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The only ones to blame for the rise of fascism are the fascists. They choose to support an ideology of bigotry and genocide. They choose to act that way.
All you’re doing is enabling them by making them out to look like victims when they are anything but.
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Because decades of nonviolence used as propaganda made them easy to manipulate and abuse. That’s why.
I know it’s easy to see things that way but the reality is they’re people and if we went to move into a better future then we’re going to have to work out how to convince people to move forward with us.
It saddens me how many purportedly on the left seem to want nothing but conflict and violence. It feels like they’re working to try and make things worse simply so they can feel some foolish sense of pride at being right or play out some childish freedom fighter fantasy.
Yep it’s definitely a fantasy and not a reaction to the rapidly growing percentage of Americans openly calling for violence against us. Preparing to defend oneself is not the same.
They’re gonna be rounding up people and throwing bodies in ditches and you enlightened centrists will still be running defense for these fascists.
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For the last 40 years, boomers have had a stranglehold on government power. And you know what they say. The good die young. What’s left in charge are some of the most distilled evil, brain addled geriatrics. With little in the way of actual ideas about solutions. Only clinging desperately to power and relevance. To the detriment of everyone else.
This is such a tiring generalization. Boomers, like the rest of Americans, had been detached from politics for much of their lives. You realize most every president has been near a 50/50 split for vote? It’s not like Reagan won with 80% of the vote, which the majority voting age at that time was boomers.
Who has a stranglehold on government power is corporations. Fight the real enemy, not the people who for much of their lives (at least half of them) were trying to do the right thing.
I suggest we choose to fight at all. Which we haven’t. Somehow for the last 6 years we all continue to talk most and act least.
The simple fact is if everyone who was capable of voting did vote in their interests we would easily move the US left (actually getting us to somewhere center/left-center as there is no left whatsoever in America). Republicans would go away, we could move past Democrats, and directly address corruption.
But, “their” system of making people think voting doesn’t matter (plus of course voter repression and gerrymandering) and keeping people focused on shit that doesn’t matter (like ageism) is working, as it has for decades.
The average age in Congress is the highest ever, both things can be true.
It is a tired generalization. That’s why I didn’t make it. I wasn’t talking about boomers in terms of this party or that party. But boomers as a block and their control of the positions of power in the parties.
I see “anti-government” and “against government tyranny” in this story a lot, but these people are NOT anti-government. They’re very pro-government, as long as the government uses its power to enforce their beliefs. They’re very willing to use the power of government to enforce the laws as they see them, and ignore the laws they don’t like.
Seriously. The monarchy they want is a form of government.
They don’t want monarchy, they want feudalism.
No, the people cheering for their spray tanned leader to have absolute power and to be above the law want monarchy, not feudalism. That’s literally one of the cited differences between the two.
Remember, we outnumber these cunts.
But do we out-gun them?
I don’t think any civilians should be able to own firearms, but those MAGA cunts own them and you can be damn sure I’m not going to let them get one up on me.
Everyone, buy a gun, train thoroughly, and don’t let these assholes bully us into letting them run the country.
Unfortunately this is the way.
This isn’t a game, the police will not protect us, that’s been shown. They’ll happily club an old lady to the ground and shoot you in the face with rubber bullets if you get near them. I tell my friends as often as I can now is the time. Get a gun or two (a long one a short one) and learn how to use them. Learn some basic medic training (you just need to know how to stablize somebody). Start networking with like-minded people around you. Learn how to rely on yourself and your community. The rightwing wants to install a theocracy in the U.S. in disregard of whatever personal freedoms you hold dear and they’re very close to accomplishing it.
In Upstate NY? Most likely so. I grew up poor, in a family that relied on hunting for food. I’m significantly more financially secure now, but I’ve still two long barrels locked up with a fair amount of ammo.
Just in case.
Everyone, buy a gun, train thoroughly, and don’t let these assholes bully us into letting them run the country.
Yeah, because if there’s one thing we know, it’s that more guns will solve all the problems.
All of them? Absolutely not. The problem of these shitbags being armed and wanting to use them to install a dictatorship? Yeah, being on somewhat equal footing of arms definitely helps.
Yeah, anything to give them an excuse to get more and bigger guns, because escalation always makes things better. Woo Guns!!!
What’s distressing is that while the extreme-right may be a minority, republican supporters are something like 40%+ of the US electorate. There are tens of millions of people who hold those views.
The last time it got close to this bad, it ended up in the Oklahoma City Bombing.
What’s going to happen this time?
It’s not something that’s always in the forefront of my thoughts, but I’ve been expecting something like that since qanon took off
Which one?
To be clear I know which one you were referring to. But isn’t it kinda fucked up that there’s been enough that you might even have to stop to ask that for a second.
They will dangerously convene and wait for JFK, Jr. in Dallas again.
As a Democrat from upstate NY let me tell you why the rural areas are dark red: NYC seems to be all that matters.
At least 50% of NY’s population lives within 50 miles of NYC and I wouldn’t be surprised to find out its closer to 65% or 70%. Of course it gets the most attention. I get why people living outside that area would be upset but they cant be surprised.
You see the same thing in every state with a large metro area. There’s always griping from western and central MA but the fact is 75% of the population lives in the Boston metro area.
The issue, addressed in the article, is that these rural areas used to have industry that gave people a sense of purpose. Now the choices are basically move to a city, die of a heroin overdose, or join a right wing militia. We need to give these people something to do that’s beneficial and where they feel they’re contributing to their communities, otherwise, they’re going to be wooed by groups with ulterior motives that dress their goals up in rhetoric of service and cohesion.
used to have industry that gave [men] a sense of purpose
They need gender-affirming care.
Whew, for a second I was afraid someone wasn’t going to explicitly make it about gender.
Thank you for your service.
Women aren’t dying of drug overdoses in Appalachia and the Rust Belt?
I mean we have crumbling infrastructure. You could probably start some sort of government program to have people work on that. Like the whole pipeline from education through training, building, maintaining, researching.
Unfortunately a chunk of the us is pathologically opposed to that sort of thing.
The exact people we’re supposed to be coddling and hand feeding, specifically.
I’m sympathetic to economic concerns, that sympathy lessens alot when you reject any offered solutions to scream “coal or bust” (or relevant absent industry here.) That sympathy dissipates completely once you decide to blame gays and blacks and start spending all your “I ain’t got no money” cash on Maga gear and throwing faschie parades.
It’s almost as if it’s not about economics at all 🤔
I’m sympathetic to economic concerns, that sympathy lessens alot when you reject any offered solutions to scream “coal or bust” (or relevant absent industry here.)
The problem with this statement is that liberal/left/environmentalist forces have been waging a war on coal for decades now, and winning. This is the root of the rural working class turn against the Democrats. We had nearly 200k coal workers in the 80s, and now it’s down to under 50k. That’s people directly employed in coal, not to mention those employed in the thriving rural economies they supported. Millions of people have been impacted by the decline of coal, and right or wrong, they perceive Democrats as responsible for both the decline, and the failure to support the people who were impacted.
At this point you have generational poverty as a result of the closure of coal mines and plants, and you have kids growing up who don’t know what it used to be like, they only know the abandoned buildings and drug addiction they grow up surrounded by. I’m not saying we have to tolerate the negative attitudes that fester in these situations, but we do have to understand where they come from, and we certainly shouldn’t let it stop us from trying to make things better. If people have positive, productive things to do, they won’t spend all their time on the internet finding reasons to hate their neighbors, and that facet of the problem will solve itself over time.
It’s funny how the enlightened centrists who attack leftists (no matter how varied) as single issue voter, big govt nuts, and insensitive are always the same people who think “if we don’t use big govt to ban all energy except coal and force companies to reopen all the mines no matter how problematic then they have every right to overthrow the government.”
Why don’t we try that with a leftist position? “Institute single payer Healthcare so every citizen has access to healthcare scot free or else we’re going to overthrow the government?”
Y’all would SCREECH about it being economically impossible, brand us as terrorists, and be ITCHING to gun us down. But hey the people who just want to kill gays and own blacks again, they get a pass and we need to cowtow to their demands or else we deserve it.
a. Coal sucks. It was never going to last forever. It’s horrible for the environment at like every stage.
b. 200k people is nothing. There are almost that many people living in my neighborhood of Brooklyn alone. I’m not keen on them having so much more political power than here.
Mining for coal again is just a non starter. There’s only so much in the ground to begin with, and a lot of people don’t want the environment to be damaged that badly.
There are things we could do as a society to make things better. Probably none of the good ideas come from the right wing. Basic income or government work programs would probably help. Letting the free market decide will just lead to people being exploited and the environment savaged.
People love to make the “empty land should vote” argument by harping that urban areas “don’t care about rural needs” but also love to ignore that anytime the rural areas are consulted the response is always basically “coal or coup” or “ban f**s or coup.”
I’m tired of these various right wing interests absolutely refusing to engage with any part of the process then crying that they’re being oppressed because they don’t get their extreme demands met, and I’m tired of people making excuses for them as they march in the streets to undo the whole country.
200k people is nothing.
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What a horrible, neoliberal thing to say.
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It’s not just 200k people, it’s hundreds of thousands more that lost their livelihoods when the main economic driver in their area shut down.
I’m not arguing for coal (it’s 2024, why are we still using it at all?), I’m arguing against abandoning an entire population of people who made their livings off of it and its cascading economic effects.
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Yeah, I’d love to reinstate the CCC & Youth Corps as permanent jobs programs, including all the arts funding, but that ain’t happening. Guess we’ll just have to get shot by Proud Boys instead.
its the same on the other coast… Seattle and the i5 area are what keep Washington blue. There are some deep red parts of Washington state and its frightening. As someone that looks like my father (Anglo Saxon) but identifies with my mother (Lakota), it is a surreal experience sometimes. People are fucking crazy and the people who think they are powerful (the deep red) because they are loud are going to have a very rude awakening if there is a violent revolution. They do not have the numbers to repel an angry populace that is fleeing the cities.
That’s the entire planet. Metropolitan places are metropolitan. Homogeneous places are filled with ignorance and prejudice.
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NYC matters a whole lot fucking more than Mechanicville. What do they even want?
NYC has a shit ton of economic and cultural output. It matters.
I get that people might feel bad that they’re seen as irrelevant or uninteresting. But, uh, tough?
All citizens deserve representation. Taxation without representation is why the USA was founded in revolt against the British.
They literally have representatives. At federal and state levels. And presumably local, too.
Yes but if the representatives aren’t representing their populace accurately, then what is a citizen to do? Vote, obviously, but in the meantime?
The unfortunate truth is that largely the state of New York may as well just be the province of New York City, plus a few additional hangers-on that don’t really matter beyond a couple percentage points here or there. And those folks out hanging on, upstate, aren’t feeling very represented. Because New York City is, essentially, all that matters in the state economically.
I don’t know how to solve this in a way that makes sense. I believe that every person is entitled to representation that matches their needs. But when you have a single representative attempting (if they even do that) to represent both the big city and the rural interests at the same time, there are going to be some incompatible requests. And the city wins those, always, because it’s the economic driver of the state.
I DO understand economic concerns in these areas making people leery and whatnot, but I am SOOOOOO over this argument that they have NO responsibility to have even the most casual relationship with reality and “What are they supposed to do? NOT overthrow the government and advocate for slavery?! Gtfo here you insensitive libtard!”
If my car’s check engine light light comes on I can’t replace my spark plugs with twizzlers and expect it to run better, you can’t throw a “kill the gays and blacks” parade and expect NYC to send your small county 75% of their tax revenue.
The reps are based on geography. They have districts. They’re supposed to represent those people. The Senate less so, since that’s two people for the whole state, but that’s a problem for any state that’s not fairly homogenous.
I don’t really have a good solution that doesn’t make some heavy changes to the us government. But within the current constraints, I think cities frankly matter more.
Side note: I’ve been reading about how people’s minds change. It turns out that when someone encounters a fact or statement that challenges their group status, like “cities matter [and the suburbs don’t]” above, the brain typically reacts similarly to how it responds to a physical threat. Pretty much no one responds to that kind of thing with a cool rational head. The brain desperately looks for security, even if it has to fall back on “no, fuck you.” I do it, too. Makes debate hard.
The capital of Washington DC has “taxation without representation” on their license plates.
Democrat in NYS here. The right wingers I know are often pissed that we have to obey laws that make sense for cities but don’t make sense for rural areas.
Similarly, they get pissed that billions of dollars go to NYC when we have important bridges and roads that have been closed for years.
I understand why it is that way. I understand it’s hard to have it any other way. And I understand our country is facing more important things right now. But I can also sympathize a bit.
NYC is the money maker because money gets put into it which makes it the money maker which is why money gets put into it, etc.
A lot of these areas used to be economically successful and aren’t anymore. It does suck that I’m stuck here due to family and friends. Sure I could pack up and move to a liberal city but I’d be leaving a lot behind and my son would be without any extended family. Can’t do it.
Lack of diversity, the higher degree of isolation in rural/suburban life, and higher amount of churchgoers getting preached hate probably has something to do with it too.
I always think it’s funny how these hypocratic douchbags will wear masks in public to prevent people from recognizing them but wont wear one to save their neighbors life.
I also think it’s funny how they claimed having military and police joining the groups that they know what they’re doing, when these people spend their lives being told exactly what to do, how to do it, and what to think about it.
Last note, looked this one up just to be double sure, how they got a guy with the name Mizrahi to join a white power hate group when that name has origins rooted Jewish and Israeli cultures is beyond me. How people can be convinced to go against their own best interest is beyond me.Reminds me of the movie easy rider, and that movie was made in the sixties but its still so relevant, every time people start trying to live freely
“Oh no. What you represent to them is freedom.” “What the hell’s wrong with freedom, man? That’s what it’s all about.” “Oh yeah, that’s right, that’s what it’s all about, all right. But talkin’ about it and bein’ it – that’s two different things. I mean, it’s real hard to be free when you are bought and sold in the marketplace. ‘Course, don’t ever tell anybody that they’re not free ‘cause then they’re gonna get real busy killin’ and maimin’ to prove to you that they are. Oh yeah, they’re gonna talk to you, and talk to you, and talk to you about individual freedom, but they see a free individual, it’s gonna scare ‘em.” “Mmmm, well, that don’t make ‘em runnin’ scared.” “No, it makes ‘em dangerous.”It’s tempting to dwell on the hypocrisy, after all, surely saying one thing and doing another should be the ultimate way to scare people away from your ideology. Even the Right is obsessed with highlighting perceived inconsistencies and hypocrisies from the Left. But at this stage in the game, with climate change, culture wars, and a fractured population that shares no common values, hypocrisy is small potatoes. Let’s hold people’s feet over the coals and make sure that the right policies get passed.
Years ago I dated someone who lived in upstate New York. Her neighbor flew a Confederate flag. And also poisoned neighborhood cats.
That’s unbelievably sad… 😞
Flag yes. Killing cats, no. They are a huge damage to the environment.
You’re a horrible person and no amount of pretending to be high minded will change that
I’m talking about facts and you’re attacking me? Who’s horrible? Ad hominem.
Law and order? So they also want Trump in prison?
So funny, the proud boys guy was of Mexican descent, the guy in this article seems of middle eastern descent, can they really be this dumb and support white supremacy ideology?
Let us not forget the Founding member Proud Boys Gavin McInnes, who made an angry video sodomizing himself to own the libs. The proud boys REALLY don’t like talking about ol’ Gavin.
post 2024 election, J6 2 electric boogaloo succeeds, some lawmakers are dead, others tied up
Enlightened centrists: Come on guys we can’t take back the capital they’re just sad about their local economy yeah they took congress but yall being mean and calling for them to be forcibly arrested is so much worse!
Upstate New York was the first place I saw the all black American flag.
My God! These hams aren’t Steamed at all!
Not in Utica, no.
So they claim it is NRA country, and that they are rattlesnakes that one should not tread on.
Add this together and deal with rattlesnakes the American way: Simply shoot them.
Absolute dumbasses. The lowest achievers from high school, never left town, and signed up for Facebook one day, and now here we are.
In my state, claiming to be part of a militia, unless you’ve been specifically called up by the Governor, or activated by the feds somehow or another, is a felony.
These groups needs to be considered terrorists, their assets seized, and their presence made illegal. Their goal is the violent oppression of minorities in violation of the Constitution.
Long time ago the Supreme Court said advocating to overthrow the government is protected First Amendment speech, and that made sense when I learned about it but now I think it was a mistake, said from a place of great comfort.
Speaking peacefully about government change is not the same as forming an armed militia. Don’t let them conflate those two things in your mind.
True story.
