#John Pavlovitz

[justinspoliticalcorner]

John Pavlovitz at The Beautiful Mess:

Yesterday, Vice President Kamala Harris announced that Minnesota Governor Tim Walz would be her running mate in the coming presidential campaign.

The decision was met with effusive praise from both Blue voters, as well as a disparate group of politicians and commentators. Walz’ effortless warmth, his heart-on-sleeve demeanor, and his undeniable joy for life, which have been apparent for a long time in his home state—have suddenly become a national story. In a matter of hours, millions of people fell in love with the Governor, sharing videos of he and his daughter on thrill rides at the State Fair, and photos of him being joyfully embraced by a group of school children and cheerfully holding a tiny, sleeping piglet. And in the wake of the announcement and of his and Kamala' Harris’ electrifying appearance in Philadelphia at their first rally, the “Christian” MAGA Right rolled out a telling reply that they surely imagined was a real zinger: They created the hashtag #TamponTimmy. Really. That’s where they went. That’s all they got. Not only does this desperate response underscore the reality that Republican voters have nothing left but sophomoric name-calling in an effort to emulate their emotionally-stunted orange messiah in the absence of substantive critique, but it reveals how hateful toward women and how threatened by non-toxic masculinity they are.

MAGAs don’t see how much they expose themselves by using a female medical product as a slur, the way it reveals their complete contempt for women and their agendas toward them. They are so intimidated by a man this confident in who he is and so endowed with natural humility, that they have to attack these things as if they’re some sort of character flaws. Emotional maturity is a red flag for them.

[...] They are fully fed up with Trump and his surrogate’s contrived John Wayne dudebro American tough guy cosplay, and they are ready to embrace a better kind of manhood: one that doesn’t need to prove how tough it is, doesn’t have to be the center of attention, and most of all, is not concerned about showing its deep humanity because it revels in it. Tens of million of boys and young men of this nation have been irreparably harmed by the sexist dehumanization of Trump and the MAGA movement, which have been reinforced by Dark Ages theology, culture war politics, inherited/internalized misogyny, and good ol’ fashioned fragile masculinity. This nation is ready to embrace a masculinity embodied in Tim Walz and Doug Emhoff: one that does no harm, one that gladly defers to a strong, capable, talented woman, and one that makes all of us better.

John Pavlovitz nails it. The masculinity of Tim Walz is what’s needed for America, instead of the kind of masculinity the likes of Donald Trump, Andrew Tate, and Elon Musk push.

[liberalsarecool]

Stop voting for the root of the problem: Republicans and their malicious inaction.

[nerdygaymormon]

[moonbean117]

[nando161mando]

[imkeepinit]

[filosofablogger]

The XYZ States of America

This nation’s very name is a misnomer, a cruel joke.  The United States of America is no longer ‘United’ in any way, shape, or form.  I’ve long called for civil discourse, for listening to those with differing viewpoints and trying to find a space in the middle for compromise.  But those days are gone.  There is no middle ground, there can be no compromise, and this country must find itself a new…

[sentinelleblr]

Vote Democrat, save democracy.

[victoriaperpetua]

Book Review: Worth Fighting For

This collection of Pavlovitz’s writings (with a few new essays) from the past few years are well written and well-conceived. In my case, he was preaching to the choir. I pray, though, that this book can reach those who have a chance of being converted by his logic and by the truth he speaks. These essays are both timely and they address important issues, as well. In the current fraught political…

[geezerwench]

[justinspoliticalcorner]

John Pavlovitz at The Beautiful Mess:

This is an urgent moment.

In the days before the most consequential election of our lifetimes, a disturbing fiction has taken hold in many progressive voters’ minds: the idea that rejecting Kamala Harris in the voting booth is a way of hurting her personally; that abstaining or protest voting is an effective individual penalty for what they believe is her mishandling of the deadly crisis in the Middle East (one that began decades ago and that will surely outlive all of us). They see their vote (or their lack of it) as a righteous middle finger to the Vice President, and almost gleefully imagine they are injuring her by opting out or voting third party, boasting about enjoying her possible defeat:

This emotional response, is and has always been evidence of people of privilege who are either not students of recent history, have not been paying attention to the words and actions of the two candidates, or who refuse to play the movie ahead past November 5th. Ever since the sickening Hamas-birthed terrorist horrors in Israel on October 6th and Israel’s scorched earth response since then, we have seen a rising sentiment here among some Left voters that has made this a dealbreaker for them regarding the Vice President, despite the simply unthinkable alternative. And yes, the Biden Administration’s handling of the staggering violence that has unfolded in Gaza is surely greatly flawed and far from what many of us wish to see, myself included. But the reality, is that while a rejection of Kamala Harris would be a political defeat for her, it is an act of premeditated violence against the Palestinian people.

Donald Trump has admitted to weekly conversations with Benjamin Netanyahu, and that he has advised him to “do what he needs to do” in Gaza. He has recently promised to reinstitute a Muslim ban here, and in May of this year, the wannabe president said, "Under no circumstances should we bring thousands of refugees from Hamas-controlled terrorist areas like Gaza to America.” Trump has also repeatedly promised “bloody” mass deportations of immigrants from this country, both legal and illegal. In what universe will willfully placing him in power do anything but put the people of Gaza in greater peril? What is the substantive evidence that this will ultimately be anything but a performative purity stance, that helps no one other than those who squander their votes by intentionally empowering a monster? Kamala Harris is an imperfect human being, but one who will be accountable to the American people as its leader. She will be a President who we can criticize and call to task in areas of disagreement—and we will. Donald Trump will be a sociopathic, violent, self-described “dictator on day one,” with complete immunity from any atrocities he chooses. To both sides these two candidates and offer false equivalencies is tantamount to participation in further bloodshed.

This piece from John Pavlovitz is spot-on regarding the Gaza Genocide and harm reduction measures being necessary by electing Kamala Harris.

[liberalsarecool]

Trump repeated the same bullshit lie for FOUR YEARS. Said he would have 'bigger, better' option to Obamacare in two weeks.

GMAFB.

[nerdygaymormon]

[meteorologistaustenlonek]

"In light of this, may you practice relentless benevolence in your travels. May you continually seek a softer way of speaking to people, a gentler way of handling them, because you know they are as brittle and fragile and prone to breaking as you are. Remember that no one is immune from suffering, so take time to look deeply into people and see their damage and go easy on them.

But allow yourself this courtesy, too. Realize that you also deserve this same gentleness, this same space to fail. Treat your own heart as a delicate thing."

[kelinswriter]

The nerve of us queer people doing ordinary things.

(For the sarcasm challenged…that is what this is. And it’s wonderful.)