The only thing I'm proud of when looking at gen Z is that they are completely unwilling to go to war for the military complex and giving their life fighting a battle where they have nothing to gain but everything to lose. That's way smarter than my generation or the baby boomers ever were.
ah yes, and i haven't found any actually independent thinking liberals and conservatives. just people who are checking their favourite left/right wing political commentators twitter to regurgitate what they say.
They're not even good allies. They're busy shooting American citizens and selling US military technology to hostile powers. But I guess the end times needs Israel to begin so 50% of our politicians will mindlessly bootlick Israel and 40% of the rest are spineless cretins who think bipartisanship means 'compromise, always'.
I love the smell of minority&meek soap in the morning. Then I remember I'm a right wing catholic white man with privileges and I use them by shooting some jets of fire with my pocket flamethrower from the fully open window of my monster truck while on the way to the usual grill with the boys, as my god intended ;)
It's nonsense because the far left's position is cheering on Hamas, the complete destruction of the state of Israel, and chanting "from the river to the sea".
The centrist position is "ceasefire, just stay the fuck away from each other."
Your overton window is fucked if you think this is what actual centrists think.
Are you 'murican? I don't think the rest of the world agrees on any of the US's "definitions" of left, right and liberal. From a European POV, the US democrats are really, really far to the right. Sanders might be leaning toward the center. The republicans are a strange mixture of libertarian regarding economical matters and very very right-wing/intrusive on personal matters. Whenever someone even mentions/comments other people's sexual orientation and identity I automitcally assume they are creep that wants to sniff other people's bedsheets. How can you be partly libertarian and also creepily nazi-intrusive? US-republican invention I can't wrap my head around, that is.
Well, back when Steinmeier was our foreign minister and toured poor countries to advertise Germany as the land of opportunity and wealth because corporations wanted slaves they don't have to pay properly, I was called a Nazi by many for saying that they won't find any opportunity or wealth in Germany. Our government never had the well-being of immigrants in mind, they just stuffed them into dilapidated "refugee camps", told them their education is insufficient and left them to rot. I am not surprised.
I can't speak to Germany, but in the UK the government had to be forced to use the lifeguard to save drowning people because they wanted to let refugees die, and had to be forced to stop sending people to Rwanda (even if they're not from Rwanda) just to get rid of them.
That's not a genocide. There is a big difference between refusing to expend resources to save peoples life and actively expending resources to destroy lives.
And the Nobel Peace Prize you get for that will be mailed to you. Until it arrives, let's do discuss about definitions, nuances, and all these other annoying details that set a principled debate apart from blind virtue signalling.
I, for one, really care about the distinction between initiating something evil and merely not doing enough(tm) to stop it. The UK did not made them refugees. Sure, the old British empire caused trouble all around the globe, but modern refugees are mostly escaping from regional wars and totalitarian governments. One could say that it's still their fault because that's the aftermath of them leaving, but that would imply that the UK should have kept occupying these countries, so you probably don't want to go there.
So they did not cause them to be refugees. Both the refusal to save them from drowning and the deportation are an expression not of a deliberate attempt to kill them, but of a refusal to help them. The UK government does not want these refugees to be in the UK.
If we take this issue and place in the OP template, it'd look something like this:
Right: Let's not let refugees in. Left: Let's let all the refugees in. Center: Guys, you're gonna have to compromise, let's just let /some/ of the refugees in.
...
One should notice that:
Unlike the original post, this is not a strawman. You don't have to go very far to the right to find plenty of people who want to let no refugee in, and you don't have to go very far to the left to find plenty of people who want to let them all in.
Once the strawman is removed - the centrist position does not seem that absurd anymore.
If you keep insisting that "not accepting refugees" equals "genocide" - people will stop taking your claims about genocide so seriously. Because you don't care about definitions, so it could mean anything.
there's no agreed definition of echo chamber though.
It is an echo chamber to say "murder is bad" "CSAM is bad" "rape is bad" - as 99.99% of people, when pushed, will agree those things are bad, echoing each other verbatim.
It would be a mistake to characterize this as a left/right issue. That's a classic pattern for drawing up support for inhumane policies, telling "the right" that "the left" wants something and that therefore they should oppose it. This is a basic issue of lives vs. deaths, human rights vs. an oppressive fascist regime, don't allow it to be reframed in these other ways that distort it.
Lets be honest with ourselves, half of the left is in support of the genocide happening is gaza. have seen this in both US left. and just as much in German, UK, Dutch left parties. only the French left has somewhat of a push back against that, France seems to be the only western country to still have genuine left factions among its left parties.
Fallacy Fallacy. Simply naming a fallacy doesn't mean the argument is wrong. Recognizing fallacies help you know where to attack an invalid argument, they don't attack it for you.
If someone said I wasn't a true Scotsman simply because I have no Scottish heritage and have never been to Scotland they would be correct. It's not a fallacy when the person in question doesn't meet the definition of the group. The definition of Leftist is not "to the left of someone else in the room, even if if that person is a full Authoritarian."
Curious how you came to that conclusion. When I was in the math department in college, most of the smartest students were full-blown communists. Though I'm not sure how you think math factors into it in the first place
So the original post was talking world wide. Limiting the scope to a very right wing portion of the world doesn't magically change who's on the Left.
If you have a room full of people saying "Let's form a dictatorship and conquer the world!" and 1 person says "I don't think that's a good idea", that person is not automatically "on the left" just because they are to the left of extremist right wing views.
The Spanish center-left is re-positioning itself denouncing Israel's actions after years of ambivalence, and the Spanish left is calling for sanctions.
Jesus Christ this has been disproven so many times. No just because the people that push politics that are often to the left of most European democracy's main left leaning party are old white farts too does not mean that they're a secret center right pretending to call themselves a left leaning party.
Jesus Christ this has been disproven so many times.
Centrist Democrats have found their equivalent version of Bush Jr's "terrorist sympathizer" accusation, and they're going to use it as a cudgel against the left until it stops working.
ALL the left parties in the back a ceasefire and The Green Party calls for an end to the occupation. Labour are more right wing than the Conservatives when David Cameron was elected. There are left MPs still in the Labour, many have been fired or have quit.
I can't call Labour a left party in all good faith. it has been taken over by the blairites. Corbyn brought hope to the left movement, but he was run over by the fifth column of his own party. just like the US the UK is stuck in a two party system controlled by billionaires, hedge funds and the military-industrial complex
I once asked the hexbear community why they are pro-genocide against their "opponents" and got called Hitler when I didn't think it was reasonable to commit genocide at all.
From my point of view it's the extremists on both left and right that is the biggest problem.
The leftists looks at right extremists and think to themselves that the entire right-wing is like that. Same goes for people on the right. They look at what the leftist extremists do and then argue that it's how people on the left think and act.
But just like all of life, politics is not black and white. Just because I agree with the left more than the right that does not mean I agree with the entire leftist politics.
Interestingly do all the leftist who now chant "from the river to the sea..." support genocide of the jews because that is exactly what those words mean.
That's not what centrism means. It's not an immediate compromise between the two. It's acknowledging that not every single stance held by a political party is the correct one.
I can support background checks and other limitations on firearm purchases, and also not want open borders. We should be doing something about the excess of gun violence, and we should be doing something about the thousands of immigrants jumping our border.
Where do we put the *cides from left dictatorships?
Generally, the left wing is characterized by an emphasis on "ideas such as freedom, equality, fraternity, rights, progress, reform and internationalism" while the right wing is characterized by an emphasis on "notions such as authority, hierarchy, order, duty, tradition, reaction and nationalism".
Left and Dictatorship do not have compatible definitions. This is like asking "where do we put all the pregnant virgins?"
Notions of right and left have been muddled througout Russian history. The Soviet Communists professed left-wing slogans, but practised right-wing ideologies, embracing a neo-feudalist and unfree order.
I don't mind working with different definitions, but I don't think yours is very common.
What do you think about Marx, is he not left wing either?
If he is, what do you think about his notion of dictatorship of the proletariat?
Because this notion is pretty much the ideological justification for the dictatorships that were built in Soviet Union, China and other Marxist governments.
I don’t mind working with different definitions, but I don’t think yours is very common.
It is the standard definition. You just aren't personally familiar with it, because, and I'm sorry if this sounds like a personal attack, your education system and media are designed in part to indoctrinate you into liberal ideology.
What do you think about Marx, is he not left wing either?
Uh - yes? It is from Marx that we get this definition you call "not common"!
If he is, what do you think about his notion of dictatorship of the proletariat?
That it is absolute democracy, run by the people themselves!
Because this notion is pretty much the ideological justification for the dictatorships that were built in Soviet Union, China and other Marxist governments.
Indeed, you resorting to personal attacks makes it less likely for me to be willing to talk with you or your friends at Hexbear. I'm not American by the way, my country is way more socialist but never was communist (the split happened by opposition with Soviet dictatorship).
How can dictatorship be absolute democracy? You said dictatorship is completely opposed to left ideology just before.
If it's absolute democracy how can it be also a dictatorship?
By the way, this dictatorship is supposed to be an intermediate step in Marx's ideology, to protect the revolution from counter revolutions, before "real" communism is instated. Strangely it seems to never have happened, the countries that tried it staid at the dictatorship level, which was pretty much an oligarchy.
What happened in your opinion? Why did it not work?
you resorting to personal attacks makes it less likely for me to be willing to talk with you or your friends at Hexbear
I didn't attack you in any way. Not sure what you're on about. I'm also not a Hexbear user.
I’m not American by the way, my country is way more socialist but never was communist (the split happened by opposition with Soviet dictatorship).
I didn't call you American. I called your country liberal, which is a pretty safe bet since you're here on Lemmy speaking English, and the majority of the Imperial Core and Periphery have some kind of liberal democracy going on. Unless you're in Cuba or Vietnam, there's little chance your country has anything resembling socialism going on.
How can dictatorship be absolute democracy?
Because it is the whole population doing the dictating.
You said dictatorship is completely opposed to left ideology just before.
Yes, dictatorship in the common parlance, meaning absolute rule by an individual or minority.
If it’s absolute democracy how can it be also a dictatorship?
You have spent a very long time on this point. I don't mean to be rude, but didn't you think for a moment you might have misunderstood? Dictatorship of the proletariat means the common people rule themselves.
By the way, this dictatorship is supposed to be an intermediate step in Marx’s ideology, to protect the revolution from counter revolutions, before “real” communism is instated.
Only if you believe Lenin. And...
Strangely it seems to never have happened, the countries that tried it staid at the dictatorship level, which was pretty much an oligarchy.
Yes, strange, indeed. Because the USSR was revisionist trash, as I already stated. They forgot the "proletariat" part of "dictatorship of the proletariat". Odd that you seem unaware of Cuba and Vietnam, though.
What happened in your opinion? Why did it not work?
It seems I am actually opposing more genocides than you do. I just want people to consider they happen on both sides of the political compass, because the issue is human nature rather than a specific political theory. Once you get that, you may stop stupid politician polemics at best, killing each other at worse, and start building consensus to reach social progress.
It seems I am actually opposing more genocides than you.
I oppose all genocide. In my country, we're paying for one and I want to stop. I have little patience for those who see people who want to stop funding genocide and are like "yeah? Whatabout all the genocides you're not funding? Huh? Huh?!"
If I say I'm being persecuted as a Scotsman and someone points out I have never been to Scotland and have no Scottish heritage, that's not a "no true Scotsman" fallacy because I don't meet the definition of Scotsman no matter how much I claim to be one.
How did you somehow misunderstand my comment so badly? Okay, I edited it for clarity.
You are the one who, in this instance, is trying to insist orange juice is in fact coke. You are the one claiming no true scotsman.
Even in your attempt to twist it, you still include an explanation of why "no true scotsman" just doesn't apply here. What you are calling communism does not meet any definition of communism, just as no orange juice meets the definition of coke.
Let's ignore the political opponent massacres of the Great Purge and ideology fueled agricultural disasters of the Great Chinese Famine, and focus on the Holodomor in Ukraine, the Cambodian genocide, the Uyghur genocide in China.
Happened under communist dictatorships that are generally considered to be at the left.
Generally, the left wing is characterized by an emphasis on "ideas such as freedom, equality, fraternity, rights, progress, reform and internationalism" while the right wing is characterized by an emphasis on "notions such as authority, hierarchy, order, duty, tradition, reaction and nationalism".
I'm not sure what your comment means, but I'm actually saying the opposite of dictatorship being of a specific political side. I'm highlighting the fact that political extremists will end up killing in the name of their ideology, which ever it is, left, right or whatever other cult.
My comment means a Dictatorship, by definition, isn't left wing.
I’m highlighting the fact that political extremists will end up killing in the name of their ideology
How do you define extremist? It used to be an extremist view to say women should have the right to vote, or people shouldn't own slaves. Hell, Democracy used to be an "extremist" view.
So someone willing to kill in the name of an ideology is an extremist, but that's the easy extreme case. In general in modern democracies, no politician would admit to that, so the definition is rather relative to how far the political positions of a party are from the average of the last governing parties for a specific country.
So someone willing to kill in the name of an ideology is an extremist
So you're highlighting the fact that extremists will kill people in the name of their ideology, and you define extremists as people who will to kill for their ideology. Sounds pretty tautological no?
Agree with your last sentence but it is the path all the Marxist revolutions have taken. A reason being that proletariat dictatorship is a step to communism in Marx's ideology. But from history, it seems it just stops at the dictatorship.
So maybe the conclusion is that Marx methodology doesn't actually lead to a progressive/left country.
I think the true centrist would be the least likely to genocide. Right and left both imply an attachment towards one arbitrary end of the spectrum. Center implies you're willing to entertain ideas from both sides, because realistically the truth almost always lies in the middle of the extremes.
The end state of these ideals is two sides who have nothing alike wanting the other gone, and the others going, "woah wait guys, you're both a little right, let's chat instead of murder." Centrism isn't just not being able to pick a side or take conviction, it's about wanting to synthesize all relevant information into a worldview that is a bit more aligned with reality.
Yeah you really have no idea what you're talking about.
I'm ionaore what it is that makes so many lemmy users think that centrist (like me) are evil or dumb or just enabling right wing extremists. I think it's fair to say that such view are actually quite extremist in themselves.
Let me put it in a similar story as this apparently works for you?
Leftist: all right wings are Nazi's and they all want to commit genocide, we should kill them all before they kill us!
Centrist : well, let's not go so fast? Things aren't that simple nor that black and white. First off, a dead man can't learn, and a lot of actual neo Nazi types are just misinformed, disgruntled and would do well with the right people to look up to. Then, I'm quite sure that most right wing or conservatives aren't anywhere near liking neo nazi ideas, let alone genocide.
I think a lot of the more extreme ones have, like you, over simplified world views that cause these extreme views. I think if you simply keep talking you will find that nearly all of them are like you, have families and friends and a dog, they love people too, they simply have different experiences and ideas than you have. Talk to them.
Also, if you kill allmrifht wing and conservatives, isn't that genocide? I assume you're against genocide, so why are you in favor of killing "them"? That is king of a right wing thing, according to you, do you want to be that?
In short, it's not that simple, moet people really aren't that bad.
Leftist: WHAT? HOW DARE YOU, YOU NAZI! WE SHOULD KILL YOU FOR DISAGREEING!
I don't know that that's the right lesson to take away. Our history, hell our current actions, aren't the best. It's incredibly disappointing to learn about how much fucked up shit we've had domestically or caused internationally. Especially things that were against our professed values.
But this shouldn't be viewed as something Americans are uniquely capable of. It's the same thing as branding all the nazis as inhuman monsters -- its important to recognize that they were ordinary humans, so that we remain acutely aware of what humanity is capable of. At any given time.
There's plenty of ongoing genocides throughout the world that aren't being perpetrated by the US. History is filled with horrible crimes by other countries, some who were adversaries to the US. It's entirely likely that any successor the US will repeat many of the same mistakes. You can see this already in action with China in the South China Sea, claiming international waters as their own to the detriment of fishermen in neighboring countries.
I think at the end of the day, here's the distinction to keep in mind -- the US has caused bad things to happen on an unparalleled scale, but the only thing unique about the US is the resources they have to do it. Any other country in the same position could and has done the same and worse.
No that's my exact point. Most places would be equally awful given the same resources and capabilities. That doesn't mean we can't criticize the US for scale, but we should be wary that it's only the availability of resources causing that scale, nothing else.
E: Every down vote without discussion just proves my point even more. You're all in a cult.
Nah, both sides suck for different reasons.
Most situations have more choices than the two you are often presented with. For example, who is in the right, Hamas or Israel? Neither of them. They're both trying to justify killing innocent people because the other side killed innocent people.
In the meme, a centrist would obviously agree with the Democrat. If it were flipped and the Democrat were saying some equally off the wall thing, they'd side with the Republican. They've both become extremist versions of what they once were and the other side points out the obvious insanity and gets to feel smug about their low hanging trophy. And dumbass people from both sides eat it up.
Why do you think people are clinging to the center despite all the weird hate against it? They don't want to be associated with either side. Both sides get some things right and some things wrong. Yet, we're expected to take them as a package deal, because politics have become cult like.
You missed the point, there is no compromise and even people who identify as centrists will have different thoughts.
Me personally?
Healthcare as a right is already a thing. You can get it even if you're unemployed right now. The real problem is in the insurance/medical/pharma industries with all of the insane price gouging. It needs to be more obtainable and more effective. Free? No, medical supplies and labor still have some cost even if we fix the issue of cost and that money needs to come from somewhere. Even if it were given out for "free", you really think our taxes won't go up to compensate?
Health care should be free for the simple reason that it's inhumane to deprive a person of it just because they can't afford it. It's a basic human right. It works in many other countries. Maybe rich people and corporations should stop getting tax breaks and your government should reduce a bit the amount spent on the military.
The person I replied to literally said it shouldn't be free because it may increase their taxes. So it was implied that they meant it should not be free for the individual, meaning the individual should be expected to have to pay for their own medical treatment when needed.
That's one of the reasons I don't like the left, you guys expect everyone to be in lock step on every issue and you use a holier than thou approach to do it. However, I don't want to live in a Christo-Fascist Theocracy, so even though I don't love it.. I will still vote D for now. I'm literally on your side, but it's impossible to have a conversation with you guys. The right and left's chances of that are near zero and it's fucking sad. You call us centrists, but most of us never moved. You guys did. You move the line more and more every day.
I mean, I thought the right's problems were pretty obvious. I don't think there are many right wing people that need to hear it here anyways. Right wing people seem to absolutely love it when you tell them their party is flawed anyways.
To your other point, this thread is literally me saying the two parties are a problem and I've posted other comments in here saying people should vote third party.
The issue is that "centralist" has been co-opted by the American Right. The republican MAGA element has flopped so far to the extreme right that the old right now looks in the center. Because of this, and the idiotic behaviour of the MAGAs, a lot of republicans seem to use "centralist" to distance themselves. A lot of the original centralists have been forced into siding with the democrats.
From the outside, American politics is all right wing. The democrats are more in line with most countries right wing parties than their left. This has only gotten more extreme recent years. Right now, the democrats are far too close to the centralist joke in this meme. "A little bit of genocide is ok" at least when it's not Americans. You act like it's far fetched now, but we also joked about the MAGA idiots and Trump becoming president.
I have been trying on Lemmy for months. They purposefully and willfully misunderstand all centrists / independents and for some reason feel they are all secretly right wing.
It's the current state of US politics - the straw man they've built in their head that has all the wrong opinions has the same label that they've slapped on you, and labels are all that matters to them.
Most are not here to engage, think, and expand their worldview. They are here to push the "fuck you" button that gives them a dopamine hit by punishing you for having the wrong label.
But once in a while you'll talk to someone who treats you like a real person, and it's kind of wonderful.
I'll take the downvotes happily everytime. I know it's going to happen as I'm writing, but if it means it gives even one person something to think about it's worth it.
Not everyone is American. I'm German and it's way less distinct here imo. Yes, I hate the right with a passion (as everyone should), but the left really isn't any good either. It's just all a big bag of trash.
China is notionally both and what they're doing in Xinjang is at least genocide adjacent. Russia justifies their war on Ukraine as a struggle against genocidal fascists and again, it really seems like they want to destroy Ukraine as a separate culture and people by assimilation and extermination.
Both countries are frequently defended by left wingers
Of course there are idiots who defend China or Russia and call themself left. That doesn't mean that China or Russia are left. China has a weird form of state-capitalism and Russia is a facist oligarchy. They are not left, they are right extremists.
China is ruled by a communist party and position themselves as allies to left-wing governments around the world. They are clearly and explicitly left-wing.
Russia isn't left-wing, but they use they are acting like fascist and committing genocide-adjacent acts in the name of anti-genocidal anti-fascism, the rhetoric that the original commenter parodied
You do the same failure as many other people. To call yourself left or right doesn't make you left or right. Even the german nazi party NSDAP called thereselfs nationalSOZIALISTISCHE ARBEITERpartei Deutschlands and there some idiots who believe nazis are left. Of course there are not.
China isn't a left country cause they doesn't act like a left country. They have a system called state capitalism, they discriminate minorities and they cause inequality. All this is the opposite of left (the only clearly defined factor of left is the believe that every person is borned equal).
And russia claims that they fight against facists and is nevertheless facist itself, while their enemys are not. People, partys and even states can lie. Thats an improtant lesson.
the only clearly defined factor of left is the believe that every person is borned equal
This is a very controversial statement. The left is usually understood as referring to Socialism, and Individual rights are generally considered a liberal value.
The founding idea of Socialism is common, rather than private ownership. China has a very high degree of public ownership of companies, exercises a lot of control over private enterprises, and has limited private land rights. This is consistent with a Socialist approach. Restricting private ownership of land in particular is as of my knowledge unheard of under right wing governance.
China is very authoritarian and in many ways a poor model for Socialism, but it's way too convenient to simply write them off as secretly-right-wing revisionists
Are we threatening Jeff Bezos' livelihood by wanting him to pay taxes? Cause that's who we want to pay taxes, not working class but the billionaire class. Also, the working class is ALREADY paying taxes.
Ah yes genocide, where 14,500 people out of 2.048 Million have been killed in 45 days (0.7% of the population) in the war started by terrorists hiding behind the same civilians, and that number too given by the very same so trustworthy oh so poor terrorists I mean freedom fighters (who also include their own fighters killed in that number, as those poor freedom fighters have filmed themselves fighting in civilian clothes hence they are civilians), who kill their own civilians with their own crappy rockets yet blame it on the other party, and each one of the 14k killed hand counted and verified by the poor honest doctors who have never seen a gun bearing terrorist inside a hospital nor ever seen a tunnel or a hostage, being committed by the strongest military power in the region, which has the capacity to kill all those 2Million people in a single day!
Yeah that's 100% bullshit and I'll show you right now.
Downvote me if you're going to vote for Joe Biden. My negative score will be your proof. Lemmy doesn't give a shit about genocide abroad. When the only measurable act of support these people carry out is counted, it will be FOR genocide and the people who did it.
You're a fucking moron if you think the Republican alternative is a better option for Palestine. And when it comes to the general election, you're only lying to yourself if you think a third-party candidate has a chance.
We, as the US, need to fix our broken election system before we're going to have a chance of electing someone who isn't owned by corporate interests.
That's a high minded reason to vote in favor of fascism ideologically and genocide in practice. My biggest problem is that you don't even believe that's what you're doing. You're not fixing the 'broken' 'democratic' system. You have no plans to.
We should be voting independent. Voting for R or D would lead to the same outcome. I hate the blind support for Israel. They've done some truly shitty things. Our relationship feels like trying to look out for the kid who gets bullied in school, but the whole time he's out there spitting on people. We should at least be holding them accountable if we're going to send them our resources.
Yes, you really need to vote third party as much as you can. It already happened in Argentina (you may disagree with the party, but the fact that it's third party and won the elections is the point), it can be achieved somewhere else
Republicans are so fucking pro Israel it's laughable. What the fuck are you even saying? Have you completely lost the thread of the last twenty years to be coming in here pretending the opposite? I legitimately think you're a fascist who wants to end democracy and you're arguing in bad faith.
Man you really edited the fuck out of that comment over time. But sure lets respond to the edit. It's a two party system, and one of them wants to turn it into a one party system. You're clearly on board with that plan. I am not.
What is your point? What other alternative does the left have? The US is a two party state, and that is how democracy works there. I've yet to see anyone present me with an answer to that question.
Build dual power institutions and provide the services of a functioning state within the dying husk of the current regime until such time that it collapses under its own contradictions when you leverage the organization and capacity you've built up to seize state power.
I am all for building dual power, but doing that doesn't prevent you from voting for the slightly less bad party. In fact, it will take a long time till any institution we build will have enough power to have a meaningful impact in people's lives, so reducing the suffering in the meantime is extremely important. And don't even begin talking about third parties or something like that. You know as well as I do that they are never going to win. Strategic voting is the best thing we have in the brutal US electoral system.
Why are millennials killing genocide?
Nobody wants to 'cide anymore
People are just so pc nowadays
said Trump ...... (Very opionated & weird comment)
Has the woke agenda gone too far?
Because of avocado toast
Maybe export them instead, shits expensive in Europe
The machine must ruin everything.
Cancel culture!
The only thing I'm proud of when looking at gen Z is that they are completely unwilling to go to war for the military complex and giving their life fighting a battle where they have nothing to gain but everything to lose. That's way smarter than my generation or the baby boomers ever were.
That is the only justified killing. And waves, but I'm no surfer.
Centrists - making the world a friendlier place for fascism since forever.
Centrist is picking and choosing from each side, not doing a little of everything.
I'm also picking and choosing from each side, which is why I'm a leftist. Does that make me a centrist?
the dogshit stupid takes i see in this community are just proving that nobody here has actually ever encountered a centrist
please do tell me about your mythical centrist
This comment does not inspire confidence in your willingness to actually read it.
Did their comment hurt your feels?
Bad faith bro strikes again
I’m excited you think of me enough to give me a nickname!
It’s so cute, I can picture our future together.
I haven’t encountered many unicorns either, just horses with ice cream cones on their head. Still looking though.
I haven't encountered Rhino's in person but have seen many online. I think that might be what you're looking for.
ah yes, and i haven't found any actually independent thinking liberals and conservatives. just people who are checking their favourite left/right wing political commentators twitter to regurgitate what they say.
And always picking genocide from the political salad bar.
Just a little casual genocide, nothing major, some dead LGBT folk here, some dead minorities there... normal stuff. Just wanna grill.
As long as they're our alliest, gotta let Fascists be Fascist once in a while to release some steam.
A few dead children and blown up hospitals is just collateral damage. There's nothing we could do about it^1^
^1^that wouldn't upset our Fascist allies.
They're not even good allies. They're busy shooting American citizens and selling US military technology to hostile powers. But I guess the end times needs Israel to begin so 50% of our politicians will mindlessly bootlick Israel and 40% of the rest are spineless cretins who think bipartisanship means 'compromise, always'.
I love the smell of minority&meek soap in the morning. Then I remember I'm a right wing catholic white man with privileges and I use them by shooting some jets of fire with my pocket flamethrower from the fully open window of my monster truck while on the way to the usual grill with the boys, as my god intended ;)
Edit: Obviously satire
A little genocide never killed anyone.
Interesting how everyone seems to think this tweet from 2018 seems to refer to th situation in Gaza in 2023.
I can't believe someone with an anime profile picture isn't spouting bigoted nonsense.
I usually see anime profile pics submitting code to Linux open source projects.
anime pfps are one of the only valid demonstrations of horseshoe theory
Like they said, bigoted nonsense
That's because it's a Nichijou anime profile picture. That's a green flag in my book.
all I hear is helvetica standard
refreshing
so misrepresenting centrism is not bigotry? which dictionary are you using?
But nonsense nonetheless.
Is it though? Is the narrative from the center and the right not overwhelmingly in favor of the ethnic cleansing occurring in Gaza?
It's nonsense because the far left's position is cheering on Hamas, the complete destruction of the state of Israel, and chanting "from the river to the sea".
The centrist position is "ceasefire, just stay the fuck away from each other."
Your overton window is fucked if you think this is what actual centrists think.
Your overton window is fucked if you think this is what actual leftists think.
Are you 'murican? I don't think the rest of the world agrees on any of the US's "definitions" of left, right and liberal. From a European POV, the US democrats are really, really far to the right. Sanders might be leaning toward the center. The republicans are a strange mixture of libertarian regarding economical matters and very very right-wing/intrusive on personal matters. Whenever someone even mentions/comments other people's sexual orientation and identity I automitcally assume they are creep that wants to sniff other people's bedsheets. How can you be partly libertarian and also creepily nazi-intrusive? US-republican invention I can't wrap my head around, that is.
THANK YOU
Those crows were circling.
Ha, you activated my trap card. I play not-so controversial opinion. Flavor text, "Biden is center right."
Uhm... knight to B5?
THAT'S NUMBERWANG!
Do you even en pessant?
Centrist: it can't be genocide because they're doing it slowly.
It’s not genocide because there are still some left.
Actually encountered one of those in the wild.
Which centrists actually support any amount of genocide?
You people make up such fantasies in your head. This is far from the common trail of thought.
Bro/Sis this is what is happening in the debate about refugees in Germany right now so no, actually you are wrong
Well, back when Steinmeier was our foreign minister and toured poor countries to advertise Germany as the land of opportunity and wealth because corporations wanted slaves they don't have to pay properly, I was called a Nazi by many for saying that they won't find any opportunity or wealth in Germany. Our government never had the well-being of immigrants in mind, they just stuffed them into dilapidated "refugee camps", told them their education is insufficient and left them to rot. I am not surprised.
Any relevant links? I tried to google it, but it seems to me that the debate is about funding them - not about killing them.
I can't speak to Germany, but in the UK the government had to be forced to use the lifeguard to save drowning people because they wanted to let refugees die, and had to be forced to stop sending people to Rwanda (even if they're not from Rwanda) just to get rid of them.
Both stories are easily googlable.
That's not a genocide. There is a big difference between refusing to expend resources to save peoples life and actively expending resources to destroy lives.
I dont particularly care about defining what is and isn't a genocide, I care about not killing people.
And the Nobel Peace Prize you get for that will be mailed to you. Until it arrives, let's do discuss about definitions, nuances, and all these other annoying details that set a principled debate apart from blind virtue signalling.
I, for one, really care about the distinction between initiating something evil and merely not doing enough(tm) to stop it. The UK did not made them refugees. Sure, the old British empire caused trouble all around the globe, but modern refugees are mostly escaping from regional wars and totalitarian governments. One could say that it's still their fault because that's the aftermath of them leaving, but that would imply that the UK should have kept occupying these countries, so you probably don't want to go there.
So they did not cause them to be refugees. Both the refusal to save them from drowning and the deportation are an expression not of a deliberate attempt to kill them, but of a refusal to help them. The UK government does not want these refugees to be in the UK.
If we take this issue and place in the OP template, it'd look something like this:
One should notice that:
👌👍
Echo chambers and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race
Surprisingly, simply saying "EcHo ChAmBeR!!1!" without counter arguments has not fixed the problem.
I'm as shocked as you are.
Surprisingly, making it worse does even less good than pointing the causes out
I'm indeed shocked you tried so badly to make a "gotcha" towards obvious statements
there's no agreed definition of echo chamber though.
It is an echo chamber to say "murder is bad" "CSAM is bad" "rape is bad" - as 99.99% of people, when pushed, will agree those things are bad, echoing each other verbatim.
👌👍
👌👈
👌🖕
👌🤛
😩
I feel dirty, time for a shower.
Rightwingers aren't people
Point proven
Indeed, the point that rightwing scum should be hounded up and left in a deserted island is brilliantly made by rightwingers themselves.
What kind of drugs are you on?
Reality
It's fucking satire
Did you think this was supposed to be a direct quote?
It's peak /c/theLeftCantMeme
Nah more like AteTheOnion
So you, a non-leftist, are against the cultural genocide and ethnic cleansing occurring in Gaza? That's refreshing!
i hate to break it to you, but there are a lot of leftists that are very comfortable with genocide.
r/tankiejerk
Abortions for some, miniature American flags for others!
You can have a little genocide, as a treat
Enlightening comment section. Very revealing discussions on our current political discourse.
"Data for Progress" poll even back on Oct. 21 showed a majority of Republicans wanted a ceasefire. Half of Republicans in this Reuters/Ipsos poll:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/nov/15/poll-us-israel-support-hamas-war
It would be a mistake to characterize this as a left/right issue. That's a classic pattern for drawing up support for inhumane policies, telling "the right" that "the left" wants something and that therefore they should oppose it. This is a basic issue of lives vs. deaths, human rights vs. an oppressive fascist regime, don't allow it to be reframed in these other ways that distort it.
Extremists be like "You're either with me or against me!"
Right: Let's cut off our Dicks.
Left: Let's not cut off our Dicks.
Center: Guys, your going to have to compromise, let's just do some dick cutting.
Right: I guess I can live with that for now.
Left: No.
Center: See, this is why no one likes the left, you guys are the real extremists, smh
Genocide of those who want genocide? Since we’ve agreed that some genocide is ok?
I feel like a fair few of you are overreacting. Talk to me. We'll make it work.
You literally cannot do some genocide.
If it’s not from the Genocide region of France then it’s only sparkling mass murder.
Quality post.
Lets be honest with ourselves, half of the left is in support of the genocide happening is gaza. have seen this in both US left. and just as much in German, UK, Dutch left parties. only the French left has somewhat of a push back against that, France seems to be the only western country to still have genuine left factions among its left parties.
Liberals aren't leftists, Clyde. They are literally the centrists (ie, confused right-wingers) the meme is referring to.
No true Scotsman fallacy.
Fallacy Fallacy. Simply naming a fallacy doesn't mean the argument is wrong. Recognizing fallacies help you know where to attack an invalid argument, they don't attack it for you.
If someone said I wasn't a true Scotsman simply because I have no Scottish heritage and have never been to Scotland they would be correct. It's not a fallacy when the person in question doesn't meet the definition of the group. The definition of Leftist is not "to the left of someone else in the room, even if if that person is a full Authoritarian."
I DECLARE LEMMY FALLACY!
You said something on lemmy and I think it's wrong so lemmy fallacy! You're wrong! :P
Hey, I just wanted you to know that you can't just say "fallacy" and expect it to mean something.
🙏
That doesn't apply here, liberals fundamentally aren't leftists. Liberals are centrists.
While I totally agree that liberals are not leftists. Liberals in the US are on the left.
I don't really expect you to learn this, as a self-identifying leftist, because your priors are everything to you, but it is true.
Being left of the far-right does not make one a leftist. Words have meanings.
I would never claim liberals are leftists. Leftists are liberals who failed math
Curious how you came to that conclusion. When I was in the math department in college, most of the smartest students were full-blown communists. Though I'm not sure how you think math factors into it in the first place
So the original post was talking world wide. Limiting the scope to a very right wing portion of the world doesn't magically change who's on the Left.
If you have a room full of people saying "Let's form a dictatorship and conquer the world!" and 1 person says "I don't think that's a good idea", that person is not automatically "on the left" just because they are to the left of extremist right wing views.
Liberalism is the ideology of capitalism.
Leftist politics reject capitalism.
Liberalism is only left compared to conservatism, but both are on the right wing.
No they are absolutely not.
It's cute when you guys do Bernie Math to try to make yourselves seem correct.
Condescension: how centrists concede an argument.
Lmao what? Liberals vote in favor of right wing economic policies. Scotsman fallacy doesn't even apply here
It doesn't get any simpler than this, Clyde - liberals aren’t leftists.
Never has been. Never will be.
A quick Google search failed to inform me what a "clyde-liberal" is. Would you please explain?
"Clyde" is you - "liberal" is also you.
Do the math.
The Spanish center-left is re-positioning itself denouncing Israel's actions after years of ambivalence, and the Spanish left is calling for sanctions.
How terrible for Spain.
There's no Left in the US. The "Left" is more of a Center Right
Jesus Christ this has been disproven so many times. No just because the people that push politics that are often to the left of most European democracy's main left leaning party are old white farts too does not mean that they're a secret center right pretending to call themselves a left leaning party.
Centrist Democrats have found their equivalent version of Bush Jr's "terrorist sympathizer" accusation, and they're going to use it as a cudgel against the left until it stops working.
They do not care that the claim is ridiculous.
But they considers themselves leftists, and their voters see them that way as well.
ALL the left parties in the back a ceasefire and The Green Party calls for an end to the occupation. Labour are more right wing than the Conservatives when David Cameron was elected. There are left MPs still in the Labour, many have been fired or have quit.
I can't call Labour a left party in all good faith. it has been taken over by the blairites. Corbyn brought hope to the left movement, but he was run over by the fifth column of his own party. just like the US the UK is stuck in a two party system controlled by billionaires, hedge funds and the military-industrial complex
I've yet to see a leftist be pro-genocide. Tankies don't count. Tankies are confused edgy children.
I once asked the hexbear community why they are pro-genocide against their "opponents" and got called Hitler when I didn't think it was reasonable to commit genocide at all.
From my point of view it's the extremists on both left and right that is the biggest problem.
The leftists looks at right extremists and think to themselves that the entire right-wing is like that. Same goes for people on the right. They look at what the leftist extremists do and then argue that it's how people on the left think and act.
But just like all of life, politics is not black and white. Just because I agree with the left more than the right that does not mean I agree with the entire leftist politics.
Muricans be like: let's make centrists look bad by using strawman arguments.
Also muricans: yeah only voting for shit or shit lite® definitively isn't a problem and voting 3rd party is throwing away my vote
i've never seen centrism so badly misunderstood.
This is insanely reductionist lol
Interestingly do all the leftist who now chant "from the river to the sea..." support genocide of the jews because that is exactly what those words mean.
That's not what centrism means. It's not an immediate compromise between the two. It's acknowledging that not every single stance held by a political party is the correct one.
I can support background checks and other limitations on firearm purchases, and also not want open borders. We should be doing something about the excess of gun violence, and we should be doing something about the thousands of immigrants jumping our border.
Right: These people who don't share my opinion need to be genocided!
Left: No! THESE people who don't share MY opinion need to be genocided!
Centre: Could... Could we, like... Not have a crisis on our hands FOR FIVE FUCKING SECONDS!?
Where do we put the *cides from left dictatorships?
Left and Dictatorship do not have compatible definitions. This is like asking "where do we put all the pregnant virgins?"
So by your definition, Soviet Union and communist China were not actually left, just pretending ?
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/russian-politics-right-confusion/
Giving lip service to being "left wing" but not actually behaving in such a manner does not make a government left wing.
I don't mind working with different definitions, but I don't think yours is very common.
What do you think about Marx, is he not left wing either?
If he is, what do you think about his notion of dictatorship of the proletariat?
Because this notion is pretty much the ideological justification for the dictatorships that were built in Soviet Union, China and other Marxist governments.
It is the standard definition. You just aren't personally familiar with it, because, and I'm sorry if this sounds like a personal attack, your education system and media are designed in part to indoctrinate you into liberal ideology.
Uh - yes? It is from Marx that we get this definition you call "not common"!
That it is absolute democracy, run by the people themselves!
Revisionist trash!
Indeed, you resorting to personal attacks makes it less likely for me to be willing to talk with you or your friends at Hexbear. I'm not American by the way, my country is way more socialist but never was communist (the split happened by opposition with Soviet dictatorship).
How can dictatorship be absolute democracy? You said dictatorship is completely opposed to left ideology just before.
If it's absolute democracy how can it be also a dictatorship?
By the way, this dictatorship is supposed to be an intermediate step in Marx's ideology, to protect the revolution from counter revolutions, before "real" communism is instated. Strangely it seems to never have happened, the countries that tried it staid at the dictatorship level, which was pretty much an oligarchy.
What happened in your opinion? Why did it not work?
I didn't attack you in any way. Not sure what you're on about. I'm also not a Hexbear user.
I didn't call you American. I called your country liberal, which is a pretty safe bet since you're here on Lemmy speaking English, and the majority of the Imperial Core and Periphery have some kind of liberal democracy going on. Unless you're in Cuba or Vietnam, there's little chance your country has anything resembling socialism going on.
Because it is the whole population doing the dictating.
Yes, dictatorship in the common parlance, meaning absolute rule by an individual or minority.
You have spent a very long time on this point. I don't mean to be rude, but didn't you think for a moment you might have misunderstood? Dictatorship of the proletariat means the common people rule themselves.
Only if you believe Lenin. And...
Yes, strange, indeed. Because the USSR was revisionist trash, as I already stated. They forgot the "proletariat" part of "dictatorship of the proletariat". Odd that you seem unaware of Cuba and Vietnam, though.
Because it was revisionist trash.
Yes! Exactly that!
Which ones of those are we funding?
Who's we? I'm not American.
Good. I'm glad you can't vote in our elections. We have too many genocide supporters who like whataboutism already.
It seems I am actually opposing more genocides than you do. I just want people to consider they happen on both sides of the political compass, because the issue is human nature rather than a specific political theory. Once you get that, you may stop stupid politician polemics at best, killing each other at worse, and start building consensus to reach social progress.
I oppose all genocide. In my country, we're paying for one and I want to stop. I have little patience for those who see people who want to stop funding genocide and are like "yeah? Whatabout all the genocides you're not funding? Huh? Huh?!"
Well, then you should orient your impatience at someone else than me because I'm not supporting that either.
If you say so.
File them under fiction
That's not a US definition, that's how the seats where distributed in the french parliament after the revolution
Yes and I'm telling you that the same definition is used around the world.
Btw back then the frech conservatives were monarchists that opposed the new democracy itself and wanted to dismantle it
Holodomor, the current Uyghur issue.
Cambodia was more of an omnicide, but it counts
Ah yes, the well known leftist government on 1930s Soviet Russia...
Someday we'll find a true Scotsman
If I say I'm being persecuted as a Scotsman and someone points out I have never been to Scotland and have no Scottish heritage, that's not a "no true Scotsman" fallacy because I don't meet the definition of Scotsman no matter how much I claim to be one.
You: "Hey dude, could you pass me that can of Coke?"
Sane person: "Huh? There's no coke here. No cans of anything."
You: "What do you mean? That right there-" points to bottle of orange juice
Sane person: "Wtf? This isn't a can of coke!"
You: "Pfft, so it doesn't meet your fake standards. No True Scotsman!!"
Edited to add names for clarity.
More like
"Here's your coke"
"This is orange juice"
"What are you, an idiot? This is clearly orange juice, why would you think it's coke? Here's a coke"
"Still orange juice"
"Well you see, coke is made from sugar and artificial flavors, and orange juice is made from orange. That's why orange juice isn't coke."
Nah you're right, this isn't No True Scotsman, just regular gaslighting
How did you somehow misunderstand my comment so badly? Okay, I edited it for clarity.
You are the one who, in this instance, is trying to insist orange juice is in fact coke. You are the one claiming no true scotsman.
Even in your attempt to twist it, you still include an explanation of why "no true scotsman" just doesn't apply here. What you are calling communism does not meet any definition of communism, just as no orange juice meets the definition of coke.
The Uyghur genocide would be the most recent.
I wouldn't call that leftist, but more authoritarian.
That said, do a subset of leftists have the weirdest obsession for defending it because they somehow view China as leftist? Yes.
They're not mutually exclusive. To give another example, Cuba is unquestionably leftist but it's also a dictatorship.
Let's ignore the political opponent massacres of the Great Purge and ideology fueled agricultural disasters of the Great Chinese Famine, and focus on the Holodomor in Ukraine, the Cambodian genocide, the Uyghur genocide in China.
Happened under communist dictatorships that are generally considered to be at the left.
This guy: This dictatorship is on the left.
I'm not sure what your comment means, but I'm actually saying the opposite of dictatorship being of a specific political side. I'm highlighting the fact that political extremists will end up killing in the name of their ideology, which ever it is, left, right or whatever other cult.
My comment means a Dictatorship, by definition, isn't left wing.
How do you define extremist? It used to be an extremist view to say women should have the right to vote, or people shouldn't own slaves. Hell, Democracy used to be an "extremist" view.
So someone willing to kill in the name of an ideology is an extremist, but that's the easy extreme case. In general in modern democracies, no politician would admit to that, so the definition is rather relative to how far the political positions of a party are from the average of the last governing parties for a specific country.
So you're highlighting the fact that extremists will kill people in the name of their ideology, and you define extremists as people who will to kill for their ideology. Sounds pretty tautological no?
Agree with your last sentence but it is the path all the Marxist revolutions have taken. A reason being that proletariat dictatorship is a step to communism in Marx's ideology. But from history, it seems it just stops at the dictatorship.
So maybe the conclusion is that Marx methodology doesn't actually lead to a progressive/left country.
I think the true centrist would be the least likely to genocide. Right and left both imply an attachment towards one arbitrary end of the spectrum. Center implies you're willing to entertain ideas from both sides, because realistically the truth almost always lies in the middle of the extremes.
The end state of these ideals is two sides who have nothing alike wanting the other gone, and the others going, "woah wait guys, you're both a little right, let's chat instead of murder." Centrism isn't just not being able to pick a side or take conviction, it's about wanting to synthesize all relevant information into a worldview that is a bit more aligned with reality.
Yeah you really have no idea what you're talking about.
I'm ionaore what it is that makes so many lemmy users think that centrist (like me) are evil or dumb or just enabling right wing extremists. I think it's fair to say that such view are actually quite extremist in themselves.
Let me put it in a similar story as this apparently works for you?
Leftist: all right wings are Nazi's and they all want to commit genocide, we should kill them all before they kill us!
Centrist : well, let's not go so fast? Things aren't that simple nor that black and white. First off, a dead man can't learn, and a lot of actual neo Nazi types are just misinformed, disgruntled and would do well with the right people to look up to. Then, I'm quite sure that most right wing or conservatives aren't anywhere near liking neo nazi ideas, let alone genocide.
I think a lot of the more extreme ones have, like you, over simplified world views that cause these extreme views. I think if you simply keep talking you will find that nearly all of them are like you, have families and friends and a dog, they love people too, they simply have different experiences and ideas than you have. Talk to them.
Also, if you kill allmrifht wing and conservatives, isn't that genocide? I assume you're against genocide, so why are you in favor of killing "them"? That is king of a right wing thing, according to you, do you want to be that?
In short, it's not that simple, moet people really aren't that bad.
Leftist: WHAT? HOW DARE YOU, YOU NAZI! WE SHOULD KILL YOU FOR DISAGREEING!
Centrist: wut?
First it has to be genocide for anyone with a brain to care about posts like this.
Genocide is?
Don't cheapen the word.
It's moreso Right: Let's kill muslims Left: Let's kill jews Centrists: let's not do either of that
Ironically, in Germany, both the far left and the far right a re in favor of genocide. It's even the same genocide!
Really makes you realize, that the political spectrum is much more a circle than a line.
It's the same in America, we just belive it can't be genocide when the left labels it "anti-genocide"
What genocide is this dude even talking about?
Sounds like an America problem, regardless of party
I think the problem is the society-wide mindset of Might Makes Right coupled with National Exceptionalism, and that's hardly a problem in only the US.
And your answer is an america-wide mindset of "well, we aren't that bad. Others did it too" when they didn't on such a huge scale
I don't know that that's the right lesson to take away. Our history, hell our current actions, aren't the best. It's incredibly disappointing to learn about how much fucked up shit we've had domestically or caused internationally. Especially things that were against our professed values.
But this shouldn't be viewed as something Americans are uniquely capable of. It's the same thing as branding all the nazis as inhuman monsters -- its important to recognize that they were ordinary humans, so that we remain acutely aware of what humanity is capable of. At any given time.
There's plenty of ongoing genocides throughout the world that aren't being perpetrated by the US. History is filled with horrible crimes by other countries, some who were adversaries to the US. It's entirely likely that any successor the US will repeat many of the same mistakes. You can see this already in action with China in the South China Sea, claiming international waters as their own to the detriment of fishermen in neighboring countries.
I think at the end of the day, here's the distinction to keep in mind -- the US has caused bad things to happen on an unparalleled scale, but the only thing unique about the US is the resources they have to do it. Any other country in the same position could and has done the same and worse.
Not buying it. Two things can be equally awful.
No that's my exact point. Most places would be equally awful given the same resources and capabilities. That doesn't mean we can't criticize the US for scale, but we should be wary that it's only the availability of resources causing that scale, nothing else.
When the exception is basically just the USA I doubt there's really any "superior countries", just not that bad ones
The conservatives that both parties really are
You really shouldn't talk about the civil wars to say the democrats are superior
E: Every down vote without discussion just proves my point even more. You're all in a cult.
Nah, both sides suck for different reasons.
Most situations have more choices than the two you are often presented with. For example, who is in the right, Hamas or Israel? Neither of them. They're both trying to justify killing innocent people because the other side killed innocent people.
In the meme, a centrist would obviously agree with the Democrat. If it were flipped and the Democrat were saying some equally off the wall thing, they'd side with the Republican. They've both become extremist versions of what they once were and the other side points out the obvious insanity and gets to feel smug about their low hanging trophy. And dumbass people from both sides eat it up.
Why do you think people are clinging to the center despite all the weird hate against it? They don't want to be associated with either side. Both sides get some things right and some things wrong. Yet, we're expected to take them as a package deal, because politics have become cult like.
Now do healthcare as a right and abortion. Where's the compromise?
Oh, I forgot you Americans are still arguing about basic stuff
You missed the point, there is no compromise and even people who identify as centrists will have different thoughts.
Me personally?
Healthcare as a right is already a thing. You can get it even if you're unemployed right now. The real problem is in the insurance/medical/pharma industries with all of the insane price gouging. It needs to be more obtainable and more effective. Free? No, medical supplies and labor still have some cost even if we fix the issue of cost and that money needs to come from somewhere. Even if it were given out for "free", you really think our taxes won't go up to compensate?
Abortion? Let them do what they want.
Health care should be free for the simple reason that it's inhumane to deprive a person of it just because they can't afford it. It's a basic human right. It works in many other countries. Maybe rich people and corporations should stop getting tax breaks and your government should reduce a bit the amount spent on the military.
The person I replied to literally said it shouldn't be free because it may increase their taxes. So it was implied that they meant it should not be free for the individual, meaning the individual should be expected to have to pay for their own medical treatment when needed.
That's one of the reasons I don't like the left, you guys expect everyone to be in lock step on every issue and you use a holier than thou approach to do it. However, I don't want to live in a Christo-Fascist Theocracy, so even though I don't love it.. I will still vote D for now. I'm literally on your side, but it's impossible to have a conversation with you guys. The right and left's chances of that are near zero and it's fucking sad. You call us centrists, but most of us never moved. You guys did. You move the line more and more every day.
That is very a very american-centrist pov, it's your bi-party stuff that's fucked up, not the left
I mean, I thought the right's problems were pretty obvious. I don't think there are many right wing people that need to hear it here anyways. Right wing people seem to absolutely love it when you tell them their party is flawed anyways.
To your other point, this thread is literally me saying the two parties are a problem and I've posted other comments in here saying people should vote third party.
Now you really gone and rilled the identity warriors with you mentioning "bi-parties"...
Not sure to understand what you mean
"Bi" as in "Bisexual" rather than standing for "two" as you probably meant it.
Bad joke, sorry ;)
Oh nice joke :D
The issue is that "centralist" has been co-opted by the American Right. The republican MAGA element has flopped so far to the extreme right that the old right now looks in the center. Because of this, and the idiotic behaviour of the MAGAs, a lot of republicans seem to use "centralist" to distance themselves. A lot of the original centralists have been forced into siding with the democrats.
From the outside, American politics is all right wing. The democrats are more in line with most countries right wing parties than their left. This has only gotten more extreme recent years. Right now, the democrats are far too close to the centralist joke in this meme. "A little bit of genocide is ok" at least when it's not Americans. You act like it's far fetched now, but we also joked about the MAGA idiots and Trump becoming president.
I have been trying on Lemmy for months. They purposefully and willfully misunderstand all centrists / independents and for some reason feel they are all secretly right wing.
It's the current state of US politics - the straw man they've built in their head that has all the wrong opinions has the same label that they've slapped on you, and labels are all that matters to them.
Most are not here to engage, think, and expand their worldview. They are here to push the "fuck you" button that gives them a dopamine hit by punishing you for having the wrong label.
But once in a while you'll talk to someone who treats you like a real person, and it's kind of wonderful.
I'll take the downvotes happily everytime. I know it's going to happen as I'm writing, but if it means it gives even one person something to think about it's worth it.
Unfortunately I don't think it will make anyone brainwashed by echo chambers think, only enrage them
Not everyone is American. I'm German and it's way less distinct here imo. Yes, I hate the right with a passion (as everyone should), but the left really isn't any good either. It's just all a big bag of trash.
"NOOO IF YOU DON'T WHOLEHEARTEDLY AGREE WITH WHAT I SAY YOU'RE WORSE THAN HITLER"
This has to be the most circlejerk post of all time.
Where's the lie?
Of course it's gotten to 1k too. Same politics that call any opposition Nazis so I guess can't blame the lack of subtlety
The actual version:
Right: "let's do genocide."
Left: "let's do genocide, but we'll call it Anti-genocide, Anti-facist movement."
Center: "Uh, guys, I think the left is also doing genocide."
Leftists: "what are you, and idiot?? They've named the movement Anti-genocide, it literally can't be genocide. You're just a rightoid."
Wich Anti-genocide, Anti-facist movenent is performing a genocide?
Standing in the way of the Fascists acting fully Fascist hurts their feelings!!!!
China is notionally both and what they're doing in Xinjang is at least genocide adjacent. Russia justifies their war on Ukraine as a struggle against genocidal fascists and again, it really seems like they want to destroy Ukraine as a separate culture and people by assimilation and extermination.
Both countries are frequently defended by left wingers
Of course there are idiots who defend China or Russia and call themself left. That doesn't mean that China or Russia are left. China has a weird form of state-capitalism and Russia is a facist oligarchy. They are not left, they are right extremists.
China is ruled by a communist party and position themselves as allies to left-wing governments around the world. They are clearly and explicitly left-wing.
Russia isn't left-wing, but they use they are acting like fascist and committing genocide-adjacent acts in the name of anti-genocidal anti-fascism, the rhetoric that the original commenter parodied
You do the same failure as many other people. To call yourself left or right doesn't make you left or right. Even the german nazi party NSDAP called thereselfs nationalSOZIALISTISCHE ARBEITERpartei Deutschlands and there some idiots who believe nazis are left. Of course there are not.
China isn't a left country cause they doesn't act like a left country. They have a system called state capitalism, they discriminate minorities and they cause inequality. All this is the opposite of left (the only clearly defined factor of left is the believe that every person is borned equal).
And russia claims that they fight against facists and is nevertheless facist itself, while their enemys are not. People, partys and even states can lie. Thats an improtant lesson.
This is a very controversial statement. The left is usually understood as referring to Socialism, and Individual rights are generally considered a liberal value.
The founding idea of Socialism is common, rather than private ownership. China has a very high degree of public ownership of companies, exercises a lot of control over private enterprises, and has limited private land rights. This is consistent with a Socialist approach. Restricting private ownership of land in particular is as of my knowledge unheard of under right wing governance.
China is very authoritarian and in many ways a poor model for Socialism, but it's way too convenient to simply write them off as secretly-right-wing revisionists
Source?
What do you dispute? That China and Russia act this way or that there are people on the left who defend them?
Ummm, no
That's not the center's position. That's the position of people pretending to be center.
It's more like:
Left: "Let's destroy people's livelihoods with higher taxes on small businesses and also force people to do things they don't agree with. "
Center: "Um, that's not a good idea. Let's not do either of those things."
Right: "Yeah, that's right! Let's commit genocide and make it easy for murderers to get weapons."
Center: "No, that's way worse! What the hell?"
Left: "That's it, if you don't agree with us, you're the enemy!"
Right: "Exactly!"
Center: ....
Except that's literally not what the left wants
If "the left" raises taxes on a business or individual that pays close to 0 and normal taxes bankrupts them, is that bad?
Are we threatening Jeff Bezos' livelihood by wanting him to pay taxes? Cause that's who we want to pay taxes, not working class but the billionaire class. Also, the working class is ALREADY paying taxes.
Jesse, wtf are you talking about??
Ah yes genocide, where 14,500 people out of 2.048 Million have been killed in 45 days (0.7% of the population) in the war started by terrorists hiding behind the same civilians, and that number too given by the very same so trustworthy oh so poor terrorists I mean freedom fighters (who also include their own fighters killed in that number, as those poor freedom fighters have filmed themselves fighting in civilian clothes hence they are civilians), who kill their own civilians with their own crappy rockets yet blame it on the other party, and each one of the 14k killed hand counted and verified by the poor honest doctors who have never seen a gun bearing terrorist inside a hospital nor ever seen a tunnel or a hostage, being committed by the strongest military power in the region, which has the capacity to kill all those 2Million people in a single day!
That is a convenient choice of time to label that as the start to this war.
Who crossed the Gaza-Israel border to massacre villages and cities at the beginning of October?
The current conflict did, and if we go to the past to say "no u started it" we'd go back to the bronze age
is 14500 people not a lot?
Did someone redefine genocide to "killing a number of people that u/Iseif deems 'a lot'"?
well what is it then.?
There's just... so much to unpack here.
Maybe we just throw the whole damn suitcase away.
The US is literally funding genocide right now but wait, it's only wrong when it's against white people
Yeah that's 100% bullshit and I'll show you right now.
Downvote me if you're going to vote for Joe Biden. My negative score will be your proof. Lemmy doesn't give a shit about genocide abroad. When the only measurable act of support these people carry out is counted, it will be FOR genocide and the people who did it.
You're a fucking moron if you think the Republican alternative is a better option for Palestine. And when it comes to the general election, you're only lying to yourself if you think a third-party candidate has a chance.
We, as the US, need to fix our broken election system before we're going to have a chance of electing someone who isn't owned by corporate interests.
That's a high minded reason to vote in favor of fascism ideologically and genocide in practice. My biggest problem is that you don't even believe that's what you're doing. You're not fixing the 'broken' 'democratic' system. You have no plans to.
They're both the same party.
Whataboutism. A vote is a gesture of support. A vote for something is supporting that thing.
You support murdering children.
Bye Felicia
We should be voting independent. Voting for R or D would lead to the same outcome. I hate the blind support for Israel. They've done some truly shitty things. Our relationship feels like trying to look out for the kid who gets bullied in school, but the whole time he's out there spitting on people. We should at least be holding them accountable if we're going to send them our resources.
Yes, you really need to vote third party as much as you can. It already happened in Argentina (you may disagree with the party, but the fact that it's third party and won the elections is the point), it can be achieved somewhere else
If voting means you agree with one of the parties, not voting means you agree with both and are ok with either ruling.
There are more than two parties.
In the US there are only two, for all intents and purposes. It's the logical conclusion to the "first past the post" system.
In other countries I agree with you. Still, not voting is not an option (unless you are ok with any party).
The combined power rings of every major and minor party swirling in a thousand bands of light to combine into my political opinion
Great, you've showcased you have a fundamentally flawed understanding of American politics.
Sorry I'm voting to keep the fascists out of office, and to hold them accountable for their actions?
People have been screaming about the military industrial complex since Vietnam but go off I guess..
Posting this meme like you aren't voting for Biden
Biden voters have the gun of fascism to their head. To pretend otherwise ignores reality.
Republicans are so fucking pro Israel it's laughable. What the fuck are you even saying? Have you completely lost the thread of the last twenty years to be coming in here pretending the opposite? I legitimately think you're a fascist who wants to end democracy and you're arguing in bad faith.
https://www.jns.org/netanyahu-meets-with-republican-senators-in-jerusalem/ ^ senate minority leader
https://m.jpost.com/israel-news/netanyahu-meets-with-republicans-after-temple-mount-visit-618092 ^ Speaker of the house
Republicans invite Netanyahu to address Congress as part of spurning of Obama ^ basically every republican
https://www.nationaljournal.com/s/31845/ ^ you're a fucking clown bro
https://globalnews.ca/video/10091490/the-u-s-has-always-stood-with-israel-chuck-schumer-speaks-at-march-for-israel-rally-in-washington ^ senate majority leader
https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-bidens-washington/the-week-when-biden-hugged-bibi ^ President of the United States
https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.php?ind=q05 ^ basically every democrat
No, you're a fucking clown for thinking one side being bad makes the other side good.
You: vote republican or you support genocide.
Me: you're seriously pretending Republicans don't also support this shit? You're a clown.
You: :clown: honk honk
---‐-
And since we're editing links in retroactively, fuck it:
Trump says he stands with Netanyahu after a barrage of GOP criticism for saying he ‘let us down’
Man you really edited the fuck out of that comment over time. But sure lets respond to the edit. It's a two party system, and one of them wants to turn it into a one party system. You're clearly on board with that plan. I am not.
... what?
Lol fuck off, you're enabling Trump, who is the fascist on the ballot
'The' fascist on the ballot
Better than being a straight-up fascist.
You're not less of a fascist because you're the one in the in-group. Quite the opposite.
I am less of a fascist that someone who spreads propaganda with the clear goal of getting fascists elected.
It's not fascism if it's only against brown people
What is your point? What other alternative does the left have? The US is a two party state, and that is how democracy works there. I've yet to see anyone present me with an answer to that question.
Third parties
Build dual power institutions and provide the services of a functioning state within the dying husk of the current regime until such time that it collapses under its own contradictions when you leverage the organization and capacity you've built up to seize state power.
And if you don't the fascists will.
I am all for building dual power, but doing that doesn't prevent you from voting for the slightly less bad party. In fact, it will take a long time till any institution we build will have enough power to have a meaningful impact in people's lives, so reducing the suffering in the meantime is extremely important. And don't even begin talking about third parties or something like that. You know as well as I do that they are never going to win. Strategic voting is the best thing we have in the brutal US electoral system.