Link - https://twitter.com/ClareDalyMEP/status/1747323130060697682

They already Community Noted her - Clare Daly is a highly controversial Irish politician who was accused of nepotism, support for dictators like Putin and Assad, causing divide in European parliamentary left, and arguably doesn't represent not just dead Irish ancestors but also majority of living Irish.

  • CyborgMarx [any, any]
    ·
    11 months ago

    You don't seem to understand "western" is just a colloquialism for Americanism and Pan-Europeanism, geography plays only the most superficial of roles in the historical distribution of these cultures, imperialism tends to do funny things with geography

    Also, in what possible way is Cuba culturally similar to the United States, and how is Australia culturally isolated from the rest of the Anglosphere? It's the fact it's populated by anglos that makes it a western country, not it's positional coordinates on a giant sphere

    • FunkyStuff [he/him]
      ·
      11 months ago

      Cuba isn't culturally all that similar to the US, but the sense in which you're using "Western" is clearly different to what he means. Cuba is culturally similar to other Caribbean countries, we all share the past as Spanish colonies with imported African slaves and indigenous genocides, then being handed into American Monroe Doctrine hegemony. Similar history to every single Latin American country. When someone says West and means "countries that are closely linked economically, culturally, politically to America and Western Europe" as opposed to imperial core, I think it's fully reasonable that they include Latin America, even when some Latin American countries don't participate in the imperialist projects of the US and its allies.

      • CyborgMarx [any, any]
        ·
        11 months ago

        When you ask the average Joe on the street what "western" means, they think "the countries where rich white people are", it's really that simple, nobody is out there talking about hemispheres or gps coordinates, any other definition is ad hoc, uncommon, and personalized

        When someone says West and means "countries that are closely linked economically, culturally, politically to America and Western Europe" as opposed to imperial core

        That sentence literally just describes the entire world

        Let's clock how ad hoc this kind of logic is by using a country I'm familiar with; Morocco or the Maghreb: name literally means "the west", close links with America and Western Europe historically, politically, and even culturally; by the definitions used in this thread, it's a western country

        See what happens when you don't stick with the obvious conclusion that even your average Long Islander figures out intuitively

        • Dolores [love/loves]
          ·
          11 months ago

          your imaginary Long Island schlub exhibits the base layer of 'the West' being, in many cases a simple "us vs. them". but the writers and politicians who made the thing up have had to justify it in more detail, and they've always introduced contradictions. working from the 'intellectual' justifications & calling out the inconsistencies is an important step toward undermining the vulgar team mentality of the schlub

          although idk why we're arguing about it here as if we're vested, when we should all agree 'the west' is a liberal term and we have our own terms [core/periphery, imperial/colonial etc]