cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/17713638
““If we jail Trump, get rid of Maga, end the electoral college, ban voter ID, censor free speech, we’ll save democracy,” says one meme in a QAnon channel on Telegram that depicts Biden in a Nazi uniform with a Hitler mustache”
Apparently they at least understand their opponent’s view .
Your daily reminder accelerationism posts are likely 70% Russian propiganda
Hey give some credit to America’s other enemies: China, North Korea, and Iran
The other 30% are criminally stupid Americans who either want fascism or are too dumb to see how their actions promote the end goals that they pretend to fight against.
I’ve seen more than a few with post histories that legitimately make them look like they oppose fascism, but GeNoCiDe JoE makes them help the other team light a fire in the engine of the fascism train.
too dumb to see how their actions promote the end goals that they pretend to fight against.
GeNoCiDe JoE
The irony here is palpable.
If you’re holding your nose in November like I am, I have no problem with you. But if that’s your single issue, know that the alternative is much worse. For the sake of harm reduction, it’s better to vote blue and stem the bleeding with someone who might bend to pressure vs the alternate option of ‘finish the job’ who wont.
If that’s your single issue and you vote third party, that’s the behavior I’m calling out, because like it or not, our system has only 2 parties that remotely have a chance in November. They’re lining up behind a convicted felon who wants to bomb Palestine harder and all the shit that’s in project 2025 while we argue and promote accelerationist behaviors to punish or try to make the party ‘learn it’s lesson’ when history shows they only ever move right in response to losing the left.
I fucking hate that I have to vote Biden again, but I understand electoral politics and know that accelerationist stances only harm the most vulnerable among us. Harm reduction sometimes involves doing things you find objectionable because the only other option is magnitudes worse. Biden sucks in a lot of ways, but he can somewhat be reasoned with and doesn’t want to take away my family members’ basic human rights.
It’s a shit choice, but life is full of shit choices. And more often than not, not playing the game defaults you to the worse option.
Hey look it’s the comrade we’re talking about
It’s quite funny how the rhetoric has devolved to the point where comments like yours are almost indistinguishable from MAGA supporters who talk about people being “paid by Soros” all because I don’t support funding and arming people in their pursuit of genocide.
Do you realise that there are political options beyond voting for either Trump or Biden? Maybe the people who are antifascist but opposing Biden are advocates for one of those alternatives?
and I’m not (only) talking about voting for the Green Party either.
Do you realize that alternative political opinions are immaterial to electoral discussions about who can win on a first past the post electoral system? Maybe those alternative opinions should understand that 3rd party voting historically favor the right, which is currently running an antidemocratic fascist who wants to rev up the friers on the current genocide and spark new ones close to home?
I’m all for alternative political options and work on those locally myself. But if you’re only voting red party every 4 years, you’re directly contributing to the slow erosion of our democratic process.
alternativepolitical opinions are immaterial to electoral discussions about who can win on a first past the post electoral systemIt doesn’t matter what you vote for in the end. The same people will be in power.
Salem Media Group and InfoWars are not Russian.
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Wait info wars is not Russian? I’m dubious
It isn’t. Russia may be using or imitating them, but InfoWars is just the result of a guy trying to cash in on Limbaugh by imitating him.
Don’t cut Alex short, he also cashed in on imitating Bill Cooper (who absolutely hated him).
I put this on another post from another account, but I found it, and I’m going to paste it here:
Do it! DO IT!! Shut up talking about it, and let’s get the civil war started!! Because I suspect it will be over before supper time.
In reality all they’re going to do is talk about it, because they’re small weak little people. Look at the big bad Proud Boys. When faced with the consequences of jail, they cried like little girls and begged the judges to take pity on them. Only one defiantly yelled “TRUMP WON” on his way out is the courtroom, but that was even after he cried and groveled.
Point the first: no. War is awful no matter how short or long it is, just no.
Point the second: folks said the first American civil war was going to be short, too.
In summary, no.
People love looking at the first civil war in conversations like this, but the next civil war is going to be nothing like it. For a likely comparison, you’d have to look at the Spanish Civil War and The Troubles in Ireland.
Americans have no fucking clue what they’re asking for.
Or for a more recent events, Syria. I enjoy following modern history and geopolitics, but fuck me that is a mess of proxy forces, non-state actors, and local warlords.
If it pops off, somebody on the world stage is going to co-opt and prolong any US civil war/sectarianism to keep the US broken or distracted with a prolonged insurgency and COIN. Russia is already working to highlight any existing and/or astroturf internal division, and we’re seeing right now how effective proxies can be at causing an enemy to hurt itself in its confusion.
Iran knew that Oct7 would demand a firm response from Israeli civic and political society, and Netanyahu/the government fell for the trap. See also, 9/11.
I agree that a Civil War 2 would be vastly different, all I’m saying is that it would be anything but short.
Gotcha. Very valid point.
It drives me insane that every “you just have to vote!!” liberal thinks that a civil war is two armies meeting on a battlefield. That’s not how it works at all! There are no armies. It’s literally guerilla attacks meant to make the state ungovernable, and the enemy is very possibly your neighbor who saw your anti-trump post on NextDoor.
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Do you think it’s going to be easy to exterminate all the hillbilly terrorist cells that are supported by their local communities and sheriff’s departments?
Certainly not if the federal government supports them…
folks said the first American civil war was going to be short, too.
And we’re still going through it! 😭
No war is a good war.
Might be a good time to arm up(unless you’re mentally ill in a way that will make you hurt yourself or make you hurt others before any actual conflict has begun). Just in case of course.
Edit/Addendum: If you have kids, please get a gun case and please educate them about proper gun safety and how to properly check if there’s any ammunition in chamber, etc. In fact, might as well take a gun safety course yourself.
How will arming up help anything? Honest question.
Parity is important. Why did the Soviets need nukes? Why did France?
The right sees the left as defenseless, because they see the left as the anti-gun crowd.
I will give up my 2nd amendment rights at the same time as my neighbor up the street with the “stop the steal” flags.
What would you do with the guns? What will they do with the guns?
What is the envisioned game plan here?
I like to put little holes in paper at 100 yards.
In the fall I hunt squirrel and deer.
That’s the sum of my game plan?
They’d shit their rascals the second bullets started flying.
Yep. Actual coup plotters don’t stand on street corners with signs yelling about it.
They’re not wrong that democracy’s under threat. But maybe the threat’s from the guy who has literally said he’s going to murder political opponents - y’know, the guy they support.
Given Trump’s failure to maintain power when he had it, I have little faith the gravy seals will rise to an occasion while his opposition is in power.
Not saying it shouldnt be taken seriously… Saying it should be televised 🍿
Agreed. I don’t fear the thicc morons assembling on a large enough scale or being organized enough. These are Walmart shoppers who vacation in Florida every year for the most part, they’re not going to be committed, adaptive, intelligent, resilient. They’re not loyal enough to any one cause by nature, most are just vocal karen types over a bunch of superficial bs.
Will/can some of them be a problem? For sure, but… Yeah
I fear that those who favor the rule of law and maintaining peaceful order are even more complacent than the Q-tards. So if they have a sizeable portion of the cops on their side…
The Guardian is a UK source and isn’t the best at US news. They don’t quite understand US voters, so read the facts but ignore their opinions and analysis.
UK readers: Trump voters are like your drunk uncle down the pub who’s always shouting at footy on the telly. They’re going to talk big, but it’s doubtful they’ll ever actually get off their arse and do anything they claim.
The Guardian has an international writing staff.
The author of this article, if you click on her name, for example:
Rachel Leingang is a democracy reporter focused on misinformation for Guardian US. She is based in Minneapolis, Minnesota
Here’s her LinkedIn, saying she has 10 years of reporting experience after going to the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communications in Arizona for 4 years. https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachel-leingang-6a044b2a
Didnt they launch an attempted coup d’etat last election? Granted an incredibly shittly planned and executed one, but they stormed the capitol trying to hang government leaders.
I think the point they’re trying to make is that the second they met actual opposition (when the secret service fired on the mob trying to breech what I think was the legislative chamber, don’t recall exactly) the mob dissolved immediately.
I will never not chuckle at gravy seals
Meal Team 6
y’all kaida
Meal Team six is reporting for duty. Just after they hit up the all-you-can-eat buffet at the Kountry Kitchen.
So when are all you “enlightened centrists” going to finally admit that radicalizing fascist rhetoric is not protected free speech? When are you going to admit that broadcasting blatant lies for political gain is in fact enemy combatant and insurgent behavior and that those rhetoric mills- created by the 1996 Telecommunications Act- must be shut down with extreme prejudice?
They never will. It was rarely in good faith, and even then it was merely earnest stupidity.
Probably never. Not because I necessarily disagree with you in spirit. This speech is damaging and without redeeming value. My only problem is that the process of deciding what speech is and isn’t permissible is more dangerous than this speech.
It’s not hard to figure out. Are you representing a blatant lie as truth? Are you doing it to destabilize democracy? To the cage you go.
Ah everything you e never actually tried to do seems easy. Especially when you’re 14.
And how do you feel about a Trump stacked executive deciding what is a blatant lie in 9 months time?
When are you far left communists gonna admit that we shouldn’t be teaching children how to “make prison hooch”?
When are you extreme anarchists going to fess up that we shouldn’t be melting the elderly?
When are all you far leftists gonna admit to things you already probably agree with?
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Wow, that goes beyond civility straight to a temp ban. Un-clench.
The US died under Reagan as anything but a capitalist exploitation farm.
Right-wing peasant ignoramuses are darkly hilariously concerned about preserving the structure of their owner’s money printer and their own subsistence.
We are under threat, by the domestic terrorists known more commonly as the Republican party. Maybe they could attack themselves and save America and democracy.
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Immigration? Come on in, we’ll worry about it later!
So many takes but the legislative branch built together an immigration plan, one that involved quite a lot of money to the border to help enforce it and crack down. Both Dems and GOP worked together on that one. Then Trump said to bail on it, that immigration was a winning ticket for Presidency and congress Republicans sank the bill.
So… legit the thing you’re bitching about is a political tool by the Republicans.
Removed, complete misinformation. Take your Fox talking points elsewhere.
American values? Can’t have that!
Like the separation of church and state?
Immigration? Come on in, we’ll worry about it later!
That’s how 99% of the country got here. It’s what made (and still makes) this country great. Incorporating people from around the world is an American value.
Trump is running again? Let’s do EVERYTHING and ANYTHING to stop him from campaigning!!
What about the American value of respecting law and order by not supporting a convicted felon for president?
Crime is getting worse? Let’s ease up on punishment! Crime isn’t getting worse.
Crime is actually going down.
Biological men want to compete with women in sports? Okay!
Accepting those with different beliefs and respecting the way they choose to live their life is another American value.
Yikes.
Quite a bit of misinformation there but I’ll just have you explain American values for us.
Does it include paying off a pornstar that you had sex with wile your WIFE was pregnant? How about jewish space lasers? Handies in theater? What are your thoughts on insurrections? Tax breaks for the rich? I could literally go on for days with shit that’s gone down since 2016.
Hey. Shut the fuck up, bigot.
Welcome to Reddit 2.0
Immigrants are the reason dumbfucks like you can stuff your face with chicken nuggies for cheap.
I can tell the rest of what you’ve said is dogshit without reading it.
Under threat of what? The wrong people being in charge? The wrong people are ALWAYS in charge. The labels and speeches mean nothing. The fact of the matter is that power seekers end up with power because decent people won’t stoop to that. Literally a random number generator would pick better politicians.
Even if you did, the random people would be corrupted by power.
The best thing to do would be to divide power as much as possible - instead of having a few very powerful people you have hundreds of times more people with much less power.
How about the logical extreme of that? Anarchy!
I am an anarchist, so yes, that’s what I mean. I just worded it in a more accessible way
This is 100% overblown. It’s also the same article circulating. This type of crap is to sell newspaper subscriptions.
And fear. They are bullies who want to be feared.
“the call is coming from inside the house”
The tree of liberty, she thirsts. But not for what they think.
this is peak white privilege.
random Muslims were tortured for looking like they might have been in the vicinity of a terrorist, but these guys are represented in the government.
I keep think that Trump’s the immediate threat but wait until some coagulated cum trickle like Stephen Miller is the candidate.
“coagulated cum trickle” oh my, what beautiful prose 💘
Do you think we can associate that phrase with Google searches for Stephen Miller like they did with Santorum a while ago?
One way to find out! That would be so legit
“The right” doesn’t believe any such thing. "The right’ doesn’t exist. MAGA believes it. Probably the GOP believes it. But those two groups don’t hold the patent on “conservative thinking”.
Never confuse the loudest for the most numerous. They are a minority of fundamentalists who have taken over the microphones of the GOP, but the vast majority of “everyday folk” are just trying to live their lives just like you or I.
The very proof of that is Trump’s guilty verdict. Do you think there weren’t at least a few “conservatives” on that jury? Of course their were. But a person can be conservative and still do their duty. I’m willing to be a number of service men and women in the military are also conservative, but I have no belief that they’ll suddenly “rebel” because at the end of the day, they aren’t insane. I’m sure some of the capitol police on J6 lean conservative as well. But guess what, they all just did their job.
Maga is not “conservatives”. In fact MAGA is not a political ideology at all; it’s a very loud excuse to use hate as a weapon, nothing more. While I may not be “conservative” in any sense of the word, and believe it’s a relic of history, it’s not MAGA. It’s a very real and tangible political thing that sadly never gets debated or talked about anymore because MAGA shouts over top of it.
The thing is conservatism IS MAGA. It is the seed that bears horrible fruit.
Conservatives have never ever been the good guys in the history of the United States.
Period.
Imagine pretending the arm isn’t attached to the armpit cuz it stinks less…
Hard disagree here.
I agree with you that Conservatism is an outdated concept that it’s done far more harm than good in the world. It’s a relic that needs to be relegated to the dust-bin of history, yes.
But Conservatism is nothing more than a series of economic and political ideals. Nothing more. There are a thousand different reasons for people to identify with one side or the other. Neither Conservatism nor the left equivalent are monolithic static things. They’re protean and change depending on the motivations of the people who currently hold their reins in the public sphere.
Does Conservatism (ie. The Right) generally attract more people with intolerant beliefs and hateful dogmatic behaviours? You’ll get no argument from me there. But the number of them that are willing to pick up arms and commit treason because of it. The number of the right that is wiling to use their intolerance as an excuse for violence, is still the minority no matter how many ways you slice it.
Conservatism might be old and outdated. It might be a haven for the uneducated and the intolerant. But here’s the thing…
It always has been.
And if it always has been, than why were the 70s, 80s, 90s, 2000s, all violence free? Why was there heated debate between the two sides, but not violence? What’s changed now?
And you know the answer to that.
And if it always has been, than why were the 70s, 80s, 90s, 2000s, all violence free? Why was there heated debate between the two sides, but not violence? What’s changed now?
This is the most straight white comment ever. Most of those decades still had lynchings. And why are you ignoring the '60s while looking back at our history? Seems like you don’t want to look at that decade specifically. The reality is that conservatives have been murdering liberals for as long as this country has been around. Even people as conservative as West Virginia coal diggers were massacred by conservatives using police and the pinkertons for being just liberal enough to believe in getting paid fairly.
It takes some extreme cognitive dissonance to look at the 80’s and 90’s and declare them “violence free”.
We’re at a 50-year low for violent crime right now. Politically-motivated violence is surging though. And what side of the aisle is committing the most politically-motivated violence? It’s the right. Every time, without exception, the right is the side pushing violence.
But a CVS burned down!!
But Conservatism is nothing more than a series of economic and political ideals. Nothing more.
Uh huh, and what do those policies look like?
- No right to vote. (See: Kansas Supreme Court)
- Government decides who you get to marry. (No gay marriage)
- Government-enforced dress codes. (No Drag or “Transgenderism”)
- Book Bans. (Criminalizing LGBTQ+ literature or writings by non-white authors)
- Expanding the Death Penalty to include non-violent criminals. (Currently targeted at sex offenders, but with a clear aim to target LGBTQ+ people)
- Expanding the justice system to include torture and other deliberate forms of cruelty. (Currently targeted at sex offenders, but with a clear aim to target LGBTQ+ people)
- Right Wing Dictatorship. (Crush “Wokeness” and make the Democratic party illegal)
- Genocide. (Calls to “exterminate” trans people at CPAC)
- Genocide. (Calls to completely wipe out Palestine)
- Genocide. (Openly celebrate police killing PoC)
- Genocide. (Lots of literal Neo-Nazis, including in elected party positions)
- Genocide. (Happy to let poor people die from lack of access to health care)
- Genocide. (Regularly calling for Nuclear War, especially against Arab/Muslim nations)
- Genocide. (Regularly calling for Civil War because they want to wipe out their political enemies)
- Murder. (Calling for citizens to engage in vigilante justice, such as running people over in the street or throwing them off of bridges)
- Murder. (Celebrating killers like Kyle Rittenhouse and calling them “heroes” for killing democrats/leftists.)
So yeah, “Nothing more” than some perfectly normal “political ideals”. Nothing to see here. /s
I’m going to concede defeat here because obviously I’m not doing a good enough job in explaining my position. But everything you just listed is exactly my point. When did all of those things start occuring? Was it before or after MAGA took over the Republican Party?
Essentially all I’m saying is that Correlation does not equal causation. All of those things you’ve just listed aren’t because they’re conservatives, it’s because they’re assholes. They just happened to find a party (Republicans) that told them that it’s okay to let your asshole flag fly. Conservatism and Republicanism are two different things. Always have been. Conservatism is economic theory (low taxes, high privatization, lower goverment oversight, etc…) Republicanism is political theory (immigration, law and order, militarization, etc…)
MAGA took over Republicanism, convinced everyone that it was Conservatism in order to appeal to the “common folk” in order to take over the GOP.
You’re list isn’t a list of Conservative ideals, it’s a list of Republican ideals. Those aren’t the same thing.
I guess what I’m saying is, again, Correlation is not causation. All republicans are are conservatives, yes. But not all Conservatives are Republicans (or at least they wouldn’t be if the country wasn’t in the grip of some two-party system bullshit. They’re two very different things.
But again, I’m not doing a good job of explaining that, obviously, so I’m going to back out with grace and take the “L”.
Have a good day.
When did all of those things start occuring? Was it before or after MAGA took over the Republican Party?
It was before. MAGA made it worse, but everything I listed has been a Republican party position for the past several decades.
You only started noticing after Trump took office, which is a lot of people’s experience if they were politically apathetic before Trump.
I’m going to concede defeat here because obviously I’m not doing a good enough job in explaining my position.
It’s because your position is indefensible given recent history and the trajectory of the political landscape.
Fair enough. You’re more than welcome to your opinion. But to my mind, what’s indefensible (and ridiculous, frankly) is painting absolutely everyone on one side with the same brush, no matter how much you may hate that side’s ideals (or lack thereof).
Uh, one side is unrelenting about suppressing everyone else’s rights, and has demonstrated that they’re willing to take control by force and violence if they don’t get ‘their ideals’. If you’re on that side, you’re an asshole, and being ‘painted’ as an asshole is the least that you deserve.
Please stop for a moment, step outside your yourself, and ask… “Am I the baddie?”
You so desperately want to separate the two, you’re literally arguing the opposite. Conservatism has been the Republican Party since the 1950s at minimum and much more likely quite earlier than that.
If conservatives think the Republican Party doesn’t represent them, then why has that party continued to exist?
Short answer: because they’re the same thing. You can’t on one hand declare that “they don’t represent conservativism” and then on the other hand allow the party to continue.
It’s not at all correlation — it is exactly causation. Conservatism == Republicanism. And the reason it does is because it gives conservatives the platform and power that they desperately want in order to enact their backward ideals, whether economic or political, it makes no difference.
If you feel so strongly in your position, then instead of quibbling over semantics, maybe start your own party of such righteous conservative ideology and let’s see whether it serves those ideals or whether it devolves into the same bullshit that the Republican Party has for decades.
I would assert that any party based on conservative ideals will, at some point, become akin to what the Republican Party has become. And the sole reason — critical thinking is not a part of the ideology.
If conservatives think the Republican Party doesn’t represent them, then why has that party continued to exist?
Because money is power. The hard-liners running the show keep it that way while ma and pa everyman in the midwest really don’t have any kind of say in it.
I would assert that any party based on conservative ideals will, at some point, become akin to what the Republican Party has become. And the sole reason — critical thinking is not a part of the ideology.
I firmly do actually believe that, yes. Eventually. But even when it devolves, it’s not going to be all of them. It’ll be a minority or people who have the money, which gives them the power, while ma and pa everyman in the midwest (again) has little control over who uses their ideals for what purpose.
Like the original person that replied to me, you’re doing the indefensible of automatically painting every single conservative with the same brush, and that’s just flat out inaccurate.
There’s a difference between believing in some backwards ideals like conservativism, and acting on them. I live surrounded by Conservative thinkers. And yeah, they’ll admit that they don’t believe in gay marraige, lgbtq, immigtation, etc… all of that stuff. Is it backwards? Yes…absolutely. Will they take up arms against a government and think advocate violence? No, that’s stupid. Despite their individual beliefs in their own home, they generally have the opinion of let everyone live their life.
Yeah, there’s people who are insane like that, and want to push that belief onto everyone. And yeah, their unfortunately in charge of the narrative of the GOP and the Republican Party.
But painting every single person on one side of the line as the same is not only wrong, it’s harmful to any sort of debate because if you pretend all conservatives are violent racists than you’ll just alienate the ones who aren’t.
That’s because every single conservative I have met or known, act and think the exact same way — selfish and self-righteous, and they damn everyone else who isn’t themselves or their family members.
And I have met thousands, since I have lived in the bastion of conservatism for 30 years (and yes I’m quite unhappy here and can’t wait to move).
So yeah I’ll paint them all with that same brush because they ALL voted for Trump (the literal dozens that I know and keep tabs on, which is a fair sampling against all I’ve ever met) and took away rights from people I care about by getting 3 lying justices on the Supreme Court.
As the saying goes…if the shoe fits…
What an embarrassing comment. You’re arguing semantics as your starting point but then you’re just doing it badly. What does it matter about the abstract idea behind an ideology when the practical effects of that ideology have consistently been racism, sexism, homophobia and bigotry?
I have no idea the point of this argument. You have to be living in a fantasy world where a rational Republican party exists. Many people will argue that this was a time in the past, but honestly, there has never been an era of a rational Republicanism.
In America “The Right” = “Conservatives” = “Republicans” = “Trump/MAGA”
in 2016 63 Million people voted for Trump. In 2020 74 Million people voted for him.
Roughly half of American voters are backing the Republican Party and Trump in 2024. The Republican party is dominated by MAGA-style culture wars.
I get that it is comforting to believe that Fascism isn’t mainstream Conservatism, but it absolutely is, and ignoring that fact does nothing to protect us against the threat that it poses to this nation and its people.
I agree with you, but I want to point out that this conflation is a direct result of our election system because it mechanically cannot support more than two parties.
Any other political interests need to merge together into one big entity that is nearly impossible to disentangle from the rest, so now maga = conservatism and we lose a lot of nuance in or political decision making and ability to be represented.
I’m pushing for Election Reform this election to move past First Past the Post voting.
Maybe you let them go to war. Then at least you can get rid of them for another few hundred years.
