#seeing the value shift real time because now many democrats and leftists

[rainbowloliofjustice]

Also, what these pro-ACAB idiots don't realize is that police officers sees shit that people can only have nightmares about. They don't realize that cops would often have PTSD from seeing so many innocent people getting killed in very gruesome ways, entire families being slaughtered at times, just the cruelties of others. Hell, they even catch legit child predators in the act (1/2)

There's even a video that showed body cam of cops busting into a hotel and finding a child with blood on the bed in which they arrested the pedophile, who kidnapped the child, hiding in the room. And these cops have to see that SO OFTEN while these idiots who are screaming "ACAB!! reblog to hate a cop uwu because they're all pigs uwu" get fucking """triggered""" because of fictional shit. It's just... So damn infuriating to see

The biggest issue is that many of them are unwilling to accept criticism (which would allow them to see the faults in their movement/slogan/whatever) or talk about other alternatives to just defunding and getting rid of the police. Like Obama said, the left is awful at conveying a message. 

“The key is deciding, do you want to actually get something done, or do you want to feel good among the people you already agree with?” Obama added.

And wanna know something? A lot of them want to feel good among people they already agree with. To them, that’s progress. They often have no intention or desire to actually do anything. They have no intention or desire to reach out to anyone other than those who already disagree with them. And ironically enough, a lot of the people criticizing Obama for criticizing the way they go about things are blue checkmarks and people who have a cushy bed of money to sit and a house that is guarded by a nice, picket fence. A lot of them think that if they have to convince you or think that you’re just an idiot for not fully understanding what a three/four letter slogan means and how it is intended to be interpreted, then you aren’t worth getting on their side.

This, among many other reasons, is why the left and progressives are fucking losing to republicans and conservatives. Yeah, ik that defund the police and ACAB is meant to say that the system is corrupt and that some police areas are overly funded. However, I still disagree with it for the criticisms outlined in my other post, as well as the fact that some areas actually have a relatively decent police force and because I know that politicians will probably gleefully defund the police and then take another vacation. 

I also disagree because I know what those slogans “truly mean” because I’m fortunate (or unfortunate depending on how you look at it) enough to be able to spend a majority of my time on social media watching idiots be idiots. If you have to give a one to two minutes long explanation of what something means after you say it because someone doesn’t “truly” get what it means, that is a sign that it is fucking awful. 

Like I have absolutely zero issues (other than ya know, general safety, people, etc.) against social workers, paramedics, etc. being sent out to places alongside the police so that way, they can properly deal with issues. The reality is that police officers are not trained to be able to evaluate mental health and may not have any idea how to talk down a crazy addict. The reality is that social workers and paramedics are not equipped to deal with said crazy addict waving around a gun and threatening to shoot people. Given that the situation can be one of two ways, both should be sent out to investigate and better allow one or the other to actually do their job. Not to mention, if some fucked up shit does happen, you have people that are not obligated to feel like they need to protect someone out of fear of repercussions or loss of their job. 

Similarly, I have no issues with scrapping the current training system that police officers have to go through in favor of one that better teaches how to de-escalate and how to better handle situations before having to turn to aggression. I also have no issues with either getting rid of or heavily limiting police unions. I have no issues re-allocating money from overly funded police forces to better public systems. 

However, despite all that if you so much as criticize acab or the dtp crowd you’re just someone who uwu wants to sleep in the same bed as pigs uwu or yOu jUsT dOnT gEt iT. If you have to constantly tell people “they just don’t get it” or “they’re misinterpreting it” every time a criticism is brought up, that is probably a sign that it should be re-evaluated and to evaluate whether those criticisms hold weight and if so, use those criticisms to better yourself. 

But, since they want to feel good around people who already agree with them, they see no reason to change. As long as many of them continue to do that, they will continue to lose supporters

[bustedbernie]

what do you have to say to a leftist who has most of the same criticisms of the Democratic Party as other leftists, but who has also voted for them in every election in which she's been eligible? "well you didn't vote dumbass" like, literally can't be the sum of your defense for every Democratic political failure, can it?

To be patient, that patience brings fruit. Large-scale change happens over timescales that exceed a presidency or two and if you’re not invested in the long-haul, you’re going to be disappointed. To hold officials accountable, write letters, show up to council meetings and other easily-accessible things, even go to congressional offices. And be aware that what we say and do can affect others and their perceptions. That a lot of what Bernie Bros said in the primaries were directly copy/pasted by republicans to attack us (and it worked in a lot of places) hah. That getting voter participation way up is one of our largest goals regardless of where you sit on the left and being hyper-critical of democrats, calling them failures or corrupt, just doesn’t help that cause. And on that point, democrats have universally excelled at expanding voter access in every place they’ve been empowered to do so. But then, I also don’t think democratic failures as presented by leftists are often democratic failures at all. 

The ACA is pointed to sometimes as a democratic failure by this type, but I just don’t see it as a failure. It was a massive step forward. I think too, on this issue, people see the UK with its NHS, Canada with its various provincial single-payer plans, or France with its Sécurité-Sociale and they want something like that here. But, all of those systems were constructed over time and continue to evolve. And we’re not starting in the aftermath of the war. I think our efforts also need to be framed in the context of our politics. And that’s just not a pill that’s easy for this type to swallow. I mean, how can democrats have failed truly in the last 10 years when Mitch McConnell hasn’t even allowed votes on the most basic of democratic proposals? Are democrats really failing or have we been deprived of the power to make effective change? Despite that, we made some decent progress just with Obama at the helm. When they criticize us for being happy that Trump is gone, are you (or your friend) forgetting that Obama DID somehow get some good things through? It was less stressful? That there was that hope that we could keep making those changes as time passed? 

I think it’s also facetious when they spend so much time talking about democratic failures. Regardless of whether or not this particular friend votes, there are many others like them that don’t. Doesn’t this friend bear some of the onus for these “failures” for not getting others like them to vote Democratic? Democrats have routinely been punished for progressive legislation proposals since the 90s. Part of why the ACA was such a massive win was due to the leftover bruises from when Clinton tried to pass his healthcare proposals. What is this friend doing to change the environment to make these proposals less scary? How do you get people that are open-minded to making changes but who currently are comfortable with the system on board? Because Bernie’s “ban private insurance” chased a lot of folks that would perhaps be in favor of wide healthcare reform away. Or “Castro was chill, he taught people to read...” This is a pretty consistent thing leftists do. If we aren’t meeting people where they are and where they are now, how can we win? 

I guess I’d tell your friend that democrats already do reflect on their failures and it’s an attribute that is built into the party apparatus. I’d ask them why they fail to reflect on their own failures, the failures of the progressive caucus in the most general sense, and the failure of the left itself to take accountability? At what point is this “democratic failure” just a projection to escape accountability? Because I’ve noticed that when AOC says most people in swing districts that supported M4A got reelected, she blocks people on twitter for pointing out that many of those “swing-districts” she cites are D+20 districts. Xochitl Torres-Small was hurt by AOC and Bernie Sanders in a R+2/5 district. How do leftists think anything we want (yes, we, because even most “moderate” dems want many of the same things as the leftists despite their claims), without those marginal districts? And how do we win the Senate at all if we can’t field candidates that can win state-wide? 

I think me and lot of the folks that follow this blog do call themselves leftists, or would call themselves leftists, but don’t want to associate with very vocal people like your friend because though we may be pleased that they are voting well, we are frustrated that this friend is hurting us in other ways. We are frustrated that they call our policy accomplishments half-measures or failures. We are frustrated by how many of our leftist allies are willing to sacrifice the need for social justice for perceived economic gains. There are so many domains and areas where we could really increase our margins that are stymied because we get written off as extreme. Progressives that have won council seats now talk about how getting progressive legislation is almost impossible with progressive language (and i use progressive to reference Bernie Sanders-type followers). Yet, they note that you can start making progress with other language. Parking minimums can be voted away by talking about more liberty for development, options for renters and owners, a healthier market, etc. “Incentive programs” are easier to pass than a new tax. Maybe leftists see these things as failures and an abortion of progressive values. But I think we see it as getting things done in a way that CAN be done, and be done now. 

I would ask your friend to look to examples where incrementalism has helped cement democratic power and led to real, physical changes. In this country, the slow embracing of public transit by a larger number of people is a good example. Those first light rail lines in Denver, Houston and Phoenix were heated. Pulling teeth. Sometimes even violent rhetoric was used. For a silly little train. But once you get that first little segment of light rail, over a decade or so, people adjust and it’s not so bad. Then they might even want it to serve THEIR neighborhood. Maybe so they could get to an airport without driving, or see a ball game without parking, or get drinks with friends and enjoy the conversation rather than pay attention to the road. They might even want to use it to get to and from work everyday. Or to run errands. And that’s exactly what has happened in each of those cities. Phoenix in particular defeated a Koch-backed ballot measure and voted to fund multi-mile extensions to its system and begin planning even more. Hopefully, in two more decades, those will bear lots of fruit, leading to more sustainable, humane cities, that are more accessible, cleaner, and dense. We also saw Maricopa County vote blue. Small things, over time, add up. Change happens. Attitudes move.  We can do that with healthcare. If we can get a public option added to the ACA, it will just naturally expose how wasteful insurance actually is. People will be more likely to buy into it. And it will help build trust with people who “don’t want the government involved with my doctor.” And given how we’ve seen the politics shift just since the ACA was passed, something akin to M4A would likely be right around the corner. 

So yeah, hold democrats accountable. But the thing is, we already mostly do that. I’d tell them to remember who the real enemy is, and if they are criticizing Nancy Pelosi or Joe Biden or Kamala Harris or whomever more than they criticize Mitch McConnell and his fascist army, then i have to doubt how progressive your friend is in the first place, regardless of their voting habit. 

[thevividgreenmoss]

Let’s remember what the left critique of Obama’s administration is. Leftists argue, roughly, that while Obama came in with lofty promises of “hope” and “change,” the change was largely symbolic rather than substantive, and he failed to stand up for progressive values or fight for serious shifts in U.S. policy. He deported staggering numbers of immigrants, let Wall Street criminals off the hook, failed to take on (and now proudly boasts of his support for) the fossil fuel industry, sold over $100 billion in arms to the brutal Saudi government, killed American citizens with drones (and then made sickening jokes about it), killed lots more non-American citizens with drones (including Yemenis going to a wedding) and then misled the public about it, promised “the most transparent administration ever” and then was “worse than Nixon” in his paranoia about leakers, pushed a market-friendly healthcare plan based on conservative premises instead of aiming for single-payer, and showered Israel with both public support and military aid even as it systematically violated the human rights of Palestinians (Here, for example, is Haaretz: “Unlike [George W.] Bush, who gave Israel’s Iron Dome system a frosty response, Obama has led the way in funding and supporting the research, development and production of the Iron Dome”). Obama’s defenders responded to every single criticism by insisting that Obama had his hands tied by a Republican congress, but many of the things Obama did were freely chosen. In education policy, he hired charterization advocate Arne Duncan and pushed a horrible “dog-eat-dog” funding system called “Race To The Top.” Nobody forced him to hire Friedmanite economists like Larry Summers, or actual Republicans like Robert Gates, or to select middle-of-the-road judicial appointees like Elena Kagan and Merrick Garland. Who on Earth picks Rahm Emanuel, out of every person in the world, to be their chief of staff?

Centrism and compromise were central to Obama’s personal philosophy from the start. The speech that put him on the map in 2004 was famous for its declaration that there was no such thing as “blue” and “red” America, just the United States of America. A 2007 New Yorker profile said that “in his skepticism that the world can be changed any way but very, very slowly, Obama is deeply conservative.” Obama spoke of being “postpartisan,” praised Ronald Reagan, gave culturally conservative lectures about how Black people supposedly needed to stop wearing gold chains and feeding their children fried chicken for breakfast. From his first days in office, there simply didn’t seem to be much of a “fighting” spirit in Obama. Whenever he said something daring and controversial (and correct), he would fail to stand by it. For example, when he publicly noted that the Cambridge police force acted “stupidly” in arresting Henry Louis Gates Jr. for trying to break into his own home, he followed up by inviting the police officer and Gates to sit down and talk things out over a beer. A disgusted Van Jones has characterized this as the “low point” of the Obama presidency, but the desire to be “all things to all people” had always been central to the Obama image. Matt Taibbi described him during his first campaign as:

…an ingeniously crafted human cipher… a sort of ideological Universalist… who spends a great deal of rhetorical energy showing that he recognizes the validity of all points of view, and conversely emphasizes that when he does take hard positions on issues, he often does so reluctantly… You can’t run against him on issues because you can’t even find him on the ideological spectrum.

Adolph Reed, Jr., who as early as 1996 had described the politics of “form over substance” being practiced by a certain “smooth Harvard lawyer with impeccable do-good credentials and vacuous-to-repressive neoliberal politics,” warned in 2008 that “Obama’s empty claims to being a candidate of progressive change and to embodying a ‘movement’ that exists only as a brand will dissolve into disillusionment,” and his presidency would “continue the politics he’s practiced his entire career.” Reed saw the devotion Obama inspired as a kind of “faddish, utterly uninformed exuberance” and said that Obama’s “miraculous ability to inspire and engage the young replaced specific content in his patter of Hope and Change.” (When Obama did get specific, Reed said, he often “relies on nasty, victim-blaming stereotypes about black poor people to convey tough-minded honesty about race and poverty,” talking frequently about “alleged behavioral pathologies in poor black communities.”)

Obama supporters think all of this is deeply cynical and unfair. But those who want to argue that Obama was the proponent of a genuinely transformational progressive politics, his ambitions tragically stifled by the ideological hostility of reactionaries, have to contend with a few damning pieces of evidence: the books of Pfeiffer, Rhodes, and Litt.

Granted, these men are all devoted admirers of Obama who set out to defend his legacy. But in telling stories intended to make Obama and his staff look good, they end up affirming that the left’s cynicism was fully warranted. Litt, for instance, seems to have been a man with almost no actual political beliefs. Recently graduated from Yale when he joined the campaign, he was never much of an “activist.” Litt was drawn to Obama not because he felt that Obama would actually bring particular changes that he wanted to see happen, but because he developed an emotional obsession with Barack Obama as an individual person. Pfeiffer feels similarly—he fell in “platonic political love.” Litt’s book begins:

On January 3, 2008, I pledged my heart and soul to Barack Obama… My transformation was immediate and all-consuming. One moment I was a typical college senior, barely interested in politics. The next moment I would have done anything, literally anything, for a freshman senator from Illinois.

He describes the beginning of his brainless infatuation: “[Obama] spoke like presidents in movies. He looked younger than my dad. I didn’t have time for a second thought, or even a first one. I simply believed.”

Litt’s memoir is remarkable for its lack of interest in actual policy. He mentions climate change in one or two sentences (p. 111), but seems to have spent most of his White House years preparing jokes for various black tie events like the Alfalfa Club Dinner and the Al Smith Dinner. (Litt’s rule for writing speeches for dinners of rich donors: “Jokes about money are acceptable… Jokes about power are not.”) Litt helped the president record videos for BuzzFeed (to get in touch with millennials), and Between Two Ferns (to plug the floundering healthcare.gov website), and to tape a birthday message for Betty White. But he was particularly in his element in preparing Obama’s annual comedy monologue for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner (WHCD). The WHCD, now thankfully gutted of its significance, was mocked outside Washington for the icky chumminess shown between political elites and the press corps. But Litt obsessed over it, and anecdotes about it take up page after page of his book. (An incident in which one of the president’s comedy PowerPoint slides failed to display correctly is told with dramatic flair over two full pages.)

This is the Washington of the Turkey Pardon and the Easter Egg Roll, where photo ops and symbolic gestures matter far more than such comparative trivialities as “what the actual policies of the administration are.” In fact, Litt even says that during the second term, he felt as if he was being given “the political equivalent of a vegan cookie” because the speeches he was writing focused on things that were “all nutrition, no taste” like “help[ing] more students pay off loans” and “insur[ing] more people.” He wanted to make jokes about Republicans, not try to talk to the American public about housing policy. In fact, Litt, Rhodes, and Pfeiffer all subscribe to a politics of gesture, where if you want to address some crisis you give a grand speech about it. One of Rhodes’ proudest moments is writing “the Middle East speech,” and describing a moment of political difficulty, Litt writes: “We needed something to break through. That something was a speech.” These three men are speechwriters, so we can forgive them for being preoccupied with descriptions of things rather than the things themselves. But this tendency to prioritize “getting the words right” over the actual experiences of human beings ran through the whole Obama presidency. Ordinary people were a kind of alien species—Litt says they referred to them as “real people (RPs)” and tried to litter speeches with “RP stories” to make them relatable. “In Washington you never stop hearing about the details of policy but you rarely see its effects.” This is only true if you rarely bother to examine the effects.

There may not have been much Change, but there were plenty of speeches about it. The economic situation of the average Black family may have been catastrophic under Obama, but he did give “the historic race speech.” The United States may have bombed an Afghan hospital, burning dozens of patients alive in their beds (their families each received $6,000 in compensation), but Obama gave a very powerful Nobel Peace Prize speech about how the pacifism of Martin Luther King needed to be balanced with a recognition that using force can be morally necessary.

…My colleague Luke Savage has analyzed how pernicious the influence of The West Wing was on a generation of young Democratic politicos, and sure enough Litt says that “like nearly every Democrat under the age of thirty-five, I was raised, in part, by Aaron Sorkin.” (More accurately, of course, is “nearly every wealthy white male Democrat who worked in Washington.” The near total absence of women and people of color in top positions on The West Wing may give more viewing pleasure to a certain audience demographic over others.) Litt says in college he “watched West WingDVDs on an endless loop,” and Pfeiffer too describes “watching The West Wing on a loop.”

Luke describes the kind of mentality this leads to: a belief that “doing politics” means that smart, virtuous people in charge make good decisions for the people, who themselves are rarely seen. Social movements don’t exist, even voters don’t exist. Instead, the political ideal is a PhD economist president (Jed Bartlet) consulting with a crack team of Ivy League underlings and challenging the ill-informed (but well-intended) Republicans with superior logic and wit. During the West Wing’s seven seasons, the Bartlet administration has very few substantive political accomplishments, though as Luke points out it “warmly embraces the military-industrial complex, cuts Social Security, and puts a hard-right justice on the Supreme Court in the interests of bipartisan ‘balance.’” It has always struck me as funny that Sorkin’s signature West Wing shot is the “walk and talk,” in which characters strut down hallways having intense conversations but do not actually appear to be going anywhere. What better metaphor could there be for a politics that consists of looking knowledgeable and committed without any sense of what you’re aiming at or how to get there? Litt says of Obama that “he spoke like presidents in movies.” Surely we can all see the problem here: Presidents in movies do not pass and implement single-payer healthcare. (They mostly bomb nameless Middle Eastern countries.)

Their West Wing-ism meant that the Obama staffers completely lacked an understanding of how political interests operate, and were blindsided when it turned out Republicans wanted to destroy them rather than collaborate to enact Reasonable Bipartisan Compromises. Jim Messina, Obama’s deputy chief of staff and reelection campaign manager, spoke to a key Republican staffer after the 2008 election and was shocked when she told him: “We’re not going to compromise with you on anything. We’re going to fight Obama on everything.” Messina replied “That’s not what we did for Bush.” Said the Republican: “We don’t care.” Rhodes and Pfeiffer, in particular, are shocked and appalled when Republicans turn out to be more interested in their own political standing than advancing the objective well-being of the country. Rhodes nearly has a breakdown when he is dragged through the conservative press over some Benghazi nonsense. He found himself in “an alternate reality that was insane,” and can’t believe Mitch McConnell turns out to be so “staggeringly partisan and unpatriotic” that he doesn’t care about Russian hacking.

The Obama Democrats, guided by the “let’s just all sit down in a room together and work out our differences” temperament of Obama himself, seemed desperate for Republican approval and shocked when the right proved unreasonable. In 2012, long after Messina had been told explicitly that Republicans were not going to be friendly under any circumstances, Obama invited congressional Republicans to the White House for a screening of Spielberg’s Lincoln, in order to show how political adversaries can cooperate for the common good. “Not one of them came,” Rhodes laments. Obama held out hope that a party willing to destroy the entire planet in order to preserve the privileges of the super-wealthy would come to his movie nights and work things out amicably.

The Obama administration bent over backwards to show that it was pragmatic and moderate and sensible, even inflicting cruel harm on families to show their toughness. Here is Tyler Moran, who was a deputy immigration policy director on Obama’s White House policy council:

There was a feeling that [the White House] needed to show the American public that you believed in enforcement, and that [we weren’t pushing for] open borders. But in hindsight I was like, what did we get for that? We deported more people than ever before. All these families separated, and Republicans didn’t give him one ounce of credit. There may as well have been open borders for five years.

We deported tons of people and separated families, and Republicans wouldn’t praise us!

This same bizarre naivete is evident in Obama’s dealings with Benjamin Netanyahu, as recounted by Ben Rhodes. Rhodes says it was obvious that “Netanyahu wasn’t going to negotiate seriously” about a just resolution to the Israel-Palestine conflict, and that Netanyahu “rejected any effort at peace.” Israeli settlements continued to be constructed in brazen violation of international law. Yet, Rhodes says, “despite Netanyahu’s intransigence, [Obama] would always side with Israel when push came to shove.” In 2011, the Obama administration vetoed a UN Security Council resolution declaring the settlements illegal, even though they plainly were and Obama himself had previously acknowledged as much.** Rhodes says the Palestinians were finding “little more than rhetorical support from us.” They barely received even that. Rhodes relates a stunning anecdote in which Obama meets with a group of Palestinian youth. One nervous boy summons the courage to tell the president that his people are being treated as Black Americans were once treated. Obama does not know what to say in reply. Incapable of directly criticizing Israel, he mutters something about how he believes in opportunity for all. But moved by the boy’s testimony, he decides later to act. What does he do? He adds a line to a speech he gives to Israelis, in which he tells them that Palestinian families love their children just as much as Israelis love theirs. Does he condemn the racist Israeli state? He does not. Does he actually do anything for the boy? Of course not.

Rhodes and Obama are frustrated, then, at criticism “for not being sufficiently pro-Israel, which ignored the fact that he wasn’t doing anything tangible for the Palestinians.” They gave Israel billions of dollars in military equipment, they refrained from tangibly aiding the people Israel oppresses, and Obama went before AIPAC in 2012 to say absolutely nothing in support of Palestinian rights and instead declare:

In the United States, our support for Israel is bipartisan, and that is how it should stay…. I have kept my commitments to the state of Israel. At every crucial juncture – at every fork in the road – we have been there for Israel. Every single time. … Despite a tough budget environment, our security assistance has increased every single year… We’re providing Israel with more advanced technology – the types of products and systems that only go to our closest friends and allies. And make no mistake: We will do what it takes to preserve Israel’s qualitative military edge – because Israel must always have the ability to defend itself, by itself, against any threat… No American president has made such a clear statement about our support for Israel at the United Nations.

Obama swore to AIPAC that he will always fund Israeli missiles before the Detroit school system (if this isn’t “declaring allegiance to Israel”—which Ilhan Omar has been called anti-Semitic for talking about—then pray tell, what would be?) As with the Republicans, Rhodes cannot understand how Democrats can give in on everything and yet still be rejected. How do they not understand? They’re being played for suckers. Of course they’ll still call you anti-Semitic even if you would give the lives of your children to protect Israel’s right to an apartheid state. Of coursethey’re not going to stop building settlements just because you have declined to challenge them on anything. That’s how political power works: If the other party senses you’re weak and won’t do anything to pressure them, they’ll walk all over you! Throughout the Obama staffers’ books, you can hear them crying: But it’s not FAIR! We played nice and they took advantage of it! Gentlemen, that’s how this game works!

…The left can learn a few important lessons from examining Pfeiffer, Rhodes, and Litt. First, these are not the sort of people you want in government. You need people who (1) have clear moral vision (2) have thick skins and (3) do not care about the goddamn White House Correspondents’ Dinner. You need people who understand that politics is about gaining power and then using it to make people’s lives better, not about giving uplifting but empty speeches and walking with purpose down Washington hallways. They also need to avoid accepting political reality as “fixed.” The people who defend Obama suggest that his hands were tied—power was arranged in such a way that he could not act. But the question is: How are you going to change that arrangement of power? If it’s true that “X bill will never pass this Congress,” then how are we going to get a different Congress? The Obama administration was reactive. They played the hand they were given, they had a very narrow sense of the boundaries of the “possible.” They did not understand that being uncompromisingly radical is actually more pragmatic.It’s essential to stop fetishizing credentials. Obama wanted to “hire the best qualified people no matter their politics, and send a message of unity.” That led to him hiring actual Republicans. Unless you’re a Republican, don’t do this. “No matter their politics”? No, politics matter. Your politics are the sum of your vision of what ought to be done. If a president wants to get something done, they need a team of people who also want to get that thing done. That should be elementary, but there just wasn’t that much politics to the Obama movement. Everything was about a guy.And I suppose that’s the final lesson here: Cults of personality are bad. Movements need to be about the people, not a person. The West Wing view of politics is that you just need to get the smartest, most competent, most qualified, most virtuous people into government. But that means nothing without a substantive vision for change and an understanding of how you mobilize an authentic popular movement to make it happen.

[fapangel]

Thoughts on Antifa?

Antifa is just thetip of the iceberg.

I first got thisquestion in my inbox shortly after the first Antifa riot on the nightof Milo Yiannopoulos’s Berkeley speech, but I’ve been sitting on it for two reasons:one, to take time to formalize my thoughts better, and two, to avoida “rush to judgement.” You see, it’s not Antifa specifically wemust worry about, but rather how the left wing itself reacts to them.

In my multipleresponsesto my Friendly Local Antifa, I’ve been very clear that just becauseextremists exist (andthey will always exist -)doesn’t mean that they speak or act for any larger group. To claimthey do is a classic fascist tactic,as evidenced by Hitler’s exploitation of the Reichstagfire as a casus bellito round up his Communist political opponents. Lettingviolent radicals act without serious efforts to stymie or punishthem, or even praising and normalizing their motivations while weaklyimpugning their behavior, is also aclassic authoritarian tactic, something the left wing is quick tonote in the context of the Ku Klux Klan, but never apply to the likesof the Earth Liberation Front. That’s why I mention “IllinoisNazis” so much - the mere existence of some goose-steppingretards doesn’t even establish them as a threat in and of themselves,much less a movement with actual national political power.

Thisapplies to “Antifa” because what they really areis pro-Communist radicals.It’scurious that reporting on Antifa never, ever seems to mention it,even though tenseconds on Google turns up some damningimages pretty fast. These people have neverbeenshy about being Communist radicals, or advertising it to the world.Considered in a vacuum, then, they’re just Illinois Commies brawlingwith Illinois Nazis. As the Beatlesreminded us, just because they carry picturesof Chairman Mao doesn’t mean they’re gonna makeit with anyone, anyhow. SoI waited, and watched, to see if the larger wave of hysteria,obstructionism and outright violence would abate naturally as peoplewound down from the heightened passions of the election.

Theyhaven’t. On the 15thof April (two days ago,) yet another wave of mass protests werestaged across the country, with the theme being “Trump shouldrelease his tax returns.” The closest one to me was only twelvemiles distant, in Ann Arbor, MI. Home of the University of Michigan,the city’s small, wealthy, ultra-left and nestled in the middle of aconservative, rural area - and the protest’s highlight speakers(including a few Senators) delivered their speeches on theUniversity’s quad. (Thisis the exact kind of campus speaking event that Antifa used violenceand thuggery to silence at Berkeley when the speaker wasconservative.)Obama-appointed government officials have openly defied the lawfulorders of the sitting President, and been openly and loudly laudedfor it by the left wing. Members of our intelligence agencies havecommitted actual,unambiguous treason by leaking classified intelligence to acorporate media that writes every article with malice aforethought ina concerted and untiring effort to undermine the legitimacy of theoffice of the President of the United States. The left has proudlybragged of the multiplemunicipal governments - you know, cities - swearing to defyFederal law and law enforcement authorities, and some have evencalled for left-wing enclave California to secedefrom the Union. Theyhave scrambled to erect every possible barrier to the President’scabinet nominations, damn the consequences to effective governance,and the unfolding intelligence scandal is revealing how the power ofsecretive agencies was abused by Obama’s administration to undermineand slander his incoming successor. And of course, there’s thethuggery and violence on the street, waged by the likes of Antifa.

Theseare the tangible consequences ofthe left wing’s constant calls for “resistance” to the President- these are notjust words, but a national policy that’s been put into action. Thisisn’t justcute pins to show off to your lit club buddies how “woke” you are- it’s widespread, tangible popular support for the politicians,bureaucrats and businessmen working towards their ends. And thoughthey might call that end “resistance,” theyreally meanrevolution.

DanielGreenfield of Frontpage Magazine wrote a beautifullysuccinct summary that you should absolutelyread in full, but his mostcrucial paragraphs were these:

“There is no form of legal authority that the left acceptsas a permanent institution. It only utilizes forms of authorityselectively when it controls them. But when government officialsrefuse the orders of the duly elected government because theirallegiance is to an ideology whose agenda is in conflict with thePresident and Congress, that’s not activism, protest, politics orcivil disobedience; it’s treason.

After losing Congress, the left consolidated its authority inthe White House. After losing the White House, the left shifted itscenter of authority to Federal judges and unelected governmentofficials. Each defeat led the radicalized Democrats to relocate frommore democratic to less democratic institutions.

This isn’t just hypocrisy. That’s a common political sin.Hypocrites maneuver within the system. The left has no allegianceto the system. It accepts no laws other than those dictated by itsideology.

Democrats have become radicalized by the left. This doesn’tjust mean that they pursue all sorts of bad policies. It means thattheir first and foremost allegiance is to an ideology, not theConstitution, not our country or our system of government. All ofthose are only to be used as vehicles for their ideology.

That’s why compromise has become impossible.”

The ideological divide in the left wingis nothing new - it started in earnest in 1969, when thesocialist-communist bloc of the party first gained real tractionversus the “classic” New Deal progressive Democrats. The rift hasgrown steadily since then, culminating in the last election, when theNew Deal Democrats, the blue-collar union voters flipped the “bluewall” of the Rust Belt red for the first time since Reagan. Thedifference now is that the socialist-communist based branch ofthe party now control it, definitively. Their ideology andvalues are completely alien to the founding principles of America,the principles for which its laws were built to enshrine, nurture,and protect. This is why political compromise has grown more and moredifficult in America - the common ground between parties simplydoesn’t exist, and even if it did, socialist-communistideology has never been based on the concept of compromise orreconciliation.

Communist ideology is based onrevolution - in fact it’s a cornerstoneof the ideology. Revolution, by definition, is a complete andutter rejection of the legitimacy of the existing structure ofsociety. The left wing reveals their disdain for our society ineverything they say and do - their perennial crusade against everyaspect of capitalism, (“Big Whatever,” “Occupy Wall-Street,”)their endless trust in the sanctity and flawlessness of publicinstitutions versus “greedy” private enterprise and, above all,their unceasing devotion to righting the myriad “crimes” of“social injustice.” Hell, with “social injustice” it’s rightthere in the name. They reject, on every possible level, the mostbasic building blocks of Western society in general.

The true significance of Antifa is thewidespread popular support their thuggery has received from the leftwing - it indicates the final abandonment of any pretense todemocracy or fair dealing on their part. This is precisely why theirlanguage has taken on the tones of revolution and war as of late,dividing the populace into “us” versus “Nazis.” In oursecular society, Nazis are tantamount to demons; inhuman, beneathconsideration save through a rifle scope. The label’s a simple andeffective way to dehumanize people, and that’s the first step in theconditioning required to kill.

It’s already accelerating. After theBerkeley police made a point of confiscating weapons - and anythingusable as a weapon - from anyone converging on the park ahead of thelatest scuffle in Berkeley, Antifa took to reddit to argue foroutright arming themselves withfirearms. (Note how California’s ban on open carry, implementedby DemocraticGov. Jerry Brown in 2011 suddenly becomes Reagan’s fault.) Andother outlets are calling for leftists todegrade or destroy any government apparatus they do not control.

We have been down this roadbefore, more than once - the spate of anarchistbombings back in 1919, the radical left terrorist bombings by theWeathermanUnderground, and many others. But even at the height of anti-waractivism in the late 60s and early 70s, things were never thisbad. Much of it owes to new media - it’s atrophied theonce-ironfast stranglehold the corporate media had on politicaldiscourse in this nation, which has pushed the left wing to resort tomore brutish tactics to silence their opposition - doxxing, threats,intimidation and, of course, “de-platforming.” New media has alsoallowed the classic “grassroots” organizational tactics pioneeredby Chicago machine politics to go large-scale (moveon.org et al.) Theolder people, the wiser people, the experienced and the jaded - I’vetalked to them all, and they all agree that it has never been thisbad. The battle lines have been clearly drawn and the battles arebeing waged openly, vigorously and without apology.

Not every Democrat or liberal isa leftist - far, far from it, in fact. But I fear that the Democraticparty is far too gone for the sane people to reassert controlover it. As Greenfield points out, the left has retreated to“cultural urban and suburban enclaves where it has centralizedtremendous amounts of power while disregarding the interests andvalues of most of the country. If it considers them at all, it isconvinced that they will shortly disappear to be replaced bycompliant immigrants and college indoctrinated leftists who will forma permanent demographic majority for its agenda. But it couldn’twait that long because it is animated by the conviction thatenforcing its ideas is urgent and inevitable. And so it turned whathad been a hidden transition into an open break.” Thesepeople, long assured of their intrinsic superiority, are nowconfident in their eventual supremacy - and thus they are contestingthe legitimacy of the President of the United States, and indeed ourentire government, directly. We have been down this path before, too- it led to the Civil War.

That phrase - civil war- is the second reason I letthis post percolate for so long. I’m naturally antithetical tohysterical “sky is falling” arguments, as they’re invariably fullof shit and trying to sway people with fear and emotion, the facts beutterly damned. The current spate of gay,lesbian and transgender people buying guns for self-defenseagainst the imaginary hordes of Right-Wing Gestapo comes as nosurprise, because I’ve watched Conservatives panic-buying AR-15safter every shooting on the evening news for eight goddamn years. Andfor eight years I called them hooting morons becauseObama’s desire to “gitall yer gunz” far, far outstrippedhis ability to do so,legally and politically. Political vigilance against gun control isalways needed, yes, but people rushing to the stores and stockpiling(then-scarce) ammo in their basement were expecting a ban tomorrow,despite over a decade ofDemocrats losing ground on the national gun control debate, to saynothing of the Supreme Court rulings upholding - and incorporating -an individual right to keep and bear arms. Andthe ones I scorned and mocked the most were the ones insisting theymight need to use theirnew rifles in the not-so-distant future; that social unrest and evenviolence was just around the corner. I held these people to be theright-wing incarnation of the hysterical left-wing ninnies I soloathed and spared not my scorn, because being on myside of the fence didn’t make them any less an idiot.

Theday after the Berkeley riot, I decided it was about time I got off myass and purchased an AR-15.

For the first time in my life, Iam truly afraid for my country - and for my friends, my family, andmyself.

[democratsunited-blog]

Socialists working from within to push Democratic Party further left

https://uniteddemocrats.net/?p=6269

Socialists working from within to push Democratic Party further left

Democratic candidates around the country now seek their blessing. Americans are joining their ranks by the thousands, rapidly expanding the group’s membership rolls in just a few years.

And a sharply leftist political agenda that once produced eye rolls – on everything from their opposition to capitalism to their questioning the very existence of prisons – has become a serious topic of discussion on social media, and in mainstream political debate.

In short, it’s going according to a plan by the Democratic Socialists of America, a group that’s dedicated to pushing an anti-capitalist, socialist platform by infiltrating and working within the Democratic Party, and pushing it further and further to the left.

“Progressive and socialist candidates who openly reject the neoliberal mainstream Democratic agenda may choose for pragmatic reasons to use the Democratic Party ballot line in partisan races,” wrote Joseph M. Schwartz, vice chairman of the DSA, in the socialist Jacobin Magazine last August. “But whatever ballot line the movement chooses to use, we must always be working to increase the independent power of labor and the left.”

The Democratic Socialists playbook, detailed on its website, calls for a methodical march to becoming a truly national force – where they can run candidates and push ideas under a Socialist Party banner – by first working from within the Democratic establishment. That strategy paid off big with the recent congressional primary victory of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old DSA member who much of the media has ordained the new face of the Democratic Party. 

Ocasio-Cortez plans to stump for other Democratic primary candidates in the coming days, in Kansas and Michigan. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., a self-described Democratic socialist, reportedly will join for one of the stops. 

The DSA, which is not a formal political party but bills itself as the largest socialist organization in the U.S., is working its way into the Democratic Party in part because of its failure to advance its own brand with a voting public reflexively suspicious of hard-left socialist policies. So it set a goal of working with groups devoted to a wide range of issues like health care, college debt, immigration, and racism to see socialism – and Democratic Socialist political candidates – as the vehicle for policy changes.

“If we don’t relate politically to social forces bigger than our own, DSA could devolve into merely a large socialist sect or subculture,” wrote Schwartz and his co-author, Bhaskar Sunkara, founder of Jacobin Magazine.

The organization also has recognized it needs to broaden the diversity of its own membership, which it concedes is predominately white, male and upper-income.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democratic Socialist who scored an upset victory in the New York Democratic congressional primary

“We will focus on overcoming this historic bias of our organization toward white (particularly male) activists. We will do this by building deeper ties with organizations representing poor and working-class women and people of color …  We must do so with humility and take our lead from the organizations that organize and are led by poor and working-class people in those communities.”

Political experts say the soul searching is somewhat surprising.

“They seem very pragmatic, which to me doesn’t seem very Socialist,” said Daniel Pout, an instructor at Arizona State University’s School of Politics and Global Studies. “They have to almost be non-socialist in order to be popular.”

The DSA’s effort to push their causes through the Democratic political machine has met with success. Ocasio-Cortez has grabbed the headlines and broad media attention, but the DSA claims its candidates have won 22 of some 30 elections they took part in.

Whatever the numbers, it’s become trendy for Democratic Party candidates to align themselves with the Democratic Socialists. One of the more prominent examples is Cynthia Nixon, the former “Sex and the City” actress who is running against Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the New York Democratic gubernatorial primary.

Whatever [political party] ballot line the [socialist] movement chooses to use, we must always be working to increase the independent power of labor and the left.

– Joseph M. Schwartz, vice chairman of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA)

“It’s nice to see that our policies and what we espouse are resonating with people running for governor,” said Abdullah Younous, co-chair of DSA’s New York City chapter, to Politico. “The landscape is really shifting, and people are noticing it across the state.”

And the Democratic establishment, feeling the pressure to perform well in this year’s midterm elections, doesn’t seem terribly concerned about the DSA’s efforts to push the party even further left. 

“The DNC’s mission is to elect Democrats from the school board to the oval office, and we welcome the help of all organizations to achieve that goal,” said Sabrina Singh, deputy communications director for the Democratic National Committee. The DSA declined to comment for this article. 

That leaves Democratic Socialists in a position to withhold their endorsement if a Democratic candidate isn’t far-left enough, posing a challenge to those who see the group as a vehicle to boost their chances of getting elected.

A flyer at a New York City DSA meeting to discuss whether to endorse Nixon was quoted by Politico as saying: “We don’t just grant endorsements to progressives who beg us for one. We endorse people who can advance the anti-capitalist struggle.”

DSA members say Democratic candidates must be willing to embrace policy positions like universal housing and health care, free public college education, shelter and transportation, the abolition of ICE, of the U.S. Senate, of prisons, and an economy where the worker is the priority. The DSA website also calls for everyone to receive a basic income — whether or not they work.

The group has said it wants to move away from the image – though not all the tenets –  of Marxist-Leninist principles. It does not want to be seen as a fringe group, so DSA-backed candidates frequently quote names like Martin Luther King, Jr. and Franklin D. Roosevelt, rather than Karl Marx or Vladimir Lenin.

Critics say they are determined to hit back at what they depict as a Marxist fox in Democratic sheep’s clothing. A large part of the Democratic Socialists’ growing support comes from younger voters who have no memory of the Cold War, and the more sinister threat and reputation of the Soviet Union and other Socialist states around the world.

“This is the tactic that Communist parties and socialist movements have used all over the world to gain influence in the political world,” said Murray Bessette, academic programs director of the The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, a Washington, D.C., nonprofit. “We saw that in Venezuela. They didn’t come to power as Communists, but that is what they were.”

Bessette said his group teaches about authoritarian regimes that started out by downplaying or denying socialist or Communist leanings.

“Martin Luther King very explicitly considered viewing the Soviet Union and socialists as allies for civil rights in the U.S.,” Bessette said. “But [ultimately] his great speeches, his call for civil rights, were a call for the American people to live up to the principles of the Declaration of Independence. It was an embrace of democratic values, not a rejection of them.”

Some Republicans across the country see opportunities to pick up critical swing votes if Democrats lurch too far left before November’s congressional elections.

“Democratic Socialism is a false paradise,” said Marc Molinaro, Dutchess County, N.Y., executive and front-runner for the Republican gubernatorial nomination. “What New Yorkers and Americans want is the ability to achieve success. Every American family deserves individual freedom, and the opportunity to achieve real success.”

“I don’t think New Yorkers or Americans want to embrace a party that hands over all aspects of our lives to a government that can barely provide services competently.”

Republicans believe they can also capitalize on issues like the Social Democrats’ call to abolish the ICE agency, which is picking up more support among more mainstream Democrats. Wisconsin Rep. Mark Pocan last week introduced legislation to abolish ICE, which led House Speaker Paul Ryan to say Democrats “have really jumped the shark on the left.”

Perhaps in response to the hard swing left among many candidates, some Democratic Party leaders asked Socialist candidates to tone down their anti-capitalist, pro-universal public benefits rhetoric. But emboldened Democratic Socialists don’t seem in the mood for compromise.

Democratic Socialist candidate Franklin Bynum, who in March won the Democratic nomination to be a Houston criminal court judge, simply refused Democratic Party leaders’ pressure to make his tone more mainstream. Bynum made clear the Democratic Party machine was useful to him, for now, given the limits of what he could achieve on the margins.

“If I have money, I will give them money because I can’t organize a get-out-the-vote campaign by myself,” he told the New York Times. “But I am focused more on building a movement than I am on helping Democrats get elected. My priority is reaching people who aren’t being spoken to at all.”

Pout, the Arizona professor, thinks socialists might someday have a chance at building enough support to run candidates of their own, under the Socialist Party banner.

“There’s an attack on the center, in both parties, on business-as-usual,” Pout said. “Jeff Flake, in my state, decided not to run again, he sees no way he can fight against this anti-establishment, anti-status-quo” environment.

Elizabeth Llorente is Senior Reporter for FoxNews.com, and can be reached at Elizabeth.Llorente@Foxnews.com. Follow her on Twitter @Liz_Llorente.

  Read full story here

[takashi0]

#i never thought i'd see the pendulum of political parties swinging back the other direction#i remember learning in history class that republicans and democrats used to basically be opposite of how they currently are#in terms of values and lowkey its kinda surreal#seeing the value shift real time because now many democrats and leftists#consider being anti-censorship for example and standing up to censorship to be an alt right dogwhistle#even though i remember when i was younger#it was always the republicans and the right who were pro-censorship and all that moral value shit#and that shift is seen in other aspects too like#the whole acab and dfp shit#where they're too headass to realize that a normal person#who does not spend all of their time micro analyzing on social media#absolutely will take your slogans at face value

Also, what these pro-ACAB idiots don't realize is that police officers sees shit that people can only have nightmares about. They don't realize that cops would often have PTSD from seeing so many innocent people getting killed in very gruesome ways, entire families being slaughtered at times, just the cruelties of others. Hell, they even catch legit child predators in the act (1/2)

There's even a video that showed body cam of cops busting into a hotel and finding a child with blood on the bed in which they arrested the pedophile, who kidnapped the child, hiding in the room. And these cops have to see that SO OFTEN while these idiots who are screaming "ACAB!! reblog to hate a cop uwu because they're all pigs uwu" get fucking """triggered""" because of fictional shit. It's just... So damn infuriating to see

The biggest issue is that many of them are unwilling to accept criticism (which would allow them to see the faults in their movement/slogan/whatever) or talk about other alternatives to just defunding and getting rid of the police. Like Obama said, the left is awful at conveying a message. 

“The key is deciding, do you want to actually get something done, or do you want to feel good among the people you already agree with?” Obama added.

And wanna know something? A lot of them want to feel good among people they already agree with. To them, that’s progress. They often have no intention or desire to actually do anything. They have no intention or desire to reach out to anyone other than those who already disagree with them. And ironically enough, a lot of the people criticizing Obama for criticizing the way they go about things are blue checkmarks and people who have a cushy bed of money to sit and a house that is guarded by a nice, picket fence. A lot of them think that if they have to convince you or think that you’re just an idiot for not fully understanding what a three/four letter slogan means and how it is intended to be interpreted, then you aren’t worth getting on their side.

This, among many other reasons, is why the left and progressives are fucking losing to republicans and conservatives. Yeah, ik that defund the police and ACAB is meant to say that the system is corrupt and that some police areas are overly funded. However, I still disagree with it for the criticisms outlined in my other post, as well as the fact that some areas actually have a relatively decent police force and because I know that politicians will probably gleefully defund the police and then take another vacation. 

I also disagree because I know what those slogans “truly mean” because I’m fortunate (or unfortunate depending on how you look at it) enough to be able to spend a majority of my time on social media watching idiots be idiots. If you have to give a one to two minutes long explanation of what something means after you say it because someone doesn’t “truly” get what it means, that is a sign that it is fucking awful. 

Like I have absolutely zero issues (other than ya know, general safety, people, etc.) against social workers, paramedics, etc. being sent out to places alongside the police so that way, they can properly deal with issues. The reality is that police officers are not trained to be able to evaluate mental health and may not have any idea how to talk down a crazy addict. The reality is that social workers and paramedics are not equipped to deal with said crazy addict waving around a gun and threatening to shoot people. Given that the situation can be one of two ways, both should be sent out to investigate and better allow one or the other to actually do their job. Not to mention, if some fucked up shit does happen, you have people that are not obligated to feel like they need to protect someone out of fear of repercussions or loss of their job. 

Similarly, I have no issues with scrapping the current training system that police officers have to go through in favor of one that better teaches how to de-escalate and how to better handle situations before having to turn to aggression. I also have no issues with either getting rid of or heavily limiting police unions. I have no issues re-allocating money from overly funded police forces to better public systems. 

However, despite all that if you so much as criticize acab or the dtp crowd you’re just someone who uwu wants to sleep in the same bed as pigs uwu or yOu jUsT dOnT gEt iT. If you have to constantly tell people “they just don’t get it” or “they’re misinterpreting it” every time a criticism is brought up, that is probably a sign that it should be re-evaluated and to evaluate whether those criticisms hold weight and if so, use those criticisms to better yourself. 

But, since they want to feel good around people who already agree with them, they see no reason to change. As long as many of them continue to do that, they will continue to lose supporters

[takashi0]

#i never thought i'd see the pendulum of political parties swinging back the other direction#i remember learning in history class that republicans and democrats used to basically be opposite of how they currently are#in terms of values and lowkey its kinda surreal#seeing the value shift real time because now many democrats and leftists#consider being anti-censorship for example and standing up to censorship to be an alt right dogwhistle#even though i remember when i was younger#it was always the republicans and the right who were pro-censorship and all that moral value shit#and that shift is seen in other aspects too like#the whole acab and dfp shit#where they're too headass to realize that a normal person#who does not spend all of their time micro analyzing on social media#absolutely will take your slogans at face value

Also, what these pro-ACAB idiots don't realize is that police officers sees shit that people can only have nightmares about. They don't realize that cops would often have PTSD from seeing so many innocent people getting killed in very gruesome ways, entire families being slaughtered at times, just the cruelties of others. Hell, they even catch legit child predators in the act (1/2)

There's even a video that showed body cam of cops busting into a hotel and finding a child with blood on the bed in which they arrested the pedophile, who kidnapped the child, hiding in the room. And these cops have to see that SO OFTEN while these idiots who are screaming "ACAB!! reblog to hate a cop uwu because they're all pigs uwu" get fucking """triggered""" because of fictional shit. It's just... So damn infuriating to see

The biggest issue is that many of them are unwilling to accept criticism (which would allow them to see the faults in their movement/slogan/whatever) or talk about other alternatives to just defunding and getting rid of the police. Like Obama said, the left is awful at conveying a message. 

“The key is deciding, do you want to actually get something done, or do you want to feel good among the people you already agree with?” Obama added.

And wanna know something? A lot of them want to feel good among people they already agree with. To them, that’s progress. They often have no intention or desire to actually do anything. They have no intention or desire to reach out to anyone other than those who already disagree with them. And ironically enough, a lot of the people criticizing Obama for criticizing the way they go about things are blue checkmarks and people who have a cushy bed of money to sit and a house that is guarded by a nice, picket fence. A lot of them think that if they have to convince you or think that you’re just an idiot for not fully understanding what a three/four letter slogan means and how it is intended to be interpreted, then you aren’t worth getting on their side.

This, among many other reasons, is why the left and progressives are fucking losing to republicans and conservatives. Yeah, ik that defund the police and ACAB is meant to say that the system is corrupt and that some police areas are overly funded. However, I still disagree with it for the criticisms outlined in my other post, as well as the fact that some areas actually have a relatively decent police force and because I know that politicians will probably gleefully defund the police and then take another vacation. 

I also disagree because I know what those slogans “truly mean” because I’m fortunate (or unfortunate depending on how you look at it) enough to be able to spend a majority of my time on social media watching idiots be idiots. If you have to give a one to two minutes long explanation of what something means after you say it because someone doesn’t “truly” get what it means, that is a sign that it is fucking awful. 

Like I have absolutely zero issues (other than ya know, general safety, people, etc.) against social workers, paramedics, etc. being sent out to places alongside the police so that way, they can properly deal with issues. The reality is that police officers are not trained to be able to evaluate mental health and may not have any idea how to talk down a crazy addict. The reality is that social workers and paramedics are not equipped to deal with said crazy addict waving around a gun and threatening to shoot people. Given that the situation can be one of two ways, both should be sent out to investigate and better allow one or the other to actually do their job. Not to mention, if some fucked up shit does happen, you have people that are not obligated to feel like they need to protect someone out of fear of repercussions or loss of their job. 

Similarly, I have no issues with scrapping the current training system that police officers have to go through in favor of one that better teaches how to de-escalate and how to better handle situations before having to turn to aggression. I also have no issues with either getting rid of or heavily limiting police unions. I have no issues re-allocating money from overly funded police forces to better public systems. 

However, despite all that if you so much as criticize acab or the dtp crowd you’re just someone who uwu wants to sleep in the same bed as pigs uwu or yOu jUsT dOnT gEt iT. If you have to constantly tell people “they just don’t get it” or “they’re misinterpreting it” every time a criticism is brought up, that is probably a sign that it should be re-evaluated and to evaluate whether those criticisms hold weight and if so, use those criticisms to better yourself. 

But, since they want to feel good around people who already agree with them, they see no reason to change. As long as many of them continue to do that, they will continue to lose supporters

[takashi0]

#i never thought i'd see the pendulum of political parties swinging back the other direction#i remember learning in history class that republicans and democrats used to basically be opposite of how they currently are#in terms of values and lowkey its kinda surreal#seeing the value shift real time because now many democrats and leftists#consider being anti-censorship for example and standing up to censorship to be an alt right dogwhistle#even though i remember when i was younger#it was always the republicans and the right who were pro-censorship and all that moral value shit#and that shift is seen in other aspects too like#the whole acab and dfp shit#where they're too headass to realize that a normal person#who does not spend all of their time micro analyzing on social media#absolutely will take your slogans at face value

Also, what these pro-ACAB idiots don't realize is that police officers sees shit that people can only have nightmares about. They don't realize that cops would often have PTSD from seeing so many innocent people getting killed in very gruesome ways, entire families being slaughtered at times, just the cruelties of others. Hell, they even catch legit child predators in the act (1/2)

There's even a video that showed body cam of cops busting into a hotel and finding a child with blood on the bed in which they arrested the pedophile, who kidnapped the child, hiding in the room. And these cops have to see that SO OFTEN while these idiots who are screaming "ACAB!! reblog to hate a cop uwu because they're all pigs uwu" get fucking """triggered""" because of fictional shit. It's just... So damn infuriating to see

The biggest issue is that many of them are unwilling to accept criticism (which would allow them to see the faults in their movement/slogan/whatever) or talk about other alternatives to just defunding and getting rid of the police. Like Obama said, the left is awful at conveying a message. 

“The key is deciding, do you want to actually get something done, or do you want to feel good among the people you already agree with?” Obama added.

And wanna know something? A lot of them want to feel good among people they already agree with. To them, that’s progress. They often have no intention or desire to actually do anything. They have no intention or desire to reach out to anyone other than those who already disagree with them. And ironically enough, a lot of the people criticizing Obama for criticizing the way they go about things are blue checkmarks and people who have a cushy bed of money to sit and a house that is guarded by a nice, picket fence. A lot of them think that if they have to convince you or think that you’re just an idiot for not fully understanding what a three/four letter slogan means and how it is intended to be interpreted, then you aren’t worth getting on their side.

This, among many other reasons, is why the left and progressives are fucking losing to republicans and conservatives. Yeah, ik that defund the police and ACAB is meant to say that the system is corrupt and that some police areas are overly funded. However, I still disagree with it for the criticisms outlined in my other post, as well as the fact that some areas actually have a relatively decent police force and because I know that politicians will probably gleefully defund the police and then take another vacation. 

I also disagree because I know what those slogans “truly mean” because I’m fortunate (or unfortunate depending on how you look at it) enough to be able to spend a majority of my time on social media watching idiots be idiots. If you have to give a one to two minutes long explanation of what something means after you say it because someone doesn’t “truly” get what it means, that is a sign that it is fucking awful. 

Like I have absolutely zero issues (other than ya know, general safety, people, etc.) against social workers, paramedics, etc. being sent out to places alongside the police so that way, they can properly deal with issues. The reality is that police officers are not trained to be able to evaluate mental health and may not have any idea how to talk down a crazy addict. The reality is that social workers and paramedics are not equipped to deal with said crazy addict waving around a gun and threatening to shoot people. Given that the situation can be one of two ways, both should be sent out to investigate and better allow one or the other to actually do their job. Not to mention, if some fucked up shit does happen, you have people that are not obligated to feel like they need to protect someone out of fear of repercussions or loss of their job. 

Similarly, I have no issues with scrapping the current training system that police officers have to go through in favor of one that better teaches how to de-escalate and how to better handle situations before having to turn to aggression. I also have no issues with either getting rid of or heavily limiting police unions. I have no issues re-allocating money from overly funded police forces to better public systems. 

However, despite all that if you so much as criticize acab or the dtp crowd you’re just someone who uwu wants to sleep in the same bed as pigs uwu or yOu jUsT dOnT gEt iT. If you have to constantly tell people “they just don’t get it” or “they’re misinterpreting it” every time a criticism is brought up, that is probably a sign that it should be re-evaluated and to evaluate whether those criticisms hold weight and if so, use those criticisms to better yourself. 

But, since they want to feel good around people who already agree with them, they see no reason to change. As long as many of them continue to do that, they will continue to lose supporters