There is no number of foreigners that is unacceptable to sacrifice for a middle class livelihood. Anti-cop because they can imagine a scenario where a cop inconveniences them. These principles don't apply to the Waffen SS because they can't imagine a soldier personally inconveniencing them and, of course, foreigners aren't really humans.
This whole myth that the military takes advantage of the poor through some kind of "poverty draft" is just absolute bullshit that contributes to the whitewashing of the military.
The fact is that the military is still largely comprised of "middle class" people, largely white, with POC still being a minority. White people still make up a majority of combat jobs, i.e. the infantry.
This image that poor people are joining as a means of social mobility is bullshit. The military struggles like hell to recruit people from poorer areas and it's getting to the point where the military largely recruits from those who have family that were in the military, or from those whose families weren't struggling to get by.
When I was a recruiter for this college's ROTC program in Southern California, the army was pouring money into trying to market becoming an army officer for Hispanic people. The army was literally willing to give a full ride upfront to college to Hispanic people and damn near nobody was going for it. That was decades ago and they're still doing the same marketing campaign with the same amount of results.
So, this myth that we can't hate on the troops because they had no other choice due to being poor is just absolute bullshit.
Good post, and here's some data to back up what you're saying.
Rich Man’s War, Poor Man’s Fight?: Socioeconomic representativeness in the modern military
Historically, the American armed forces were disproportionally drawn from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. A transition toward a smaller and more selective military has changed this tendency. Since the armed forces do not gather data on recruits’ family income, previous studies relied on geographic data to proxy for economic background. We improve on previous literature using individual-level data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 and study population representativeness in the years 1997–2011. We find that recruits score higher than the civilian population on cognitive skill tests, and come from households with above average median parental income and wealth. Moreover, both the lowest and highest parental income categories are under-represented. Higher skill test scores increase enlistment rates from lower- and middle-income families while decreasing them for high income families. The over-representation of minorities in the military has declined in recent decades. Non-Hispanic White casualties are now over-represented in Iraq and Afghanistan.
79% of Army recruits reported having a family member that served. For 30%, it was a parent.
In terms of social class, Kane (2006) found that people who serve in the military come from more well-off neighborhoods than those who have not joined the military although the economic elite are underrepresented in armed service (Heritage foundation of all places did this study)
Importantly, it was historically the poor who fought in America's wars. But now it's the children of the once poor but now middle-class who largely fight in wars. They're treating the military like college or a trade.
Military recruitment standards are pretty much written with middle class white kids in mind. The crimes that will disqualify you are predominantly done by the poor, the tattoos that will DQ you are predominantly associated with black people, the drug policy is straight out of the Nixon campaign playbook, etc. Of course, there's a waiver for all of these if you need to get one, but then that hides discrimination behind the recruiters themselves who will push harder to get kids that look like themselves over the line due to implicit biases.
Military recruitment does still lie to white kids though, and that can't be fully discounted. If you grow up in a culture that tells you from cradle to grave in every waking moment that joining the military is an unqualified good, and then you are looking at the capitalist workforce and see only soul crushing jobs that don't do any good for anybody, then it's very easy to see why joining the imperialist violence doers is such an attractive option for anyone that hasn't been radicalized against imperialism (which is like 95% of America including half of all self-described leftists).
I would say save your sympathy for people who not only regret what they did but who are doing some kind of working or organizing to make up for it, and also that agitating for the left among the military is a waste of time compared to doing it among the currently politically disengaged.
Which makes sense. People join the military because they think they’re “Serving their country” and doing something good. Really poor people have no desire to do that since this country has only ever fucked them over.
People join the military because they think they’re “Serving their country” and doing something good.
I don’t think that’s necessarily true. A lot of people really do join for selfish reasons and ‘survival,’ but it seems like a lot of people do not even think the benefits are worth it these days because of all the warmongering and you know, seeing homeless vets on the streets.
I dont believe that no matter how bad things are in america there are "a lot" of people that go to the military because the choice is "enlist or not survive(or struggle greaty for it)". Especially true the further back you go. The choice almost never is between army and starving. Its between army and a sucky to very sucky job (that will still allow you better living conditions than the people you will opress and help kill and emiserate while in the army.
I think this is one of the pitfalls that the American Left has created for itself (eg "the right wants to ban abortion to get more desperate poors to die for them"). Also, the misreading of the situation of Vietnam that the reason there was such a powerful anti-war movement was because the petit-bourgeoisie's kids were dying along with the poor.
That's not to say middle income families don't have economic pressures, just that they aren't the archetypical "veteran" in our minds.
The army was literally willing to give a full ride upfront to college to Hispanic people and damn near nobody was going for it
Haha my friend got his engineering degree paid for by the military before enlisting and now he gets to draft dodge because of an injury. Didn't know this was why he got his up front, hahahaha.
All the libs making excuses like 'but muh propaganda poor ppl!' seem to think the poors are too fucking stupid to see the US military for the torture factory that it is, theres a word for this.
These conversations always devolve to westerners showing their whole ass asserting that its ok for them to murder us in the global south if its for free college and a camero.
okay, but, look; if I don't go to college and learn useful skills, then how can I get my comfy middle class life that I can pretend is secure?
im sorry, but murdering poor brown children in places that have never had steady electricity is the only way.
maybe you just don't understand economics. I'd explain it, but you obviously never went to business school.
these ppl also act like you cant just get a loan to go to college like the vast majority of ppl. Not to mention if you truly are poor you automatically qualify for pell grants which pay 100% of your tuition.
i mean, that's kinda bullshit, but also, revolution and killing ghouls (in video games, of course. gaming is liberation because something something crypto) is a GREAT alternative, if you were already willing to live in a war zone.
killing ghouls (in video games, of course. gaming is liberation because something something crypto) is a GREAT alternative
Some of ya'll still don't get it, you can get multiple slurp juice to use on your hexbears by killing ghouls in minecraft
Also don’t most soldiers come from solidly middle class backgrounds?
by the US military's figures, yes
though they have a vested interest in fudging the numbers
“It’s okay to kill innocent people to move from middle class to a slightly more comfortable position in the middle class” -A disturbing number of people in this thread
Also beyond the police having near identical demographics to the army the "propaganda" part APPLIES TO PEOPLE THAT JOIN THE POLICE JUST AS MUCH
Do people really think that anyone that became a police officer more than 5 years ago wasnt exposed to equal ammounts of "police cool and good and badass and protect and are loved by community" propaganda from media and games and movies as the ones that exist for the army. Yet most american leftists use the propaganda excuse to "be sympathetic and understanding" too troops and never about police where they rightfully yell ACAB. Chauvinist brain
If I bomb a child in Afghanistan and then shake my head and say “I regret this,” then it should make you pity me and not be mad
The only good American vets are the ones who acknowledge their sins and seek redemption through actions and not defend their time in the military and don’t get pissy when POC/foreigners are understandably wary of them as if they’re entitled to automatic forgiveness.
“B-B-BUT MUH REVOLUTION!!!! MUH 1910 SOLDIERS!!!”
Lol. We’re nowhere near a revolution. And if we are, then it’s time to shut up and nut up and show that you truly want to redeem yourselves and not just want a brand new Camaro at the expense of Muslim people.
Also of note for 1910 soldier was it was forced conscription of youth to fight in a senseless meat grinder via trenches. Joining the military to get a cheap college degree and live a middle class lifestyle while bombing out a town somewhere in Iraq or Afghanistan is nowhere near fucking comparable (if you asked many of the Russian bottom wrung soldiers in WWI if they wanted to go home I'd bet a majority would say "fuck yes get me out of here so I can return to my village").
Also its insanity to do any analogy and comparison between illiterate starving conscripted peasants and workers that saw the deaths of millions of their fellow citizens in a useless war and modern grunts of the most murderous and reactionary empire that get to do sex toursim all over the world while being rewarded with better conditions than 95% of their fellow citizens who themselves have better conditions than 95% of the foreign citizens those soldiers help opress and kill.
How can anyone come out with an analysis that points to remotely similar class character and interests and remotely similar approaches and chances of "win over"
Bringing back the classic from the old sub
POV: Americans invade your country
You see american choppers in the bright blue sky, hundreds and hundreds of screaming american soldiers drop from it, you look across the field and see the tanks rolling in. You hear a loud explosion and realise that the shrine you have protected for thousands of years with tooth and nail is destroyed by the empire, you come to the realisation that this is very probably the end of your people who've struggled to survive all these centuries.
You realise that very soon there is going to be a river of blood of your people here; white phosphorus and depleted uranium will be shot very soon, deforming babies for decades to come, and millions of your people are gonna be killed. Your millennia old language and religion will be wiped out, you're very likely the last of your kind.
Suddenly, an American soldier kicks you down, puts his foot on your neck and aims his standard ar-15 on the side of your head all while screaming; you realise you're gonna die, and you won't have to see the destruction of your community that you fostered so carefully all these centuries for.
Just before he pulls the trigger, you think to yourself, "To be fair to him, he probably had a low GPA in highschool and didnt have a health-care, those are notoriously hard to get in America"
All troops are bastards
"I didn't know what I was signing up for!"
:bruh-moment:
What do you think we did in Afghanistan? What about Iraq?
What about every country we've bombed and left a trail of death behind us?
This information isn't hidden. The people signing up in the 10-20 years lived through it! People can regret signing up all they want, but they don't get to downplay their support of Amerikkkan imperialism. They can move on, do better things with their lives, but they're still culpable for their choice
i knew one based anarchist who had fucked up and joined the military. they admitted they fucked up, it was a stupid childish decision and they were desperate to get the hell away from their family, and they regretted not finding a decent way to do it. i never once saw that fucker sober. they said when they were leaving, they looked for data to leak, but didn't have access to anything good.
i never once saw that fucker sober.
This is what gets to me. I've seen footage of pilots who flew the planes that took Northern Korea back to the stone age. They looked completely haunted by what they'd done once they realized it was wrong. How is it that these men who were almost certainly not Communists show more regret and contrition than some "Socialists"
How is it that these men who were almost certainly not Communists show more regret and contrition than some “Socialists”
Proximity is in fact key here. They are the actual literal perpetrators of the atrocity in question & directly observed them in action. Other people, no matter their systemic positioning, did not actually personally drop those bombs. They did, and they cannot deny that they did.
I hate to be the user who keeps asking for this, but where did you find that footage? I'd like to see it
It could've been any number of documentaries. The only one that comes to mind right now is the Counter-Intelligence 6-parter on Vimeo. Maybe The Coming War on China? I'll try to figure it out when I'm off work.
I mean, among "baby leftists" who know about what the US did but still can't grasp the theory, the conditioning is hard to shake. A veteran, the same guy who did the :communism-will-win: stunt at West Point and now has a podcast, mentioned that he had hopes to "reform" the military from within as a junior officer, only to have that expectation slam him in the face like a rotating door. Which is why he hoped to be discharged with a bang.
Not to infantilize them, of course, just weighing it in.
"I had no choice" no the choice you had was to remain poor like the people you murdered who didn't happen to have a Nazi jobs program they could sign up for.
"Sorry Afghan civilian, my free college is worth more than your life."
Drone operators when they see a child in the strike zone
Weighing how much fun I'll have at frat parties later vs how sad that kids parents will be picking up their body parts. Oh well click the button.
the bike comic but in reverse. "i figure i'm happier with my money and education than those kids would be with their lives. so whatever"
Yes it is. You can actually work for McDonalds instead of killing people to get an engineering degree.
Here's the thing: you're not owed a middle class existence. If your options are "murder people" or "not become middle class" you're an evil person if you take the murder option. None of the people veterans murdered had options to "escape poverty."
Do you make these same excuses for cops?
No there are plenty of poor people who don't die. I'm one of them.
I'm not a new account.
You were never going to die of poverty. You're inventing stakes to excuse your Global Cop dad or whatever. Most people who join the military are not poor even by American standards.
You're a chauvinist who thinks that foreigners are not equivalent to Americans.
If the stakes are "kill or be killed" then it's death to Americans, Hitlerite.
If the stakes are “kill or be killed” then it’s death to Americans, Hitlerite.
I'm gonna be honest here, this; I think that this is crank shit. You didn't have to go there, and you should know that the core premise here is literally not even correct; and everything that I have ever read about any real AES project tells me that they also know that. They just want Americans to stop fucking with their people & their internal development as a society, which they are correct to want.
I don't even disagree with your points about people "not being owed a middle-class lifestyle", and I do not give a shit about "Johnny America" and his projected guilt about whatever war-crimes he did. These are people that in a just world ought to face a revolutionary committee. But I don't agree that there's any value in buying into a framework of "Existential Struggle of Nations" weird-shit, even as a rhetorical device.
The comment's been removed, so you may not be aware, but they were the one who made the stakes "kill or be killed." I'm pretty sure I was even quoting them there.
If their argument is that it's ok for Americans to join the military and kill people abroad because otherwise they'll die, then that's the framework I'm going to respond to.
If their argument is that it’s ok for Americans to join the military and kill people abroad because otherwise they’ll die, then that’s the framework I’m going to respond to.
You can respond to it, by saying that it is in fact bullshit, and leaving it at that.
Come on this is sad. At least Ukrainians and Russians have the excuse of conscription in the latest war, Americans don't even have that.
You think people in the global south aren't also being killed by the system? Have you seen how the average informal settlement of shacks or township looks? Have you lived in one?
I do not make excuses for cops
Well why the fuck not? It’s the exact same situation, except cops are less likely to actually kill people. Cops kill lots of people, soldiers kill way more. They’re both ways to “escape poverty” by becoming a weapon of oppression.
ACAB goes double for soldiers. Honestly if someone was calling for the summary execution of every American soldier and veteran I’d say “That might be going a little bit far, but I support it”
Its worse actualy, the choice is between enlisting and possibly having a crappy life thats still COMFORTABLY better than the living conditions of most people the US army kills and immiserates around the globe. The choice almost never is "enlist or live like a middle eastern poor person"
Yeah I think it's better to not murder people than to murder people. Wacky, I know.
Is it acceptable to become a cop to "escape poverty?"
Neither cops nor the military are good, participating in both makes a person a bastard. But how can you at the same time say "these people should stay in poverty", when that's the whole point of the police and military in the first place?
Noone should be poor, cops and troops are bastards.
Because we live in reality as it exists right now. If you are faced with the choice of joining the Waffen SS or not joining the Waffen SS, the moral choice is the latter.
No argument there, I just think saying people should be in poverty for the sake of their own morality is kinda fucked up. Poverty isn't an excuse to join the military, but the prospect of someone doing so certainly isn't an excuse to say that someone should stay poor. They're just morally better off not joining. Also let's be real a lot of people who did join are still poor so it did jack shit for them.
if you think US troops live in 'grinding poverty' you should see how their victims live.
:bloomer: see 3 people banned for imperialist apologia before reading this, thanks @mods :rat-salute:
We had that many liberals among us before this thread? Gross. Good thing they're gone
Warmish take but I'd argue the troops are actually far more guilty than cops. Many people are cops simply because it's a job, and there is a way you can naively spin it as "helping people", like providing support in emergencies, etc. Being brutal is not inherently part of it, if you're not educated on the nature of policing.
Joining the military means signing up to kill people in the name of the United States. Period. There is no "helping".
It's really funny when they're like "I had no idea what the military was!"
My dude, toddlers understand that the point of the military is to shoot people.
Yeah, that's why it irritates me so much when leftists who scream "ACAB" bootlick troops and vets because they think "normal rubes respect the troops, so you gotta be normal". Or even worse, they repeat the lie that "the military is the only example of state power/public welfare that Americans see perform competently so we need to worship it too" - motherfucker the post office works every damn day!
A former teacher of mine was an army vet and said what surprised him most about boot camp was how much emphasis there is on learning how to kill another human being.
He knew that was silly - obviously it's the army, what else would you be learning - but it still surprised him that his job as a soldier was 99% learning how to kill people.
100,000% agree. Cops kill a lot of people. Soldiers kill way way more.
If cops are the handguns of the state, soldiers are fucking predator drones. And I think it’s pretty obvious that predator drones are worse than handguns.
tbf you do need at least some of them on our side to do a revolution. czechoslovakia famously had communists infiltrate the police from the top down and purge reactionaries and used this for leverage for a quick and painless socialist revolution, though afaik we were the only country that did it that way and the liberal government was extremely weak after ww2. partisans were able to quickly join police departments as the government reformed and had a ton of leverage.
with russia, they formed soldiers councils among sympathetic soldiers and used their experience to train workers in combat. in china vast swathes of the nationalist military defected to the communist cause. at one point, the communists had 10k socialists vs around 3 million soldiers, tables flipped pretty quickly as it went on. russia certainly had an imperialist military, and so did east germany (remnants of imperialists, more like) and their example would be more applicable to america's situation.
The funny thing is, I don't even think that joining the military is morally irredeemable. I just hate this "Look, I'm just as much of a victim as the children I killed" attitude. Mike Prysner is an ex member of the Waffen SS and he's dedicated his life to defeating American Imperialism.
I agree with you here. There's no need to coddle smol bean soldiers. There just needs to be a viable path toward atonement such that they can be used for the dismantling of the imperial apparatus.
There is very little that is irredeemable. Maybe it's my Christian upbringing showing but if you repent whatever you did and commit yourself to the revolution, you should be forgiven. I'm not taking about being opportunistic here like Hans Landa, I'm taking about a genuine change of heart. If you're reading this and you're in the military or the FBI or the police forces, it's never too late to do the right thing. Being a bastard is a role people choose to play, it is not the essence of their being.
Even the last emperor of China had a good life after the revolution. Not everything needs to end in blood and death.
The only good American vets are the ones who acknowledge their sins and seek redemption through actions and not defend their time in the military and don’t get pissy when POC/foreigners are understandably wary of them as if they’re entitled to automatic forgiveness.
Weren't soldiers conscripts back then in Tsarist Russia? Quite a difference when compared to US volunteers.
...and living in abject poverty, the material conditions between those soldiers that led them to a revolution aren't even close to US soldiers who are doing it for slightly more comfortable middle class lifestyle.
a good number were volunteers too, usually like 50-100k at any time. like 2/3rds of american forces were conscripted for vietnam, russian regular army was like 4 mill prior to collapse. do the math i guess
though most conscripts would just be sitting in border outposts in the russian empire and not doing anything crazy. became a big issue during ww1 and the war with japan
It makes sense then, conscripts tend not to want to die for the empire for little to no gain.
Thanks for the information
should also be considered that a lot of american 'volunteers' arent true volunteers, they join the military because theyre in the middle of nowhere with zero education and want a way out and its a purely economic decision. most dont expect to have to terrorize children. one guy i know just sat in a car near the border playing on a gameboy seeing if there were any cartel drones flying around. said he detected a single one in his entire career
like 2/3rds of american forces were conscripted for vietnam
1/3, but I doubt they'll do that again because even with a minority being draftees there was a lot of rebellion.
communists infiltrate the police from the top down and purge reactionaries
This kind of strategy is great if you can swing it, but it requires a large organized and disciplined leftist party that the US has never had. Part of the reason why we over focus so much on individual choice is because the capacity for anything else has been burned out of American society by the conditions of American capitalism.
in china vast swathes of the nationalist military defected to the communist cause. at one point, the communists had 10k socialists vs around 3 million soldiers, tables flipped pretty quickly as it went on.
Not remotely comparable since the KMT had to resort to kidnapping random teenagers and forcing them to bear arms against the CPC. At that point, joining the Communists was pure self-preservation so you had a rifle to shoot the KMT goons who were about to kidnap you.
nah. we have plenty of street gangs. probably better at urban guerrilla warfare, especially defensively, than the US military.
probably true, and there have been many socialist groups organized around illegal activities, but ultimately there will be some sort of confrontation that requires regimented, centralized tactics. read mao tbh, he has a lot of fascinating takes and theres a reason he is required reading in us military academies.
one take that mao had was that the 10k or so troops he had were battle hardened and had grown to be friends with the rural people through stopping to repair towns and so on. he then would order the army through hazardous terrain in order to bring pursuing nationalist chinese troops 'down to their level', experience what they have experienced, and make them more likely to join the socialist cause through shifting their material conditions drastically due to attrition
organized crime: notoriously disorganized.
remember, more than 0 of these groups grew like mushrooms on the corpse of groups like the bpp. these are (for the most part, probably even less than the US military) not raging barbarians or disorganized hordes of angsty teens with machine pistols. don't buy the copaganda.
i mean, the big crime people™️ near me are like, extremely disorganized lmao. i know them. theyre just less stupid than the cops
the majority of the organized people I've met have been from chicago or los angeles. and they were pretty on their shit.
nah. we have plenty of street gangs. probably better at urban guerrilla warfare, especially defensively, than the US military.
Yeah shooting at children because of terrible aim is good urban guerrilla warfare lmao. I don’t know about where you live, but in the US gangbangers aren’t training with guns
people die when that shit happens? it's not actually worse than the US military. at least they don't intentionally shoot random kids.
and I mostly think they don't give a shit. again, still less bad than the US military.
Yes, people die. And they don’t care, which is I think it’s funny that you think they’re good at urban warfare and defense
If you're a (imperialist)soldier or a cop you're a bastard. Simple as. You may have been propagandized into it to a massive degree or you may have few other economic options. Still a bastard.
It seems obvious. If someone walks up to me and says hey "I'll give you 1 million Dollars to go kill that mom, dad, and kid over there just hanging out in the park" and I accept that is an evil action. Even if I'm dirt poor and dang a million dollars would let me escape poverty that's an evil action.
Choosing to join the military is the same thing except Americans have been told it's good their whole life. Plus it pays way less than my example so it probably won't even let you escape poverty.
Now I won't say soldiers or even cops are irredeemable of course. If you get out and realize your evil and spend your time now atoning one way or another then good job you are no longer so evil. Obviously expect no forgiveness from those you hurt but if you're truly atoning you wouldn't. This is where many people seem to go wrong. Like oh damn I joined the military and I know/knew it was bad but please feel bad for me now cause I feel sad about it. No you go do something to make up for your sins if you feel bad about it.
Of course individuals making evil decisions in a huge system that requires them is not the biggest issue. I won't spend all my energy on individual soldiers. They are bastards but the bigger problem is and the focus must be on the machine that told them to be.
This is where many people seem to go wrong. Like oh damn I joined the military and I know/knew it was bad but please feel bad for me now cause I feel sad about it. No you go do something to make up for your sins if you feel bad about it.
Sometimes redemption is a lonely road. It will likely not always stay that way if you continue to be authentic, but it will start that way. If you rather be a fascist because it’s easier than doing good things for the sake of being a good person, then you’re just a fascist :eric-andre:
Like bro, you were willing to endure 6 months of a sweaty meathead yelling at you and killing random families at your commander’s order but you can’t handle when someone doesn’t look you in the eye and forgive you? Lol. A bit narcissistic
Basically ya. If you truly understand what you did was evil you wouldn't ever demand someone forgive you. You do good things as much as possible and if someone decides to forgive you you thank them and keep doing good.
And yes redemption is likely lonely especially at first but I don't know probably shouldn't have signed up for the murder machine if you wanted people to think you were a good person and want to be around you. Of course I support outreach to people trying to redeem themselves. Organizing good things for them to do is of course a solid plan.
Now time for the international cop defenders to out themselves
We need posts like this on like monthly intervals just to weed out the fascist apologists.
POV: Americans invade your country
You see american choppers in the bright blue sky, hundreds and hundreds of screaming american soldiers drop from it, you look across the field and see the tanks rolling in. You hear a loud explosion and realise that the shrine you have protected for thousands of years with tooth and nail is destroyed by the empire, you come to the realisation that this is very probably the end of your people who've struggled to survive all these centuries.
You realise that very soon there is going to be a river of blood of your people here; white phosphorus and depleted uranium will be shot very soon, deforming babies for decades to come, and millions of your people are gonna be killed. Your millennia old language and religion will be wiped out, you're very likely the last of your kind.
Suddenly, an American soldier kicks you down, puts his foot on your neck and aims his standard ar-15 on the side of your head all while screaming; you realise you're gonna die, and you won't have to see the destruction of your community that you fostered so carefully all these centuries for.
Just before he pulls the trigger, you think to yourself, "To be fair to him, he probably had a low GPA in highschool and didnt have a health-care, those are notoriously hard to get in America"
You can feel it too, can't you? The change in air pressure. The empire is crumbling like the Gothic manors it was built on.
the question i have is whether these people are on their journey to leftism and need a solid nudge or whether this is a hard block that will forever leave them as pro-western-labour imperialists
hard for me to know since anti-imperialism was my entry point to leftism, and the idea of identifying as leftist but not hating imperialist america just doesnt compute to me, but i know everyone has different entry points and people often get to the bigger program in stages rather than all at once (i know i did). people like patsocs are obviously a writeoff cos seriously what the fuck, but baby "leftists"/socdems etc who havent broken through the military propaganda yet seem like they probably still have more potential than most to be brought into the fold?
I know Roderic Day has been writing a bunch about how he wants to reframe propaganda from brainwashing and this is a good example of why, it removes agency in a way that serves to essentially exonerate people for making deals for blood money made from the lives of foreign peoples.
Moreso he prefers to push the idea of going along with propaganda as a rational choice, conscious or subconscious, wether it be for direct material gain or in a way that helps cope with the reality they live in, if china bad then america less bad, and thats somewhat easier to mentally handle, for example. You could still argue within this framework over how acceptable or unacceptable the choice to take blood money is, but it makes it a real choice that someone is deciding rather than a thing they simply cannot helps as a cog in the machine.
This is his full essay on the subject but I havent read it all yet.
Absolutely. I immediately thought of his essay. These people are not misled fools who are brainwashed by propaganda into hating China or joining the military or whatever. They are imperial subjects who knowingly seek out imperial deals and simply find the terms acceptable.
