I honestly don’t know if Americans have what it takes to change the path we’re headed down. I haven’t really got much faith left in our society. We’re pretty pathetic.
Hope I’m wrong.
With all the uneducated, divisive disinformation, and faith-based worldviews out there it’s hard to even get people to agree that a problem exists, and therefore even harder to convince the electorate how to appropriately address it. Public medicine would fix this problem like it has in the rest of the world yet still many Americans believe it’s Marxism for some stupid reason.
Public medicine would fix this problem like it has in the rest of the world yet still many Americans believe it’s Marxism
for some stupid reason.…because a group of politicians who need campaign funding to stay elected tell them “government bad” at every opportunity.
There is one party to blame here. Republicans. They made up the death panels bullshit. They made it so Lieberman could filibuster for the big insurance companies and keep them rich. They made it a goal to “own the libs.”
Democrats deserve criticism for their Neo Liberal bullshit too, but this wouldn’t have been pushed this far without the Republican propaganda and lies.
All we can do it keep moving forward and try to take care of each other as we go.
Yeah there’s 350 million of us but only one of these incidents in the decade+ since Occupy Wall Street?
We don’t have the guts.
Are you shooting down CEOs? No? Then you’re part of the problem with being pathetically weak.
Friendly reminder that killing CEOs isn’t the only answer. Sometimes it’s throwing tea in a harbor. Or tarring and feathering a tax collector.
Just do your part.
All those things are from a past where democracy wasn’t a thing and indeed you needed to uprise to an oppressive power.
This is still the case for the majority of the planet.
It is not the case in the developed nations. And even in the US Trump has won the popular vote.
You feathering a tax collector is an act against the will of the majority. This is not a revolutionary act, because you’re not acting brave and sacrificing yourself to voice a majority’s opinion.
Contrary, your actions are radical activism. You represent a minority, and yet you so firmly believe in your own righteousness that you justify violence.
You are wrong.
You just have to realize it.
I went through your comment history to see if you are a gun owner, and I think you are not. So this makes you part of the problem you just posed in your comment here, since you have no means to commit to peaceful but aggressive armed protesting.
That’s not the right way to encourage people to arm themselves.
I don’t have anydesire to encourage people to do anything.
There are people out there who will always be useless bitches that passively complain all day other people aren’t doing things when they themselves don’t bother to make any effort themselves to try to change shit.
I’m the audience you’re talking too. I’m 32 and just got my first rifle. It was awkward for me at first, and attitudes like yours contributed to that.
So fuck you man.
Good stuff. Be sure to regularly train with it, or you might as well wrap a bow on it and give it to the people who will be trying to take it away from you.
You’re such a jackass dude
… or maybe they’re not reveling every aspect of their lives on a public forum for personal safety reasons.
We’re pretty pathetic.
I’m not some flag saluting, Lee Greenwood asshole, but you couldn’t be more wrong. You are on Earth and the truth is 5 billion light years from you wondering about your existence. Americans may not all have the best education. They may be apathetic at the polls due to distrust in the system. However, Americans are NOT pathetic. The media may have you convinced that we are divided on the left and the right, but we are divided up and down. You start to take away things and I’m sure you will find out how strong they can be. Americans have fought and will fight tooth and nail for what they believe in.
Americans are NOT pathetic
Buddy, we just RE-ELECTED a convicted felon and rapist who instigated an insurrection and illegally attempted to overturn an election AFTER we already fired him for massively failing, including in regards to the biggest crisis America has experienced since WW2. A guy that has openly stated he is anti-union and worker rights. We can’t even get on the same page about healthcare, despite having examples from other first world countries across the globe showing what we could do to better our situation. We targeted black people (still are), then gay people (still are), and now we’ve moved on to targeting trans people. Wealth disparity is increasing by the year. Billionaires OWN our politics top to bottom.
We’re categorically fucking pathetic.
I don’t think this speaks to how pathetic Americans are, but instead to how much the rich have us under their thumb.
We need to start working against atomization if we want things to get better, and I think this is/was a really good way to bring people together. Talk to the uninformed people in your life, be the healthy opposition to their beliefs that many people dont have. Make them understand who their real enemies are.
It is in the upper classes best interest that we close ourselves off, entering echochambers as we talk about how evil it is for someone to disagree with our own beliefs.
You are on Earth and the truth is 5 billion light years from you wondering about your existence.
Quote is crazy hard but I disagree with you so much lol
You can’t act like the Civil War didn’t happen. We put men on the moon. We developed the Atomic bomb. We have 11 aircraft carriers. Whether it fits your argument or not Americans have grit and we will take back our power.
I find it interesting that nothing you listed is contemporary. Even the aircraft carriers. We’ve have a lot of aircraft carriers for a long time.
You’re reaching pretty far back to find anything of significance Americans have done that’s positive. And some of what you listed is decidedly not positive.
Maybe you’re thinking about what Americans USED to be.
There are a lot of points in history I’d bring up to show the grit of Americans before those specific ones. The Civil War was fought to keep the wealth-generating plantations under the federal tax jurisdiction, the moon landing was a cool thing that happened 50 years ago and produced no real tangible benefits at a point of time where those resources could’ve been put to much better use, the A-bomb was a war crime and our aircraft carriers are used to support illegal wars to kill brown people protect the interests of oil companies.
You are saying that these things are bad things. I’m not saying they aren’t. I’m saying Americans achieve things. Americans are fucking tough. Also, I will argue that you couldn’t pop a pimple of truth on this statement: “he moon landing was a cool thing that happened 50 years ago and produced no real tangible benefits”.
Oh, by golly, are you wrong.
The atomic bombs and iarcraft carriers are for “Americans (people)”
No, fucker, WE didn’t do any of that. WE are shitposting on Lemmy. I know for a fact you didn’t build any aircraft carriers yourself. So can “WE” stop talking credit for things less pathetic Americans have done?
the truth is 5 billion light years from you wondering about your existence
What?
Yeah, no idea what they were getting at with this.
No fucking clue what they’re on about there.
Far from the truth.
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People love to use examples like MLK and Gandhi as the poster children for peaceful protest achieving results, and years ago I’d have naively agreed.
But the reality of it is that they could not have succeeded without the threat of violence from more militant alternatives, such as Malcolm X/The Black Panthers or the Ghadar revolutionaries/Babbar Akali Sikhs.
It’s the carrot-and-stick metaphor. The powers that be will ignore any nonviolent attempts for reform until a violent movement makes the nonviolent alternative more appealing.
Capitalism has long asserted that there are checks in place to protect people. Consumer protection laws, industry regulations, collective bargaining, and voting with your wallet are some of the myths that capitalism says are supposed to stop bad businesses from hurting people. But when we see these systems failing en masse, and the powers that be refuse to do anything about it, what recourse is left?
Both are necessary. The first creates public support. The second “creates government support”
A little direct action can be surprisingly effective
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The peaceful protest has a purpose. It is the purpose of due diligence. It is to show an escalation. A point at which other avenues were tried and ignored leaving one with no choice but to try others that are more militant. You try all the avenues. And leave the last resort as a last resort. But historically we know that more often than not real change happens when there is either the threat of violence or the actuality of violence.
People as a whole don’t seem to be invested until it impacts them. It’s hard to impact people enough with peaceful protest to change their minds. That’s why blocking highways or major thoroughfares were threatened with violence. Because the point of protest is twofold. It is to educate. But more importantly it is to inconvenience people. Because without the inconvenience, they do not get invested.
People don’t understand that more than protecting people, social policies such as housing, welfare, and medical aid programs protect the capitalist system itself.
social policies such as housing, welfare, and medical aid programs protect the capitalist system itself.
It was not always like this but yes over as 40 years the money has been looted and used against the working class.
It took wage slaves all this time but I think it is finally registering:
How is everybody working so hard, we are working more and we are more productive but nobody but few have any more money
The money is being extracted via complex legal, social and propaganda mechanisms and we are letting it happen by being obedient dogs fighting rich man’s fake news stories.
If you take a look at europe, there is plenty of countries who score way better on these issues, and the underlying system is still capitalism. It might not be perfect but if you include a social aspect and regulate in the interest of the population I believe it is the best system we have.
If the political pressure was high enough, political powers would buckle. But see who got voted for president? Its clear that the people chose this themselves sadly
You live in a country that couldn’t elect Bernie as a president. There’s no peaceful protest happening. And yet you claim violence is the only option.
In reality, half of your country simply disagrees with you. Start your violence, get a civil war, and maybe you’ll finally settle things somewhere somehow.
But don’t bullshit about effectiveness of peaceful protest.
Trump won a majority vote in the most recent election. Peacefully, your country chose corpos over moderate middle (there’s no left in your politics). Their peaceful protest works flawlessly. You’re just not on the winning side of the protest so you call for violence. You will lose this fight too.
I understand why people are upset but its a sad reality, that you just don’t have the masses on your side. I think your point is the crux to all of this. If a majority doesn’t get behind your conviction then violence will not solve your problem.
It’s a point that’s impossible to get across in this echo chamber. But it’s also why this echo chamber will never achieve anything.
Via democracy or violence, for a regime change you first need to figure out a way to get the majority to agree with you.
and how they actually made change
Uh…
If peaceful protesting worked to affect change, it would be illegal
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Organized labor can also take some non violent action like general strikes. The important thing is the organization part, once you’re organized you’ve got power whether it’s violent or not.
A smaller less organized population can definitely use violence effectively, but it still takes critical mass to affect permanent change.
Join or create community groups and labour unions
Oh good lord. He kept the gun and the fake ID?
I guess MS in Computer Science doesn’t mean you’re smart.
I spend my working life surrounded by PhDs, have done so for ~28 years now, and let me assure you: education and intelligence are orthogonal.
I worked in higher ed computer support at a major research university for 12 years, believe me I know.
I’m guessing he kept it all intentionally. He had the manifesto on him, probably expecting “accidental” suicide by cop in hopes that his message would continue and not be painted over by the media. Yeah, he could have ditched the gun, but again, perhaps he didn’t want there to be any shadow of a doubt that he is guilty. This was an intentional sacrifice in hopes of making a change.
Yeah, I realized about 30 seconds after I wrote that… “he wanted to keep the gun and the ID as proof that he was the guy”.
He escaped clean, and then let himself get caught so he could make his case in court.
Let’s see if he plays the next hand: plead ‘not guilty’, refuse all plea agreements, and demand a jury trial.
To be fair if you’re never caught that’s probably the smartest thing to do.
Someone discovering a gun is 100% gonna call the police and bam they have a good clue.
I can walk 1/2 a mile in any direction and find a body of water or deep woods where it would never be found. Also, I’d field strip it and chunk the parts in different places.
Do you think he had access to those places without looking suspicious?
He was on the run in a town he has no connection too.
There’s water in central park. Would’ve been nothing to chuck the pistol in a pond. Break it down a bit if you’re extra. Slide in one stream, barrel in another, mag, grip, etc until you’ve disposed of it. Or trash cans at various bus stops on the way down to VA. Tbf it’s really easy to back seat something like this. His brain must’ve been running a mile a minute, it’s honestly impressive how well he did
Where should he have deposed with it not being found? If he had multiple IDs its stupid tho he showed the same one as he knew they were after him
I’ve scouered his Goodreads, Instagram, Twitter accounts.
He looks like he’s a tech bro who went to University of Pennsylvania. He had some cool somewhat anti-capitalistic takes, and criticised Elon Musk. But was also following and reposting a couple alt-right accounts like RFK Jr and Joe Rogan. He seems to have been a big consumer of the capitalistic self-improvement type industry.
Here’s his github picture and account
Doesn’t look like the guy to me.
Different angle and no hood,.but yeah, somebody else.
He was caught with the same new jersey fake ID the suspect used and an anti-healthcare manifesto
I mean you can give me all the forensic evidence, and it’s not him.
Ahhhh.
“it can’t have been him, I was in London with him all of last week”
“He couldn’t have been with you in London because he was also with me in Turkey on a Hot Air Balloon ride”
I Am Luigi’s Alibi
ohhh I see.
Pardon.
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It seems likely that within short order his unifying action will be drowned out by any divisive perspectives.
Kinda like universal healthcare.
Sigh. The hope was fun while it lasted. He’s too anti-capitalist for the right and too problematic for the left so no side will claim him, and they’ll just devolve into claiming it was the other side for a bit before not caring anymore. No revolution to be found here, just more sadness.
That’s a github profile
my bad. keep on mixing the two up.
Some problematic interactions with alt right type stuff
(this gives “traditional family values” vibes)
Do expect him to conform to your ideas of approved right think?
Ironic.
But also some cool anticapitalist takes
(His last Goodreads review)And some weird ass takes
I appreciate you posting his takes from every side. Idk wtf to think about this fish one.
Edit - oh just saw the date, he was like 16 when he posted that. I posted stupider weird shit at 36 so I’ll give that weird one a pass.
Ohhh I just shared the fish one cuz I thought it was funny and cute and humanising.
My conclusion is he wasn’t a pure ideological leftist like many of us here. But he shared similar critiques of capitalism and grievances.
And on the culture war side of things, he seems to have been more “centrist” ie. taking some points from “both sides”. Which in my opinion is problematic, but also shows we might have more in common with the populist right than we think. A lot of them are deeply critical of heirarchy and inequality similar to us (although they end up supporting billionaires 🤦).
I don’t see how #1 and #2 are problematic. #2 might be, but I’d need to see the video.
Unless your argument is that anything remotely positive about Tucker Carlson or Peter Thiel is automatically bad?
That just shows how lemmy would be willing to eat alive anyone being able to critically think instead of repeating their pre-recorded mantras on what’s good and what’s bad.
You’re ridiculous, and probably 18.
How has no one mentioned that he legit looks like Dave Franco?
you mean to tell me he’s a programming nerd too!?
This guy gets a free pass on wierd beliefs to me. Sucks that the first ceo assasin was caught though. He really showed how possible it could have been to get away with it though.
Part of him probably wanted to got caught. The guy showed an extreme respect for justice, more than the current US legal system, and he knew what he had done.
He’s a G, honestly.
He actually believes his beliefs.
If you’ve never read Ted K, I recommend it. It’s not an easy read, but he wasn’t wrong.
I like the part of Industrial Society where he spend the first 10 pages just bashing on liberals
Honestly, same
Read that and cheered (most of it) on.
So how’d you like the race theory and fascism parts?
The liberal that is holding back the left like the regime lapring acolytes?
Those who are most sensitive about “politically incorrect” terminology are not the average black ghetto-dweller, Asian immigrant, abused woman or disabled person, but a minority of activists, many of whom do not even belong to any “oppressed” group but come from privileged strata of society.
Modern leftish philosophers tend to dismiss reason, science, objective reality and to insist that everything is culturally relative. More importantly, the leftist hates science and rationality because they classify certain beliefs as true (i.e., successful, superior) and other beliefs as false (i.e., failed, inferior). The leftist’s feelings of inferiority run so deep that he cannot tolerate any classification of some things as successful or superior and other things as failed or inferior. This also underlies the rejection by many leftists of the concept of mental illness and of the utility of IQ tests. Leftists are antagonistic to genetic explanations of human abilities or behavior because such explanations tend to make some persons appear superior or inferior to others. Leftists prefer to give society the credit or blame for an individual’s ability or lack of it. Thus if a person is “inferior” it is not his fault, but society’s, because he has not been brought up properly.
I’ve said the same thing as the first paragraph here on lemmy and got buried for it. Always thought that most of the politically correct BS came from white busybodies.
You can take some solace in knowing that Ted Kaczynki agrees with you
So did MLK. See: Letter From a Birmingham Jail
I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
I seriously want to clap every time I read it
An inactive majority will always be a bigger obstacle than a counter-radical minority when it comes to change. Any given social movement is usually supported by like 10% of the population fighting heavily from both extremes to shave even a little bit of the ambivalent 80% towards their cause
I thought uncle ted’s was tos violation…
We can swap his work now?
No idea lol
He wasn’t drugged though…the professor had him “discuss/debate” with another “student” who was really a young prosecutor from Boston with the sole objective arguing fiercely against any perspective Ted presented, to fuck with his perception meter. But no gallons of acid for him.
So I commented above in response to Ted’s MKULTURA fun…I bet he was arguing with a left leaning prosecutor who invalidated any perspective Ted had based off that quote…
Maybe I’m thinking of a different manifesto, but didn’t ol’ teddy start ranting about elves and stuff towards the end of the document?
Tbh it’s been a while since I read much past the first few sections.
That said, he was MKULTRA’d real hard. I wouldn’t be too surprised if some Terrence McKenna-type weirdness snuck in there.
He wasn’t drugged though…the professor had him “discuss/debate” with another “student” who was really a young prosecutor from Boston with the sole objective arguing fiercely against any perspective Ted presented, to fuck with his perception meter. But no gallons of acid for him.
I think the elves must have been someone else. Ted’s manifesto was mostly about technology being the root of society’s problems.
Yeah you’re probably thinking of McKenna. He was real into talking about the elves he met on DMT.
I prefer his “jeweled self-dribbling basketballs” to “elves”.
I’m wondering if you’re confusing Ted K with Terence McKenna? Very dissimilar people but could be a function of reading both around the same time in your life, maybe.
If not and you remember what you’re thinking about, and it’s indeed a manifesto by a criminal ranting about elves, I’d love a name/title if you feel like sharing.
Honestly, I’ve read a lot of manifestos and writings of people without the firmest grasp on reality and they get kinda jumbled up. It might have been McKenna, it might have been the time cube guy (whose name I forget), it could have been a dmt trip report on erowid.
Fair enough. No worries!
That looks like something that could have been written on here or reddit a week ago and would have been met with at least modest approval in regards to the oligarchy.
Yeah, still really dumb though.
I don’t know if I’ve ever resonated with something so much in my life.
So if you read into Kaczynski a bit, in a way he’s kinda history’s first incel too. He went off into the woods because he was upset about getting rejected by a girl and went super nice guy™ on not just her but life too. He blamed technology on his inability to read into a woman and he was too insecure to learn from it.
This guy is doing something else, he attacked the elite not because of technology and their relationship but because of their wealth and direct actions.
He is ID’d the sources of issue more precisely.
Internet liberated the flow info enough for a smart person to connect the dots better.
Uncle Ted was working within the framework of the old world. A lot of shit that is common knowledge to a wage slave now, was reserved to the elites.
Ted’s thesis was not wrong but it was very crude.
history’s first incel
What definition of incel are you using that eliminates the rest of history?
Well fair enough…I’d still call him one thought
This kid is from wealth. It seems very wealthy. Not country club money but country club owner kind of money. Its more likely for fame and getting in the history books
His upbringing doesnt diminish his activism. The consequences for him are the same as a poor person as well.
So, since he seems identified, do we know the link they’ve made between the two different photos by now?
Waytoobased
I don’t disagree with a lot of what the Unabomber wrote. I don’t disagree with this person’s hatred of the healthcare system.
But you cannot assassinate your way out of capitalism.
It just does not work that way. You cannot assassinate corporations into putting people over profits when they are legally required to do the opposite and you cannot assassinate your way into a law being changed.
It doesn’t hurt to remind the ruling class once in a while whose boss.
But yeah. A revolution will take a lot more than a targeted assination of a couple CEOs.
Does it help? Because I’m guessing what will happen here is CEOs will just get big security details and less-discerning copycats will end up killing innocent people.
And rates will continue to rise and not one less person will be denied.
In the short term yes you’re right.
But look at the populist anger this action sparked. These kind of extrajudicial killings that rile up the population, are very much associated with revolutions and changes in power. (Sometimes for good, sometimes for bad).
Dude, America just elected a plutocrat dictator. There’s not going to be socialized medicine any time in the near future and insurance companies will pass the cost of their security teams on to the people forced to pay for their needless existences.
That plutocrat was elected through a manipulation of populist rage.
Check out the policy proposal forums RFK and Trump set up for their supporters. Expanding Medicare has more upvotes than downvotes
Paul Krugmann wrote an interesting piece touching on this yesterday (Gift Article) https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/09/opinion/elites-euro-social-media.html?unlocked_article_code=1.gU4.cSdP.OL0VogKNmVT3&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare
Expanding Medicare has more upvotes than downvotes
You really think this represents US society at large? I think you’ll need a better source than that.
I am sure bootlicking will drive change
Who’s boots am I licking? Please quote me doing so.
You shill regime propaganda while pretending to on working class
It is uncouth
What does that sentence even mean?
The current system was forged with violence. What so you think is gonna beat it? Thoughts and prayers?
Whether or not it can be resolved with violence, it will not be resolved with targeted assassinations by a handful of people.
There is no example where a capitalist system was toppled with targeted assassinations. There are lots of examples where the security state got a whole hell of a lot more oppressive after them though.
I’m sure that totally won’t happen this time in the U.S. for sure.
That’s such bullshit, security escalation happens either way, they don’t need any excuse, just see the track record. Also, it’s not like anyone is saying this killing solved capitalism, they just know its impact has shaken the ideological foundation a lot more than finger-wagging at people on the internet
The Internet has not changed the ideological foundation in the slightest. It has sparked some calls for reform, but the capitalistic ideology hasn’t been changed at all through this murder.
Except the problem is that humans are cognitively advanced than other animals. We should be able to find some way to reason out our differences, otherwise we’re always going to be stuck in a dark cave of our own making. What’s the fucking point of humanity then?
The problem is that there aren’t effective ways to curtail sociopathic behaviors which come to the surface because of our current economic tool of choice. Tbh, it will not matter what economic tool we use because the greed problem and self-preservation problem will remain. It always does!
We should be working towards developing safeguards and mechanisms to protect humanitarian ideals, and to curtail sociopathic behaviors. I think a big part of this is that people should elect better leaders. If you’re forced to choose “lesser of two evils”, then there should be a mechanism to organize an effective write-in choice.
If someone then comes to kill you for making democratic choices, as happens in autocratic regimes, then self-defense is valid and justified.
It hasn’t been established that intelligence is a requisite for survival.
If we think of intelligence as goal-directed and adaptive behavior, then natural selection will select for competitive traits, and so whatever ended up losing was less intelligent in some sense, even if it’s a single-cell organism.
Actually, there’s a lot of evidence that points to intelligence being a sexually selected trait rather than naturally selected, so in that sense it may actually negatively correlate with survival. In other words, your big brain is the human equivalent of peacock features; it will get you laid but doesn’t do much good when a tiger comes around.
Think of it this way: to sit around doing math problems all day, you have to have the basic necessities for survival dealt with, which shows you’re a good mate within the current environment. Which is all well and good until times change, the going gets tough, and you need to kill something to put food on the table.
There’s a pretty reasonable societal model (that scales beyond 10 people living in a cave) that has so far prevented sociopatic behavior.
We have laws and we have democracy to establish them. Whatever happens in your dumbfukistant, in western Europe it’s unimaginable to be able to use violence and physical power to claim territory or food. Even a drunken fight in a bar will get you in a lot of legal trouble. E.g. being a stronger ape gets you exactly nowhere in life if you use want your power to dominate. You could use it to create, and you’d be rewarded.
Very similarly the economic system could be trivially adjusted to conform the societal values and violations would be prosecuted. All this requires is a democratic choice.
The societies so far democratically have no chosen to abolish capitalism. Although a lot of western-european democracies have severely limited the potential for abuse from this system.
We don’t need to develop mechanisms, we don’t need violent protests, we don’t need vigilantes. We simply need for people to choose differently. And if they don’t, it’s their choice.
Ah, yes, you in your default country definitely need a better democratic system, although Trump did win the popular vote, so I wouldn’t hope for that much change tbh.
How well is “western” Europe doing at curbing the global corporations ability to turn the earth into wasteland?
The majority of people in an average western European country want to drive their car and fly to their vacation destination. They also might heat their homes with gas.
Destruction of climate is not anti-democratic. There are green parties in every parliament and they get 15-30% of votes. E.g. only that many voters consider the issue of climate change to be pressing. The others believe things are fine, or that moderate measures are enough.
You keep preaching “evil corpos oppress us poor”. But this is simply not true. The majority of the population is pretty content with the status quo, and if they weren’t they could change it any election cycle.
You are making my point for me. They couldn’t do anything about the current system of they wanted to within the system. Consent has been manufactured, packaged, shipped, and bought.
They perfectly can. It requires them to make a collective choices that will require individual sacrifices in order to achieve collective gains (assuming people actually see it that way).
And that’s clearly not in anyone’s interest. And you’re one to tell them what’s wrong or right.
There’s no system. There are free individuals living their lifes as they see fit. But you somehow keep imagining an evil monster that suppresses everyone’s free will, while you, the hero, are unaffected.
Sociopathic behaviour is not prevented, it is rewarded. Stepping on other people to claim more wealth is encouraged. A decent person has no money, in general, and most people are decent. Nobody chose this. Nobody voted for this, and there’s no vote which will put an end to it. We are, like it or not, in a situation where we cannot change the system to benefit us (us=the working/middle classes) by peaceful means. The ruling classes are extending their monopoly with every move, and will never willingly give power back. I’m terrified by the prospect, but looking at similar situations in history, I think violence is inevitable.
What are you on about? You can easily vote for far left in pretty much any of the functioning democracies in Europe. And if a radical left party were to win, they could easily implement a profit cap.
You’re talking about some “ruling class” as if we’re in a society where such bounds exist by birth right of some sort. Anyone can become a politician and be elected to be the main voice of the country’s legislative and executive branches. You don’t need violence to radically change everything, you need a majority’s approval. And, I’m telling you, your ideas are already out there and they’re not selling. They’re not selling even peacefully, but you somehow dream that someone will die for them?
Here’s my experience as a citizen of the United Kingdom.
A vote for a party which will benefit the majority of people (which you are calling the “far/radical left”) is ignored because of our first past the post political system and because of the mass media, which is rabidly pro-establishment. A lower rate of further education exacerbates this effect. They form an impenetrable system which disallows anything but the tiniest of incremental changes, while the climate and the wealth gap worsen exponentially and relentlessly.There is a ruling class, and it does largely depend on birthright. None of these billionaires are self made, look closely enough and you will find seed money in their mercurial rise, usually from a family member. You have your eyes shut if you think we’re not ruled by the wealthy. It’s a fact. If you want to argue this point with me you can, but you will lose.
In my country, it’s difficult to become a politician, you usually have to get a specific degree from one of three specific universities, which are much easier to get into if you are -you guessed it- rich.
Which ideas of mine are you talking about exactly? Without some specifics on what you think they are, your last two sentences just don’t land.
A vote for a party which will benefit the majority
We can stop the discussion right here. You clearly know better than the voters themselves what’s best for them. In my opinion, it would be the most efficient solution for us to nominate you to be a dictator for life, as you will achieve a better outcome for everyone than them thinking for themselves.
The rest of your argument continues with insults towards the voters disagreeing with your political views “uneducated, influenced by media, etc”. You, obviously, do see yourself as a superior being and thinker.
I don’t think debating democratic choices with you makes any sense. You’re anti-democratic.
They’re trying to whitewash him into being a conservative nutjob.
While I am too old to advocate for violence, this line hit me pretty hard:
"Violence never solved anything" is a statement uttered by cowards and predators."This is a silly ad hominem argument though, an indication that what he’s arguing against is too valid to refute on its own merits.
Violence solves things. But by the powerless? No, historically speaking that just leads to military action, often followed by mass executions. Fighting fascism with violence is like fighting fire with gasoline. They feed off that shit. Maybe you can argue it worked in Haiti, albeit with a lot of help from yellow fever. But have you been to Haiti?
He’s right that peaceful protests never solve anything. But organizing and acting as a bloc solves a lot. General strikes, civil disobedience, boycotts, even voting as a group has a strong track record of changing things.
I want to believe that peaceful organization like civil disobedience leads to change, but I can’t recall seeing that work in recent history…
How recent is recent? Tunisia, Egypt (well until the population turned out to be too dumb for democracy anyway) are examples.
It hasn’t worked in the US because it’s been too half-assed and the existence of democratic options lowers incentives. Contrast the successful civil disobedience during the civil rights era, where the right to participate in elections was one of the things being denied. But with the increasing signs that democracy is being controlled by a few billionaires, it may see a comeback.
well until the population turned out to be too dumb for democracy anyway
Liberals when
