the only thing that their particular brand of idealism lionizes more than empty plattitudes is martyrdom for a just cause, preferrably if the martyr is somebody else than their privileged ass.
Example: remember how :open-biden: gloated over how powerful it was when George Floyd cried out for his mother when the life was choked out of him? she did nothing that would prevent the mothers of other black people from going through the same loss, she just bathed in the smugness of being able to merely pretend to be on the right side of history while fully benefitting from the murderous and inhumane status quo she props up. This kind of spectacle, this act of turning the marginalized into icons of virtuous suffering against their own will is the lifeblood of the American liberal.
So if the new wave of clericofascist legislation leads to trans kids killing themselves because they are forced through the permanent damage of going through the wrong puberty, if it leads to women having to deliver their rapist's baby, if it leads to further gay bars being firebombed and further abortion clinics being shut down, this is what these ghouls want. They want it just as much as the Republicans they adore so much. It is part of their act - the worse the dominionist fascists lash out, the more they repress us, the more leeway the Dems have in being the Lesser Evil.
For the American left, there is hardly a need more pressing than to break this all-smothering cultural hegemony. The time has come to unite everybody who gets trampled on in today's America. The nurses, the service and warehouse workers, the ravaged old working class, the victims of racist border regimes and overpolicing and land theft, the targets of patriarchal and queerphobic hatred, the slaves in the industrial prison complex, the army of all those America oppresses domestically to keep its rotten, corrupt system afloat at the expense of the entire rest of the world.
For the American left, there is hardly a need more pressing than to break this all-smothering cultural hegemony.
I think the pressing question is how. we made real gains following the Floyd protests - like a seriously huge influx of new blood to most left orgs in major cities, small or large - but that hasn't translated to any movement in the war of position. like the libs are hushedly talking about taking direct action against the state if this draft is made official, but they don't have the organization to see these things through but they're all also simultaneously whining about how tired they are. so whatever happens will either be a whimper or the spontaneous and provoked rage of the class.
an enraged response would be the best possible thing that could happen because it would immediately force the supreme court to back down. and that makes a clear delineation between effective and ineffective action: voting and symbolic protest accomplished nothing but direct action nipped the ruling in the bud. it's so stark that it'd be hard to miss. but I'm not sure agitation is going to provoke an immediate response. it does feel like the tension is ratcheting up the way it was right before occupy or the Floyd protests, though.
why are they like this
the only thing that their particular brand of idealism lionizes more than empty plattitudes is martyrdom for a just cause, preferrably if the martyr is somebody else than their privileged ass.
Example: remember how :open-biden: gloated over how powerful it was when George Floyd cried out for his mother when the life was choked out of him? she did nothing that would prevent the mothers of other black people from going through the same loss, she just bathed in the smugness of being able to merely pretend to be on the right side of history while fully benefitting from the murderous and inhumane status quo she props up. This kind of spectacle, this act of turning the marginalized into icons of virtuous suffering against their own will is the lifeblood of the American liberal.
So if the new wave of clericofascist legislation leads to trans kids killing themselves because they are forced through the permanent damage of going through the wrong puberty, if it leads to women having to deliver their rapist's baby, if it leads to further gay bars being firebombed and further abortion clinics being shut down, this is what these ghouls want. They want it just as much as the Republicans they adore so much. It is part of their act - the worse the dominionist fascists lash out, the more they repress us, the more leeway the Dems have in being the Lesser Evil.
For the American left, there is hardly a need more pressing than to break this all-smothering cultural hegemony. The time has come to unite everybody who gets trampled on in today's America. The nurses, the service and warehouse workers, the ravaged old working class, the victims of racist border regimes and overpolicing and land theft, the targets of patriarchal and queerphobic hatred, the slaves in the industrial prison complex, the army of all those America oppresses domestically to keep its rotten, corrupt system afloat at the expense of the entire rest of the world.
I think the pressing question is how. we made real gains following the Floyd protests - like a seriously huge influx of new blood to most left orgs in major cities, small or large - but that hasn't translated to any movement in the war of position. like the libs are hushedly talking about taking direct action against the state if this draft is made official, but they don't have the organization to see these things through but they're all also simultaneously whining about how tired they are. so whatever happens will either be a whimper or the spontaneous and provoked rage of the class.
an enraged response would be the best possible thing that could happen because it would immediately force the supreme court to back down. and that makes a clear delineation between effective and ineffective action: voting and symbolic protest accomplished nothing but direct action nipped the ruling in the bud. it's so stark that it'd be hard to miss. but I'm not sure agitation is going to provoke an immediate response. it does feel like the tension is ratcheting up the way it was right before occupy or the Floyd protests, though.
entire lifetimes of propaganda