This is just a vibe, so take it for what it's worth.

But personally I feel like I've been experiencing, witnessing, or hearing less stories about people managing to "deprogram"/"convert"/"change" people in terms of their political ideology. Actually I've been hearing more of the opposite, accounts of people regressing: "A year ago I talked my racist uncle into being a Bernie bro but in the last 3 months he's gone all the way back to QAnon." That sort of thing.

It doesn't seem to be just me, I've seen a lot of "Debate Bros" start to have increasingly strict rules about who they debate, or just abandon the whole protect of debating all together to just stream to their existing fans. Some (one in particular funny-clown-hammer ) openly say it's because they fell like their opponents have consolidated their base and there's nobody reachable anymore.

And that's what it feels like, consolidation. Echo chambers have become more effective, it almost fells like people have scripted retorts to whatever talking point might get thrown at them. Fuck, "Israel" just straight up as academies on how to do this shit. It's like the internet has just perfected rhetoric so much that once you pull someone in they're just locked into it forever.

Idk, I just feel like everyone who is a Chud/turbo-lib/Succ/Tankie RN is probably gonna die one at this point. Every ideology is just a Skinner box now.

Edit: And another thought, it is a bit ironic, I recall us Commies were the first ones to be saying "one-on-one debate is a often worthless performance, and most people who get too deep into Far Right ideology are probably a lost cause and not worth wasting energy to reach," and everyone giving us shit for it and acting all noble about how the market place of ideas could fix everything. Now post-Trump everyone seems to be realizing we were right and Libs and Chuds alike are abandoning the whole affair.

Edit 2: I wrote this while drinking box wine and listening to Post-Punk, sorry. What provoked this was learning that "Why should we bother to reply to Kautsky?" quote by Lenin we all love is probs fake. Made me think about what truth there may be in it even if it isn't actually real.

Edit 3: just woke up and Jesus I made some big ass grammatical errors in this post. Fucking box wine!

  • Red_Sunshine_Over_Florida [he/him]
    ·
    7 days ago

    I hope they can successfully build a wider critique of capital and imperialism beyond the current crisis in Gaza. My fear is if this is not done, then the momentum for a broader push for justice will dissipate once the ongoing crisis ends.

    • Droplet [comrade/them]
      ·
      edit-2
      7 days ago

      Nothing will be done because there’s no organized left to turn radical sentiment into political actions.

      • Red_Sunshine_Over_Florida [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        7 days ago

        Well, I wanted to say that too but, I didn't know how to say it in a polite way.

        The left is very disorganized and seems unable to break out of a cycle of repeating all the actions that contributed to its disorganization. And we reminisce about the past to take ourselves away from those failings. I'm as guilty of it as most people are.

        • Droplet [comrade/them]
          ·
          7 days ago

          Yes, this is unfortunately the reality. As long as the Western left has no intention of actually taking power, the capitalist ruling class will never have to cede to their demands.

          • Red_Sunshine_Over_Florida [he/him]
            ·
            7 days ago

            I don't believe in the inevitability of communism myself. I think barbarism is more than plausible as long as these important questions go unanswered.

            • Droplet [comrade/them]
              ·
              7 days ago

              The conditions for communism are likely made inevitable by changes in the material conditions, but it doesn’t mean it can spontaneously happen. It simply opens up the opportunity for political transformation to take place, but if nobody is there to seize that opportunity (which will also come with heavy resistance from the bourgeoisie), then communism will not happen.

              In other words, unlike what many idealists believe, the masses won’t suddenly become socialists/communists just because things are getting worse, in fact they are more likely to become fascists in a everyone is out for themselves way as the conditions deteriorate.

              • Comp4 [she/her]
                ·
                7 days ago

                I can't predict the future, but things are going to get worse. That's the only thing that's almost certain. Some people might be able to carve out a piece of heaven in a dying world, but a lot more folks are going to suffer.

    • MaoTheLawn [any, any]
      ·
      6 days ago

      It's the classic 'liberals are against all wars except the current one'.