Nearly a third of Americans – 30% – say people may have to resort to violence in order to get the country back on track, according to the latest PBS News/NPR/Marist poll.
It’s a sharp rise from 18 months ago, when 19% of Americans said the same.
It’s a horrific moment to see that people honestly believe that there’s no other alternative at this point than to resort to political violence.
I mean… is it? I think it’s pretty obvious in the context of the regime essentially giving itself carte blanch to perpetrate political violence on its desired scapegoats and opponents.
I’m frankly getting pretty fucking tired of people complaining about how this is a startling development and being shocked by what’s happening. They wrote a playbook back in 2019. They published it on the open internet. They said they would follow it. They are now following it. You are not allowed to be surprised by any of this.
This country is BUILT on political violence. The revolutionary war. The civil war. Hundreds of thousands of people died in those conflicts. Only more recently have non-violent protests accomplished anything and that was only possible because of the more free atmosphere those wars established in this country. That freedom is now almost entirely gone. What choice do people have left?
Don’t forget the riots and strikes between 1900 and 1920 (or 30?).
Successful application of violence today is complicated by the sophistication of surveillance and the electronic, centralized distribution of money.
It’s difficult to pull together a large enough coalition to be able to fight effectively because the process of finding those people is short circuited by early discovery.
Nonviolence is the only way until a large enough segment of the population is desperate enough to trigger action.
Before that happens, effective leaders must be found and a support network must be readied to go into action quickly to professionalize and unify it when it happens, but before that is used to manage nonviolent action…
While I agree that non-violent is the way to go, I think we need to change our definition of “violence.”
Property destruction should not be considered violent. Especially when precautions are specifically taken to ensure that no people were harmed during act of property destruction or sabotage.
On the other side of things, actions such as destroying wildlife habitat or polluting the air, water, and soil systems of the Earth should be considered “violence.” It is violence towards all of humanity, and towards life itself.
Incredibly recently. The Civil Rights movement included advocacy for political violence, and arguably one of the only reasons it worked was Malcolm X and the Black Panthers saying “hey here’s our alternative if our nonviolent fight doesn’t work, we’re all strapped and willing to hand out more guns if shit requires it”.
But Trump (lied and) said he didn’t know anything about Project 2025.
You’re not allowed to say the part in brackets without summoning the Gestapo.
We need a general strike. The country would be brought to its knees if deprived of profit and labor. That tactic was extremely effective in Chile in 2019, and had they not fallen for the trick of liberal reform, they would’ve had a successful revolution on their hands with virtually no bloodshed.
If you aren’t in a union, then please consider joining the IWW to unionize your workplace (bonus: you’ll get higher wages, better benefits, and more time off if you succeed!) to strengthen a general strike if we finally manage to enact one (the UAW is planning one for May 1st 2028, but it could happen sooner)
And for our international friends, you should join one as well, as fascism is gaining momentum globally. If your country isn’t listed below, just contact the IWW directly in the link above.
Can you afford not to get paid for 2 weeks? If so you’re in the minority. Most people can’t. Not to mention they have kids they are worried about, medical conditions that they can barely afford even with insurance. Rising housing and grocery costs. Etc…
I’m not trying to be a downer. I would love to see this happen, but we need a “realistic” way to accomplish it, to convince a majority to participate.
Unions build up strike-funds with membership dues so that members can continue to receive a salary while striking, that’s why unions are so essential for working class people to be able to flex their power non-violently.
Consider that Chile is a much less wealthy country than the US. but was able to successfully commit to a general strike for over a month.
Honest question, how much of the US population do you think is unionized? Without looking it up
I’m familiar with the depressing statistic already, a little under 10%.
However, bear in mind that the majority of the most critical infrastructure for making profit, such as ports, trains, trucking, and medical care have the highest rates of unionized jobs, and would still be incredibly effective for a general strike (Generally only 3.5% of the population would need to participate to have a meaningful effect). Even with our abyssal rate of unionization, we still hold incredible leverage if we choose to use it.
The UAW has a general strike planned for May 1st 2028, which has real odds of working. Unfortunately it’s still 2 years out, and by that time may be too late. I’m hoping it’s moved up at some point.
1-2%
Realistic way is people just drop out of consumer economy to the fullest degree possible for them. Cancel all unnecessary subscriptions, shop local for only necessities. Look how quickly Disney blinked just because of a wave of cancellations, now do that everywhere.
People are going to cite the Kimmel cancellations until we legally aren’t allowed to. I… am skeptical.
A common talking point was that the real danger isn’t people who cancel out of solidarity: it is people who realize they have a disney plus subscription they haven’t used since Mandalorian Season 2. Because those are the bread and butter for these services and once people look at their bill and realize how much they have been spending over the years, they tend to not come back. And this all lined up with Disney (allegedly?) wanting to do a cost increase and enough “mainstream media” pointing out that Kimmel didn’t actually say anything even slightly controversial.
Contrast that with stuff like Sucker Punch firing the dev who made a Mario and Luigi joke and tripling down on it… and nobody giving a shit because Ghost of Yotei is coming out! Or all the attempts at encouraging people to support BDS boycotts. I mean, Palestine was the single biggest issue and the sole reason the Democrats lost, right? Then… why is everyone leaping at new gamepass deals and so forth?
Time and time again it is shown that people just don’t boycott luxury goods. If you can afford a luxury good you “earned it” and will find every possible excuse to keep buying it. What DOES tend to work is contacting the advertisers. Much like chuds contacted credit card companies to get gay games off Steam et al. Because, much like contacting your elected official, they understand that people actually caring enough to pick up the phone means a lot of people are REALLY angry.
Palestine was not the sole reason Democrats lost or the single biggest issue for voters according to the polling data. There was a small percentage for whom it was their sole or primary motivation in voting.
Can they afford to live under a fascist dictatorship that crushes dissenters and disappears citizens at will? It seems that by “realistic” resistance you mean “without inconvenience” but we’re never going to get to that point. That seems to be what people are hoping for and it just doesn’t work that way. The longer we wait the more sacrifice will be required.
No I mean “realistic” as in getting enough people to participate that it would actually have an impact.
Will those people attempt to make an impact if the cost is more than inconvenience?
What? What are you talking about? If enough people don’t participate then it won’t make a difference. And you’re asking if they would still participate if it costs too much?? I’m sure many people would love to join but feel due to their current circumstances that they can’t. That demo of people is being overlooked and shit on for some stupid reason.
Can you afford not to get paid for 2 weeks? If so you’re in the minority. Most people can’t.
The general strike is being planned for almost 3 years out. We would have to save less than 2% of our paycheck to more than cover 2 weeks without being paid. We need to normalize preparing for a general strike, and be willing to help each other if needed when the time comes
To add on to this:
Look what happens when people protest or go on strike. Everyone SAYS they are in full solidarity with the workers at Starbucks. But they also gotta get to work and that picket line is really holding up traffic… and now they also need to drive three blocks away to a different Starbucks. Look, something something no ethical consumption under capitalism so fuck you I earned this coffee milkshake and maybe if you worked harder you could buy one too.
A General Strike requires a fairly overwhelming majority of support to begin with. And, if we had that… we wouldn’t be inching ever closer to a civil war.
Just because something is hard doesn’t mean we shouldn’t with for it.
It isn’t about being “hard”. It is about being “effective” and understanding the circumstances and impact.
But also… yeah, “this is going to be really hard” IS a consideration when it comes to social action. Because you have very few chances at that before people get bored or get demoralized. One of the most cliche examples are all the college kids who inevitably get super behind a candidate who doesn’t win and then they start insisting that voting doesn’t matter.
But the inverse of this is a very real consideration amongst the people who organize protests and resistance. There is a shocking amount of effort “behind the scenes” to downplay stupid fucking bullshit like “make your profile picture black”. Because people do it and say “I helped” and start ignoring you. And while there is a LOT of discussion and argument regarding the utility of the parade protests… at least those get people outside.
And the start of any form of action is to understand what the impact of said action is and whether it is even feasible to begin with.
Don’t try for things because there don’t seem feasible before trying them, got it
Perhaps this is why trump just declared war on nonprofits. They could potentially pull together resources to keep people fed during a coordinated nationwide strike.
They in general exist to tackle goals directly opposed to fascist regimes, so it males sense to target them.
Education, social justice, feeding the hungry, and protecting nature are all examples of goals Trump’s regime are staunchly against.
That’s why mutual aid organizations are essential. They operate outside of the legal system, so can’t be directly targeted as easily. If you or anyone else reading this have the time, please consider joining your local mutual aid group. That could be Food Not Bombs, a different group local to your city or town, or even your local church if you’re in a rural area.
If you don’t have one in your area, start one! Here’s a little guide on how and where to find likeminded folk to start one with: https://infosec.exchange/@tinker/113589807117870451
Thanks for the link.Trump is going after those next - nonprofits.
Can you afford not to get paid for 2 weeks? If so you’re in the minority. Most people can’t.
Let’s be honest most people living in first world countries can indeed do that but they don’t like to renounce to all the commodities they have.
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This is the only path other than violence and just as likely not to happen.
I agree that a general strike is the absolute least that should be done. But a general strike would have to hit the ground with the EXPECTATION that it will get violent.
It’s inevitable that Cheeto will try to use his jackbooted thugs to crack down hard, and taking it meekly and then hoping to sue over it later won’t be an option.
When the MAGA S.A. come to put you down, they aren’t going to stop. I’m not saying that the strikers should start violence. But go in eyes open with the understanding that a a certain point, you all are going to have to make the fuckers bleed because they won’t think twice about doing it to you.
At this point I’m tired of people trying to give a prescription for the ‘right way to do things’
“A man who procrastinates in his choosing will inevitably have his choice made for him by circumstance.” Hunter S. Thompson
The problem is there absolutely is many, many wrong paths to take, and we have to learn from past attempts to avoid their mistakes. Notice how the arab spring movement, while initially promising, ultimately failed to prevent a new authoritarian regime from taking hold in most of those countries.
There are going to be different prescriptions from all political ideologies, but most of them can be dismissed to narrow down the possibilities.
- Right-Libertarians will advise we privatize everything and remove regulations - Doesn’t work. Creates the conditions for Neo-fuedalism and capital dominating every aspect of life.
- Moderates/Social Democrats will suggest we can reform our way out of this by voting for the right people - Didn’t work in Nazi Germany, didn’t work in Franco’s Spain. Due to corporate capture, they ultimately cannot resolve the issues that cause people to foolishly shift toward fascism in hopes to escape those issues.
- Marxist-Leninists will say we just need a revolution with a Vanguard party - Doesn’t work. Results in extremely unfree authoritarian states like the USSR, North Korea, and China’s CCP. Basically state capitalism under the guise of socialism in name only.
That leaves the Libertarian-left/Anarchists. We have evidence that their methods result in pretty sweet outcomes, they just have never survived very long due to the whole world usually being against them.
Okay, so what do we do to in our case? First off, avoiding a civil war or extreme violence is vastly preferable, as the alternative has some big downsides. The best non-violent method we have at our disposal is a General Strike, which directly targets the machinery that fascist states rely on. Combined with mutual aid networks and civil disobedience, it has a rather good chance of preventing a fascist takeover with a minimum of violence.
The alternative is straight up revolution, which requires the participating population to be educated on a shared vision, methods to organize, and how to avoid centralizing power structures or cult of personalities which lend themselves to co-option by the above mentioned groups.
I 100% agree with the overall point that there are very bad outcomes to getting this wrong, but my point is that we are out of time. Even if we manage to pull off a general strike with mural aid and civil disobedience we could eventually all have to come together on a direction or course of action going forward and I dont see that happening and even in the best of circumstances I think the country balkanizes/otherwise dissolves after a series of geographically and ideologically independent insurgencies rise up from the chaos that’s about to happen.
I’m not trying to be a doomer, but I think the time to steer into the skid has passed
I’m in favor of both options at once
Even if you are in a union, join the IWW as well. Most modern unions are insufficiently radical for what’s coming, and all the best organizers I know are IWW dual-carders
Agree 100%! For others reading, here’s a good article on the merits of dual-carding.
Gee, almost as if Russian propaganda is working.
Before the Civil War one politician opined that if a war started you’d be able to mop up all the blood spilled with one handkerchief.
Anyone who thinks a new fight will be any easier has probably never been in a real fight.
I don’t think people realize that if a new US civil war kicked off the lines wouldn’t be as clear as north vs south. this would be state vs state, city vs city, neighbor vs neighbor. you could draw lines in your god damn sub division/street.
And if it were alliances between states it would be a god damn logistical nightmare. Imagine California being allied with New York for example. or Hell Minnesota being allied with like Arizona or whatever. how do you move supplies, troops, and what have you between allied states when you got a shit ton of hostiles between the two.
Add to the fact that unlike the first civil war you now have US military bases all over the world. what happens when you got folks within the SAME base in the middle of Germany that suddenly don’t “agree” with each other?
Cluster fuck is an understatement.
There’d also be a shit-ton of drone warfare. Thousands will die without ever seeing their killers face. It’s also entirely possible AI will be bombing people and you’ll basically be killed by an algorithm.
Lets also not forget cyberwarfare, ranging from external to internal sources, ranging from doxxing people to invented news events with AI gen/manipulated images/audio/video, all the way up to knocking out public infrastructure, locking down hardware of local gov / businesses / banks with ransomware, etc.
Random, unofficial people are capable of either most or all of that.
Oh and of course if shit really kicks off, other countries will probably do the CIA’s signature move of funding arming and training various groups of people.
I saw one dream map where Canada drops two tentacles; one reaches down through the West all the way to San Diego, and the Eastern one reaches just north of Washington.
Humor aside, I agree with your take. A war of assassins and terrorists on both sides.
I’ll add one more note. Back in the day, the Irish Republican Army was the most feared underground in the world. They only had a handful of soldiers, but a superb organization. If a shooter was supposed to kill someone in Geneva, he’d have three or four cars waiting when he got to the airport, and each driver would know five places the shooter could stay. He’d have a choice of getaway drivers and extra safe houses and docotrs on tap.
How do you still manage that in the current (and worsening) surveillance state? I mean Luigi showed its possible for a lone wolf but I have to question being able to organize without being known. If you are caught organizing an antifa org then you’re also uber boned.
My point was that the next war won’t look anything like the last one.
Anyone who thinks that some molotov cocktails they made is going to bring down the system has another think coming.
In my view the only way organization would work is with the assistance of an enemy nation with the ability to circumvent the surveillance state (to ship in weapons, avoid communication eavesdropping, etc). And unfortunately those nations are mostly very, very far away.
I can think of a funnier map: Canada taking NY, Washington DC, … and Mexico (re)taking the west coast. Imagine if Texas ended up being again part of Mexico.
It’s also why we need to avoid violence and make the regime stumble into itself.
Which is why Chinese and Russia propaganda is attempting to stoke the fire (remember, they eliminated their opposition, so they don’t have the same experience inciting violence and they think they do).
avoid violence
implying there has ever not been violence or that the current amount of violence by right wingers and the US government isn’t already, currently, right this fucking second even worse than before Trump’s first term
nonviolent resistance is an important front but it alone won’t be enough, I fear.
Its going to be more like the people vs the federal gov.
If you think this, you should talk to your average republican voter. They will suck that orange cock until every bit of their wealth and ability to afford food is gone, and blame whoever fox news points a finger at that day.
This is why the techniques pioneered by the native americans, and taught to colonial rebels by their experience fighting with them, would be the most likely path.
What is that, you ask? Guerilla warfare. It’s why we were able to defeat the most powerful colonial empire since the Romans.
We had the same conditions you described, a good chunk of people who still considered themselve British were mixed in with those who sought freedom.
Hard to hide from a drone.
or Hell Minnesota being allied with like Arizona or whatever.
Isn’t Hell in Michigan?
It would be a clusterfuck. Especially since the type of violence some have advocated for recently is more akin to political assassination. We need to push back on the false equivalence of “person X says stuff I don’t agree with about perceived identities, therefore that speech ‘unpersons’ me, therefore it’s tantamount to a death threat, therefore actual violence against that person is justified.” You can literally find examples in these comments here.
If you have thousands of lonewolves each deciding unilaterally to assassinate (insert political opponent or public figure here) based on their own subjective perceptions, that no longer resembles a civil war, it more resembles a free-for-all hellscape.
I’d suggest a more useful concept is to form strong local communities committed to their own well being, mutual aid, and defense. Whatever that looks like for you in your area. Your mileage may vary. This is not legal advice.
There may have to be a free-for-all hellscape phase before getting to an organized something-better phase in the hit video game super mushyroom kingdom.
So which hashtag would you use to end slavery?
Let’s turn it around.
I say violence won’t work.
Please explain in detail how you see the conflict going. I mean, I’m certain that the same people who couldn’t get past the DNC to get Bernie nominated will have no problem facing off against “military contractors” hired by the billionaire class.
Details, please.
I mean, I dread whatever violence is upcoming. But the reality is liberation has never happened with solely nonviolent means. Even King and Ghandi were buttressed by groups that used a variety of tactics, including violence, to force the state to come to the table with them.
This isn’t to advocate indiscriminate or senseless violence, but if your resistance group is nonviolent, and condemn any violence by other resistance groups, they have severely limited the range of tactics acceptable for use, and cede the power of justified violence to those in power only.
There’s a good book called “How Nonviolence Protects the State” that goes into depth on this, you should check it out.
In the end is a “good cop, bad cop” situation.
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Still not seeing an actual plan.
I’m pretty sure we all agree that violence is a bad solution. The problem is we’re all out of good ones. What are the alternatives at this point?
Society upholding its part of the social bargain. Making these people feel afraid to express such opinions anymore. Without that long term, even physical violence will only buy temporary change. These people will always return if given the opportunity. And for generations Americans have been taught to tolerate intolerance.
I don’t see how we would make them afraid without any implied threat of violence though. Apart from that, I wholeheartedly agree with you.
Through a threat of non-physical violence. Cutting them off from society. The reason we’re now debating about actual physical violence, about actually killing people. Is because society as a whole failed utterly to do that.
The last time this happened, the Civil War. Sherman was stopped much too early. As well as reconstruction. The fact that Confederate leadership was just allowed to surrender then allowed back into society with very little reprocussion. Not even to have all their property confiscated to repay for the damage they’d done. Let alone be exiled from the United States itself completely. That open sore was allowed to fester and become celebrated.
All of which served as an inspiration and a blueprint to the first wave of fascists in the early 20th century. It was all open and tolerated by society. That’s why it returned.
that lever is getting harder and harder to pull. already it’s impossible to get, for example, blatantly transphobic videos removed from youtube. The right’s campaign of reframing the consequences of their bigotry as “censorship” or “anti conservative bias” has unfortunately resonated with big tech.
and a lot of these nazi fucks feel like they are protected from the consequences of spouting their nazi fuck bullshit, probably because they increasingly are.
So what did Occupy Wall Street accomplish? What about the March for our Lives protests? What about the BLM riots? What did Bernie Sanders winning every single county in the 2016 WV Democrat Primary accomplish?
So, no actual plan?
Those examples were the plan. But peaceful revolution have been shown to be impossible.
Wishful thinking isn’t a plan.
Using a hashtag to end slavery isn’t much of one either.
Violence works, otherwise there wouldn’t be any. We’ve put up a whole system of laws and police and investigators and courts and prisons in order to provide an alternative to violence. And even then, that system is itself backed up with a real threat of violence as well as its occasional localized deployment.
Yesterday’s “pep rally” where none of the military leaders dragged in had anything good to say about it suggests that there is not the overwhelming military support that Trump wants there to be. There are plenty of examples of far less powerful local forces successfully standing up to superpowers. Afghanistan is one. Wallachia is another.
When the entire federal government and many state governments have wholly abandoned the systems put together to avoid violence, and are in fact using the husks of those systems to apply violence to their opponents, we’ve already crossed the Rubicon.
I would like to throw in that Vietnam managed to not only win a war against the US/French/Australians… but to also win a war against China, after the US left Vietnam.
Basically, after the US and allies left Vietnam, Vietnam invaded Cambodia to put a stop to Pol Pot’s monstrous Khmer Rouge regime… and then China invaded Vietnam in response.
Vietnam repulsed them.
Despite being somewhere between considerably to vastly outnumbered, and fighting on multiple fronts.
The lesson of this story is do not fuck with the Viet Cong.
Say what you will about their version of ‘communism’ as a societal model, but holy shit does modern Vietnam have an insane military track record, with basically all its roots in guerilla warfare.
Violence fails 50% of the time, if not more. Every fight has a losing side.
Yup, and the side that loses is the side that wasn’t violent enough.
Read up on your history.
The US dropped something like five Hiroshimas a day on North Viet-Nam for years.
Germany killed many more enemy soldiers than Russia did.
Quality over quantity.
Hi, my name is ICE, off to a death camp for you, according to me and my paramilitary goon squad who broke into your house/apartment at 3 am.
Don’t bother arguing, that’s what the gag and spit hood are for.
Violence is already here.
Thoughts and prayers are not an effective defense.
I would suggest either hiding, very, very well, which is probably impossible for most social media addicts who’ve publicized half of their existence, and for morons who think that their VPN isn’t keeping logs that can all be subpoenaed by the government…
Or maybe some kind of actual local community organizing, involving you know, actually speaking with your neighbors in meatspace, getting to know them, forming at bare minimum a plan for how to deal with say, food shortage, brown out/black out, etc.
And what’s the plan?
Going to start shooting Federal officers in the street?
Here’s what happens; Federal government shuts down the power to the whole city. Mobilizes the National Guard. Brings in overseas ‘military contractors’ like after Katrina.
Meanwhile, the 0.001% is at its beach house on Bali.
That all happens if you do nothing as well.
Infact it literally already is happening, half of what you describe as a potential reaction.
I am not going to give you the plan on an unsecured, publically accessible communication platform, you are a moron for asking for that.
I, personally, am crippled, and plan to do nothing and remain as close to an unthreatening digital ghost as possible.
That might, might actually work for me, because I am white, and have never registered as any kind of party affiliated voter, have never given my biometric data to any company or device for any reason, haven’t been on an air flight in 20 years, don’t have any social presence beyond this here psuedonomyous account.
Maybe you could start your plan with learning some basic opsec.
I can’t remember… Historically how has fascism been defeated? It’s right there, but for the life of me I can’t recall. Can you help?
I don’t remember, how many countries in Europe installed Fascist governments after Lenin came in?
I can cherry pick historical facts too.
Cherry picked? A world war is a cherry picked fact? Well now we know your delusions aren’t limited to present issues.
If you feel name calling is a viable tactic, I guess I’ll have to cede to your vast intelligence and withdraw. I may be deluded but I know when a conversation is a waste of time.
Name calling would be something like “you’re an idiot”. Saying you’re delusional for minimizing arguably the worst war in human history as a cherry picked fact is descriptive. But yes, this is a waste of time.
Idealists thinking that humans, notoriously violent mind you, have somehow evolved beyond violence WHILE VIOLENCE IS OCCURRING is absolutely insane!
Your point is valid.
It probably looks like a dystopian novel surveillance state, with drones watching you every time you leave your house (or not). All internet and phone communication would be monitored. And anyone caught saying things the government doesn’t like would suffer consequences.
With individual events prompting it and happening occasionally regardless of the surveillance state.
It’d look a lot more like the Irish than the Civil War. It’d be a country of everyone living in fear.
Sadly, the best defense we have is the fact that Trump is an idiot surrounded by dolts.
A competent leader would have locked everything down years ago.
A competent leader would have realized that the country is in a pretty good spot, he’s in a pretty good spot. They’d focus on helping the American people and improving the world and the country.
They wouldn’t be Hitler with more grift.
It takes a special amount of dumb to do the damage they’ve done. With their goals, they can’t, by definition, be competent.
I’ve been saying this since 2016.
All Trump had to do was call the Saudis on Inauguration Day and tell them that they were going to put $50 billion in his bank account.
Then he could have sat back and done nothing.
I’m a life long New Yorker, and I’ve seen Trump’s dumb for decades. Besides bankrupting casinos, he lost about a billion trying to buy the Plaza Hotel.
Everything is Russia’s fault, got it.
Well if an ICE officer stops my husband based on his appearance we’ve both agreed that we should resist that arrest.
That would end in violence and probably our deaths. What else can we do? Let them take us god knows where?
And after all that training we’ve had to never let kidnappers take you to a secondary location! There really isn’t another choice.
Historically, it has always taken violence to remove fascists from power.
The problem with all of this is that the right is literally saying this exact same thing.
We dismiss it because it’s ludicrous, because they HAVE all the power, their guy IS the deep state that controls everything, but our media world has fashioned a narrative for our stupidest segment that they’re the oppressed underdogs.
Meaning, no matter what happens, even if we get our best outcome and drag this administration onto the White House lawn, we still have to live next to millions and millions of people who think we’ve been planning to do that to them for decades now.
There is no good solution that doesn’t involve some kind of new leadership that needs to be built from the ground up and will likely take generations to nurture and develop.
So what though? If it gets to the point of having to violently overview the government, we’re past the point of precedent. We can just use their beloved AI to scrub social media profiles and purge them from the voting registry. Sure they’ll believe that was the plan all along, but we’d have a few decades where the scales were tipped so far in our favor that their children and grandchildren could be properly educated without all the revisionist bullshit.
That’s the key, right? You’ve gotta build a society afterwards that doesn’t perpetuate the cycles of abuse and enlightens people with education. One that doesn’t exploit anybody and doesn’t have a class structure that divides people. That’s the only way you can build a society that can reliably raise every child healthily. Any society that strives for equality like that will necessarily have to ignore the voices of those who want to hold it back.
There’s ample of evidence that a couple of decades to reeducate their children and grandchildren simply isn’t enough or doesn’t work.
We had a couple of decades to educate everyone about fascism,… and yet we’re here.
We allowed them to rewrite the history books. We’re here because education was so fucking bad. I grew up in California and was taught that MLK’s I have a dream speech solved racism in America and that the civil war was about states rights. There’s lots of room for improvement.
Trying to educate people who insist on being lost beyond salvation is a waste for everyone involved. If they love the sword so much, let’s let them die by it and let’s move on past their era.
Then you begin a thousand-year cycle of violence and reprisal for that violence until our great great great great grandchildren have no idea why they hate this group of people they live next to.
There’s a precedent for this, you might have heard of it.
we still have to live next to millions and millions of people who think we’ve been planning to do that to them for decades now.
They already believe that. There’s no point in asking your oppressor if they are uncomfortable with you getting oppressed. Just ask any school bully.
It’s not a matter of asking permission OR rolling over and letting them get away with being stupid, violent, orcs, it’s a matter of needing a particular brand of leadership that can rein in our worst people’s worst impulses and being patient and focused enough as a political side to stay united and focused on making changes that benefit everyone. Otherwise we’re descending into a state of pure social decay as the system grinds to a halt because we don’t trust each other and we don’t even have clear sides in the conflict.
I don’t see our current population of the US being able to do any of this, so I don’t see revolution, even small-scale or “soft” revolution as being a viable option. We have to all get a lot more social and accepting of each other, we need to use our social skills and networks to rebuild the governing bodies in our communities on local levels and install representatives that actually represent us, and this has to be done in a way that eliminates the influence of corporations but also still raising money needed for political action. So yeah, we’re cooked.
Not always. The Portuguese carnation revolution happened without violence. Spain democratised right after Franco’s death.
How can you say “Spain democratized after francos death” as if the entire bloody Spanish Civil War didn’t happen?
By that same logic it seems that Germany also overcame fascism peacefully, because Germany democratized right after Hitlers death.
So violence, military coup or heart failure?
Heart failure sounds both easier and more likely.
Facebook clowns laughed at me when I said that you can vote in fascism, but you have to shoot your way out.
Well it’s true. You can’t be diplomatic with fascists. You can’t “get on the same level” with billionaires.
They have no reason to listen or care, unless we give them a reason to listen or care.
And no matter what, all violence is somehow leftist violence. Trump in his speech to the generals said that they need to deploy against ‘animals’ who fire at firefighters climbing ladders to save people. At first I was incredulous, but then I saw a comment that pointed out that not too long ago a Trump supporter really did fire at firefighters doing their jobs (and climbing ladders). Not only that, but he was the one who started the fire in the first place to bait them.
Yet it is our fault somehow…
This is just people waking up to reality. Trump has the White House, the senate, the House of Representatives, and the courts. He controls the military and has already begun deployment to “democratic” cities. His buddy in Texas is redistricting to help him consolidate power, and I am sure Abbot is not the only one. Every move Trump makes is designed to cripple opposition to his regime. Republican states are purging voter rolls and enacting bullshit laws designed to disenfranchise people of colour.
Milquetoast democrats have made only the most pathetic gestures of opposition to Trump. The first genuine thing Trump ever said was when he expressed surprise yesterday at how little resistance he has faced from the left. Republicans were right about one thing: the American left is a bunch of pussies.
If more Americans think political violence is the only way out of the mess Americans made, it’s probably because they are starting to develop a vague but accurate understanding of what is happening in their country.
Perhaps the Democratic Socialists (DS) can become the unifying source of resistance. They are the ones fighting, but there are too few to have political impact.
It’s up to the citizens to back them, and the DS must drum up the leaders and present them so citizens can choose them.
I think the DS values are the closest to the new deal approach that made America a wildly successful nation and beacon for just treatment of humans.
Heck, Europe and Japan took their governing cues from America during the Marshall plan. They are examples of following the ideals our leaders used to value. This is the real “make america great again”.
This is my fondest wish. I think many Americans are ready to rally around someone mounting a serious opposition to Trump, but no one has stepped up so far. I love Bernie and i believe he is important to the movement, but they need a young, charismatic, inspiring leader to start getting very loud about the real situation in the US. It will be an uphill battle because the media have been captured by people either cowed by or sympathetic to Trump. Maybe Lemmy can be the platform for DS in the states. Legacy media has failed (with maybe 1-2 exceptions).
Well, I think AOC is leading the fight, but she needs support to become a major player politically. Mamdavi is evidence of her rising power, and he can now be one of those leaders.
Jasmine Crockett is another. Sure, not DS, but easily a coalition member. I hope there is strong effort foran revolution of leadership in the Democratic Party.
I had a lib tell me the other day that democratic socialists are actually a secret SpecOp branch of the Tea Party tasked with infiltrating the dem party and undermining the efforts of patriots like Jeffries and Schumer, and that it is a blatant lie and MAGA propaganda that countries left of US dems exist and are functional. Europe has apparently been a warzone since WWII because they’re taken over by socialist terror organizations. I was then blocked for linking to the Wikipedia article for Democratic Socialism.
I think breaking the blue tribe propaganda is going to be one hell of an uphill battle, unfortunately. A lot of dems align on policies with leftists, at least socially, but once you use the trigger words, their programming activates and freak the fuck out and call you a MAGA plant despite all evidence to the contrary.
Alright, (s)he might identify as a liberal, but he’s actually exactly the same as the most radicalized MAGA cultists. He just chose a different set of crazy.
That person does not represent even 1% of liberal or progressive adherents. Crazycis crazy, regardless of that lunatic’s flavor of belief.
As for reactions to “democratic socialist” by Democrats, I suspect what you are seeing is from people who are chest deep in the Democratic Party core activist zone. They likely are afraid of change, even if it would better meet their ideals. Their cozy insulated blanket is just soooo warm. :)
As much as I wish it were the case, this is not even close to the only dem I’ve spoken to who is brainwashed into thinking that anything truly left, like much of the world outside of the US, could never work in reality. Suggesting it means you voted 100% for Trump or Stein, and if you say you didn’t you are lying. You can agree with them on damn near every social policy under the sun and provide metrics from progressive nations on their successes, and they’ll refuse to accept that anyone could possibly be more progressive than them, despite literal mountains of easily verifiable evidence.
I think unfortunately many people are just very politically ignorant and have no desire to even begin to question the US process or try anything different. The US is simply the best at everything. Europe and their crazy whacko ideas may as well be an alien planet and not worth thinking about.
Of course this isn’t all people, some shift is happening (as long as its not called socialism, generally), but in my personal experience leftist ideas pretty much get you locked out of any discussion. I typically get smug “Oh its so cute you’re in your socialist phase, you’ll grow out of it and understand politics like me” treatment.
Maybe after 350 years here in America, I need to seriously consider returning this family to Europe 😞
The gerrymandering in federal elections is something that amazes me since decades ago. I understand it when it was created. But today? When you can count all ballots in a few hours? I get the divisions when you have to vote for the Senate or your district, but in a federal election you are only voting for one person. Count all the ballots, find the one with the most ballots and name that person president. It’s not that hard.
violence is already happening, it’s just that people are too scared to fight back against it
not only that people not close to areas of violence are still too content, because they have thier creature comforts with them.
You can’t vote your way out of fascism. Trump already launched an insurrection to hold on to power. He won’t let it go now that he’s better entrenched.
I suppose we’ll give it a try in a year. I do think leftists, including myself, should admit and prepare that they might need to violently resist The State tho.
“Those who make peaceful reform impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.”
Violence is how we beat the Nazis the first time. If there’s a cleaner option that’s actually feasible, then yes please… but failing that, cutting the head off the snake is a pretty tried and true method. And if it grows back, cut that one off too - they’ll get the message eventually.
Exactly. Ultimately these people don’t actually believe in anything other than power. Their arguments are in bad faith. Any compromise is just a temporary weigh station as they prepare to push even harder.
How did compromising with the right work for abortion? Parental consent laws became onerous clinical regulations became bans on performing procedures became making getting an abortion legally murder. How did compromising on trans rights go? A few “reasonable concerns” about girl’s sports became blanket bans on sports became bans on life-saving care for minors became restrictions on basic ID documents became attempts to criminalize the very existence of trans people. This isn’t slippery slope conjecture; it’s directly observed history.
The simple awful truth is that we have fundamentally incompatible visions of the world. They see The Handmaid’s Tail as an ideal to aim for. They think the literal God of the universe wants them to create this nightmare. And with God at their backs, they can justify any evil to create their warped utopia. Any action can be justified. Any lie can be excused. Any suffering by any number of people now can be balanced against the perfect lives they imagine we’ll all live once they force us all into their dream world. The worst thing about them, is that they actually think they’re the good guys.
This is the fundamental problem. Their vision of an Earthly paradise is our vision of Hell on Earth. We have fundamentally different visions for the future. They cannot convince the majority of the population to willingly create their vision. So they have to resort to violence, disenfranchisement, propaganda, and fraud. (All justified for the greater good.) And ultimately we’re going to have to use every tactic they use and more if we want to keep these monsters from turning our nation into Gilead.
Fundamentally, elections were designed to be a peaceful alternative to the peasantry revolting against the government and beheading their king. As Americans come to grip with the reality that their elections are meaningless, their politicians are bought and their only alternative to fascism is fascism-lite with a pride pin (no trans ppl allowed though) this attitude will continue to fester.
PBS running these insipid polls lately is so fucking offensive.
Americans are already doing violence on Americans to execute their fascist vision of this country, en masse, within and without institutions. Violent change is here. The violence question is over. Public opinion is for TV.
The country went off-track when Reconstruction was defeated by white terrorism and the old slaveocracy retook their wealth and power. We’ve been struggling with the aftermath since then.
“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”
I hate that I agree with this.
Humans can be so much more than violent cavemen, but we aren’t there quite yet.
Suprisingly, both of them are on the same side of the barricade.
Yea for sure, suck the copium. There is a reason why patriots rhymes perfectly with idiots
magats are not patriots.
Patriots love their country and criticize it when its wrong.
Nationalists create a fantasy narrative of what their concept of a “country” is, and think that’s the best thing in the world.
I probably fit into the category of “patriot”, I love the multiculturalism of the US, I love the progress that has been made on Civil Rights and the protection of people with disabilities and recognition of the rights of LGBT+ people, I love the constitution (well… some parts need to be tweaked), the 1st and 2nd amendments, separation of powers, the idea that “American” is not a race, but an ideal; And I do recognize that the history is dark and those dark history should be taught so we can prevent those from happening, and I do NOT support this administration’s blatant violation of the constitution and anyone involved should be thrown in jail.
These “nationalists” don’t even love the country, they do not support freedom, they are traitors, and should be dealt with accordingly.
Patriots love their country and criticize it when its wrong.
This line turned on a light bulb deep in the recesses of my brain that were formed while being raised by rural conservatives.
In my conservative world at least, punching down was pretty much universal, not just a political thing. You don’t criticize your parents/betters or honestly even disagree with them many times, but you can expect criticism of your own every move. Generational trauma isn’t a single event, after all.
Or, if you’re lucky, the parent is the type to sweep everything under the rug and pretend that everything is perfect.
So with those kinds of traits plus the very hierarchical thinking, you can see how you simply do not criticize your people in charge, your religion, etc.
But that’s only for YOUR people. If somebody is an OTHER then that means they are nowhere on your hierarchy (the correct one, obvs) and are therefore worth less than the lowest peon on your side.
Soooooo, that was a long way of saying these people probably THINK they love their country because they treat it with the same honor, deference, and “see no evil” that they give their own grandmother.
magats are not patriots.
They are. That’s the dirty truth of the Post-Cold War state of the nation. What we’re getting a taste of is authentic Real Americana.
All the flowery liberal hagiographies of noble, selfless liberty lovers was propaganda. Trump is the beating heart of American oligarchy. And the oligarchs have had this country by the throat since the day settlers put boots on the soil of the New World.
These “nationalists” don’t even love the country, they do not support freedom
The “freedom” this country promises is a lie. It’s the old Auschwitz line. “Work shall set you free”. Horseshit. These people want to work you into your grave.
They are. That’s the dirty truth of the Post-Cold War state of the nation. What we’re getting a taste of is authentic Real Americana.
You are getting a taste of long running russian media manipulation, enabled by rich oligarchs who care more about their power and money than country.
A russian literally wrote the book on how to take down the country.
And this shit thats happening right now is literally what was written in it.
You’re not seeing anything authentically americana from the right. You are seeing gullible idiots manipulated by outside forces to destroy the very ground they stand on out from under themselves, and do it while praising a country that they and their predecessors hated and vilified as the great communist evil.
A russian literally wrote the book on how to take down the country.
Which Russian, the one that says gay atheists take down the country or the one that says gay Jews take down the country?
Russia pushes every angle. The point is to spread division.
FTFY
“Israel pushes every angle. The point is to spread division.”
A russian literally wrote the book on how to take down the country.
Sorry bro, but the calls are coming from inside the house.
Part Two of Washington Bullets begins with a nine point manual on how the US goes about enacting regime change against those who defy their interests. Prashad uses the events of the 1954 CIA backed coup of Jocobo Arbenz in Guatemala, and a myriad of other examples, to describe the repeated strategies used by the CIA, and other regime change arms of the US State Department. There are patterns of imperialism which play out again and again. Understanding these patterns is vital when analyzing what the State Department is currently looking to do to their enemies such as China, Venezuela, and Iran.
The first step in any US regime change effort is to manufacture public support for intervention. This involves a propaganda campaign not just at home, but also within the target Nation. Prior to the coup in Guatemala, journalists from NYT, Chicago Tribune, and TIME all received payments from the United Fruit, the multinational company which dominated Guatemala. In reality Arbenz was a popular leader who sought to enact minor land reforms. In the media he was portrayed as a dangerous communist, drunk with power. As the US corporate media fell in line, the CIA filled the streets of Guatemala with anti-Arbenz propaganda. This strategy of propagandizing both the American Public, and the people of whatever country the US is targeting, has been repeated again and again. Libya, Syria, and Venezuela have all seen money from the West used to bolster right wing media campaigns inside their borders. Control of public opinion has been one of the most vital components to US regime change efforts from the beginning.
Step four in Prashad’s manual of regime change is to “Make the Economy Scream.” A reference to directions given by Henry Kissinger and Richard Nixon to the CIA in 1970, as the US looked to overthrow the Democratically elected Salvadore Allende in Chile. Here we see a vital component of what Prashad calls ‘hybrid war.’ Isolating from the world those Nations who seek to develop themselves, and reclaim their own natural resources. Sanctions and blockades are used to starve smaller nations of financing and trade, as corporate media outlets point and say “look. Don’t you see socialism clearly doesn’t work?” US sanctions recently led to many deaths in Venezuela and Iran during the Covid-19 pandemic, as the US has continued their murderous regime change efforts, with techniques they designed almost 70 years ago.”
FTFY
You are getting a taste of long running Israel media manipulation, enabled by rich oligarchs who care more about their power and money than country.
They literally are. The same goes for Israelis commiting genocides, as to the Russians commiting it. All of them are patriots to the fullest, and you can suck you copium freely, because as it seems, you are very simillar to them. Just waiting for your own patriotic front to be on the rise.
Depends on how you define “patriot”. If it is strictly nationalism, then yeah. If you define “patriot” as someone who loves, in this context, democracy and human dignity, then I would disagree.
I’ve never known the term “patriot” to not be soley a nationalist dog-whistle… unless we’re talking about beers on Family Guy
To me, a patriot always been someone who is willing to sacrifice of themselves to make the country better for everyone else. Whether that means sacrificing their life in battle, giving up significant wealth, or using their talents to help those in need.
MAGA is all about grievance, and what the country should be doing to service them. They are nationalists and identitarians, not patriots.
I always thought nationalists are fed a sense of pride (through indoctrination, propaganda, belittling of other nations) in their country, and patriots just develop their pride organically because the country they live in is great at taking care of their people (and even those who are from other nations).
Every patriot loves his country as long as it’s feed with propaganda and lies about it. Ah, and as long as patriot is in the gaining side of the country. If not, they will start spreading bullshit about “the other group is not group of true patriots”.
Idiots rhymes with patriots perfectly, and for me it’s the perfect comedy.
Those are nationalists, not patriots. They love tyrants.
That’s part of why I’m neither a patriot nor a tyrant.
