It’s been about 6 weeks, let’s see what we may have missed:
I once saw someone say that if all concentration camps were of equal size and “effectiveness”, and Candidate A would build 10 camps while Candidate B would build 9, obviously you should vote for Candidate B.
This is a hypothetical so extremely simplified as to completely miss anyone’s point, and possibly be harmful, and yet still it is several levels above the vast majority of the General Election discourse on this forum.
One reason it misses the mark is that nothing is of equal scale or effectiveness. For example, the 9-camp administration could obviously be much more competent. The 9-camp administration could naturally encounter far less resistance from courts, legislatures, journalists, and even protestors.
If there was an ever-growing, organic, street-level resistance movement under the 10-camp administration, someone tasked solely with the goal of designing a way to fracture and dissolve that movement might very well say the best way to do so is have the 9-camp administration come into power so that the movement fights with itself over whether to go hard against the new administration or even fights over whether to challenge it at all.
Obviously it is possible for all this (and much more; there’s infinite other things to consider) to be weighed calmly and rationally and still come to the conclusion that the least amount of harm comes from electing the 9-camp administration. But I don’t think that’s what ANYONE is doing. They have started with the conclusion that feels comfortable, and they will get extremely angry when that conclusion is challenged. Not that anyone on this forum, or the internet in general, with fleetingly few exceptions, is doing anything close to a good job at laying out the counter arguments.
Still, whenever anyone uses the word “purity” I have to laugh to keep from crying. Nobody, not one flesh and blood human, nobody but the strawmen, is saying, “well there are some areas the candidate and I don’t agree.” They’re saying the candidate does active harm, and promises to do even more active harm! They’re saying the total amount of harm between the candidates is either similar or too impossible to prognosticate between.
It kills me that people have reduced this to, “well obviously the only possibility is that people are being vindictive about the primaries, and are willing to harm others to make a point.” Everyone I know that I’ve ever talked to about their decision(s) to abstain from voting or to write in a candidate is someone from a group or groups who are right at the very front of the line for receiving both direct and indirect violence from the state.
But of course all of this discussion is such a monumental waste of time as far as the election itself goes, given how close to zero your individual vote is to make an impact on whether we get Candidate A or Candidate B. The discussion is useful, however, if people are willing to listen (and to speak) with open minds and open hearts and realize exactly how the foundational depths of state depravity can make an extremely politically educated (and extremely oppressed) person choose not to participate in an illegitimate election. Like if we could just get to that point where some of you could say, “OK, I think I understand their position now.” Even if you follow that up with, “but I still think it’s best to vote for this candidate, and that’s what I’ll do,” it would be a monumental shift in your understanding of the state and its power structure and its history that I think would only do good things going forward.
I’m not sure how we get to that point. Contrary to a lot of people’s beliefs, this kind of forum debating isn’t the most conducive way to learn these things. It would have to look more like study groups, I think, where we start off not even arguing. Because right now we have a situation where someone says one paragraph they’ve formulated from 100 books read and 10 years of street-level organizing experience and talking to people who live on the streets, and 12 people come back instantly with very emotional stances on why that paragraph was all wrong.
In a similar vein I had my kids convinced the phrase “Hot as a haddock” was a thing, which lead my daughter using it in front of her friends when she went to University - insisting it was a thing, googling it only to find there was only one matching entry and it was her brother asking if the phrase hot as a haddock was a thing
Let them deduct cake.
Aren’t they just regular dolls if nobody is gonna fuck em?
https://wokeglobaltimes.com/2020/07/23/bad-china-takes-a-typology/amp/?__twitter_impression=true
This is brilliant
When you are a dick to someone, they are less likely to join your side. That’s why you have to post that meme over and over again. To deflect from the fact that your bullshit turns people away.
That’s literally the first time I’ve ever posted that meme.
That’s why I performatively typed “where’s the fucking macro” as I needed to actually go and find it.
I understand if that part was opaque but it doesn’t change the fact that you just made some shit up.
I also never posted a snake emoji but I did post this:
That and a number of other posts have been my ace in the hole that’s made me well aware that you people have had no desire to have a real conversation with a real person, rather, you just want to vent at a makeshift avatar of equal parts real things and strawmen.
But it’s never too late!
And, like, I get it. Most of you Lads had Liz-1 and Bernie-2 and now neither of them made it. It was so close; after looking like it’d be a Liz v Bernie contest everything went sideways in a matter of weeks. Then a fucking pandemic happened. Calling it frustrating and disappointing doesn’t really do it justice. Being alive can be unbearable and inside all of us is a deep well of pain and sadness.
Fuck, wasn’t planning on ending a post like that but there it is.
Not to disrespect George Orwell, but the man laid it on pretty thick in 1984. It’s not in any way subtle. Like, teenagers can and do read 1984 and understand what he was getting at with doublespeak and the Ministry of Truth and whatnot. It’s a great and prescient book on many levels, don’t get me wrong, but it’s also not hard to understand.
A thing that broke me after 9/11 was just how blatant and stupid the fascism was. They weren’t even trying. They actually fucking called it “The Patriot Act” when they created a bill to enhance police state surveillance. The Patriot Act. Like, Orwell would have blushed at that, it’s too stupid and on the nose for 1984. Teenagers reading 1984 would have rolled their eyes if he’d written about a Patriot Act that expanded domestic surveillance. America is dumber than your average 1984-reading teenager, that’s where we’re at now.
https://twitter.com/thejuicemedia/status/1288989754210557960?s=09
https://twitter.com/thejuicemedia/status/1288989754210557960
Libertarian here. It’s just because naturally they have lower IQs and aren’t as good at logic. I fully support them having equal rights in spite of this.
I say this with a genuine combination of love and seriousness, because I deeply appreciate all of the fantastic people on UP.
There are a lot of smart people on this forum, and smart people (especially poker players, maybe) are unusually adept at looking for and finding threats in the world around us. That said, I think we need to be careful about becoming an echo chamber for acute depressive thoughts in response to each of Trump’s new weekly horrors.
The dude is a monster, surrounded by monsters, and enabled by monsters. I’m scared too, and my family is in the process of updating our passports. But none of us UPers are made safer by driving each other toward despondent helplessness, and the game isn’t over yet.
Worst case scenario, we can all pile in a solar-powered bus caravan and get some breathless coverage from Tucker Carlson before we bluff our way (right? who else could do it better?) across the Canadian border.
Stay strong, team. We’re in this together.
Part of me wants to dump my entire portfolio and go 50/50 Apple and Tesla. I’d never do it but we can all but guarantee once they split people will be able to “afford” them now because they’re “cheap” so there will be a huge pump.
It’s like I’ve been transported to the Motley Fool boards circa 1999.
(my pony got stuck watching an ad that it couldn’t skip)
From IRL discussions that I’ve had with people on the right(everything from RWNJs<---->bog standard conservatives) I have discovered an essential part of the desire to share their views via youtube.
It’s important to understand that all people make decisions and come to conclusions based upon emotion, the logical justifications are tacked on post hoc.
They watched a youtube that made them feel smart because the person in the video confidently delivered non-rebutted points that confirmed their “gut” instincts. It is not the concepts or arguments contained within the videos, it is the feeling that they had while watching the video that they are trying to share with you.
The video didn’t steelman their opponents’ arguments or critically examine the positive claims that were being made. So, when they are confronted with disagreement, they feel disoriented because the video that made them feel good about their beliefs didn’t convince them of those beliefs; it only reinforced what they already felt.
speech should have started with him finishing chopping that wood, shirtless. sweat glistening over his muscular torso. he wipes himself with a towel, puts on a shirt, then jacket, then tie, in silence. walks up into the camera frame and says “eat the rich” and the speech ends immediately
The RNC lineup is like The Really Rottens team at the Laff-A-Lympics.
Biden is doing so well tonight I award him one judgment-free hair sniff of a stranger of his choosing
Steve Scalise: Hi, I’m so fucking stupid I got shot and almost died and still oppose all gun control. Good night.
Cliffs on tonight? 5 words or less will do.
Person Man Woman Camera TV
https://mobile.twitter.com/DBF_NYC/status/1298099551820230660
https://mobile.twitter.com/DBF_NYC/status/1298099551820230660
Donald is at home watching and is like hey, her name is trump too
I heard that David Sklansky was so brilliant at math that he could’ve gotten a Field’s medal but simply didn’t consider it worth his time. Instead he focused his efforts on 538 riddles, SAT math competitions, and thought experiments in an online poker forum. He also came up with the Fundamental Theorem of Poker. A theorem which is so difficult to prove that he figured no one else could possibly understand the proof so he omitted it altogether.
The Democratic party is a powerful force in keeping minorities oppressed also. They pay nothing more than lip service to inequality in order to dupe liberals into thinking words mean more than actionable policies.
I take a Chomsky-type view that the Democratic party are the center-right faction(GOP is the far right faction) of the Capitalist party that has essentially had one-party rule of American government. So, I agree that the Dem party tends to be a lot of talk, little action, and have a lead from behind mentality. I’ll reserve judgement for individuals on a case by case basis, valuing action over rhetoric. Which leads us to your next question…
Do you really know what their perception is? I don’t know anyone in a militia, but always thought they were primarily anti-governmental authority abuse.
None of us can peer into the minds or hearts of militia members. We can observe their actions though. They can scream from the mountain tops that they hate abuse of governmental authority. They can arm themselves and cosplay ubermench in the woods all day, every day.
In real life, right now, the police are abusing their authority. People(Black, Latinx, white, LGBTQ, men, women, etc.) are protesting that abuse. The police are responding by doubling down on the abuse while committing war crimes on and beating the protesters.
If a militia member was truly against abuse of authority they’d stand in solidarity with the protesters. Instead, we see militia members getting fist bumps and shout outs from the cops. Guess what…they were full of shit. Their words meant nothing. I will judge them the same way I judge the Dem politicians: actions over rhetoric.
First must come the solidarity. That means finding and tackling the issues we align on and not get hung up on what we don’t. As I said earlier, Black people being at much higher risk during a police encounter is absolutely a result of systemic racism. But the actual problem at hand here are the out of control POLICE! Why not address one issue at a time so as not to get divided and bogged down, which is exactly what the establishment counts on?
I’m just throwing spitballs. I don’t see how we ever unite when everyone plays right into the hands of the elites by keeping us busy engaged in culture wars
You and I are aware enough to know that politicians who are in the back pockets of the billionaires will never lead us out of the Status Quo Desert of Injustice. Change for the better comes from direct action and grass roots movements.
I don’t mean to have this come off as attacking you. However, even when I charitably read what you wrote, I see it as (uninformed?)criticism of activists who are doing their level best to use the limited resources that they have to bring change to their communities. You and I do not get to tell the people doing the work what order they should address problems in. What authority do you or I have? What expertise do we possess? What track record of success can we point to and say, “You activists should do things the way I feel is best.”?
Those that seek to divide us will always find a wedge to use as culture war fodder. The antidote is solidarity. It’s free to give and impossible to run out of. When I see people struggling for dignity, I don’t debate whether they should be trying to combat police brutality or systemic racism first or second. My solidarity is unconditional.