some real great takes here 
I was brought up in a household that was anti military.
Only as an adult was I able to form my own opinion.
Without a strong military in the past we would certainly not be here today and without a strong military now, who knows what other nation might decide to attack our sovereignty.
It's childish to be anti military - it shows you do not understand the interconnectedness of our society - good and bad.
It's disingenuous to ignore the effect the aggression of the cold war and its aftermath had on the current Russian situation.
Bro, I don't know what warped version of reality you live in, but without a strong American military to stand up to the Soviet Union during the Cold War, you'd be speaking Russian right now. Ukraine blew their chance to join NATO as soon as possible like everyone else did when the Cold War ended, and they are now being slaughtered en masse by Russia in their attempts to turn them into their newest southwestern oblast.
As a liberal raised during the backlash to the Iraq War, my attitude towards the Military Industrial Complex has really changed in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s seemingly inevitable invasion of Taiwan. Add in the possibility that the US could be dragged into new wars in the Middle East and even possibly South America, and I really don’t think we have the luxury to say “weapons bad, let’s not build any”.
Being the policeman of the world absolutely sucks. War absolutely sucks. But one of the best ways to prevent China, Russia, Iran, Venezuela, etc from saying “might make right, let’s take this land and these resources from our neighbors, since no one can stop us” is for the US to say, “no, we will stop you and we have the will and the tools to easily do it.”
who's responsible for the US choosing to police the world? 
The US is the most benign empire one could wish for. History makes that plain, and just peeking over the fence at contender's tendencies and track record further reinforces that. Easy moral justification backed by actual moral justification.
in honour of all the defense of us atrocities i present to you: the hacker news logo with the fascist "life rune" symbol:
maybe we can get that as an emoji in the same vein as 
The US is the most benign empire one could wish for. History makes that plain, and just peeking over the fence at contender’s tendencies and track record further reinforces that. Easy moral justification backed by actual moral justification.
Oooh my cracker detector done blew up reading that one. Military industrial techbro scum deserve the collapse that's hurtling towards them, and there will be no empathy in me for them when it hits. Only ugly, contemptuous gut-laughter.
How many countries has China invaded in the past 50 years again?
There’s at least one country China has invaded: China! Think about it, where does all of China’s labor and production come from? That’s right. Uncritical support to China in resisting Chinese imperialism.
The US isn't even a benign empire to its citizens living in the imperial core. It frequently murders them with a militarised police force, oppresses its civilian population, has the largest prison population per capita in history (modern?), practices slave labour, rigs its elections and assassinates popular political figures.
can you name another empire that's as good to anglo capital? didnt think so. maybe later kiddo.
without a strong American military to stand up to the Soviet Union during the Cold War, you'd be speaking Russian right now.
As a liberal raised during the backlash to the Iraq War, my attitude towards the Military Industrial Complex has really changed in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s seemingly inevitable invasion of Taiwan. Add in the possibility that the US could be dragged into new wars in the Middle East and even possibly South America, and I really don’t think we have the luxury to say “weapons bad, let’s not build any”.
In my 3 years of posting on hexbear I have never once seriously called someone a fed but this is the most
thing I have ever seenChina’s seemingly inevitable invasion of Taiwan.
Fuck these ignorant liberal imperialists.
I mean it probably will happen, unless you're taking issue with the language used
yeah biden's really acting like he's being dragged into war against his will. totally.
just like bush, that fucking peacenik. so unwilling.
So against it he circumvents Congress to send guns to Israel
So against it he kept cuttin checks to Ukraine for years
So against it he kept pushing back the withdrawal date from Afghanistan
it's always funny how tech bros will be very opinionated about geopolitics (or anything really), used to being pampered I guess so they think their
are like some rare nectar to be poured into their community with delightif
can convince them AI driven paperclip production is mankind's biggest threat then pushing atlanticist imperialism apologia shouldn't be hard eitherWithout a strong military in the past we would certainly not be here today and without a strong military now, who knows what other nation might decide to attack our sovereignty
Has the US even had a credible threat to its sovereignty since it's formation? I genuinely cannot think of a war the US was in where it wasn't the aggressor, barring maybe the World Wars but neither one posed a threat to sovereignty
The War of 1812 had the Americans as aggressors still, they're the ones who kicked it off.
Red Dawn
i got to the part in this movie where the old guy in the cabin reveals
spoiler
his granddaughters hiding below the floorboards
and couldn't stop laughing and couldn't continue the movie from there b/c of how stupid it was.
'Sovereignty' here os being used as a short way to say 'do whatever the fuck we want with zero consequences'.
americans think that if america hadn't entered world war II the nazis would have taken over the world. in fact, if america and russia hadn't entered the war, the US would undoubtably allied with the Nazis. we would have had a domestic holocaust, planned and executed by Americans against communists, jews, blacks, homosexuals, and the disabled.
It's childish to be anti military - it shows you do not understand the interconnectedness of our society - good and bad.
It's childish and shows a lack of understanding says the person who thinks the only positions on the military are 'it's good' and 'it's bad' while only recognising one of those.
It's disingenuous to ignore the effect the aggression of the cold war and its aftermath had on the current Russian situation.
Response is a rambling screed that addresses none of what it's replying to and questions their grasp on reality.
Add in the possibility that the US could be dragged into new wars in the Middle East
"Dragged in". "Dragged into" new wars in the Middle East. By whom and how? If America didn't want to fight wars in the Middle East it could simply... not.
But one of the best ways to prevent China, Russia, Iran, Venezuela, etc from saying “might make right, let’s take this land
Please name the wars in the last 30 years that China, Iran, or Venezuela have fought to take additional land.
The US is the most benign empire one could wish for. History makes that plain
I don't even have to address this one. Just crackpot unreality shit.
Yeah, the US bombed your country, but what if, hypothetically, it was China bombing your country instead? What if Joe Biden was Chinese? What then?
orange site is by far my favorite place to agitate. You'd be surprised how well you can disrupt a conversation by providing a well placed "but that's not true at all".
they really are just motivated by a pathological need to sound smart. They've done no research on any history, but they know they can earn nods of approval by repeating what Smart People say.
Its really frustrating because the site is a mix between the worst VC brained dipshits in the world and the true technological craftsmen of our day. The blog posts on there have a ton of amazing info then the comments are like "mmmm llms make gud books"
I sometimes really wonder if Amerikkkans would actually do anything if the military launched a literal coup
I guess none of these bootsuckers would
The right are the closest to the military and the most armed and will be fine with it, the armed left are so few it'll sadly be a slaughter, and libs will hush up because they'll literally be threatened and all their sabre rattling hinges on their absolute safety, because they're inveterate invertebrates. Everyone's a vocal believer in liberalism when some black or brown country is the target, but the moment they have to weather the violent massacres to uphold what they've been screeching about, they'll shut the hell up and start believing that sometimes bad things happen and what can you do?
They're fine with Vietnam losing a million people, but they don't even want that a cop should give them dirty looks.
I think the libs would protest en masse, and if the coup leaders are smart they'll just let them wear themselves out because I don't think they'll be capable of any kind of organized resistance. They'll just have their week in the streets, go home when they run out of sick days at work, and spend the rest of their lives patting themselves on the back for "doing everything we could" to prevent General DeSantis or whoever from taking over and implementing nationwide pogroms against all non-cishet people.
the government is widely loathed and the military is widely respected. all it would take is the right general. someone who speaks in the idiom of the resentment of the middle class, raging against the dark bargain between the rich international puppetmasters and the destitute welfare leeches. I think we can expect it as soon as the far right gets on the same page about Israel and trans people.
well there goes absolutely any interest i had in tinkering with llm's
They think of themselves as educated but I've heard the argument made by actual teenagers that the US needs a strong military or North Korea, China, or Russia will attack it.
Misread as
Orange site getting dismantled for bootlicking
As long as you steer clear of anything vaguely political and don't post much, Hacker News isn't that bad.
Basically. I find it useful for finding tech blogs, so I can stick them in my RSS reader.
Also, fun fact, David Graeber had an account on the orange site: https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=davidgraeber
