Texas!
I say that I hate the haters. But also my enthusiasm is dampened a little by the fact that we had to even experience this because people are soooo fucking stupid.
I literally talked to a middle aged gay man recently who admitted he barely understood what happened Tuesday “Oh we elected a new governor? Or something? What are midterms?”
Its like DUUUUDE THIS IS REALLY IMPORTANT HOW ARE YOU SO OBLIVIOUS???
Just remember something. In the United States, you only exist in a democracy if you are in the top 10% of household incomes. Anyone poorer than this has absolutely zero say in government policy. Your votes don’t matter.
And before some mouth-breathing moron starts hyperventilating about “encouraging people not to vote,” you can actually go look this up. It’s been studied. The opinions of the top 10%, and only the top 10%, are reflected in federal policy going back decades.
This is why the vast majority of people don’t give a shit about democracy in the US. They don’t give a shit about protecting a democracy that they themselves are only nominally a part of. Just because you vote doesn’t mean your vote actually matters.
In my friend group the two people least interested in politics are a queer guy and a hispanic guy. The rest of us are straight white dudes. I am always baffled that they are not more invested as people who are more likely to be negatively impacted.
Ya like, good that we aren’t going to back slide into autocracy just yet. But like the reason is because the autocrats were so incredibly stupid and incompetent they did things that are directly tied to raising prices on everyone. If gas prices were low, this would have been like 2018.
Present!
(Please I am begging you Americans to keep up the pressure! Keep going for woke!)
Maybe find the middle ground? It is certainly a good reason to celebrate that republicans lost and Trump shuts up for once. It is also true that there are democrats that would just as well fit the republican party. But it is also sure as hell true that true progressives can only come out of democrats not republicans. So US should make it count, hold anti progressive, status quo democrats to account and root them out. Then it will become a flawless victory.
hold anti progressive, status quo democrats to account and root them out.
That’s where the win will be. We have succeeded in a temporary reprieve.
Celebrate? yes! But only as long as we dont dust off our hand and sit down job well done.
Yup getting complacent is how Republican can still win 2028 and get Vance as president. Especially when many D voters are doing so because of living cost and it is probably not going to be fixed fast enough.
We’ve seen Obama drone kill kids at weddings in Pakistan. We have seen this circus before.
Yes! Found one!
NO PWEASE DON’T BRING UP THE WAR CRIMES I HAVE NO TRUE MORAL GROUND TO ARGUE AGAINST IT PWEASE.
Here! Found another!
Forever at your disservice.
You either get Blue Peter Theil puppet or Red Peter Theil Puppet. The Money Behind Hakeem Jeffries
The Democrats are electing leadership later in November. I’ve already written to my representative to not elect Jeffries, and I’m thankfully not alone in my sentiments.
My senator is Schumer, so I’m SOL there. Hopefully other Americans are writing their Senators.
You saw it? Did he pilot the drone? Did he purposefully aim at the wedding? Did he target children?
If he is blameless that way and we cannot blame soldiers who just follow orders, then who should take responsibility ever? (The answer is both are at fault if you need to spell it out btw)
Obama personally reviewed every name on the Disposition Matrix, after they were tried by FISC, a secret court using secret interpretations of US and international law. The DM is still active and in Trump’s hands now.
There were (are?) multiple CIA drone strike programs. I only know about the ones in Afghanistan and Pakistan (I think Southern Spear in the Caribbean is wholly DoD, not CIA.)
In Afghanistan, (off the top of my head) the CIA drone strike program averaged 500 sorties a year, fifty civilian casualties for every person-of-interest executed. The operators called them bugsplats. They called dead children fun sized terrorists. That is to say dead kids were so common they had jargon for the phenomenon. Whether the casualties were infants or grandmothers or somewhere in between, news agencies reported them as militants. Villages were encampments.
PTSD was epidemic among drone operators. Turnover was so high the drone programs were consistently running short and requiring crews to run long shifts. They were also treated like shit by their superiors, which was especially harsh when they were previously pilots.
It turns out killing other humans can be traumatic even if done from extreme distance, and the experience is filtered through digital obscurity. It demonstrated the opposite side of the canard that gamers can’t tell the violence is fake. Drone operators sure can tell the violence is real.
Kill orders passed through at least three layers of command. Often the order to hit a site with Hellfires came after it was evident the POI was nowhere to be found.
Disclaimer: I only researched the program in Afghanistan, now ended, so my information might not apply to the other theaters. The data sets are different so the statistics may also be different.
Obama may not have personally targeted the kids or fired the Hellfires, but he knew what was going on. He knew the heinous casualty rate and could have adjusted policy. He didn’t.
I still think he was the best US President of the 21st century (so far), but he was still an evil fuck regarding the international war on terror. He also fucked up with the surveillance state, and look! It all fell into exactly the wrong hands.
And, eventually we invented the AGM-114R-9X Ginsu Hellfire which pops out blades instead of an incendiary burst, and maybe fewer folks died thanks to the development. That didn’t affect Afghanistan, though.
Don’t put words in another person’s mouth. You know what they meant. Don’t play dumb to enrage the comment section.Edit: Okay wrote without reading the whole comment. They’re being a dick too.
I’ll believe in blue wave when the American empire contracts, it recalls its military, closes the global bases and releases everyone from their gulag supermaxxes
or even enforces its own laws consistently
I do feel like we’ve been here before though, when Obama and HOPE won so hard that there’d never be a Republican POTUS again, and then he conducted imperial BAU for eight years.
And we’ll be here again, because people are morons that don’t learn from their mistakes.
I have seen almost non-stop celebration today, acting as if Trump was done, Fascism was over, White Supremacy was gone, and that all has returned to right and good in the world.
These elected officials arent even sworn in yet. and wont be sworn in… till january, and idiots are celebrating like jobs done don’t have to worry about it anymore.
We have a handful of new democrats elected. We have a ton of old democrats that have no compunctions about siding with Republicans and letting Republican shit go through in exchange for that AIPAC/Big Business money. Just cause a lot of the seating chart is blue doesnt mean blue business will be done, nor does it mean red business will be stopped.
This shit isnt the fuck over. The shit is only just about to begin to get started.
2 things about Obama.
- He had no idea what he was doing. He was chosen because he had no experience and would not expect to know how to rock the boat much less try. He was also naive and thought other people could be trusted to at least not hurt themselves in their attempts to hurt everyone else.
- He only had a Democratic majority for just a handful of months. Bullshit lawsuits kept him from having the majority that had been voted in for almost a year. When he finally got a majority he got the ACA passed, but even then he didn’t have enough of a majority to push it through without watering it down to near useless.
I think most of us were pretty disappointed that Obama didn’t do more, but looking back, it was pretty clear that he was only brought in as the janitor to clean up after the previous cluster fuck.
A man that says to the rich “Im the one standing between you and the pitchforks” knows exactly what his job is.
A man that tries to make a grand bargain with the opposition party to cut Social Security, and was only stopped by a faction of the opposition party who couldn’t be seen working with him, knows exactly what his job is.
A man that flirts with the idea of a public option, and still ends up supporting the system that the opposition party proposed, knows exactly what his job is.
The bottom line is, Obama was to the right of Colin Powell.
Oh and no one gives Obama 400k speech fees (also known as the post bribe) without him delivering on what they wanted.
Obama did exactly what he was supposed to. Capture a popular social movement and prevent it from actually accomplishing anything.
Its why Democrats exist.
Don’t know why you are being down voted, this is 100% accurate
Because only a complete moron would say the ACA did nothing.
Is it great? No but it’s so, so much better than what existed before. It literally has saved many lives and if not for that shitstain Lieberman could’ve gone further.
Maybe everyone here is too young to realize how awful healthcare was before that.
Criticize sure but people sound like idiots when they downtalk a huge piece of legislation that actually improved things a lot, even if not obviously being the best solution.
I agree, but it wasn’t the Democrats idea. It was the Republicans who proposed it, and the insurance companies backed because they saw dollar signs
Other than making it illegal to not have health insurance, and offering discounted insurance to some people based on their state, what do you think it did?
Or you know… Actual universal healthcare and pushing to punish the financial elite for the 2008 crash
Edit: What the actual fuck happened to Lemmy?!
I’m getting downvoted for saying universal healthcare is better?? Holy shit this place became milquetoast
Ill take any other hybrid private insurance /government subsidized system than our current one. The Swiss or Dutch systems would save the US so much.
deleted by creator
The mind of a liberal everyone
Jeez-uzz. Majick wands are in short supply. What do you expect? This shitshow has been running for several seasons. Subterfuge, chicanery and (most of all) politics have been involved in politics from day one. Life has evolved to be increasingly more dog-eat-dog in all aspects. Perhaps we can hope we’re at the peak of a cycle?
what a cheerful outlook.
I’ll take harsh reality over a comfortable lie
👍
it was pretty clear that he was only brought in as the janitor to clean up after the previous cluster fuck.
Thats the job expected of every democrat president.
I think most of us were pretty disappointed that Obama didn’t do more
The president is the head of the executive branch, not of the legislation. It’s not his job to change the law. That’s already the first layer of deception.
he was only brought in as the janitor to clean up after the previous cluster fuck.
oh I also thought it would be convenient to have him in office if the second great depression came through, so they could just blame the black guy.
With the way they’re acting, you’d think that these dudes wanted Republicans to maintain control. Like, I don’t have a lot of faith in democrats to actually get the shit done that they need to, but the defeatism is absolutely absurd.
I was spending my time volunteering for Democrats campaigns, and I’m still barely enthused with the result.
It’s a very small step forward in a possibility of a government that works for its people. But anyone smart on here knows that goes much more fine-grained than the color maps.
(Red is obvious. But blue? Blue is still many shades of gray)
It’s not defeatism. It’s acknowledging the reality of the situation. They can pass all the wonderful legislation they want. Trump will veto it and they do not have a veto proof majority. He has already said he is going to become “Mr. Veto”.
What a status quo comment, 2n2voa. Whether its easily successful or not, the dem reps should be fighting, and doing their job as a check and balance on the executive branch.
I swear to god the double trauma of COVID and Trump during formative periods of some peoples’ lives made it pathologically impossible for them to take a win for even a day or two. That’s how you burn the fuck out. Don’t rest on your laurels, but making people feel like nothing is ever enough is how you get them to stop showing up.
We have plenty of wins, built on the hard work of working class Americans door knocking, phone banking, canvassing, signature gathering, etc.
I’ve always been a fan of the color red. Imagine if (let me dream) the republican party falls and the DSA can take red as their color against the establishment dems’ blue. Fighting on the red side would feel good then!
Gonna need like 50 years to wash the stank off that color. Every time I see a red baseball cap I get alarmed and concerned about a very untrustworthy person I should avoid. Usually it’s just a sports team hat but it never fails to raise my blood pressure.
Mario cosplayers in shambles right now!
Haha somehow in that context it never crosses my mind
I bet Mario would be pro-union
Its much more likely that the DNC would assume the mantle of a fallen republican party, and change their color. They were always only pretend blue anyway.
Believe it or not, the colors were reversed or kinda random for a long time actually. Dems were red, GoP blue. Iirc, that didn’t shift until 2000, lol.
As I remember it, the colors were more business pinstripe gray for the conservatives and blue for the democrats.
Would be more like the UK parties’ colors then.
I see it a lot in organizing, like taking even a second to breathe is going to accidentally infect you with an airborne centrist virus.
And then the going gets rough and all the “We can rest after the revolution” types are burnt out so they start publicly infighting at the first disagreement because they’re tired and hopeless and miserable.
IMO, you should have higher standards.
Carville hasn’t been remotely relevant in a decade.
They probably wanted progressive wing to collapse before getting back in the seat. Now people have a reference point to compare them to and hopefully democrats that can’t live up to that will get rooted out instead.
You’d think that but have a look at hexbear’s midterms containment thread. The way they speak about it internally is different. They are very happy the Republicans lost, they jsut don’t care that it’s the democrats who won.
Hexbear is as toxic as 4chan I’ll pass looking at any of their shit.
I blocked the “Tankie Triad” so I don’t even see their fascist propaganda. Because I experienced it on multiple instances, I literally can’t imagine using the Fediverse while still having see all their bad-faith shit…
fascist when le “authoritarian”
Ditto.
I’m so glad my instance is defederated from them
The way they speak about it internally is different.
So, are they lying to us, or are they lying to each other?
Neither, people read everything through hermeneutics of suspicion or innocence and pre-judge accordingly.
For anyone who doesn’t know what hermeneutics is, it’s when you read things through the eyes of this guy:
That’s hermaneutics you heretic! Or hermanneutics if you’re trying to hide from Gloria Vanderbilt.
With the way they’re acting, you’d think that these dudes wanted Republicans to maintain control.
Oh believe me, they do. I’ve literally been told how much more awful Democrats are than Republicans. IIRC, the reasoning behind that was some vague shit about liberals watering down true leftism or something. Like, yeah, one side wants to establish a fascist totalitarian government and has literally set out to murdering foreigners and dissenters with ICE, but hey, your identity politics are more important.
Immigrants and dissenters have always been murdered. And children and women.
As “one of those people” you are talking about, we’ve been here before. Yes, it feels awesome to get such a decisive victory over the republicans. I’ve seen this before. Over and over again. The pendulum has swung back to the left. But, just because we voted in a bunch of Dems, hell even a bunch of Socialists, that doesn’t mean they will, or even can, fix the most broken parts of this system. Democrats have enabled and even facilitated some of the worst aspects of what we’re seeing right now from Trump and Republicans. I mean, you yourself even admit it: “I don’t have a lot of faith in democrats to actually get the shit done that they need to”.
The difference is, we know what needs to be done. A really famous guy wrote about it over a 100 years ago. Having Blue majority didn’t improve anybody’s material conditions in the past. Why would it now? Yes, they’re “less bad”, but Dems are still pretty bad. What makes this time different?
I love the outcome of the election. It was a bloodbath. But I’m not deluding myself that wholesale change will ever come from national electeds. Defeatist? Maybe. I’m just tempering my expectations, even from DSA endorsed winners.
this post sums it up best imo. Prove me wrong. Prove all of us MLs and “tAnKiEs” wrong. Prove to us that voting can and does work, that we can materially improve people’s situations without protest.
Don’t get me wrong, I see what you’re saying and I generally agree with your leftist sentiments.
That said, you are incorrect that the Democrats have been totally unsuccessful in improving material conditions for people. I’m with you that it hasn’t nearly been far enough, but they did accomplish significant things for women and black people.
JFK passed the equal pay act. LBJ passed the civil rights act. Clinton passed the violence against women act. These things had an effect that was tangible, even if we need more.
In Texas, my grandmother wasn’t able to have her own bank account without my grandfather signing a permission note until John Connally, a Democrat, passed the Marital Property Act of 1967. My mother never had that problem because a Democrat changed the conditions for women in this country.
Do I want a true left to rise in the United States? Yes. Do I think the Democrats have any hope of fixing capitalism? No. BUT, this victory is sweet, and I’ll be raising a glass to the Democrats today anyway.
JFK passed the equal pay act. LBJ passed the civil rights act.
You’re skipping why those passed when they did. Postwar US was in a red scare, Communism spreading across Europe, fear of uprisings at home, and that fear forced progressive concessions. The one era of capitalism people romanticize is that one, and it was shaped by fear of Communism plus massive grassroots working-class movements. JFK and LBJ didn’t pass those laws out of kindness. Cities were burning, people were organizing at rates this country had never seen, demanding better material conditions.
Clinton passed the violence against women act
This law was very limited and a classic neolib policy. It did not, in fact, dismantle any systems of oppression. It was another concession to the feminist “radicals” of the era.
In Texas, my grandmother wasn’t able to have her own bank account without my grandfather signing a permission note until John Connally, a Democrat, passed the Marital Property Act of 1967. My mother never had that problem because a Democrat changed the conditions for women in this country.
Democrats didn’t do this though. That’s my whole point. Sure they may have signed the law, but the pressure and the framing came from socialists and activists, through fear of revolution, strikes, boycotts. Yours is a standard liberal talking point, and it whitewashes history and erases the struggle that was actually fought for.
Do I want a true left to rise in the United States? Yes. Do I think the Democrats have any hope of fixing capitalism? No. BUT, this victory is sweet, and I’ll be raising a glass to the Democrats today anyway.
On this we agree. Victory was sweet yesterday. I’m mostly celebrating. But we need to continue to organize and fight for what we want. Capitalists and billionaire oligarchs will not just give us what we want out of the kindness of their hearts. That’s simply not how any of this works. Don’t become a “If Harris won we’d be at brunch” kind of person.
The Democrats fought for same sex marriage when the Republicans have always been anti-LGBTQ. Republicans spent so much money on ads that lied about us wanting to marry animals, etc. and the Democrats were still able to push it through.
yes, broadly dems fight for lgbtq … when it’s beneficial to them. For most Dems, lgbtq rights are just a bargaining chip, and not embedded into the platform as it is for DSA, for example.
“Corporations are fine with exhibiting symbolically pro-queer behavior—perhaps sponsoring a gay pride festival or lobbying the Governor of North Carolina—but only when it’s marketable”
“The rights of queer people do not depend upon the whims of capital. A broad coalition of the left can fight against the advances of the religious right. We must reject organizations like the Human Rights Campaign, who are funded by and work closely with capital to preserve the capitalist status quo. In doing so, queer people must build alternative organizations that fight for our rights from the perspective of the working class. Only by combating capitalism, and continuing to build a socialism infused with queer radicalism, will queer people dismantle the oppressive structures which harm us.”
The conversation I was responding to was comparing Republicans vs. Democrats. Someone was trying to make it seem they’re the same. I was just offering a counterpoint.
yes, broadly dems fight for lgbtq … when it’s beneficial to them. For most Dems, lgbtq rights are just a bargaining chip
As opposed to Republicans, which actively oppose any LGBTQ rights. They are nowhere near the same.
not embedded into the platform as it is for DSA
As far as I’m aware there is no official DSA party (correct me if I’m wrong), the DSA aligned candidates usually run as a Democrat. Have any ever ran as a Republican?
DSA uses the Dem ballot line because there’s virtually no path to victory as a 3rd party. That doesn’t make them Democrats.
Dems and Reps are virtually the same. They both serve capital and corporate interests. The same billionaires funding the Reps also fund the Dems. Nothing has materially improved in decades. In fact, the complete opposite has happened: things have gotten progressively worse every year no matter if the guy in charge is blue or red. But sure, Dems are “winning” the culture war.
Respectfully, stand down, comrade! I’m on your side and not becoming a Kamala brunch enthusiast. I appreciate your opinions on history and thank you for sharing your thoughts.
The fight definitely continues, but a little win feels nice. I can go back to my usual full on class warfare in the morning.
I’m more just shouting at clouds than at you specifically. Cheers! 🥃
that we can materially improve people’s situations without protest.
Who said anything about without protest?
As always, voting is one of several strategies we must pursue at once … and it’s not even the most important one.
roosevelt
The pendulum has swung back to the left
🧐
The tankies want Trump to win because they think that after he’s destroyed the US, a socialist utopia will rise from the ashes.
A theocratic autocracy will rise from the ashes. Unless you kids have done more prep work that you let on, your not winning the war if it goes hot, and the crazies with stockpiles and organization in place have the advantage over unprepared forum users.
There will be several theocracies arising in various places. And they’ll all be at eternal holy war with each other.
At least some one will keep the ashes warm for us.
Not a single tankie believes in utopic socialism
Of course not. But it’s what they claim to believe in.
You have a very warped view of what Socialists believe in.
Socialists believe in a real try at social equality. Tankies believe you must murder people or at least ignore large amounts of suffering to force it in one fell swoop.
Tankies believe you must murder people or at least ignore large amounts of suffering to force it in one fell swoop.
yes, because tankies arent utopian and they know real change takes sacrifices, and it has happened throughout history
Real utopians are those who think we can liberate mankind without death and violence
I’m talking specifically about tankies, you know that kind of people who worship the likes of Putin and Xi and root for Hamas and the Houthis.
I dont care about putin and Xi but I support hamas and houthis for resisting zionist forces
what does that make me?
Supporting fascists makes you a fascist. Just because they fight against other fascists doesn’t make it better in any way.
“tankie” is pejorative term used by fascists and libs for Socialists and Communists. the people who use the term tankie unironically often denounce many or all existing Socialist states (Cuba, China, DPRK, etc) as “authoritarian”.
I repeat: You have a very warped view of what Socialists believe in.
Yeah. Couldn’t have said it better myself.
Socialists are not tankies, and tankies are not socialists (despite often claiming otherwise).
“tankie” is pejorative term used by fascists and libs for Socialists and Communists. the people who use the term tankie unironically often denounce many or all existing Socialist states (Cuba, China, DPRK, etc) as “authoritarian”.
No it isn’t. It’s a pejorative term for fake leftists who do not have regard for human life even though that is supposed to be the only concern they have. Sure, it might get overused or incorrectly applied on this platform. But that’s because we’ve seen so many damn true tankies.
DPRK
Everybody should denounce the DPRK.
No?
Lmao show us anybody claiming any of this shit.
because they think that after he’s destroyed the US, a socialist utopia will rise from the ashes.
Not even that – they just want to clear the way for Russia/China to gain more power.
This is very incorrect.
I’m not going to lie, as an outsider this always seems to be the case. Could you explain what you actually want and what you could see realistically happening if the fascists won?
Not who you asked, but I want socialism, which requires revolution, which itself requires a mass working class revolutionary party, a militant and class conscious working class, and instability within the capitalist class. The first two are directly actionable through joining socialist orgs like PSL and doing large amounts of outreach, agitation, etc. The latter is out of our control, no matter if the Democrats or Republicans win in elections, and is more a matter of course as capitalism decays.
Fascism isn’t something that can be elected. Fascism is when the capitalist class oversteps the legal boundaries and restricts the civil rights of the country, when bourgeois democracy is replaced with outright direct rule by capital. Republicans winning or losing does not actually increase or decrease the chance of fascism, because fascism is a response to economic conditions and rising socialist organizing outside of the legal system.
This is important, because it means Democrats winning does not stop fascism. Fascism is out of the control of the working class, and can only be prevented by socialism, and stopped once in action by fighting it directly. In either case, mass socialist organizing is both the vaccine and the cure for fascism, depending on the timeline.
Fascism is when the capitalist class oversteps the legal boundaries and restricts the civil rights of the country, when bourgeois democracy is replaced with outright direct rule by capital.
Seems like democrats getting elected does help alleviate fascism then?
Also, what do you mean by “fighting it directly”?
Democrats getting elected doesn’t alleviate the risk of fascism, because as I said, it’s the capitalist class overstepping the legal boundaries. Democrats can legislate all they want against fascism (which they won’t do, let’s be honest), but the point is that capital does not care what is legal, and holds the actual power in society by owning the commanding heights of the economy. It can directly implement fascism without the consent of the DNC.
As for fighting it directly, a socialist revolution prevents the risk of fascism by taking the commanding heights from the capitalist class. In the case of fascism, socialist revolution is what can end it most effectively. In either case, armed struggle is almost certainly necessary, but it’s far cleaner before fascism actually is implemented than after.
There is always a risk of fascism. My point is that fascist policies are implemented and acted upon far more often under R rule than D, and prosecuted more under D than R.
Could you explain what you actually want
Simply put: I don’t want billionaires controlling every single aspect of society, as they do now.
If you’d like to read more, I agree with all of this.. I also agree with all of this.
what you could see realistically happening if the fascists won?
Arguably, and I would, the fascists are already in control. Just think of the tech enshittification at the hands of technofascists. Think of the endless wars; how much say in those wars do you truly believe you have? Think of the military budget outspending every single other country combined. We are the most powerful and richest country in the history of this planet … and 50% of americans can’t afford a 1 bedroom apartment. Americans can’t afford groceries. Real wages have been stuck in the 1970s. We are bankrupting ourselves with medical and student debt. Nobody can afford a house. Kids still in cages, guantanamo bay still operating, ICE record funding every year,
How much say do you have at your job? Unions are being squashed and suppressed. Have you attended a pro-gaza rally lately? How did the police treat you?
…I want a better world in which the 99% actually have a say, actually have a better life, and we don’t have 1% of people hoarding all the power and wealth of the world. This IS possible.
That sounds amazing, but somehow our methods for achieving it always end up opposed.
I have seen that sentiment directly expressed many times and I’ve seen it implied many times. Still see it despite blocking the shit out of sources of those kinds of opinions. Just today someone said to me “if you don’t think it should be burned down now, what would it take?”
No, nobody has said this, lmao.
I’ve seen a lot of hysteria around “tankies” since I started using Lemmy and I gotta say I really don’t get it. Yes, there are people here who are to the left of Democrats. No, that doesn’t make them the enemy, or secretly MAGA or Russian or whatever. They just… disagree with liberals. I see opinions attributed to “everyone from a .ml community” that I’ve never seen from any of the actual users. People gleefully brag about blocking swaths of other users, yet I’ve almost never seen any .ml user actually being as toxic as they get branded. I’m pretty sure I’ve even heard people say that you are a particularly bad one, but I haven’t witnessed it.
Also, lemmy was created by ml’s right? It’s one thing to have very little tolerance for different political opinions, but it’s another thing entirely to literally just be the gray characters from this meme and still somehow think you’re in the right.
I’ve seen a lot of hysteria around “tankies” since I started using Lemmy and I gotta say I really don’t get it
I used to think this but then discovered that most of the actual tankies are blocked by my instance.
By contrast I pointed my browser to lemmy.ml just now and the front page includes a celebration of “Russia Unity Day”, a reading group for “Soviet Democracy”, and three “good news only” type puff pieces about China. There’s definitely a solid bloc of propagandists out there.
As others have said, they want to run that kind of instance I don’t actually have any huge beef with it. To an extent I think it’s good to have some other perspectives and news sources. Just be aware that that’s who people are talking about when they talk about “tankies”, not the people who post stuff critical of the Democratic Party.
Most content from .ml users likely isn’t even political, so people certainly overstate how prevalent radicalism is. Lemmy is part of the fediverse and isn’t a reserved political space any more than any other part of it. But you are much more likely to see controversial positions from the “tankie triad” compared to other instances and other social media. It is one of the few big instances where you can find popular support for Russia over Ukraine or denying the Uyghur genocide for example.
I think people generally think of themselves as progressive when they come here, and it might be their first run-in with revolutionary socialists. They get caught between their progressive beliefs, largely around the Bernie/AOC area, and this suddenly new group (to them) of people that despise reformism and the Democrats almost as much as the Republicans. It creates a lot of friction, IMO. And yea, Lemmy was and is made by MLs, which means we have a permanent foothold here.
Have you tried browsing hexbear.net and Lemmygrad.ml? Lemmy.ml has its own vibe because we don’t really defederate from anyone, but Lemmygrad.ml and Hexbear.net are pretty good examples of what “tankies” are like when we aren’t getting into constant squabbles with liberals. You’ll see tons of queer people, a lot of passionate people, and a lot of normalcy, to be honest.
I like hexbears cute pictures, even if they dont like me. lol
People should run their lemmy instance as they want.
The non stop feudposting about what people do in their own instance is ridiculous. Block the instance and move on with your life if you need to. Block me to while youre at it! Who cares?
It seems there is some other agenda at play with those who are on this dumb ass crusade against .ml
Tankies don’t want a socialist anything though
The problem here is a red fascist carrying water for free and someone paid to troll on behalf of black fascists look the same on the Internet.
All the tankies I’ve talked to seem to be fully in favor of accelerationism – just wanting whatever will cause the most damage to the US the fastest. So, yeah – they were absolutely rooting for the Republicans.
I am hoping that the accelerationism this country needed was a cultural one rather than a violent one – that the conservatives showed so much ugly to the world that the American people pushed the Overton window a bit away from conservatism and will continue to reject that whole world of bullshit in the future.
It can’t just be the gas prices, right?
Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable. - JFK
This is why I always advocate for replacing First-past-the-post voting with a voting system that gives 3rd parties the freedom to run for election without a spoiler effect. But I guess blue maga thinks the democratic party is more important then the United States of America.
I guess blue maga thinks the democratic party is more important then the United States of America.
When it comes to the party leadership and many politicians, absolutely.
I think ordinary people who are registered democrats and “vote blue no matter who” types are much more receptive to the idea of a sensible voting system. Ranked choice has the name recognition, but there are better systems like STAR.
Even here on Lemmy, we have plenty of debates/arguments of “vote blue because of harm reduction and (first past the post + game theory)” versus “vote for the candidate that matches your ideals even if they aren’t one of the two that has a chance of winning.” What I do not recall seeing, however, are debates about how first-past-the-post is actually the superior voting system because of reasons XYZ.
Any “arguments” in favor that I can think of are typical conservative bad faith bullshit talking points. The people do not favor it, except probably for a big chunk that gets their information about the world from the talking heads’ conservative bad faith bullshit talking points.
It can’t just be the gas prices, right?
I’ve been highly disappointed by the American voters before, and I expect I will be again.
But, yeah. I’d wager that a simple fuel price graph could predict the outcome of the next several elections. If it’s high, people will vote out whoever is currently in power.
No because we know fascists would take control. We want you to read theory, join PSL, do mutual aid and help build a vanguard.
If you have enough self-awareness to call yourself a tankie, you’re not a tankie.
Tankie is just anyone to the left of burning orphans for warmth. It’s also a nazi dogwhistle.
That’s tankie propaganda, which seems to be the whole reason for you creating your account.
Tankies are the violent authoritarian wing of socialists, who believe liberals, landlords, bankers, intellectuals, etc. should be put to death. Stalin, Mao, etc.
They’re kinda like fascists as far as loving violence and purging their undesirables except the boot is a different flavor:
“We will live in a utopia if you merely give us the power to kill everyone we dislike!”
Psychotic comment, what the actual fuck is wrong with you?
I don’t see how disliking tankies is psychotic, but you’re more than welcome to explain if you feel like it.
That’s the nazi propaganda being dogwhistled, yes.
No it isn’t. Facts that you don’t like aren’t automatically propaganda.
Want to try again?
I recognize that the group called tankies is the group of people that supports the DPRK, PRC, Vietnam, Laos, and Cuba, and I support them, so I belong to the group called tankies. I’m self-aware of that, so don’t pretend my support for these countries isn’t going to get me called a tankie.
Yeah? Can you show us one?
It would be difficult because I’ve already blocked them.
I’ll take that as a no, then.
Read the thread lmfao
I did. I see a bunch of .ml’s clearly and strongly saying that we don’t believe in accelerationism.
I mean Schumer and Jeffries are out there taking the “high” road again, so the first indication that positive change is coming would be those two fucking off to the other side of the sun.
I’m old enough to remember Blue Waves hitting the rocks of Decorum and Civility and doing fuck all. I’m not getting my hopes up ever again.
And you’re gonna try your best to pass that feeling on
If I keep these thoughts inside they’ll take me to the grippy sock hotel.
Plus you know me. You know this isn’t my best. I’m sorry to disappoint but I’ve been dealing with the bullshit that happens no matter who got elected.
🫂
Do I know you? I’ve seen you make reasonable comments and then today multiple doomer ones. I don’t think I know you, but I do think you seem somewhat open to feedback even if you do make excuses.
I make doomer comments all the time
Noted.
U mad?
BLue mAgA
They’ll tell you that they do. I’ve had some tell me that electoralism won’t bring about socialism and things have to get way worse before the people revolt.
Accelerationism is imo the left wing equivalent of the american conservative-christian death cult.
Yeah accelerationism is bad mmmkay
Yes that is my opinion what are you implying?
I was agreeing
Cool cool. The ‘mmmkay’ threw me off ✌️
It’s from a quote by Mr. Mackey on South Park.
electoralism won’t bring about socialism
Prove this wrong then. It’s never happened.
Why do you think this meme is applicable here? Calfpupa never said socialism never works, she said you can’t vote your way to it. If your point is that you’re happy with the neo-colonialism of northern Europe, yeah we know the liberal position.
Norway voted themselves into socialist policies. Then leftists say it’s not Socialism. But when you say it’s bad in a different argument, they are held up as an example of Socialism. If the voting continues as it has in the past it could become full socialism.
The arguments that are in favor of social democracies are those around the effectiveness of social welfare programs and how effective compassion is as a political root, but that doesn’t make them fractionally socialist and they aren’t held up as socialist countries. I feel like a lot of this follows from a view of “socialism is when the government does stuff”, which I doubt was the definition Calfpupa was using.
What voting trends have you seen that suggest a move towards democratization of the economy over privatization that would be in line with complete democratic control? Further what trends have you seen in freeing neo-colonies from debt trappings and foreign ownership?
I mean, it’s true.
Doomer bullshit.
Things get better by making them better not making them worse with no plan to make it better again.
Leftists go like this
Step 1: Bring down the government
Step 2: ???
Step 3: Socialism!
We’ve laid out the plan multiple times. Doomed is thinking this is as good as it gets.
I missed it multiple times, apparently. What’s the plan. And, I’m not being facetious, I’m genuinely curious.
https://kbin.earth/m/lemmyshitpost@lemmy.world/t/3350832/-/comment/15325938
You have no plan.
I just laid it out for you. This smacks of privilege. “I got mine, FU!”
You haven’t laid out a plan though because you don’t have one.
That’s true.
Policies are a spectrum. We do need to remain mindful of the similarities and the differences between red and blue. If there are overlapping similarities that we don’t like, we speak out, or not.
That’s what we said all the way. Vote blue, but don’t expect it to be magic pill. A truly democratic government is the one accountable to its people.
The election results should be a wake up call. People are ready for the change, and are pissed with the government in a very bad way.
It is a victory right here nonetheless. One of many coming forward, I hope.
That’s what we said all the way.
Yes, to your credit you probably said this, and a whole bunch of folks with you. But I’ve been in plenty of conversations with folks who outright deny that Biden is fully complicit in the Gaza genocide, or even worse, acknowledge this but then go “no biggie!”
Dems won, that’s good. They have control of the senate which they haven’t had for a while.
So here’s my damper, there was anti-trans legislation passed in blue states and there was an increasing rise of anti-trans rhetoric within the Democrat candidates. I do not want the establishment Dems and their think tanks to get the take away that they won by throwing trans people under the bus.
I’m still going to be critical of Dems, they have a lot to prove and should be spending these next couple months in meetings on how they deal with the fact Trump will veto everything they do. They will have to find a way to circumvent that veto pen or persecute Trump to the fullest extent possible as well as his regime.
So here’s my damper, there was anti-trans legislation passed in blue states and there was an increasing rise of anti-trans rhetoric within the Democrat candidates.
WA state’s bullshit is going to die in the courts. I’m sickened that it passed; looking at the districts - king and two other counties rejected it… but the boondocks voted for it overwhelmingly. you can’t put that on the left, on establishment dems, when it’s the people in the sticks making it happen.
Here’s an article linked from an LGBT+ focused and friendly online publication. It’s not all relegated to just the reactionaries.
is there a link?
ty for the link. I didn’t know how widespread that bullshit was in the dnc.
between the corpo dems and this trash perhaps it would be best to just replace them.
It’s a troubling trend and we need to be cognizant if more start espousing it.
I hate saying this but imma be honest with you. They absolutely won because they abandoned trans rights as a talking point. You have no idea how many peoples single issue with not voting democrats was gender affirming care. They hate it and will tell you in the same breath that circumcision is ok. The only reason so many republicans flipped was because of how bad the economy is performing.
I’m not saying to abandon trans rights but I think I speak for the majority when I say that running on policy that affects 1% of the population and angers 50% of the population is stupid. Instead of phrasing it to help trans people, we should focus on expanding healthcare access to ALL citizens. Not just trans people.
If the candidate can’t explain how trans Healthcare is part of Healthcare for all, especially women, then that is a skill issue. Al Sayed practically dog walked them on Fox News over this issue and won big
You and I both know it doesn’t matter what you say. All they have to hear is the word trans and they won’t vote for it.
If they aren’t able to hear past the words trans then they aren’t listening to the politician no matter what they say.
Now is the time for them to start laying the groundwork for actual changes…
- things like barring lobbying funds from politics (I know, it’s the Dems, they’d never do that)
- anything that claws back the government’s power and brings mega corps to heel (naïve, I know!)
The trump terms have demonstrated that there aren’t enough checks and balances because the GOP have demonstrated following the rulebook is optional. If we can’t rebuild democracy, we must harden it.
(I’m a kiwi with no skin in the game here, but now is the time to really start pushing, not celebrating)
So a lot of anti trans would-be-red voters voted blue but still supported their gross views in supporting anti-trans stuff. That tracks.
Fuck the Democratic establishment, especially Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries. I don’t trust them any further than I can throw them.
But the voters are what’s giving me a little bit of hope for the future. The fact that so many solidly red states and districts could flip is seriously huge. It’s a sign that the winds of change are blowing in the right direction.
Agreed both counts.
Fuck every Zionist supporter of Israel regardless of which side of the orchestrated divide they stand.
The only war worth fighting in the US is the class war.
The populace standing up is refreshing. The DSA and Dems who are pressuring MFA and abolishing Citizens United have my support.
Just emailed my rep saying I don’t want her to support Jeffries.
My rep (Oakland, CA) is very active in the House and has many community events.
She is liberal.
