Excited to find the western chauvinists in this community.
Edit: Wow apparently the only people on chapo dot chat are whitees unaffected by and benefiting from their imperialism confidently declaring how the perpetrators are to be treated.
Y'all have some nerve
Edit 2:
ITT If you shoot a black kid in the back in downtown Baltimore I want nothing to do with you. If you perfarate an entire back family in Mogadischu or Baghdad that's ok, you did growth and spaces.
man people ITT are projecting so much and responding to arguments that no one made. It'd be hilarious if it wasn't so sad.
You wanted a struggle session, didn't you?
:agony-consuming:
So what exactly are you arguing then? This whole thread is just you responding to posts giving actual material reasons for accepting veterans in the movement, and you saying "lol you're not even understanding what I said"
I don't think anyone here thinks the US military or imperialism is good or making excuses. They're saying veterans are a net benefit to the movement towards our goals. Is your argument that everyone should insult them? Is it that being able to insult them is more important than having them in the movement?
The tweet says that western leftists' opinions are irrelevant. The implication is that victims of the US military are the ones who can shit and insult them.
Rightfully so, they carried out acts of US imperialism against them.
It seems the thread has turned into does that mean US leftists need to adopt this take or is it acceptable to welcome them in the movement for their knowledge and skills despite their past?
I know. USAmericans will turn everything on its head and make it about themselves.
My argument is for troops to have the same standards applied to them as men who got #metoo'd. If you're not ready to accept reformed #metoo'd men then you should do the same for troops. If you're ready to accept them but with caveats then troops have to have caveats too. My argument is for you to be consistent with your principals.
I'm not absolving troops of the part they play in the imperial war machine, but they are fundamentally different than #metoo'd men. The vast majority of those being #metoo'd were in a high position of power with the choice to be a piece of trash repeatedly, those in the military can face a wide variety of punishments up to being killed by their own allies for putting up too much of a fuss. This isn't an excuse for continuing to commit atrocities, but it is much different than choosing to violate and assault people in 'exchange' for a better job.
The military is also filled with victims of capitalism looking for a way out of bad conditions and may have been fed propaganda their whole life thinking this is good. Once out, many veterans feel negativity towards the military. Again, this doesn't fix what they have done, but asking US leftists to disallow or heavily discourage veterans from joining the movement is effectively extending the amount of time the US war machine can keep doing what it does best.
I don't disagree with the tweet in that those who have been on the receiving end of US imperialism absolutely have the right to fling insults and take as much time and hoops to jump through to forgive them if at all.