slowly radicalizing me and I don't like it
:sicko-blur:
Can't wait for all my leftist friends that I managed to convince electoralism works rubberband back into tankies bc moderates are massive bitches
:sicko-beaming:
this is literally half my friend group rn and I'm running out of counters
:sicko-crowd:
Didn't think we could do worse than Scott Garrett, but Gotheimer is a fucking demon.
I know right? Somehow they found this ghoul. I just wish there was a video of him freaking out over that local reporter in Teaneck
I remember when I first learned the term mental gymnastics during the 2016 election. I then went on to understand the term first hand as I continued to try and believe that the mueller report would amount to anything politically meaningful. Embarrassing as that is, I’m still proud to have come around to the truth of the eternal science. At some point you just have to admit you’re fucking wrong. I don’t envy these clowns or the knots they have to twist themselves into to care about this dumb bullshit. History and theory are much more liberating than anything having to do with the fucking parliamentarian.
If these people keep confirming all the predictions of Capital people will start thinking Marx was right!
A lot of folks will buy that, but it'll still chip away at the margins. Over a few years, with additional growth coming from other factors (including those new leftists talking to their friends), that can be a significant shift.
They know they’re wrong and that their ideology is bust, but they have money and they’re comfortable so they can larp safely
Nothing galvanizes extremists and recruits for them more than inaction
:wonder-who-thats-for:
A: "Things are on fire, maybe we should put the fire out"
B: "Fuck off"
years later
B: "Hey, why are there so many extremists now?"
The shitty thing is they've really vindicated all the leftist criticisms of moderates being disingenuous incrementalists
Manchin and Sinema are creating more bitter leftists than AOC at this point
:party-sicko:
Yeaa, but if the choice ever comes down between AOC-type candidate and a Manchin-type candidate, the libs will do everything possible to get the conservative elected. I'm certain that 2009-2011 was full of similar comments from the libs as well, it didn't matter when the choice came down between the left and the conservative, they will always choose the conservative.
Do you remember which subs? I have no idea what even existed back then.
SRS wasn't really "left" per se. It was a big part of my own pipeline leftward, personally, and it was further to the left than Reddit itself (not that that's hard), and it pissed off chuds on Reddit to a degree we haven't seen since, but I would say it was progressive and probably leave it there. Great for pointing out sexism and racism, but there was no class analysis at all.
:brd:
The same neolib dipshits were posting trash about median voter theory after Biden won.
They got what they wanted. Now they get to eat shit. Who cares
I was an anti imperialist libertarian who was friends with communists in 2010. I don't know exactly what the scene was like on the left, but I believe "bleak" is a good estimate
A good chunk of libertarians can be moved left -- basically those who give a shit about other people, and just got sucked into a dumb ideology after recognizing that both mainstream parties are bad.
It's good to keep talking to those folks, too, because giving a shit about people can get worn down over time, and a lot of libertarians who don't become leftists hop on the pipeline to fascism.
I don't remember there actually being a leftist scene back then :(
if the choice ever comes down between AOC-type candidate and a Manchin-type candidate, the libs will do everything possible to get the conservative elected
I mean, a lot of people on here aren't exactly going to help. They're going to call AOC a fascist and hold out for a protracted people's war or general strike. How anyone thinks that's moving the ball forward, I don't know.
There are plenty of legitimate criticisms of AOC. "sOcIaL fAsCiSt!1!!" is not one of them. There's no path to a mass movement through calling one of the most popular and furthest-left politicians in the country a Nazi.
And we're not talking about a choice between AOC and Lenin reincarnate; we're talking about a choice between AOC and Joe Manchin. A legitimate critique of what passes for leftist candidates in the U.S. would acknowledge the many ways those candidates are still an improvement over the most conservative of Democrats.
Who's settling? No one's saying AOC-type Democrats are the ideal. The point is that they've obviously an improvement over the likes of Joe Manchin.
This is a question I keep coming back to- is there a way to have honest analysis amongst ourselves and also recognizing that some of that analysis suggests actions that aren't a good idea in this moment?
I personally think a lot of the criticisms of AOC are well founded. But that doesn't mean I'm going to lead with them when talking to libs I'm trying to radicalize, and I don't think most people are suggesting that.
I guess what I find weird about comments like yours is you seem to be saying we shouldn't even be criticizing her amongst ourselves which, just, why?
I'm all for honest analysis and criticism -- but calling AOC a fascist is neither. Who does that appeal to outside of (some) terminally-online leftists?
Do you see what you're doing again? You're conflating analysis with tactics.
Who does that appeal to? Why does it matter if it's not in our messaging?
"I had to spend so much work convincing my friends of nonsense and that's all been ruined by reality itself"
the life of a neoliberal adherent is some kind of three stooges bit of constantly throwing a curtain around a flaming room and pretending everything's fine
That one article about chuds not taking the vaccine and dying, because taking it would vindicate the libs
I'm running out of counters
Huh fancy that it's almost like you're fucking wrong
Having policy debate be a fuckin' recreational activity was the worst decision.
I feel like the best way to convert a neolib is to just get them to read their own shit back to themselves a couple times. Like holy fuck that's an insane level of dissonance.
Maybe I'm giving them too much credit, but I think that was exactly what they meant. I read that less as "I'm running out of ways to defend my ideology, which I know to be correct" and more as "I'm beginning to suspect I was wrong"
A lot of them are really showing how young they are, all while accusing every leftist of being under 18
They did a poll a year or two ago and buried the results because it showed that they were mostly teenagers.
It's really obvious none of them have done any actual labor in their entire lives.
"Why are the chapocels always yelling about the War on Terror? Like is that even that big a deal any more since Obama ended it? Get a grip tbh."
💪👈 sheeeeesh!
Didn't you hear Biden? the war is over! It's hella cringe that you care about the heckin drone strikes that are killing randos. All my homies hate criticism of the state
https://imgur.com/jfygOxz
Two Democrats and fifty Republicans in the Senate are blocking the things you want and you're wasting your energy being mad at the Democrats? If the two decades since Gore lost to Bush didn't teach you to focus your fire on Republicans, nothing will.
Congratulations, you hit on exactly the talking point to convince me to turn back from my cynical ways. I've been mostly paying attention to politics since watching tanks roll through Moscow on the news in the early nineties and I've never heard such a refreshing argument! I have watched the Dem party flail ineffectually for decades and now chumps like you and other centrists demand my vote even though the only major accomplishments they've had in 40 years is a watered down healthcare reform. The courts are stacked with young conservatives, LGBTQ right may start coming under fire, abortion may soon be effectively illegal in most of the country, and democracy is actually under attack with NO FUCKING HOPE for federal reform because of two senators and the coward hiding behind them are more invested in archaic senatorial rules then insuring everyone can vote. But hey maybe in another 40 years I can look forward to a means tested "public option". Or I can say fuck you, fuck the party, I'm done. Shove your sanctimonious self-righteous BS in the face of someone who hasn't been hearing it for 40 years, and telling their friends the same thing.
Oh fuck yes
R/NEOLIBERAL BECOME TANKIES CHALLENGE (MORE POSSIBLE THAN PREVIOUSLY THOUGHT) :tankie:
The vast majority of denizens on that sub are confused, ideologically incoherent people who can't decide if they're neoliberals or New Dealers with the serial numbers filed off at any given moment
Honestly, we don't want these people and they can go whinge and cry with their friends in Langley. You reap what you sow, neoliberal turds don't get to repent.
On the contrary - we want anyone and everyone. No matter what your past politics. Leftists are unbelievably, unfathomably outnumbered. There's no purity test nor should there be.
The purity test is that western chauvinism gets you a ride on Elon's rocket. If you love colonizing so much, why don't you colonize Mars? :garf-troll:
Also:
Two Democrats and fifty Republicans in the Senate are blocking the things you want and you’re wasting your energy being mad at the Democrats?
Uhhh, yes? Because I know what the fucking GOP is and what it stands for and I know that they just plain oppose anything that I would regard as good. So it's a literal waste of time and energy to get mad, in this context, at Republicans.
Yeah...they wanted these people, knowing who they were. They got Joe, they got their Senate majority to go with their House majority.
Are they too young to remember how the Obama supermajority years went? Or do they just care more now
They’re too young and have no knowledge of political history. The old sub always pointed out Obama wasted a supermajority and once I started to read old articles from 2009-2012 the leftists were right.
Leftists read history better than everyone and even if I was a liberal I’d probably trust their knowledge of history more than anyone else.
But if only ol' mean Joe Lieberman wasn't around to block our 60-40 supermajority we could have a public option now!!!!!!!!!!!
It'll be funny if Biden gets primaried by some "reformed" Republican in 2024
Reality has shown you cannot trust neoliberal democrats, however neoliberalism is still correct.
Just like the Chicago school freaks saying they made all the right decisions that led up to 2008 and wouldn't have changed a thing or done anything different.
Neoliberals, sowing: "The only way to make progress is through moderate, incremental change, which you obnoxious children on the left don't understand"
Neoliberals, reaping: "Okay fine, the leftists where proven right in reality, but they were mean about it so I'm going to stubbornly remain a fucking moron."
Whenever articles are written, whenever political speeches are given, or whenever analyses are made about a situation, it is assumed that certain people of one group, either the left or the right, the rich or the poor, the whites or the blacks, are causing polarization. The fact is that conditions cause polarization, and that certain people can act as catalysts to speed up the polarization; for example, Rap Brown or Huey Newton can be a catalyst for speeding up the polarization of blacks against whites in the United States, but the conditions are already there. George Wallace can speed up the polarization of whites against blacks in America, but again, the conditions are already there.
Kwame Ture, The Pitfalls of Liberalism, 1969
Lots of insight to be reflected upon from this speech! In this particular case, I think it has a lot of explanatory insight into “I’m being radicalized and I don’t like it”.
This is a good way of explaining how individuals matter without falling into Great Man Theory.
I can relate to that, that crawling sense of "things really can't go on like this, can they?" is really uncomfortable after a lifetime of having Acceptable Positions beaten into your head. And obviously individual events would trigger that feeling, but overall it didn't feel like it was due to any one person or group, just a little too much of everything being insane at the same time.
I had to look it up. (And there's a Lovecraft connection.)
WTF? I put my faith in conventional power structures and they did nothing but entrench themselves further? Even though I Voted?? Fucked up IMO.
Buncha doomers in here bemoaning the progress the left has made as impermanent and unimpactful, but I disagree. In my organizing work I find people more susceptible to leftist positions than ever before. People are really beginning to realize the incrementalist lie is a con, and reality just drives home the point every day. There's no substitute for the educational power of material conditions, and ultimately it was going to take shit getting bad for people to learn. But they are learning.
lol.
*That’s the real issue this time,” he said. “Beating Nixon. It’s hard to even guess how much damage those bastards will do if they get in for another four years.”
The argument was familiar, I had even made it myself, here and there, but I was beginning to sense something very depressing about it. How many more of these goddamn elections are we going to have to write off as lame, but “regrettably necessary” holding actions? And how many more of these stinking double-downer sideshows will we have to go through before we can get ourselves straight enough to put together some kind of national election that will give me and the at least 20 million people I tend to agree with a chance to vote for something, instead of always being faced with that old familiar choice between the lesser of two evils?
Now with another one of these big bogus showdowns looming down on us, I can already pick up the stench of another bummer. I understand, along with a lot of other people, that the big thing this year is Beating Nixon. But that was also the big thing, as I recall, twelve years ago in 1960 – and as far as I can tell, we’ve gone from bad to worse to rotten since then, and the outlook is for more of the same.
—Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail ’72*
fifty years ago. they're still fuckin learning? they ain't learning shit.
And? Communist sentiment hasn't been this popular here in like a hundred years.
fifty years ago. they’re still fuckin learning? they ain’t learning shit.
The whole point is that in increasing numbers people aren't believing that lesser evil crap anymore.
Communist sentiment is less popular than it was during the Cold War, knock it off. These are a bunch of kids being trendy and edgy with labels, they don't know and single fucking thing and will immediately be brought back to being good Dems come election time.
I seriously doubt they will run back to the Dems because back in the Cold War they actually were willing to bribe them with stuff. They aren't anymore, so there isn't even any perceived gain from flipping like that.
It's now the popular perception that the Democrat government doesn't do anything but sit around and talk about maybe thinking about doing something eventually, some day. There is no trust they will do even the bare minimum anymore.
the point is that it's not incentive based, it's fear driven. they're just afraid of the little they have being taken away.
Lol, that's not true at all. Hell, the left is more ideologically coherent than it's been in America for a long time. It's not alot still, but compared to the Bush and Obama years, there is a way more active media sphere of people who are all becoming connected and radicalized.
I'd like to echo this sentiment, as well as @TreadOnMe and @furryanarchy. During the time @garbage is discussing, Capitalism still seemed to be on the rise. We laugh at how fucking absurd the quote is now, but Fukayama's "end of history" line was not seen as absurd at the time. People really thought that communism/socialism was demonstrably unworkable, that China would inevitably liberalize, and that capitalism would lift the world out of poverty and solve all our problems. That's clearly not the hegemonic thought anymore, and history has proven those predictions false. We're in very different material conditions than we were when Thompson wrote that. Gotta focus on the material analysis rather than only look at the arguments as the words themselves.
biden got more votes than any fucking candidate in history.
Nah. A small percentage of people are radicalizing, a much larger percentage of people are realizing the absurdity of the status quo. They might not see the alternatives yet, but they at least see the failure of business as usual. It's our job to be the educators in increasingly fertile ground.
Whom amongst us in the west was born a principled communist? It was material conditions that gave us the lived experience necessary to become amenable to these ideas, and then sources of education to give us the understanding. For some of us that was independent study and research. For others, someone patient and better read than ourselves helped guide our learning. I'd argue the second is far more effective for the general population than the first, and the more Cadre leftists have the greater we can capitalize on the increasingly harsh material conditions. Between climate disasters, total ineffectual democratic governance, and worsening living conditions, a huge percentage of people are at the very least REACHABLE for the first time in decades. It's on us as revolutionaries to reach them.
People posted a looooot about radicalization between 2016-2020 and then we hit the general election and all those baby leftists went right back to :vote: rhetoric. I don't have high expectations for 2024.
A lot of people stuck and a lot of people are going to be easier to stick in the future. There’s no such thing as a success with no ebb and flow that follows it. We’ve made net gains on the left since 2016. It’s our job to find the people that haven’t completely lost ground and usher them along into meaningful political action
I don’t have high expectations for 2024.
How about “high hopes” then :pete:
Hey now. I voted. And now my state is reintroducing wolves and we got paid family leave enacted. But I was one of five people in my county to vote PSL.
Radicalism -- with as little power as radicals have now -- offers very little in terms of immediate impact and almost no hope of major change. What did we get out of the BLM protests, really?
So of course people are going to continue to entertain mainstream Democrats. They at least have the power to make some immediate impact and at least offer some hope of major change (and showing up to vote takes very little effort compared to radical political organizing). It's nowhere near what's needed, but if it's the choice between that and essentially nothing, people aren't going to take the nothing on principle.
What's probably happening is that more and more people are getting primed for radical change, but voting D until some radical political project comes along that offers a real shot at substantive improvement. It's like working a shitty job until a decent job presents itself. Most people aren't going to quit thinking anything less than decent won't cut it. They're going to work what's in front of them, but they'll start contemplating how good it will feel to jump ship when they finally get something better.
It's not even the choice between shitty Democrats and nothing. It's the choice between shitty Democrats and Republicans, who are even worse.
BLM didn't achieve any structural changes, but it did actually have some immediate impact In getting the police officers arrested and charged
I think it also showed a lot of people that they aren't alone. With how alienated we all are, protests like that start the process of healing the bonds necessary for having a society.
Those were the largest peaceful protests in American history. I really don't think that they'll be the largest for long, but they could very well be the largest peaceful protests for a while.
It did some good things, absolutely. It got the cops charged, it showed people that direct action can move the ball forward where going through proper channels has failed (tearing down statues), it moved a lot of once-radical race and class discussions much closer to the political mainstream, etc.
But compare the material value of that to the cost people paid in time, effort, bail money, criminal records, and getting beaten by the police. How many people are going to sign up for that trade again? Isn't it telling that there's been no structural change, cops keep killing black people in egregious ways, and yet we haven't seen protests anywhere near the scale of last summer's? There are plenty of other factors in play (tons of people are still naively giving Biden a chance, or less-naively exploring local efforts that don't center on protests), but it's also rational to conclude that the cost-benefit of the BLM protests shows it's not a winning strategy (at least not right now). People don't want to invest in failed efforts, and if we're even half as skeptical of direct action as we are of elctoralism, we'd call the BLM protests a failed effort.
Note also that you can come up with a list of modest wins accomplished by the Democratic Party, too. People aren't going to look only at the good things done by protests and ignore the costs, but then flip that around when they consider the value of elections.
Setting aside the debate about whether anything "radical" can be achieved through electoral politics, I'd say Bernie was the harbinger of this. He didn't even set out to run a serious campaign in 2016, but people were so fed up with mainstream Democrats that they threw tons of energy and votes at him anyway because he was actually a "legitimate" candidate (a sitting senator, running on an issue tons of people cared about, in a Democratic primary instead of a near-hopeless third party bid). In 2020, when he ran a serious campaign from the start (and when people had another four years to radicalize), he had more success than any U.S. candidate who'd ever embraced the word "socialism" (including Debs). It wasn't enough to overcome the trifecta of Democratic ratfucking, poor luck with the timing of major campaign events, and an incredibly popular Republican opponent, but there was a pronounced upward trajectory. You can see that trajectory elsewhere, too, in the victories of additional DSA-backed candidates, progressive prosecutors, and explicit socialists like India Walton.
People will support the "radical" option if it has a chance. What they won't do is get so wound up in radicalism that they spike the football when there's nothing left to gain (e.g., after a leftist candidate loses a primary). Most will turn out for a backup option before not voting at all.
Basically, yeah. However much it may appear that Americans are coming to hate centrist neoliberalism, their voting habits suggest otherwise.
What did we get out of the BLM protests, really?
Materially, little to nothing. But we gained a lot of knowledge. In my life, I have never seen a domestic insurgency on that scale, and likewise, I have never seen the state employ such sophisticated counterinsurgency measures. Theory is great and all, but it is these practical experiences which solidify and refine it.
