• Dirt_Owl [comrade/them, they/them]
    ·
    edit-2
    11 months ago

    Slightly off-topic, but I hate the way people like this talk and think. Everything and everyone is a tool to be manipulated. Nothing they say or do is genuine, and there is always this smug, self-absorbed assumption that they're the smartest person in the world.

    It's like, no dude. Everyone can see you're a douche bag and everyone knows what you're doing. They just can't be bothered with your shit or don't have the authority to call you out on your bullshit. You're exhausting and depressing to be around.

    I don't know who the writer or what book this is from is btw so this comment might bite me in the ass lol. "Bruh, Karl Marx wrote this."

    • kristina [she/her]
      ·
      11 months ago

      whos the funniest person to have written this? Stephen Hawking? Mr. Rogers?

    • echognomics [he/him]
      ·
      11 months ago

      Original source article. Cockburn's article's actually about Rahm Emanuel, and his digression about Miliband is about how in the end of the day the blame for the criminality of such depraved ghouls like Emanuel lies with the goody-goody "progressive liberal" types like Obama.

      I don't quite understand what you're getting at in your comment? Cockburn's rhetoric is definitely aggressively combative, but I definitely don't think that he's being smug or insincere or manipulative ar all. In fact, I honestly think that he's actually extremely close to being purely sincere and moralistic. The key idea is that he sees the actually existing suffering and injustice around the world and feels justifiably angry at that, and he's pointing that fury at the right people and institutions, i.e., those most responsible for creating and perpetuating unjust socioeconomic systems of capitalist/imperialist exploitation. He's not at all saying that you should act like a jerk towards everyone around yourself without rhyme or reason; he's talking about there being a class war going on, and the need for principled leftists to recognise their enemies and adopt the right attitude towards them in such a situation.

    • UlyssesT [he/him]
      ·
      11 months ago

      Slightly off-topic, but I hate the way people like this talk and think. Everything and everyone is a tool to be manipulated. Nothing they say or do is genuine, and there is always this smug, self-absorbed assumption that they're the smartest person in the world.

      The norm in contemporary western culture is to admire and try to emulate such "cool, calm, and collected" creepy fucks. I fucking hate that.

      Everyone can see you're a douche bag and everyone knows what you're doing.

      I wish that was the case. I really do. sicko-wistful