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Cake day: March 10th, 2024

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  • I’ve probably received over 50 replies in this thread. I’ve taken the time to respond to as many of them as I can, so long as they’re more than just vapid insults. My apologies if my failure to put my life on hold to read everything ASAP has irritated you. I’ve tried to respond to people in the order they replied to me, and that means I may not have read a response that came later, even if it’s getting a little old by the time I get to it.a

    “Reply in good faith” yeah man only the most good faith people have to say it out loud.

    I’m trying to get the vitriol to calm down. Some people, a precious few of them who responded, have taken the time to look past their irritation to calmly, genuinely, and without insult, ask quality question about the things I’ve said that have been able to make me reconsider it. Some have even brought some great evidence for their claims and as reasoning for their questions, which really made me stop and consider some things.

    Then, there’s people like you. People who want to hurl insults constantly. Who want to assume the worst of me. Who assume everyone has as much time as them to study up, to reply to a torrent of pissed off internet comments, to do something about it. And I don’t mean that in some belittling way, as if I’m better than you because I’m so busy doing Important Things. I’m not. I’m trying to stay fed and sheltered, and it’s taking up a shitload of my time. I’m genuinely happy that some people have the opportunity to learn about it and do something about it. I just can’t do as much as some of you with the constraints life has put on me. What do I get for that? I get belittled for not having already done the work you all already did. Unfortunately, when I had the time, I didn’t have the exposure and background to ask the right questions, and now, I have the exposure and background to give me the inclination to engage and give the ideas a shot, but I don’t have the opportunity to study extensively.

    Despite that, when I accidentally wander into an unfamiliar community that federated to my instance and very quickly realized from the responses that it was full of people with a very different viewpoint, I hung around and hoped that if I tried to engage without being the first to hurl insults, maybe someone would make a good point or, better yet, bring some quality evidence or study material. Maybe I could learn a little bit about why they think the way they do. On that front, I’d say talking with people like you has been an utter waste of my time, except that it has occasionally given someone else the opportunity to step in and give me what I stayed to look for.

    If you were here in good faith, you would answer people’s critique in a way that isn’t just “uhh well we can’t do anything or even think about doing anything until the blue Hitler party is back in power.”

    See, now this? This is an utterly bad faith argument here because I explicitly said not that SO MANY FUCKING TIMES. Everyone here is pretending I said to just vote and then stick my thumb up my ass until they win. That’s not what I fucking said. I said to spend just a couple hours every year or two, depending on your local election schedule, voting for whoever among the candidates has a genuine chance of winning and will be most pliable to your other efforts. After the vote is cast, go do whatever you think will be most productive towards your goals. Organize. Protest. Boycott. I could probably get away with listing some more extreme options here on Hexbear, but you should get the point by now and be able to extrapolate. Everyone in here is sure they know the best way, so fine, let’s assume your judgment is right on that front, at least.

    I’m not interested in engaging with the vitriol on this topic anymore. I tried it, and not a single one of the rampant assholes has managed to say anything to make a serious impact. The people who weren’t assholes had a decent chance to make a good point, so my takeaway is that the assholes aren’t worth engaging with any longer than it takes to establish a point and give the people with a more skilled touch a chance to step in. I admit I’ve taken the bait and matched energy with people I shouldn’t have, probably even was the first to get heated or a little rude a few times. For that, I am sorry. Matching sarcasm to sarcasm is satisfying in the moment, but as I’ve seen, it accomplishes nothing. I made no ground with them, and they made no ground with me.

    I still have a couple notifications for other messages from you that I haven’t gotten to, but at a quick glance, it’s just the same vitriol, so I’m just gonna clear those and ignore them. Because I’m here with a genuine and open willingness to learn, despite what you may try to claim about me, if you’d like to make any remarks or provide any sources you think would be worth looking at, I would still like to consider them. But if you start berating and insulting me again, I’m just going to invite you to go fuck yourself with a rusty rake and block you. You might see me around in here if wander in on accident again or come in out of curiosity, but I’ll remain blissfully unaware of your shit ass.


  • Christ, you’re 9 of the 18 notifications I have left including this one, and damn near everyone of them had you being a raging asshole. I’ve tried to listen to what people have to say, and I have openly and repeatedly invited people to bring new evidence, and here you are trawlimg my comment history to find new and exciting opportunities to insult me.

    It’s like you’re trying to be such an asshole, nobody is ever willing to listen you or interact with you again, like you’re actively trying to drive people away from ever learning to agree with you.

    I’ve tried to read what everyone said and reply yo everyone, but you? You can go fuck yourself with a rusty rake. Your abuse has no educational value, so I won’t be reading the rest in detail, I’ll just be blocking you. Maybe I’ll stumble into a Hexbear thread on accident again someday, but I’ll remain blissfully unaware of your shit ass.



  • You are 14 out of the 30 notifications I have remaining. I assume the information you say you’ve provided is probably somewhere in there. That’s after the dozens of responses to you and others in here. At a glance, just about every comment from you goes out of its way to belittle and demean me. I admit I’ve matched energy with some people I probably shouldn’t have, probably including you, maybe even been the one to get heated first a couple times, but god damn, man, calm the fuck down.

    I’m no longer interested in being the target for your abuse. I’ll read what you wrote so far when I get a chance over the next day or two and consider it. If you have any good information you think I should look at, I invite you to reply with it here, and I’ll try to get to it as soon as I can because, despite what you assume and try to portray me as, I’m open to learning, and I’m trying to do what I can with the meager time I have, like giving up most of my one day off just to try to learn a little from a bunch of assholes who’d rather berate me. I’m trying, I’m open to learning, and you’re determined to make that as painful as possible.

    If you feel inclined to reply or message me for anything other than relaying any material you find relevant, please go fuck yourself with a rusty rake instead. I’ll try to give your recommendations an honest shot in the interest of maybe learning something, but you I have no interest in conversing with anymore.



  • I’ve tried to reply in good faith to every single person who has responded with a modicum of kindness. Well, it’s still a work in progress, I’ve got like 18 notifications still after probably 25ish replies, and I’ll pop this short one off the list before I disengage for today.

    You wanna actually try to discuss the topic? I’m happy to have a polite discussion, as you can see me doing many times in this thread if you look around. If you wanna just insult me and put words in my mouth? I’m gonna tell you to get fucked and move on, it’s not worth my time to devote more to a response like that.


  • Go ahead and gargle my balls and never reply again. Someone actually showed up, delivered a bunch of sources, and I learned the problem was worse than I thought it was. Still nowhere near as bad as Russia and many in here want me to believe, but worse than I thought when I came in here. I’d say speaking with you was a complete and utter waste of my time, but since the other guy actually provided the info, I’ll settle for telling you to shut the fuck up, gargle my balls, and please never defile my inbox with your inane replies again.


  • Thank you for actually bringing sources. I’ve tried to find them myself, but search engines heavily favor current events, so it’s difficult to find anything as old as these. I’ve probably asked literally a dozen times for sources in an honest attempt to engage with the subject, and so far, I’m FAR more likely to be verbally abused for not blindly agreeing than to actually receive information. Only one person before you has even done so much as to provide a couple names as decent starting points for research. The sheer amount of vitriol combined with a complete lack of genuine evidence was making me increasingly sure it was completely baseless.

    https://www.reuters.com/article/opinion/commentary-ukraines-neo-nazi-problem-idUSKBN1GV2TC/

    This one makes it clear that the Nazis exist in too large a capacity, but it also outright states that some of the claims that it’s a Nazi regime are just not true. While few in number, they do seem to be receiving a concerning amount of freedom and power. This one makes it seem like the problem is bigger than I expected but still certainly not at the level people here like to portray it as. I can understand the inclination to make a deal to set aside differences temporarily and enable what they perceive to be a lesser threat to aid them against a greater mutual threat, but I’m not so sure it’s a good idea.

    https://thehill.com/opinion/international/359609-the-reality-of-neo-nazis-in-the-ukraine-is-far-from-kremlin-propaganda/

    This one paints about the same picture, more prominent than I expected but still nowhere near the system issue portrayed by Russia.

    https://www.fairobserver.com/region/europe/the-ukrainian-revolutions-neo-fascist-problem-14785/

    This is the first thing I’ve seen that tries to construct a timeline that attempts to pin revolution at the culmination of Euromaidan on the fascistic elements of Ukraine. I’ve certainly heard the accusation here before, but nobody could ever offer anything resembling evidence of it, so this is interesting to see.

    I’ve had a bit of trouble following just because the author uses a bunch of unfamiliar names and just assumes I understand them, so I may be misinterpreting things a bit, so correct me if I’m wrong, but it does sort of diminish its own message to some extent. For example,

    Having gotten word of this radicalization and quasi-militarization, Yanukovich’s Berkut special police forces paid informal titushki thugs to beat up demonstrators on the night of November 30. The result was the radicalization and militarization of Maidan, and a vindication for the creation of the sotniki and Right Sector.

    They’re kinda trying to gloss over it, but it sounds like the government was brutalizing protesters, and a more militant wing of the protests eventually decided that wasn’t gonna fly anymore. Sounds about right for a faction trying to suck up to Russia.

    But the Maidan’s sotniki violated the February 21 agreement within hours. Rather than withdrawing from buildings and squares in Kiev, they occupied more buildings and threatened to take the presidential administration and kill Yanukovich. When Yanukovich fled Kiev for Kharkiv, the radicals stormed the parliament and oversaw the president’s illegal impeachment in violation of the constitutional procedure for such. They helped prevent the required quorum and kept down the pro-Yanukovich vote in the impeachment by detaining and sometimes beating deputies from his Party of the Regions. In other words, the ultra-nationalists and neo-fascists spearheaded the revolutionary seizure of power using significant force.

    This actually raises an interesting question for this community. My understanding is that the unrest began primarily because the president defied the will of both the legislature and the people to overrule an attempt to build closer ties with the EU and move away from Russia. Feel free to correct me on that if you can provide good evidence for that, but it’s my understanding of the cause.

    So you have a president defying pretty much everyone to build ties with a nation that the majority want to move away from. It seems to be pretty widely accepted in this community that violence is an acceptable remedy to that sort of situation. Then is it acceptable for the wrong people to do the right thing here? Let’s accept the premise that the violence of the revolution was driven by the fascist elements. If the government blatantly defies the people it governs and the legislature, is it acceptable for fascists to help correct that, assuming they correct the problem and stop? Obviously, Nazis aren’t prone to stopping when they’re winning, so that’s a problem in its own right, but the waters become murky, and I’d never really considered the possibility of a Nazi faction ending up on the right side of… Anything at all. I really don’t like the idea of working with the Nazis, but which is easier to deal with later, them or the government you’ve yet to overthrow? Do we let the broken clock be right twice a day, or do we step in to make sure they get absolutely no power at all?

    Ultimately, I think it’s a dangerous game at best to work with them, so probably not the right call. Still, Nazis are evil because they do Nazi shit, but that doesn’t make everything a Nazi does evil by default. I dislike the can of worms this has opened. I’ll have to think on this more. My gut reaction says tell the Nazis to fuck off, but… I dunno.

    More importantly, for his organizational efforts on the Maidan, radical nationalist Parubiy was given the key post of chairman of Ukraine’s Security and National Defense Council. He would focus much of his activity on recruiting his “hundreds” and Right Sector-like groups into the Ukrainian army and National Guard prior and during the “antiterrorist” operation in the east.

    This is the first evidence I’ve actually seen that the problem could be considered systemic to any extent. It sounds like it’s not to the extent people try to portray it as, but this does sound like the sort of thing that festers into rot if left untreated. The good news is he only seems to have held the position for a few months, so that was addressed. The bad news is he seems to have gotten elected into parliament. I would hope that was for his aid in the revolution, not for his fascistic views, but it’s still concerning he’d be elected. Somewhat understandable given the recent revolution, that sort of thing can build a cult of personality, but still concerning and a mistake.

    None of the above should be construed as a claim that all the forces in the post-Maidan government are neo-fascist, as some Russian statements state or imply.

    Even this article denies the Russian stance that Ukraine is just swarming with Nazis, though.

    That said, this does paint a picture of Nazis being given far too much leeway, which is concerning in its own right. I’d be interested in an update on the topic given this article is 12 years old.

    https://socialistproject.ca/2019/01/why-does-no-one-care-that-neo-nazis-are-gaining-power-in-ukraine/

    This is one I have some issues with, primarily because of the sources they’re using. Many are gone, which makes the claims hard to verify, and some of the rest are using sources somewhat questionably. For example,

    They’ve marched by the thousands through the streets to commemorate WWII-era nationalist formations who took part in ethnic cleansing. They’ve acted as vigilantes with little to no negative reaction from state authorities.

    The source linked as “vigilantes” doesn’t mention anything about vigilantes. Still, the claims seem mostly reasonable, but they’d take a little extra verification.

    Members of Ukraine’s far-right also offer themselves up as thugs for hire – sometimes with deadly consequences. This summer, anti-corruption activist Kateryna Handziuk was the victim of a horrifying acid attack. In July, several extremists – who apparently were paid by corrupt local police to carry out the attack – doused her with sulfuric acid, burning her over 40 per cent of her body. She died from her injuries in November.

    This is tragic, but it does seem to suggest Ukraine is trying to do something about corruption and has been for the last 7 years at least.

    It’s time to talk about why Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, up for re-election in March, is happy to flirt with hardline nationalist rhetoric and hasn’t bothered to condemn incidents like last month’s attack on a peaceful protest.

    The good news here is that Zelenskyy won instead, so the populace seems to have opted not to endorse that.

    Like the last article, this one does make it seem that nationalists in Ukraine are a bigger problem than I expected but not the problem as it is frequently presented here.

    https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/ukraine-anti-semitism-racism-and-the-far-right/

    This one actually seems to downplay the issue more than the others. It still openly admits that there is definitely a problem with nationalist factions in Ukraine, but it goes out of the way to highlight that there’s little public support compared to other countries like Germany, France, and Italy, so this actually gives me a little hope that the problem can be cleaned up once things are over with Russia.

    Overall, my takeaway is that the truth was closer to the middle than I expected. Ukraine is most certainly not crawling with Nazis, but they have allowed nationalists and Nazis to operate with too much impunity. I would be very interested in seeing more up-to-date info if you know of anything worth looking at. I’m concerned that this is a case of trying to weaponize a rabid dog, but I’m holding out hope it can be fixed once they have the stability to look inward again.

    Thank you again for taking the time to find some quality information for me to look over.


  • Well let’s look at how that worked out for us. Democrats lost, and Gaza was most likely at least a significant factor. Did the Democrats release the election autopsy report without fighting it tooth and nail for weeks? No. Did they acknowledge that failing to support Gaza caused problems for them? No. Have they shown that they’re in any way attempting to pivot away from supporting Israel? No.

    As long as we prove we’re willing to elect rightwing candidates, Democrats will continue pandering to centrists and former Republicans. Democrats will move left when we prove that moving to the right nonviable, not when we elect a Republican every time a Democrat doesn’t go left enough.



  • From the data I’ve seen so far, it looks like it slowed substantially under both of them. To be fair to Trump, it reached its lowest point, from what I can tell, under him, but I think that’s in spite of him, not because of him. This is the same Trump who said we should move all the people out and have the US take over Gaza, who said Israel should just finish the job, and who, several months after the “ceasefire” began, said that Gaza is great real estate and that we should totally disarm Hamas and build skyscrapers there. I think it’s far, far more likely that Israel decided to take a slower, less obvious approach due to mounting global backlash, and Trump just seized the opportunity to take credit so he could continue to whine about how he deserved a peace prize. If you’ve got information that would prove me wrong, though, I’m always happy to consider it.


  • No they didn’t, you don’t seem to understand what I meant when I pointed out Israel destroyed all the hospitals, the hospitals in Gaza and the health services were the only orgs counting the dead; when they were destroyed that meant there was nobody left to count the dead and as Israel intensified the genocide in 2024, it split the strip up and invaded whole cities (like Rafah)

    It is ridiculous to sit there and pretend absolute death decreased under Biden because nobody was left who would count the dead or that Israel leveling whole cities somehow magically meant the people escaped, when they didn’t escape when Israel was only leveling city blocks in the first few months

    That’s why the chart is nonsense; it’s undercounting deaths and pretending Israel didn’t destroy the healthcare system, which was the only system that could count deaths, meaning the chart is even worse than guessing; it’s lying, intentionally or not

    I could have been clearer when I spoke, so I guess that’s my fault. You spoke on what the graph showed, so I spoke on that in response. That was not intended to be a refutation of your suggestion that the graph is incorrect. It was intended to show that I don’t agree with the way you’re interpreting, but I may have been misunderstanding exactly what you meant.

    You see, you give the game away here, it doesn’t matter why Trump pushed the ceasefire through; it only matters that he did and Biden didn’t, but you’re more concerned that the ceasefire makes Trump’s prospects look better than the fact the ceasefire means less Palestinians dying every day

    My point is that I don’t think Trump pushed it through. I think Israel realized they had to clean up the appearances over there, so they started talking about a ceasefire, and Trump dove on the opportunity to take credit for it. That’s not to say I think Israel is growing a conscious and stopping. I just think they’ve realized the optics are getting to be too bad, so they’re swapping to something slower and easier to distance themselves from. This is the same Trump who said we should just move everyone out and let the US take over the area, who said Israel should just finish the job, and who, several months after the ceasefire began, talked about how Gaza is great real estate and how he wanted to build skyscrapers there. Trump is dumb as shit and even more callous, but the one thing he genuinely excels at is gaming the media cycle and making himself look good to at least enough people to keep him in power. At a glance, yeah, it looks like Trump actually went out of his way to do something right for once, but in the greater context of Trump on Gaza, it looks to me more like he just took advantage of a passing opportunity. If you’ve got any info that can refute that, though, I’m happy to be proven wrong.


  • Again this ignores the reality that the ceasefire happened under a Republican, that zionist democrats are just as fanatical as their republican peers when it comes to Israel, that getting zionist democrats elected normalizes genocide, makes it conditional, and gives the overall system a permission structure to justify further genocide against other groups, a permission structure that has already been used in less extreme but still horrific circumstances by Democrats against trans and immigrant communities

    First, I think the ceasefire is better ascribed to time and mounting global backlash than it is to Trump. Trump is the same one who proposed the US move all the people out and take control, the one who said we should just finish the job, and the one who just a few months ago, several months after the start of the ceasefire, said Gaza was great real estate and that we should clean it out and build skyscrapers. The only thing I’ve seen that Trump has said or done that suggests he gives the slightest shit about Gaza is that the ceasefire happened under him. So it seems more likely that Israel recognizes the global backlash is a threat to their long term support as protesters age up, vote more often, enter political office, and have meaningful money to allocate in boycotts. Once it became clear it was happening, I’d fully expect Trump to dive on the opportunity to take credit for it to stroke his ego and give him another excuse to whine about the peace prize he didn’t get.

    The problem here is that you think the Democratic Party is in any way, shape, or form open to Palestinian liberation; they are not, they are so fanatical they sacrificed their own chances in a national election and allowed Donald Trump to regain office, the only sane response to this kind of genocidal derangement is a total boycott of any Democrat who exhibits even the smallest degree of support for Israel

    No, see, I fully agree that the Democratic Party is going to strongly resist all attempts to break support for Israel in Gaza. I just think that breaking them is more likely than breaking Trump, and we won’t get another chance to choose who we’re pressuring for another 4 years.

    The problem I see with a total boycott of the Democratic Party is that this guarantees Republicans win, and when Republicans win, Democrats move to the right to chase centrists and fleeing Republicans. Every time. Not once in my lifetime have I seen the Democrats lose and think to themselves “wow, maybe we should court progressives instead of centrists”. Republicans win, so they pick up Republican tendencies to stay competitive.

    Compare that to what happened when we voted. Many people understandably took issue with Harris refusing to take a stand against Israel in Gaza, they abstained or voted third party, and we got Trump. Did Democrats freely release the election autopsy report? No, they fought tooth and nail to hide it for weeks. Did they admit Gaza cost them? No, they’re doing their best not to touch on that. Are they starting to pivot towards opposing Israel in Gaza? Nope. It kinda seems like we gave Republicans power in exchange for absolutely nothing.

    Creating an environment where a politician cannot get elected no matter the party thanks to Israel is how you nudge things in the right direction; otherwise you’re just fooling yourself and backing the normalization of genocide

    As a long term strategy, I think you’re potentially right from a single topic perspective. The problem with that is that the genocide had already begun and was ongoing. Playing the long game means spending 4 years of Gaza genocide in exchange for the opportunity to prevent the Democrats from supporting the next genocide. In the meantime, the Palestinians are just fucked if we can’t get through to Trump, and no way in fuck are we getting through to Trump. It was a slim chance with the Democrats, but at least we’d have a chance without having to wait 4 years for the next election.

    There’s also the problem that things get messy, and it’s really hard to get all the potential horrors covered with a vote. For example, Trump’s revocation of USAID funding is projected to lead to 9.4 million deaths by 2030, which means that that alone is going to cause almost 4x as many deaths as the entire population of Gaza, just from a single one of Trump’s blatantly unconstitutional orders. I’ve heard claims that USAID uses its money to influence regions and could be considered codified corruption, and that’s probably true to at least some extent, but that doesn’t change the fact that 4 whole Gazas’ worth of people are going to die because of Trump. But that’s not genocide, it’s spread across the globe, so it’s not really the same. But it’s also 4x the deaths. No matter who you vote for, they will do something you disagree with, probably something absolutely abhorrent, and that can feel like being complicit, but I think it’s only genuinely complicit if you’re not resisting it or if you’re willingly enabling it. Ultimately, someone is getting elected, and we’re almost certainly not going to approve of everything they do, so we might as well try to limit how shit they are before we have to start resisting the stupid shit.


  • First off, I’d like to thank you for being one of the very, very few to avoid being a raging asshole about it, and I’d also like to thank you for being one of the very few to bring new information to the table for me instead of just telling me to go find it without saying anything about where it would be.

    This was in May 2024 that collecting data was already becoming difficult due to destruction of infrastructure. 2 years of siege, bombing, genocide and destruction later. At the time of this publication, 35% of buildings were destroyed in Gaza. Since then there has been occupation, demolition, constant bombing, sieges and strangulation. These are direct deaths from Israeli attacks, already at 35,000 confirmed under these conditions 2 years ago. You won’t get an “official count” higher than 70k because it hasn’t moved in over a year. Nobody is counting anymore. Do you know what that means? The type of complete breakdown and death that this requires to happen? The purposeful targeting of healthcare and rescue workers and medics. Think of all the downstream deaths, from starvation, from disease, from pre-existing disabilities. Serious estimates put it closer to 250-300k at least. There are

    You seem to have cut off here, not sure if something got lost.

    I was aware of the destruction of infrastructure and the targeting of aid workers, but I’ve struggled to stay up to date with things in the last year or so as I’ve had a lot of strains placed on my time available to do so. While I knew this was impacting the ability to count, I apparently overestimated the effort to incorporate other information and provide a more accurate estimate, even if it’s still pretty inaccurate. I figured it was probably not exactly right but close enough for discussion purposes, but that does seem to be incorrect.

    The direct war deaths have dropped considerably since the October 2025 “ceasefire”, with “only” about 500-1000 direct Palestinian deaths, however the genocide continues through deprivation and starvation and siege. Doesn’t that make Trump the “slow genocide” “harm reduction” candidate compared to the 200k+ killed under Biden’s watchful tutelage of dropping 200k tons of explosives on one of the densest populated area on Earth, with full military protection and support and supply? Leveling some 80%+ of all the buildings and slaughtering man, woman and child with your tax payer money.

    I’ll definitely agree that it at least gives Trump the appearance of being the harm reduction candidate, but I’m not entirely convinced Trump deserves credit for it. Trump is the one who said Israel should finish the job, who proposed the US come in and take control of Gaza after they “[move] the people out”, and talked just a few months ago about how it’s great real estate and wants to build skyscrapers there. Every word or action Gaza, except the fact that ceasefire started while he’s in office, has pointed to him condoning or actively encouraging the ethnic cleanse. I think it’s far more likely that global backlash has finally reached a point that, combined with the increasing horror of a more total ethnic cleanse than they’ve achieved so far, has forced them to enter a “ceasefire” where they can try to finish the job more quietly.

    Now, that said, I will admit it is in line with my wish to slow things down and buy time for more effective measures. I will also reiterate that the only reason I wanted things slowed down was so that we have more time to use those more effective measures. From that perspective, the “ceasefire” is a win. It’s just that given the greater context of Trump’s words and actions on Gaza, I’m not convinced he deserves very much of the credit. But, like always, if you have any information that can contradict that, I’m open to reviewing it and potentially changing my mind. I won’t lie, it’d be a bitter pill to swallow to admit Trump was better, but if someone can actually provide evidence for the claim, I’ll accept it. I’m just hesitant to give him credit for what appears to be a coincidence to me.

    Ultimately, I think it boils down to Israel started it while Biden was in office, and the opening was always going to be more violent given the event it was in response to, regardless of who in the US was in charge at the time. The very start, I think, is almost entirely Israel’s fault with partial credit to the US for bolstering Israel enough to feel confident enough to do it. I wouldn’t blame Trump for the opening of Gaza any more than I would Biden simply because from what I know, Israel seems to have started this independently. From there, yes, whoever was in charge should have done whatever they can to rein them in, and no, that absolutely did not happen, at least not to nearly the extent it should have, but just because Biden handled it abysmally doesn’t mean Trump wouldn’t have treated rock bottom as challenge to dig deeper. From what I’ve seen of him in every aspect of Gaza except the fact that the ceasefire happened, he’s been as bad or worse. I think we’d have the ceasefire under Harris, too, at a minimum, and I’d be more confident we can pressure Harris to do more than I am about pressuring Trump.



  • I referred to ONE strategy (I guess you still aren’t really trying to read what is written to you) and it was that of the genocidaires, in this case including the Biden administration and the electoral party machinery that he led. You need a citation that Vote Blue no Matter Who, Genocide Edition is one of their strategies?

    I meant that I don’t know what you’re talking about when you say strategies by and for those who work against genocide. It’s a very vague statement that gives me nothing to research, nor does it provide any reading material.

    That isn’t what I said. Quote my whole paragraph and deal with it or, again, shut the duck up.

    Have you ever considered that you might be a lot more persuasive if you were less of an asshole about it? I’ve nearly left this thread several times not because of the discussion, but because of the vitriol I receive in here. Before you say “good, fuck off”, I’ll say again that I’m here actively trying to engage with almost every single comment I receive and inviting information to challenge my preexisting beliefs. You could be making a convert, but frankly, this community is full of raging assholes, and even if I agreed with everything here, I’m not sure I’d want to associate with them because they’re raging assholes to anyone who disagrees with them. You’re doing better than most, but you’re still frankly an asshole about it. I’ll admit I’ve slipped on that front, too, but I try to only do it with people who have been complete dicks to me first.

    But fine. Here we go.

    In the nation state that is doing genocide, making genocide intolerable is what will help “slow it down”. Having a red line. Not constantly giving genocidaires what they want because they’ve bamboozled you into believing they’re the less evil genocidaires.

    Well, a bunch of people decided it was intolerable to vote for a Democrat because of it, and now things are still going in Gaza, we’re in Iran, we might be in Cuba soon, we’ve abducted the leader of Venezeula, and we gave Israel a chance to get into Lebanon. Meanwhile, the Democrats are finally giving up on their attempt to hide the autopsy report, refusing to acknowledge Gaza was a serious problem for them, and still not pivoting to standing against genocide. It sounds an awful lot like we made the situation worse without gaining anything at all, so I’m not so sure this is the brilliant strategy you seem to think it is.

    You should also remember that the logic you are presenting is not a strategy for and by those who work against genocide. It is a strategy by and for the genocidaires themselves.

    Just addressed this above, leaving it here so you don’t try to paint it as dodging something.

    PS, stopping genocide requires actual intervention directly against the genocidaires and actively working against them. It means you don’t condemn Hamas, you vocally celebrate them as a resistance faction against genocide, warts and all, and utterly condemn those who work against them, including the Democratic Party. It means you do real work to support the resistance and to oppose those who work against it.

    Being on the right side overall doesn’t give you carte blanche to do whatever the hell you want without question. Some tactics are condemnable regardless of who uses them. That’s not a comment on anything in particular they’ve done, just a disagreement with the idea that you support them no matter what. Celebrate the good they do, absolutely, but nobody should be above condemnation for doing wrong.



  • Could you point to the time in the last 30 years where Republican candidates and policies were nonviable enough to make them lose more than a single election? Every time Democrats get into power, people complain that they didn’t do enough fast enough, which is a valid complaint, but then they reelect the god damn Republicans as if they had any chance of giving a shit. Clinton elected? Republicans take the whole Congress next time, and the next president after Clinton is a Republican. Obama elected? Republicans take half of Congress two years later, keep it the rest of his presidency, obstructing everything just for the love of the game, took the other half in his last two years of office, and the next president is a Republican. Biden elected? Whole presidency, Republicans control half of Congress and obstruct religiously.

    In the last 30 years, Democrats have had about 2 years where they were not HEAVILY obstructed by Republicans with substantial power in a best case scenario. So when exactly in the last 30 years did we do anything to meaningfully force Republicans to stop pulling right? Looks an awful lot to me like every time we elect a Democrat, we bitch and moan about how they aren’t everything we want and then elect Republicans. Every single fucking time in the last 30 years.