he's not lmao
you don't need to support anyone to say the west shouldn't fuckin bomb them either
Agreed. You can say what we would do to Syria is worse than Assad. Syria needs to find it's own solutions.
Because otherwise he'll show up at 3 am doing this :who-must-go: :assad-must-stay:
Assad is absolutely not a good guy. He inherited his position, as ruler of Syria, from his father after his older brother died in a automobile accident. While ostensible claiming to rule under the ideology of Baathism, he uses strong state control to enforce his own will. His family and close supporter hold all major positions in the government. The country has no free speech and criticism of the Assad family can land you in jail or much much worse. His family also systematically loots the state finances. The Baathist ideology that his family pushes isn't really a socialist system because the people don't have a say in the economy. It's more of fascism masquerading as a nationalistic socialist.
Also he's anti-imperialistic, but he definitely doesn't want the Kurds to get any sort of autonomy. He's anti-imperialistic in the same way American was right after the War of Independence.
Assad's a literal Nazi sympathiser. He's closer to Hitler, ideologically, than he is to you or I. Unswerving support for the people of Syria in their struggle against Amerikkkan imperialism and the Islamic State but Assad is about as far from "good" as you can get.
He invited David fucking Duke former Wizard of the Klu Klux Klan to Syria to do a rally that was aired on Syria's National Television. Here's a video. This isn't a one off thing either. Assad's given medals and state visits to half the fascist parties in Europe.
From his Wikipedia page:
The National Front in France has been a prominent supporter of Assad since the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War,[284] as has the former leader of the Third Way.[280] In Italy, the parties New Front and CasaPound have both been supportive of Assad, with the New Front putting up pro-Assad posters and the party's leader praising Assad's commitment to the ideology of Arab nationalism in 2013,[285] while CasaPound has also issued statements of support for Assad.[286] Syrian Social Nationalist Party representative Ouday Ramadan has worked in Italy to organize support movements for Assad.[287] Other political parties expressing support for Assad include the National Democratic Party of Germany,[288] the National Revival of Poland,[280] the Freedom Party of Austria,[289] the Bulgarian Ataka party,[290] the Hungarian Jobbik party,[291] the Serbian Radical Party,[292] the Portuguese National Renovator Party,[293] as well as the Spanish Falange Española de las JONS[294] and Authentic Falange parties.[295] The Greek neo-Nazi political party Golden Dawn has spoken out in favour of Assad,[296] and the Strasserist group Black Lily has claimed to have sent mercenaries to Syria to fight alongside the Syrian army.[297]
Nick Griffin, the former leader of the British National Party, was chosen by the Assad government to represent the UK as an ambassador and at government-held conferences; Griffin has been an official guest of the Syrian government three times since the beginning of the Civil War.[298] The European Solidarity Front for Syria, representing several far-right political groups from across Europe, has had their delegations received by the Syrian national parliament, with one delegation being met by Syrian Head of Parliament Mohammad Jihad al-Laham, Prime Minister Wael Nader al-Halqi and Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad.[287] In March 2015, Assad met with Filip Dewinter of the Belgian party Vlaams Belang.[299] In 2016, Assad met with a French delegation,[300] which included former leader of the youth movement of the National Front Julien Rochedy [fr].[301]
This isn't just a weird foreign policy kick either. The Syrian Ba'athists have always been Arab ethnonationalists, militant anti-semites, explicit anti-marxists and explicit Nazi sympathisers.
When they first took power in 1947 one of the Syrian Ba'athists collectivised all Jewish (but not Arab) businesses, make it illegal for Jews to hold government positions or jobs made it illegal for Jews to leave the country without explicit permission from the chief police inspector, which wasn't given on a large scale until 1992, made jews (but noone else) state their "religion" (whether or not they were practicing) on their identity cards and launched pogroms which killed hundred. In 1992, when the tens of thousands of Jews still stuck in Syria were finally given permission to leave to emigrate so long as they left all of their property behind and renounced any claim to Israeli citizenship only 87 chose to remain.
During the cold war, the Syrian Ba'athists sheltered fleeing Nazis, including Alois Brunner, an architect of the final solution who personally oversaw the liquidation of 128,000 people. Until 1980 he was on the payroll of the Syrian government as an "advisor".
In 1998 and 2005 a publishing house personally owned and founded by Mustafa Tlass, the defence minister of Syria from 1970 -2004, published new editions of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.
Assad and the Syrian Ba'athists are only "good" in comparison to the Amerikkkan airforce and Islamic State. They're closer to Hitler, ideologically, than they are to you or I. You should absolutely oppose the Amerikkans bombing Syria but you can (and should) do that without expressing support for literal ethnonationalist anticommunist Nazi sympathiser antisemites.
Assad is not a good guy but in the syrian civil war the alternatives were Isis win and slits the throats of anyone who doesn't want to live in the bronze age or he gives up to the benefit of some pro-market neolib no one has ever heard off and his country turns into a more fucked up version of Libya as no one wants that, Isis member or regular person.
Ba'athist leader of Syria. Socialism with arab nationalist characteristics meant to protect arab nations from capitalist exploitation and colonialism.
Hes not but you can watch hypernormalization for some grand unifying middle east theory
he's not a socialist but he is anti-imperialist and relatively secular, so critical support for resisting US hegemony and Wahhabists
and I think it's important to counter the overwhelming anti-Assad narrative perpetuated by western media and intelligence agencies, so I like to openly say "Assad good" even if the truth is more complicated than that
So in the fifties and sixties these Syrians formed a sort of left wing Arab socialist party (but when I say socialism I mean like European social democracy). Then they did a thing with Egypt that lasted like a year and then the radical wing of the party took over and then Assad's dad took control. Then Assad took control and tried to do some liberalism and Europe, the US, and Israel took advantage of it to stage a color revolution and ISIL arose.
Is Assad good? He's okay. Syria has next to nothing in terms of capital so it isn't like he can build the USSR 2. There is truth to his favoritism of his fellow Alawites. Pan-Arabism and Arab socialism are pretty much dead ideologies so he doesn't have a lot of support, but he has prevented his state from becoming a theocratic death cult or a puppet of US imperialism despite Syria being under siege since at least the '67 war (really since the formation of Israel but that's a more controversial opinion). He and his father have almost always been on the side of anti-imperialism and for that he is worth our support.
edit: I want to be clear that our support means nothing as would our condemnation, the Syrian people have a right to self determination under Assad and that is a good thing.
Because the assad song is unironically a bop. Otherwise his politics are ehhhhh.
