enbyecho

But you're ok embracing Trump genocide?

"nobody that could change anything did a fucking thing"

Actually, things did happen. Many things happened. Your ignorance of them doesn't mean they didn't happen.

In this case we have an incoming chaos presidency. Government by chaos doesn't work well and tends to return to stasis not least because people tend to want to do their jobs. Musk will disappear onto his next ADHD and excessive wealth-fueled adventure, probably Vance will have Trump shuffled quietly to the side (or maybe out a window) and the infighting among cabinet members and political appointees will ensure that few of Trump's "promises" are kept.

There will be lots of damage, many people will suffer, and recovery will take a long time. But out of that things will change.

Didn't see this coming from about 136 miles away. Oh no...

What do you mean validate they don’t give a crap. The alt right isn’t going to become less relevant because we refuse to use their tactics against them. The choice is do things by the book, keep our precious moral high ground and most likely lose or get dirty and have a fighting chance.

Actually they do give a crap. It often doesn't look that way because many of the most visible and vocal MAGA cult "leaders" want to push their members to enable their authoritarianism. But that's the top-level power grab. If we do that ourselves we further enable it and allow those leaders to say "Look! See! They are doing it so we HAVE to do it!"

Talk to MAGA cult members and you will find that if you strip away all the hyperbolic rhetoric and bring it down to the nuts and bolts level they pretty much want the same things we want - fair wages, affordable cost of living, decent affordable healthcare, bodily autonomy, etc etc. A recent Wapo article highlighted this - that if you present Harris' policies to Trump supporters absent the party they came from, those policies are very popular.

Why would I respect someone who’s grand philosophy is scapegoating and crowning a king?

You don't have to respect their ideas or behavior, but if you do not respect them as people how can you expect them to respect you? When a child steals a toy from another child, do you beat them senseless or do you use educational tactics to ensure they understand and absorb the central lessons of sharing.

I also think it's important to recognize the limits of this "grand philosophy". The average MAGA cult member doesn't really have one. They want a gallon of milk to cost $2 and a be able to get a 30 pack of Miller Lite every week without going bankrupt. Because they are poorly educated and too damned tired to care they want a silver bullet (see what I did there) to solve their problems, which this week means crowing a king. They don't think beyond that, so why would you make the same mistake?

clawing out the political and cultural power back from their sweaty hands

And how do we accomplish that? It's not a single line of effort but a combination of tactics: 1. Work harder to win at the ballot box which partly means: 2. Hold our mainstream party leaders to account and push them toward policies that will win elections. I happen to be aligned with Sanders on this and believe that to be policies that are progressive in nature but not in name; 3. Educate and inform. You can't pull people away from MAGA thinking by shouting at them. f

I believe the best framework for approaching this is to acknowledge the MAGA "movement" as a cult. It's members are often less educated and have not developed critical thinking skills nor the mental resilience to resist the brainwashing. This is only sometimes a question of intelligence - I do believe that processed food and exposure to pollutants has lowered average intelligence in particularly unjust ways, but I don't think that's the central issue here. Mainly it's a question of education and the only way to successfully educate people is to meet them where they are and to open minds, not close them.

The issue is that people confuse opinion with truth and in general are too lazy or uneducated to proactively make the distinction clear.

What good things that Trump did promise?

Flying cars.

I'm not joking.

Bernie can’t even get a joke!

I hope you are joking.

I'm not sure I want to imagine that in this context. Other contexts, no problemo. Just not this one.

You are so wound up in your anger you can't even have a reasonable dialogue. You don't even realize that shouting angrily at people just makes you look like a fool.

Keep losing elections because you’re too busy chasing the mythical centrist unicorn

I don't want centrist anything, I want socialism. Calling me a liberal is about the funniest thing I've heard all week.

But you are so angry you can't even read the words. You assume I'm things I'm not. LOLLOLOL.

The central difference between us is that instead of angrily shaking my fist and shouting at people so much I can't hear a damned thing they say - I acknowledge I'm not the main character and that listening can accomplish far more than yelling in a blind range.

I hope you live a better life and recover from your anger. I highly recommend long hikes, good food, good friends and practicing gratitude.

After Hitler came to power, invaded multiple countries and started murdering millions.

It's easy to look back and say, "well, if we had just taken Hitler out none of that would have happened" but at the time - before the war - that was less clear. Many in Germany enthusiastically supported him and it's helpful to be reminded of why: The Treaty of Versailles at the end of WWI was highly punitive. The German people felt rather justified for WWI and reacted with anger to the treaty - it's widely acknowledged as a significant contributing factor in WWII in that it opened the door to the kind of grievance Hitler was selling. By the time more people understood his aims and means it was too late and there was no alternative to war.

Now you might say well then, that just means we should have removed the Trump threat by any means necessary. I'm very sympathetic to that idea but I have a hard time accepting that for one simple reason: the lessons of WWI and II show that grievance is central to the authoritarian narrative. Direct confrontation that feeds that grievance only inflames it. A better course of action for the Democrats would have been to acknowledge the pain of wealth disparity all Americans feel and acknowledge our common goals. Instead we lent credence to the grievance and opened the door for Trump to capitalize on it.

If the rules are unjust then breaking them is an ethical imperative.

This thinking is precisely why Jan 6 happened and will happen again if we validate that thinking by doing it ourselves.

The fascists are bad not because they break the law, but because they believe and want to do fascism.

This is true. But if you want fascists to do fascism more and with more righteous enthusiasm, then adopt their tactics. Grievance is part of the ethos there. Many MAGAts truly believe that the Biden administration was "going after" them and that we liberals are an existential threat that justified any means at their disposal. This is the problem with violence and authoritarian approaches in general - the more you do it the more the other side feels the must do it.

And Trump not being in jail is frankly a crime against lady liberty.

Yes... and it's an insult, unjust and highlights the double standard for the wealthy and politically powerful. But strictly speaking it's not a crime.

The good guys are “good” not because they respect the rules, but because they believe in humane values

You know what is a humane value? Respecting other people even when you vehemently disagree with them. Acknowledging that they are human beings and have a right to their thoughts and ideas even when you feel they are wrong. Because if you do not you are tacitly agreeing to their thinking that YOU are wrong. You are giving that perspective credence and the harder you push back the more you are allowing them to justify suppression of YOUR ideas.

I happen to think MAGA zealots are absolutely misguided and ignorant. But I can see how they got that way - racism, bigotry and misogyny borne of christo-fascist white supremacy. And what that means ultimately is that the people themselves are not the enemy, the ideas are. You can shape ideas through education and by being open and accepting of people. You can't do it by rejecting people.

I appreciate your thoughtful comment.

Neither authoritarianism nor ignoring the rule of law are inherently bad.

Look, I understand the point you are trying to make. Roughly that being authoritarian to achieve "good" ends is ok. The wrinkle that you overlook is that there are many wildly varying viewpoints about what is "good". Being "inclusive of everyone" for example, is something that most Christo-fascists would abhor, their bible notwithstanding. Neglecting people for economic gain is practically a religion in itself for some people.

What all that boils down to is this: if one group ignores the rule of law because they are "right" then the other group feels fully justified in doing the same. And because we have a democracy and that democracy doesn't enshrine progressive ideas into law, we can't ensure groups with ideas we find abhorrent don't use our precedent to impose those ideas on us.

Fascism is a specific type of authoritarianism that basically does the opposite to a society of what it should look like.

Not according to fascists. Do you see the problem? You just said that fascist authoritarianism is ok - from their perspective.

Utilizing authority to make society better for basically everyone is not fascism

Hitler firmly believed he was making "society better for basically everyone". The Christian Nationalists and White Supremacists firmly believe their getting into power via a Trump administration will make "society better for basically everyone".

I know many of us would love to believe that there is an objective truth and that our beliefs about a good, just and equitable society are universal and objectively correct at a human level. I believe in the "arc of the moral universe" that is so but there is no way that I can use the mechanisms of oppression that I detest to enforce that belief on others and have that enforcement be successful.

Have you ever tried to negotiate or educate someone when you are angry? Like say your neighbor keeps playing loud music and you really want them to stop. If you come out yelling at them and are visibly angry you -might- get them to stop, but you have made an enemy. If you approach them in an open-minded way that acknowledges their rights and autonomy you have a much better chance of a constructive dialog that gets you what you want.

It's hard to think like this right now, I fully understand. We are all angry and frustrated as hell. Maybe it helps to be reminded that we still have a lot of power, especially at the local level... and that we are playing the long game.