#authoritiarianism

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Charisma Madarang at Rolling Stone:

Donald Trump, who earlier this month threatened to jail his political opponents, upped his authoritarian rhetoric during a campaign rally at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. When speaking to supporters from the swing state, where both Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris have doubled efforts to capture the election count in November, Trump lamented the criticism aimed at the Supreme Court‘s conservative supermajority and said it should be “illegal.”

“They were very brave, the Supreme Court. Very brave. And they take a lot of hits because of it,” said the former president. “It should be illegal, what happens. You know, you have these guys like playing the ref, like the great Bobby Knight. These people should be put in jail the way they talk about our judges and our justices, trying to … sway their vote, sway their decision”. Trump, who appointed three of the Supreme Court’s six conservative justices, specifically praised the Supreme Court for overturning Roe v. Wade and allowing states to ban abortion, saying it “took a lot of courage.” He said abortion will forever remain a state issue, not a federal one, and complained that Democrats are upset about it. “All they can talk about is abortion. That’s all they talk about, and it really no longer pertains,” he said. “The issue of reproductive freedom certainly ‘pertains’ to women all across this country, especially as we learn women are losing their lives under Donald Trump’s extreme abortion bans,” Harris campaign spokesperson Sarafina Chitika said in statement after his speech.

[...] Trump’s remarks about jailing those criticizing judges and justices align with his previous sentiments that he would be a dictator if re-elected but only on “Day One” in office. His desire to squash any hint of opposition if he were to return to the White House was again on full display in a Truth Social post made in early September, during which he threatened to jail people “involved in unscrupulous behavior” this election.

Donald Trump earlier this week suggested that people who criticize Supreme Court justices should be jailed, revealing that this man is anti-1st Amendment.

Preserve the 1A, vote Kamala Harris!

[thefreethoughtprojectcom]

Seeking connection with like-minded people and the real path to freedom? Tune in to this episode, and if you're in Arizona, don’t miss Liberty on the Rocks!

Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/guests-larken-rose-etienne-de-la-boetie-voluntaryism/id1439014279?i=1000673865655

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6SjTiESKuxXRCOVONcydaT

#TheFreeThoughtProjectPodcast

[mistergaslow]

Q'LA-MINDER WINS! A parody of the "Jeb Wins" meme. Mind you, what Q'la is doing in an egalitarian democracy in the first place is a mystery.

[carlpotatoman]

You know, this kind of reminds me of why both the USA, and the USSR had banned 1984. The USA said it was pro-communism. USSR said it was anti-communism. Ironically, it was neither.

The book is Anti-Authoritiarianism.

We already have our Big Brothers in the form of companies harvesting our data. We already have our Newspeak in the form of stupid sensorship (grape, unalive, ect). Do not let them police our thoughts.

"Read Banned Books" a new full page cartoon essay published in The New York Times Arts & Leisure section today.

[nonbinary-weirdo]

Y'know what Bumble could have done when Tall Shadow turned her away?

Go to River Ripples island! He'd have gladly welcomed her, gave her fishing lessons, fuck Gray Wings jealous prejudice ass and Clear Sky's authoritiarian/dictatoring shit!

River Ripple/Star'd have treated her much better even if she was a kittypet.

[on-what-matters]

i'm worried about AI

i'm worried about AI and, unfourtunately, am also worried that i can take actions to make me better off at the expense of others.

i'm worried about a perment authoritiarian state, i'm worried about living in a world where people don't have enough money to keep running their digital mind, i'm worried about not owning capital in a world where all of income goes to capital.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Jillian Frankel at NBC News:

MOSINEE, Wis. — Former President Donald Trump, who makes frequent false claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen through rampant fraud, warned Saturday that he would attempt to imprison anyone who engages in "unscrupulous behavior" during the 2024 race results. The threat was issued in a post on Truth Social, his social media website, and repeated his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen, accusing Democrats of "rampant Cheating and Skullduggery." “The 2024 Election, where Votes have just started being cast, will be under the closest professional scrutiny and, WHEN I WIN, those people that CHEATED will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the Law, which will include long term prison sentences so that this Depravity of Justice does not happen again," he wrote.

He continued, “Please beware that this legal exposure extends to Lawyers, Political Operatives, Donors, Illegal Voters, & Corrupt Election Officials. Those involved in unscrupulous behavior will be sought out, caught, and prosecuted at levels, unfortunately, never seen before in our Country.” The threat was one of the most wide-ranging that he's made while running for president after his 2020 defeat — going beyond threatening old foes and issuing warnings to those involved with the current election. While he spent much of the 2016 campaign threatening to jail his opponent Hillary Clinton, he tends not to go after people on the periphery, like donors and election workers. Election workers across the country have been subject to threats, most famously Ruby Freeman and her��daughter Shaye Moss, two election workers whose entire lives were uprooted when Trump and his allies targeted them after the 2020 election with false accusations of fraud.

America’s freedom is literally at stake, as Donald Trump posted on TRUTH Social yesterday that he would call for the imprisonment of “Lawyers, Political Operatives, Donors, Illegal Voters, & Corrupt Election Officials.”

This type of talk from him reveal that Trump seeks to lock up those opposed to his anti-American ways. It’s also why people need to vote Kamala Harris to protect American freedom.

See Also:

AP, via HuffPost: Donald Trump Threatens To Jail Adversaries If He Wins Second Term

[lonewolf23k]

Can we stop the "Cheese-eating surrender monkey" trope already? I think we've clearly established the Brits are more compliant than the Frenchies when it comes to authoritiarianism.

[thefreethoughtprojectcom]

A recently leaked draft of an Executive Order shows the Biden Administration is considering expanding the required use of digital ID’s to fight fraud — a move that is being criticized by privacy advocates and civil liberties organizations.

Read More: https://thefreethoughtproject.com/technology/whether-through-biden-harris-or-trump-digital-ids-are-coming-to-america

#TheFreeThoughtProject

[protoslacker]

The protests have managed to put in front of the media in an undeniable way that Donald Trump is a racist white supremacist and a supporter, tacit or otherwise, of this violence. And people are dying and the white supremacists marching in the street set the tone of what’s acceptable. So if we can at least say “this is not acceptable”, then maybe we can make progress. If we ignore that and let that happen, then we’ve lost the game.

Emily Gorcenski interviewed by Sam Levin in The Guardian. The data scientist exposing US white supremacists: 'This is how you fight Nazis'

After surviving far right violence in Charlottesville, Emily Gorcenski has tracked the Proud Boys and other extremist groups

[rotationalsymmetry]

Remember, people who voted for trump are generally against “big government” and they do not trust government/politicians at all. I know that seems like an oxymoron -- they’re also in favor of being “tough on crime” and at least some of them are fine with using paramilitary forces to crack down on protesters -- but again, go back to what a KKK member in the US South just after the Civil War would be in favor of, and there you have it. This absolute mess where the government fucks with POC and teargasses protesters and does next to nothing about massive crises from the pandemic to natural disasters and underfunds schools and is driving the post office out of business, there’s some people who think that’s how the government should be. That it should just get out of the way and let this sort of lawless might-makes-right white supremacist rich-get-richer bullshit carry on about its business. Like, I do enjoy superhero movies and I’m not even advocating against watching them, it’s just, I think we should be honest about it when their narratives vibe with right-wing narratives.

[spyderslut]

Marxist leninists have so many people who were not that bad. you dont have to fall behind stalin. you have people who didnt commit genocides. You pretend that the people you disagree with invent warcrimes and genocides wholecloth so you can feel superior to them and so you can just ignore what they say. We need a vanguard party in charge of everything, the people saying that its authoritiarian and unessesary are liars and brainwashed western spies! The soviet union, especially after stalin, was the inheritor of the tsarist regimes imperial ambitions and the programs of repression against the people it lorded over. The bolsheviks were tretcherous bastards who stomped out any libertarian socialist project they could get their hands on.

And now, some words from Subcomandante Insurgente Galeano/Marcos

Left Anti-Communists have worked out such an awesome and convenient lifehack to feel morally superior to Marxist-Leninists; Unquestioningly believe in completely fabricated atrocities and get righteously furious at anyone who doesn't do the same. Like any attempts to point out how none of it is remotely true are these callous acts of denialism that cruelly disrespect all the very real victims that exist. Like why won't you listen to the victims???? Any source that affirms the existence of these atrocities is completely reliable while anything that disproves them is tankie propaganda that they're probably being paid to spread anyway.

And now that we've established that all MLs are brainwashed genocide deniers, you don't have to listen to a single word they say. Just keep doing what you're doing; whether that's upholding the status quo, trying to reform it from within or opposing it while avoiding any formal hierarchy or organisation at all costs. There's nothing wrong with your current approach, and if there is then that doesn't matter; it's not like there's a better way

[astrolocherry]

In the words of Fire Signs

~ Aries, ares = ram’s horn

arise = spring, beam = bēamian “to shine, to cast forth rays or beams of light"

arian = in charge, authoritiarian

~Leo, léōn = lion , "hero"

leonine (adj.) “lion-like”

leoninus "belonging to or resembling a lion," lionhearted

~ Sagittarius , sagitta "arrow,"

sage=wisdom, arius - pertaining to, a person who, a keeping place

sagittal (adj.) "shaped like or resembling an arrow," sagacious (adj.)

"of quick perception;"

[kitwilsonsass]

knuckles is just sober grog

[joy-haver]

Marxist Leninists are just like liberals, in that they care far more about optics than they do about ideals, values, goals, or people.

I posted on my Facebook that I really love religion, and a guy said

“Religion is a reactionary force.

Yes people in our class genuinely believe that stuff. But our task is to tell everyone the truth. Playing into religious ideas because that‘s what people already believe is both inauthentic and opportunistic. And it only adds to the confusion.”

And like, there’s many problematic things here. I’m not being inauthentic. I genuinely like religion. I don’t think religion is an inherently reactionary force, and the idea that it is has been used by authoritiarian communists as an excuse to colonize, kill, and assimilate indigenous people and marginalized religious groups.

But the fact that he immediately assumes that I’m being inauthentic and trying to play 4d chess to win over the uneducated masses or something, is just like, exhausting.

That’s the problem with MLs. They think they are the only ones capable of making society better. So they think they have to trick everyone else into following them and giving them power.

For them, It’s not about helping people. It’s not about genuine love for people. It’s not about harm reduction.

In their view, helping people can actually get in the way of the revolution, because it takes away from their leverage to take power.

And like, do you see how fucked up that is?

This is why I say that your revolutionary ideas must come from a love for the oppressed, not a hatred for the oppressor. If you’ve been oppressed by religion, and you act out of hatred for it, you will end up in a position where you are hurting people who are already super marginalized because you have misidentified them as similar to your oppressor

Religion is not the enemy, dogmatism is. Inflexibility in the face of change is. And a dogmatic hatred of religion just serves to recreate the same problems we would seek to fight.

Telling everyone the truth is not mutually exclusive with religion. If you think it is, your living under a delusion.

Religion is not just a “god of the gaps” and “justify whatever we want” machine. Thats a way it can be used, sure, but it’s not at all inherent. that’s just clearly not the case for most people practicing most religions throughout time.

Idk, this is a bit rambly. But the takeaway, especially if you were raised atheist or Christian, is that you have to stop hating religion as a concept.

You can hate what it did to you.

But you can’t just broadly assume every religion is exactly like your specific brand of traumatic religion. And you have to learn about and love other religions. Otherwise you will end up doing the same shit as the people who hurt you, just for different reasons.

[elephant-in-the-pride-parade]

I mean just last month Biden pardoned every single veteran who was persecuted for being gay under an anti-sodomy law. He didn't have to do that. It's not going to make many waves in undecided electoral communities. He could have just lit the White House up in rainbow colors. But instead he fixed a long overdo wrong.

He is making things better. IRA cleared the way for major improvements, it reserved a butt ton of money for green infrastructure upgrades (which we desperately needed) and a butt ton of general infrustructure money (a bridge is the only thing connecting my parents home to the main land. it was 80 fucking years old. it is finally getting replaced). and it also gave our tax agency much overdue man power to go after tax-evading rich people and corporations.

It's perfectly valid to say Biden could be bolder. he could do more etc. etc. he's an incrementalist and an insitutionalist.

But what was also true now and 4 years ago is that a lot more people are safe in this country under his presidency than they were under Trump.

Like I am in a blue state and the Respect for Marriage Act (Another Joe Biden law) has made my family a lot more secure no matter what happens in this election. But my vote matters. (Fun fact, the last time democratic voters stayed home in my state we had to put up with a republican senator for 6 years. this is a state with a Dem super majority legislature. we thought that seat was fucking safe). My vote matters for my future safety and prosperity and it matters immediately to my friends who are terrified of a trump administration. (My queer friends in Texas for one, who know a friendly administration will embolden their scary republican government).

Democracies are only as strong and stable as their norms and institutions. As of last year, The U.S. is sitting at a high 7 out of 10 on the democratic health index (which is flawed. not terrible. But youre really in trouble around a score of 6. That's when you see a slide into authoritiarianism and loss of civil rights and freedoms. And we could get there. Trump's very happy to weaken US democratic structures every chance he gets. Every action that increases presidential power and weakens institutional independence gets us lower on that scale.)

Trump's plans to replace many civil servants with political loyalists would make it worse. He would also have the power to add more conservatives to the supreme court (whose current conservatives are very hostile to institutions and very hostile to presidential accountability) . In addition to that, Trump emboldens violent anti democracy factions within the U.S population (like in Charlottesville). He also reacts hostily to peaceful protestors he disagrees with. (I lived in D.C during the BLM protests. Trump had protestors tear gassed and rounded up for a fucking photoshoot. Trump had military helicoptors flying so low they produced tropical storm force winds over protestors. You could feel that inside buildings!)

A vote for Biden does five general things. 1. it secures four years of (painfully slow but still moving) progress. 2. It ensures institutions of government (Education, Environment, Transportation, etc.) have the funding and independence they need so their experts can do evidence based work (its one thing when your political appointee is just your cabinet secretary's office, quite another when its all your management level officials). 3 he responds to protests and public pressure. 4. He would maintain or strengthen democracy. and 5. chiefly he would not make things worse. In fact him in office prevents Trump from making things a lot worse.

If you want ranked choice voting so that our elections become more democratic, if you want to remove the electoral college's power, then voting in the general election is the way to help make that happen.

Here's how: 50 state governors and legislature are the ones with the power to move towards ranked choice and towards popular vote preference. Your state can pass a ranked choice voting law. it can pass a law that gives its electoral votes to the national popular vote winner. or if your state lets voters have ballot measures you can get those on the ballot for people to choose for themselves. See who is running for state offices. see what they say about those ideas. and then vote for the ones who want to make it happen.

you know the electoral college still exists right? maybe let's focus on dismantling that before we vote for a democrat cadaver. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Dude. You broke your whole argument in your own first sentence.

"You know the electoral college still exists right?"

And it would take either passage of laws in amendments in most states to neuter it or a constitutional amendment, neither which will happen before November.

Yeah, no shit we need to dismantle the electoral college and implement ranked choice voting. But that literally cannot be done before this election.

So stop being so stupid about this.