For many it is their only hope of escaping poverty or owning property. “Convenient” for the state that this is the case.
Desperate people are willing to do horrible things. To what extent are they to blame for being exploited? The state’s policies allow and encourage poverty, destitution, and desperation, then exploit it.
I don’t think one is just or even absolved by their exploitation, but I can have empathy.
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The state doesn’t treat veterans much better than dogs. Some get to leave with work experience, savings, and education, others get to crawl in the streets until they starve.
there is no soldiertariat. the person who joins the USian military is typically white, welloff and ideologically aligned with imperialism. they joined because they could and they wanted to. the military is the vanguard party of fascism.
We can talk all about that. but the moment they agree to play the government game and make their lives better by destroying lives somewhere else they are now part of that system and not it’s victims. Same with all those ICE agents.
Have empathy with them until they decide to be a class traitor. If it was up to me they would be in jail to mellow with their PTSD. not in the general public.
Same as joining a gang. Participate in violence and you get a roof over your head and maybe a couple meals. Wether or not it makes them “bad people” or “class traitors” doesn’t change the pressures and incentives at play. There are few alternatives and fewer viable ones.
For many it is their only hope of escaping poverty or owning property. “Convenient” for the state that this is the case.
Desperate people are willing to do horrible things. To what extent are they to blame for being exploited? The state’s policies allow and encourage poverty, destitution, and desperation, then exploit it.
I don’t think one is just or even absolved by their exploitation, but I can have empathy.
–
The state doesn’t treat veterans much better than dogs. Some get to leave with work experience, savings, and education, others get to crawl in the streets until they starve.
there is no soldiertariat. the person who joins the USian military is typically white, welloff and ideologically aligned with imperialism. they joined because they could and they wanted to. the military is the vanguard party of fascism.
I don’t have any sympathy for those who joined from a position of privilege. I acknowledge that is likely the majority of service members.
There’s also the many, many poor rural children that join for nationalistic reasons, already far down the path to fascism.
We can talk all about that. but the moment they agree to play the government game and make their lives better by destroying lives somewhere else they are now part of that system and not it’s victims. Same with all those ICE agents.
Have empathy with them until they decide to be a class traitor. If it was up to me they would be in jail to mellow with their PTSD. not in the general public.
Same as joining a gang. Participate in violence and you get a roof over your head and maybe a couple meals. Wether or not it makes them “bad people” or “class traitors” doesn’t change the pressures and incentives at play. There are few alternatives and fewer viable ones.