#those are the tools of fascists

[decolonize-the-everything]

PSA baby leftists:

src

"Scratch a liberal and a fascist bleeds" was a Black Panther slogan for a reason.

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The Crooked politicians in the government are working with the Negro civil rights leaders, but not to solve the race problem. The greedy politicians who run this government give lip-service to the civil rights struggle only to further their own selfish interests. And their main interest as politicians is to stay in power. In this deceitful American game of power politics, the Negroes (i.e., the race problem, the integration and civil rights issues) are nothing but tools, used by one group of whites called Liberals against another group of whites called Conservatives, either to get into power or to remain in power. Among whites here in America, the political teams are no longer divided into Democrats and Republicans. The whites who are now struggling for control of the American political throne are divided into "liberal" and "conservative" camps. The white liberals from both parties cross party lines to work together toward the same goal, and white conservatives from both parties do likewise. The white liberal differs from the white conservative only in one way: the liberal is more deceitful than the conservative. The liberal is more hypocritical than the conservative. Both want power, but the white liberal is the one who has perfected the art of posing as the Negro's friend and benefactor; and by winning the friendship, allegiance, and support of the Negro, the white liberal is able to use the Negro as a pawn or tool in this political "football game" that is constantly raging between the white liberals and white conservatives. Politically the American Negro is nothing but a football and the white liberals control this mentally dead ball through tricks of tokenism: false promises of integration and civil rights. In this profitable game of deceiving and exploiting the political politician of the American Negro, those white liberals have the willing cooperation of the Negro civil rights leaders. These "leaders" sell out our people for just a few crumbs of token recognition and token gains. These "leaders" are satisfied with token victories and token progress because they themselves are nothing but token leaders.

-Malcolm X

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The conservative, who does not dispute the validity of revolutions deeply buried in history, invokes visions of impending anarchy in order to legitimize his demand for absolute obedience. Law and order, with the major emphasis on order, is his watchword. The liberal articulates his sensitiveness to certain of society's intolerable details, but will almost never prescribe methods of resistance which exceed the limits of legality - redress through electoral channels is the liberal's panacea.

- Angela Davis, If They Come in the Morning: Voices of Resistance

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Since I know liberals like him so much:

[apas-95]

I think the 'problematic media' issue is composed of two principle parts, one superceding the other.

Firstly, and the most important to address to cut the discourse off at the head; yes, media is a vector by which social systems reinforce themselves. This is the purpose of propaganda, and this dynamic is completely intelligible to us if we consider the cases of 'person whose sole source of online interaction was 4chan, and who exclusively watched History Channel hagiography about fascist war machines', or 'person who developed inappropriate ideas about sex through watching misogynistic media'. It is plainly clear that it is both possible and common for media to influence people ideologically, as an apparatus of a given social system. Material reality dictates which social systems are given ideological hegemony in media, but media is in fact an effective tool of those systems.

Secondly, while acknowledging the first point, it is not the dominating factor, here. While media can and does influence people ideologically, often commandingly so, it is not some sort of cognitohazard. It is plainly possible to watch, even repeatedly over an extended timetrame, some given piece of fascist propaganda, or abuse apologia, or what have you, without becoming any more beholden to its ideas - if anything, becoming more opposed. The crucial thing, here, is that doing so requires some level of understanding and defence against the ideas presented. Someone with no rebuttal to fascist positions, with no even kneejerk dismissal that what they're taking in is fascist, is unlikely not to internalise something if they're surrounded by fascist media. On the other hand, someone who has been innoculated with opposing political theory, who is capable of recognising the social systems being reinforced by a given communicative work and reasonably countermand them, can watch a thousand misogynist movies, read a thousand racist books, peruse a thousand transphobic news articles, and leave with only stronger convictions to oppose these systems. Clearly, the dominating factor here is not the content of the media itself, but the content of the audience - whether the audience is able to sufficiently recognise, interrogate, and oppose the messaging in a given work.

All this is to say - yes, media can and does influence beliefs, but that that influence is completely subordinate to the question of whether the audience has any level of political theory or critical analysis. A liberal reading fascist literature, not holding any real theoretical opposition to the content of fascism, is safe so long as they can recognise and reject basic fascist signifiers. A feminist is able to recognise misogynistic logic in a given work. A communist can recognise and countermand reactionary spin in a news article or wikipedia page. While the politically-unconscious man will not recognise that his favourite sitcom is instilling him with absurdly sexist views on marriage, the issue here is not the media itself. Fundamentally - the issue of 'problematic media' is one best and principally solved by the development of political theory and political education, not by any suppression of the media itself, which is cumbersome.

[germiyahu]

Like can we think about the journey this website has taken? From mocking people who claim not to be bigoted and smugly patting them on the head and explaining that they are bigots but just don't realize it... to becoming those bigots?

This website used to laugh at people who said "I'm not a homophobe! I'm not afraid of things that are the same lel!" Now it says "We're not antisemites... we have nothing against Semites only genocidal Zionazis and their colonizer supporters 😂"

This website used to see red when people said "I'm not a transphobe, I just have concerns about the unregulated influence this MOVEMENT OF GENDER IDEOLOGUES is having on innocent children!" Now it says "We're not antisemites, we're just curious who is funding all this pro-Zionist legislation and initiatives and campus organizations! Aren't you worried that Zionists have an undue influence in our government and culture?"

This website used to sneer at people who said "I'm not a racist! It's a fact that black people [misquoted and misinterpreted statistic]! My God you people are against the truth!" Now it says "We're not antisemites when Zionists have proven that their bloodthirsty fascistic goals are widely supported by Jewish institutions in America, who aren't even true Jews by the way! Zionism =/= Judaism real Jews support Palestine ✊"

This website used to roll its eyes at people who said "I'm not a misogynist! Women have their equal rights under the law, and if you research it they actually have it better off than men in several areas, they're always whining about nothing!" Now it says "We're not antisemites, Jews are a protected class, more than you can say for most actual minorities, they control succeed in finance, entertainment, politics, in what ways are they oppressed? Where are these streets that Jews don't feel safe on lol? Why do they always cry antisemitism when there's a genocide going on? They actually collaborate with the police state btw 🤓"

And there are so many more examples and parallels and my posts are always too long. Antisemitism is the rug being pulled out from under Leftists to reveal that they've been right wing bigots this whole time. Antisemitism is a tool that Leftists use to radicalize themselves into abandoning their own principles, because it's just too enticing not to use it.

[qqueenofhades]

But…but…Biden has a great team of ethical, effective, smart, not evil people around him who are not 81. Also, if he gets elected and becomes senile or dies of old age or something, we have a procedure for that and then we end up with a president Harris who will probably be swell!

Cheeto Hitler (NOT THAT MUCH YOUNGER) is probably never going to die bc he’s like a cockroach, but if he got elected and did, we’d still have the axis of evil to contend with, who will be swiftly dismantling democracy as fast as their bloody, bejeweled hands can do it.

I mean... yes. This. You are not just voting for one person, you are voting for the entire team that you want to run the country. Biden is the manager and most prominent player on that team, but regardless of what SCOTUS says, he is not the only almighty god-king. When you vote for team blue, you are voting for the people who staff every federal agency, the cabinet picks, the judges who will be appointed (already the most diverse ever selected and a MAJOR issue due to the possibility of SCOTUS seats, which may be filled under Biden but WILL be filled under Trump when Thomas and Alito retire to make way for younger wingnuts), the ambassadors and diplomats, the people who make foreign and domestic policy. Etc. Etc. You are not only choosing one person, and as noted, if Biden God forbid DID bite the dust, there is a perfectly competent and indeed very historic replacement ready to take over. That is the Vice President's literal entire job and always has been.

When you vote for team blue, you are voting for a team of (for the most part) well-meaning, diverse, intelligent, qualified people who want to make life better for America/the world, and who genuinely believe in democracy as a concept. They are flawed, because they are human, but they are still by any reasonable metric the only choice at hand. That is because team fascist, uh, red, has literally descended to the depths of cartoonish and unimaginable evil and continues to make their intentions clear at every moment. Any argument to the contrary is thus delusional and wishful thinking. As such, I literally do not care if you think Biden is personally the antichrist. You are not exempted from the moral duty to do everything possible to stop the other guys from getting into power, and if that is voting for the team that Biden happens to currently manage, so be it. Anyone saying otherwise is either a Russian psyop, a tankie, a doomer, a bot, or an idiot, and none of those are your friend. Voting is the number one most repeatedly reliable tool at hand to fumigate fascists. I suggest we use it.

[some-stars]

y’all fascists don’t get that way because they’re just so stupid. and pointing and laughing at how dumb they make themselves look means you’re not thinking of them as the extreme threat that they are. like they do tend to be stupid in some ways but they make pretty solid plans and usually execute them well, as we’ve seen over the last 50 years of them continually winning. if you assume your opponent is an idiot you’re not going to be able to counter them effectively. as we have also seen. fascism has many sophisticated rhetorical tools at its disposal, and making those tools look unsophisticated is itself a tool.

[hamliet]

the notion that bnha is pro authoritarianism or social hierarchies is nonsensical not to mention acting like being pro cop is bad

Err... BNHA is pretty pro-authoritarian. I actually find it pretty disturbing. And that's even if the story turns out with the League alive at the end.

As for being pro-cop--cops are human individuals, yes. But people have in recent years in multiple countries (including Japan, by the way) protested against cops being used as tools to maintain social hierarchies wherein people who are not part of that hierarchy suffer for daring to want to be treated as human beings. When I say I'm anti-cop, I'm not saying I hate anyone on the basis of being a cop. But I am saying that the ways in which the police force are used in many countries does societal harm. Critical thinking, yo.

Honestly I feel like this whole story (BNHA) and fans reactions throughout (especially when compared to other stories) demonstrate how people are not using critical thinking. And that can have real world consequences, though it doesn't have to.

I just find it weird that people are okay with a story where the ruling class is always right and always wins. Like... how have they not? I mean, even stories that end up suggesting the ruling class isn't entirely wrong or show flaws in rebellions generally don't go hard on the authoritarianism. But Horikoshi... is doing this.

The whole thing is so weird to me personally, too, because Horikoshi's wishy-washy framing and switches in coding generally seem to be the result of him caring, deeply, what his audience thinks and feels. Too much, really, but it also seems like he genuinely doesn't want to hurt people. Except this ending--even if Tenko does reappear as New Character and saves the League--is the exact opposite. (If Tenko doesn't reappear, then everything I'm about to say is multiplied by a thousand.)

It's catering to mean-spiritedness, and while I do understand fiction isn't reality, the side he's catering to now is making the argument that fictional crimes are real crimes and thus must meet real penalties.

I can play this game too.

If people are gonna make those arguments, I'm going to say they're the problem and the reason we have wars, genocides, assaults, and more.

If you ever want a cycle of violence/abuse to stop, someone has to accept that they've taken the last punch. Not keep going until the other side is WIPED OUT.

If you equate justice with equalizing losses, then you are enacting Dazai from BSD's statement on justice: justice is a weapon. You can never heal by it.

If you want to heal, you have to stop fighting and bandage wounds. And maybe you are too injured to do the bandaging. That's okay. But someone else can, and if you try to stop them on the premise of "but no one bandaged my wounds" you're a bitter person who makes the world a worser place.

If you say a tragedy is the story, sure. But you have to set up tragedies from the start. See, Attack on Titan, which's ending I love. It began with someone crying and an ominous message to the future. You don't set up your first chapter with "this is the story of how I become the greatest hero!" spend 200+ chapters criticizing hero society and have the hero fail at the goal he'd been repeating for 200 chapters in the end and join hero society and still think you wrote a story that delivered in what you promised. You failed.

Either you wrote a tragedy and are trying to pass it off as a happy story (see how well that works usually) or your understanding of a happy story is pretty much just fascist propaganda. And yes, BNHA does have fascist themes at this point. Way more than AoT ever did. But they have smiles and cute frog girls so it's not nearly as dangerous, right? (sarcastic).

The thing is, this is where the lack of critical thinking comes in. While I've seen people talk a bit about how BNHA seems like copaganda, it's taking things much, much further than other stories usually do and into territory where I'm frankly disturbed.

Yes, BNHA started out as a clever critique of hero society and of the very idea it's now seeming to uphold: that the human instinct (which is universal in real life to) to idolize people leads to a lack of humanity for those who do not have those traits we idolize, whether their fault or not, and for people to become villains in response. But not only has it failed to deliver on this premise by upholding society (hey, Naruto and to a degree Tokyo Ghoul also failed to completely change society), it's gone so far as to endorse what it previously criticized.

It's more akin to Game of Thrones Season 8 upholding racism, sexism, and classism, than it is to Naruto or Tokyo Ghoul. GoT ended with a joke about prioritizing brothels being open, as if the misogyny was actually a good thing and not what caused a lot of the problems. There's no critical lens here. It's just like "hey, there was no point in struggling. Monarchies that abuse women, rah rah, let's go!"

BNHA seems to be going a similar route. Deku's murder of Shigaraki, Ochaco's crying over Toga, the way Shouto reaches out to Touya--it's sad, but not framed as something the audience should see as a wrong done on behalf of heroes. In fact, the heroes are not criticized at all. Frickin' Edgeshot, whom no one cares about, is fine. All of them are fine. Their statuses are generally fine, too, except maybe Enji's and even then he's not like going to face the fate of the League and die alone. His family still supports him. Hawks is completely fine and framed positively. His regret over Twice is pure lipservice. Deku really did just need to kill Shigaraki, and all his "I want to save" spiel, much like Ochaco's, is for naught. He just needed to learn to grow up and get in line.

Even if Tenko comes back, and even if Deku like... somehow knew this would happen via vestiges or whatnot (let's be real, he will if this is the case), and the message is just that society isn't ready to move forward, but at least they can live, then... I don't know, y'all. That's still depressing. I don't see how Deku is a hero for that, much less the greatest number one hero. He decided to be a hero at the cost of his own integrity, and if this was a gritty story about the realistic struggle of living in a capitalistic society where ethics are always compromised that would make sense, but... it's not. Even until the final battle, the characters were endorsing idealism.

At the very least, Horikoshi didn't deliver on his promise in the first chapter. At the very worst, he's endorsing fascist ideals.

Like, I'm sorry, but "kill this person for the good of society," the violent upholding of oppressive societal hierarchies, the importance of being a cop hero and the way the military hero brutalities are worshipped, the way heroes are lauded and everyone who doesn't get in line with this is punished, went from being criticized to being endorsed. Those are all central elements of fascism.

The little guy deserves to lose, but, but Deku is the little guy, so it can't be! Except it can be. Because it's actually pretty common irl even to trot out examples of people like Candace Owens to be like "hey, you can't possibly say Republicans are racist!"

And don't you dare say "but Japanese culture makes it unreasonable to expect a non retributive justice!" The Japanese people are not a monolith. Not to mention... Naruto, Bungou Stray Dogs, Monster, Hunter x Hunter, Yu Yu Hakusho, Mawaru Penguindrum, Oshi no Ko, Dragon Ball, Attack on Titan, and Tokyo Ghoul all say hi.

I hated the TG ending, and still hate it, but I'm not going to say that it upheld the CCG as right all along because it didn't. BNHA thus far is doing that with hero society. And even if the answer is for the League be revived and to leave society or whatever, then how can we be happy Deku is a part of this society? How can we root for him, or his classmates? Is he going to work from the inside to change it? Why wasn't that emphasized beforehand as a theme or struggle?

tl;dr Horikoshi has cooked his story no matter what he does now, and I don't think it's salvageable. Either way it has themes that are disturbing especially considering real world events across the globe, and that people should be more aware of instead of focusing solely on stories that have fascism and monsters in them but don't uphold it.

[cavegirlpoems]

The Beast & The Church in 'Black Death Rising'

I'm writing a religious horror rpg, in which the End Of Days is in full swing in 15th century Europe. I figured it'd be worth it to talk about that game's religious perspective.

So I'm going to do something inadvisable, and talk about religion from a christian perspective. (religious/setting design ramblings under the cut)

Some context. I'm a quaker; for those less invested in minor christian dissenter sects, I'll give a brief summary. Quakers are a sect going back to the 17th century, with a strong focus on egaletarianism and individual conscience. No clergy or heirarchy, no formalised doctrines, and - historically and currently - a lot of focus on social justice issues. Honesty, equality, pacifism and simplicity as core value. So that's the overview.

This is, you will note, a stark contrast to a lot of what Christianity is currently, and has historically been. Which is to say, quite often on the side of the wealthy, the societally entrenched, and the oppressive.

I am also, as it happens, very openly and obviously queer. As you can imagine, this makes me really quite uncomfortable in a lot of 'christian spaces'.

So. Let's turn our attention to the Book of Revelations, as the various ideas in there are a lot of the game's inspiration. Revelations is written extremely abstractly, with dense metaphorical language rather than a direct accounting of events. There are, needless to say, a wide variety of ways to interpret the text, but I will focus on my own.

A key feature of Revelations is the subversion of religion; the idea of a false prophet turning religion away from its moral/spiritual purpose, and making it a tool for politics, leading to the rise of 'the beast' to power. It's made clear that as the beast seizes power, it goes on to use that power to persecute the outgroup (with whom the text's sympathies lie) and that a church controlled by and reverent of the beast becomes evil and totalitarian, leading to widespread suffering.

The parallels to the state of christianity in the modern day are, to my mind, quite apt. A wide faction - 'conservative christianity' to be polite about it, or christian nationalism to be more blunt - aligns itself with the oppresser over the oppressed, concerns itself with worldly wealth and power, and is actively and openly and inexorably tied to dangerous political forces. That mainstream christianity frequently acts in support of fascism is hard to miss.

There is a particular horror, I think, to seeing representations of one's faith hollowed out and distorted, emptied of their spiritual value and instead becoming a tool for evil. The perversion of what should be sacred has a huge potential for horror.

This is, after all, a particular horror one encounters in a regular basis in the real world. I mean, fuck, one simply needs to see Kenneth Copeland speak for 30 seconds to get a sense of something deeply, deeply wrong.

So, this is the horror the game seeks to capture and accentuate. The sense of what should be holy having been emptied out and used for evil. The twisting of faith to become a tool for fascism.

To this end, the game treats aspects of Revelations quite literally. The Beast is, in fact, the leader of a vast and horrible fascist empire that is the cause of misery on a vast scale. Key to this is the total cooption of the church. The 'pope' is a reanimated corpse issueing proclamations at the Beast's direction, and the church is an engine of propaganda and inquisition that serves to enforce the empire's orthodoxy and stoke hatred against the Empire's outgroups.

This is not to say that faith is absent, but those possessing true spiritual conviction (and with it, in some cases, the ability to perform miracles) are definitively outside the church; actual faith is the domain of religious dissenters and heretics. PC clerics are not members of the church, they're actively persecuted by that church for - essentially - their refusal to spiritually sell out.

(Also, critically, miracles are not the sole domain of christianity; the game treats Jewish and Muslim figures as equally capable of performing miracles, and grants relics associated with those religions equal potency to christian ones; what matters is spiritual conviction, not one's specific denomination).

Other aspects of The Beast's Empire followed from this. Inquisitors and paramilitary agents are common enemies, and the 'seven heads and ten horns' are taken to represent The Beasts inner circle of most powerful servants.

In particular, I've given the Beast's empire it's own form of magic, Defixion, with the name taken from old roman curse-tablets. Defixion is, essentially, the magic of spiritually selling out. In exchange for eroding the user's soul, they become bound to The Beast and his empire; this gives him incredible power over them, but also grants them power based on their position within the Empire's heirarchy. Importantly, it's totally, one-hundred-percent off limits to player characters; playing as the fascists simply exists outside the scope of the game. Instead, Defixion is an explanation for why the Empire's agents have scary monster stat-blocks.

The choice of what to make The Mark Of The Beast was surprisingly easy; it's a cross, the same one that is embraced by fascist groups such as Stormfront.

(This also ties in with the use of the inverted cross as a counter-cultural icon; it's historically been a symbol of humility before God, and in the modern age is associated with strongly anti-church sentiments. In a setting where the church has turned away from God and towards hateful political power, those two meanings can go hand in hand.)

In conclusion: "I know writers who use subtext, and they're all cowards."

[tyrantisterror]

Your recent train of posts about you-know-who’s book series got me thinking. You once said “The Owl House works as a sort of rebuttal to Harry Potter in a lot of ways”, care to elaborate on that statement? Especially in regards to how The Owl House’s worldbuilding and themes clash with Harry Potter’s?

Oh man... I don't want my blog to be consumed by Harry Potter Hot Takes. I'd prefer to vent most of those feelings through my wizard books instead, it's more productive that way.

So, ok, short version: The Owl House is about a teenager from the mundane world discovering there's a magical world hidden away, goes there to learn magic, and in the process uncovers a plot by an abominable fascist to commit genocide. In very simplistic terms, that is more or less the same plot as Harry Potter.

But the devil's in the details, isn't it? Luz doesn't have any grand inheritance to claim, no prophecy to fulfill, nothing that makes her the most special specialest special person of all time. There's even a whole episode early on where a villain tries to lure her to her doom by claiming she's the chosen one, and the lesson is that NO ONE is "chosen" for greatness - greatness is something you make yourself, not something that's thrust upon you. She is not inherently gifted as a witch - in fact, she struggles harder because she doesn't have a a special bladder true witches are born with, and has to learn an ancient and forgotten method of spellcasting basically from scratch to cast spells at all. She is, emphatically and at times definitely deliberately, the opposite of what Harry Potter is.

So is her academic experience. There's a magic school in this setting, and (at first) it wants nothing to do with Luz because she's human, not a witch, and thus is believed to be incapable of casting spells. So Luz's primary mode of education on magic comes from a private mentor, Eda, who is also a wanted criminal and social outcast because of her disdain for the draconian rules of their society. Eda is an unconventional but magnificent mentor, one who is as willing to try new things and learn new methods as Luz herself, and who helps Luz discover ways to make possible what everyone else claims is impossible. Eventually Luz does convince the magic school to take her in, but in the process she changes how it runs, challenging a lot of its preconceived notions and forcing them to do better.

Which is vital, because the biggest problem facing the society of this magical world is narrow-minded reliance on outdated social categorization. Like HP, people are sorted into categories (covens here instead of houses), which they are then forced to stick to and never dabble in the others. It is explicitly compared to both the concept of tracking in real world education (i.e. forcing kids into a career path early and ONLY giving them education relevant to that one career) and the house system of HP:

And it's wrong. It's both presented as needlessly limiting, terrible for encouraging advancement and growth of both the students and society as a whole, and an immoral system that's only kept alive by the "Well, this is how we've always done it" inertia that keeps so many awful traditions in education alive. And I really do mean it's immoral, because it's the brain child and secretly crucial evil tool of a genocidal fascist.

I kind of cringe at writing those two words since I feel people have been WAY too quick to accuse cartoon villains from children's shows of fascism and genocide - like, Chairface Chippendale writing his name on the moon with a laser would probably kill a shitload of people in real life, but that doesn't mean he's an analogue to Hitler. But Belos, like fellow Disney villain Frollo, is clearly intended to be exactly that: a genocidal fascist. In a world full of magic-fueled absurdist black comedy beats, Emperor Belos stands out as a consistently serious threat, tonally dissonant with his surroundings in a way that makes him chillingly effective as a villain. And like real world powerful bigots, his power primarily comes from the fact that the systems of society favor his mindset over those of outsides like Luz and Eda - all the systems of oppression our heroes chafe against were either created by or worsened by him, with the express purpose of using them to kill everyone and everything in the magical world.

Luz could not be more thematically opposed to her enemy, and the story is incredibly consistent in showing how defeating Belos alone isn't enough, but that the systems that empowered him have to be disproven and dismantled. His enablers must be destroyed or humbled, the prejudices he encouraged must be torn down and fought at every turn, and innovation and progress must be embraced for the good of all. There's so much stuff you could analyze about the themes in that show regarding oppression and the othering of people who are different, and it's all so, SO much more consistent than the discussion of the same themes you'll find in Harry Potter.

[autolenaphilia]

The average tumblr queer hates fascism and terfs, and they should, but because they have zero understanding of what those ideologies actually is, they end up repeating such ideology anyway.

They have zero understanding that it is the transmisogynist bioessentialism that makes radfemism so poisonous. So they call trans women mentioning the words "misogyny" and "patriarchy" a terf, while their use of "afab/amab" reveal that they haven't unlearned any bioessentialism and transmisogyny. I've written about this at length before.

And this intellectually lazy acceptance of reactionary thinking goes far beyond that.

Criticize the institutions of religion and the family on this supposed queer communist site, and you'll get massive cries of protest from these queer leftists. And in content if not form they are basically indistinguishable from fascist rhetoric about how "queer leftists who read too many jewish writers (like Marx and Hirschfeld) are trying to eradicate the vital institutions of tradition, religion, family and community with their soulless materialist globohomo." (Note that the link is to a critical glossary of the alt-right on rationalwiki, so there are slurs galore)

And yes, that is what i'm doing, and I'm very proud of it. Abolishing religion and the family, and all of their sanctified traditions is a very important part of the communist project. The main Jewish writer who convinced me of this is Marx, read him.

"The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness." Literally read The Communist Manifesto, which openly calls for the abolition of the family. A lot of suppose leftists repeat what the manifesto calls "The bourgeois clap-trap about the family and education, about the hallowed co-relation of parents and child"

It's especially ironic to hear such things from self-described queers, as if family, religion and tradition aren't the most common tools used to oppress queer people.

A lot of reactionary garbage with a superficial anti-capitalist veneer has gotten into the left, which is not new. The just mentioned manifesto spends a whole chapter criticizing reactionary forms of socialism. I have myself used Marx's still valid analysis as my basis to criticize reactionary anti-capitalism.

There has been so much nationalist garbage absorbed by the left at this point that fascist thinking crop up all the time in the left. This is because planting the roots of 19th century romantic nationalism tends to bear the same fruit. And tumblr leftism is the most intellectually lazy kind of leftism.

Like your average pseudo-leftist position on nations is basically ethnopluralism, a neofascist ideology originating in the European "New right" that is trying to sell the old wine of blood-and-soil nationalism in new bottles for a postcolonial world. It's creator Henning Eichberg spent decades trying to sell his Völkisch ideology to the left. With some success, it seems like. Like the neofascist in ethnopluralist clothing position that "every culture has the right to preserve their own culture and tradition from the onslaught of global capitalist culture" is something that you'll see all the time regurgitated by supposed leftists. The one 19th century european/western concept that is seen as universally applicable is nationalism. It's bleak.

I can't even say the far-left cliché of "read theory", because a lot of theory is garbage. Not all of it though. This list comes from my libertarian marxist/"councilist" biases but Nationalism and Socialism by Paul Mattick is good, as is "Third-worldism and Socialism" an excerpt from an early 70s pamphlet by the British organization Solidarity, and the 1989 essay The Universality of Marx by Loren Goldner.

[archduke-enver-gortash]

time for me to be a cunt i guess. gortash is not some emo ya book bad boy, gortash is an absolute nightmare of a character—a proud fascist, slaver, oppressor and man who has horrific torture/dissection/science experiments as one of his top hobbies. he kidnaps several women and children and mutilates them and ruins their lives beyond recognition. he views himself as judge, jury and executioner of the world he’s violently conquering after his image and everyone else is at best a tool in his hands and at worst a mistake to be discarded. and those things are STILL only parts of the horrors this man enjoys inflicting on people. woobify him all you want, but that will not change this lmao.

[mesetacadre]

So just to preface this is a genuine good faith attempt to rectify my probable gap in understanding, not as any kind of "gotcha" or anything -

I understand that measures like suppression of other parties & anti-Party activity are necessary in the early days of a DotP, when the bourgeoisie haven't been fully ousted and the threat of counterrevolution is high, but hearing about how movements like Hungary '56 and others where legitimate grievances were co-opted by counterrevolutionary elements makes me think that once that phase is over such things become counterproductive?

Like I see other MLs online say that they generally support authoritarianism and that kind of suppression, maybe they're just exaggerating or being ironic and I couldn't tell, and I know that capitalist powers elsewhere are always going to try and forment counterrevolution, but wouldn't the best way to prevent that be to ensure they have no such populist cause to latch on to? Wouldn't a successful communist party have nothing to worry about from other parties if the people were already satisfied with them, why not allow them and show both the people and the rest of the world that nobody has any need or reason to found another?

Hello anon, thanks for taking the time and trying to understand!

First I'll nip this in the bud, "authoritarianism" is not a useful concept at all, every single political action done uses in some way authority, there is no way to get around this. When talking about states, specifically, they all use the same kinds of authority to preserve themselves, so painting just some of them as uniquely reliant on authority is obfuscating the constant violence that sustains any state. what matter is the character of this authority and who it is applied to. In the case of DotBs it is applied on the working class, and viceversa in DotPs. When you see commies saying how much they love authoritarianism or totalitarianism it's just being flippant about the abuse of these terms. Of course we do support the oppression of the bourgeoisie, but it's not a specially evil aspect of communism, it's just turning the tables.

I understand the broader point that you're expressing is that, if communist parties were successful in meeting the needs of the proletariat and educating them politically, then there wouldn't be any strife for external counterrevolutionaries to latch on to. And while this would be correct, I think you're being too idealist when approaching this topic.

First, by the time of the Hungarian uprising, barely a decade had passed since the fascist dictatorship had been beaten and replaced with a socialist government. This is simply not enough time for that situation you're describing to happen, in fact some protestors used the flag of the aforementioned fascist dictatorship. Obviously there is some fault to be placed on the Hungarian and Soviet governments for not preventing this. But given the very demanding reconstruction efforts (eastern Europe did not get billions of dollars in aid from a country untouched by the war!), I wouldn't blame the Hungarian socialist government a lot.

What you're describing has happened before too, at least partially. In one of Louise Anna Strong's books, I think The Soviets Expected It, she describes how, during the invasion of the USSR (and the nazis admitted this is internal documents as well!), the SS had a lot of trouble or simply could not get Belarussians to turn on their Jewish compatriots. In a place where during the beginning of the century pogroms had happened under the Tsar, in just 30 something years the USSR did manage to extirpate antisemitism from the general population.

However, exploiting already existing strife is not the only tool the external bourgeoisie can use to destabilize a DotP. Sabotage, assassination (kudos to my buddy Fidel), infiltration, or simply overt military threats. All of those also require self-defense measures to be taken.

With all of this being said, I also want to add that, in the timescale socialism has been allowed to develop in so far, you can't really talk about the totatily of a population supporting a DotP. Perhaps when socialism is developed enough and when the international capitalists are weakened enough that can begin to be possible. But it's unrealistic to demand in the current context for a DotP to content every single individual in the country.

[hazeltongzhi]

Is it possible to do historical materialism or be Marxist without human empathy? Genuine question cause I don’t have empathy and I’m bad at moral/value judgements. I started getting into materialism because I was under the impression that it’s a science and doesn’t involve morality or values or ideas. But the more I talk to Marxists, the more I realize that they operate on the base assumption of “we should improve our conditions,” which implies “it is good to improve our conditions,” which is a value judgement. Can I be a historical materialist and a Marxist without making this judgement and if not, what sort of thinking and reading can I do to avoid Efilism, which to my knowledge is the only political ideology/philosophy that doesn’t want to improve the world?

I have to say, extremely wide net for the definition of value judgement to put "we need to improve our conditions" as one. If "I wish to not die" is to be a value judgement, then I'm afraid not only is that definition of value completely useless, it is self-defeating and entirely benign. The fundamental basis of marxism is that all people have material needs and exist in material conditions. We have to eat, sleep, drink, breathe, play, learn, and work. How people set out to achieve these needs under their conditions forms classes and the tools of political-economy which fulfills those needs form the mode of production. The ideologies of each class relate to their material conditions, how they go about satisfying their needs, and the political-economy they exist in. Under these principles, morality is created and applied to material reality; that it is "good" to not starve. All classes have their own form of morality based, too, on their material needs, conditions, and how they fulfill those needs.

Took a look into efilism as well and going by a subreddit's definition, it's the following: "a form of Antinatalism that extends to all sentient life, created by the Youtube based Philosopher Inmendham in 2011. EFILism is the belief that DNA, and the suffering of sentient consciousness, is the greatest problem in the universe." However, you will find that this puts a value judgement on suffering, sentience, and consciousness. It is also just a fascist philosophy rooted in liberalism.

[qqueenofhades]

As an immigrant from an authoritarian country who cannot vote in the US either, thank you for your posts encouraging those who can to vote. Thank you.

I do think that a lot of the "voting is useless and stupid and you shouldn't do it!!" comes from the fact that the Online Leftists have generally grown up in an environment when voting is both always possible and can make a real difference in your government, so they take it for granted and/or actively disparage it. They think that the Correct Ideology will magically manifest in any geopolitical, social, or cultural setting if they just think it hard enough, tools like voting are "dirty" and counterproductive to making things get bad enough that the people are all in for The Revolution, and aren't really fond of flawed and slow democracy anyway, which goes backward and sideways as often as (or more than) it goes forward. They want a benevolent dictator to instantly implement everything, regardless of the fact that "benevolent dictator" is a contradiction in terms, and just like the right-wing nutcases, don't want the people to have a say in anything if there's a chance they'll reject it or force them to settle for a compromise or anything less than absolute power.

This is why American Online Leftists (and frankly, those from other countries who want Cool Lefty Points and/or are steeped in tankie ideology) spend all their time attacking the establishment political party that is overall closest to their beliefs, rather than the nakedly authoritarian and fascist one, which they either ignore, discount, treat as trivial, or actively root to win in order to "teach the Democrats/the country a lesson." While there's nothing the Democrats could ever do that would actually satisfy them, they like to post BIDEN GENOCIDAL FASCIST AMERICA IMPERIAL DICTATORSHIP screeds because they know that unlike in an actual genocidal fascist dictatorship, where such social media posts would get them promptly persecuted, arrested, disappeared, or thrown into the gulag, nothing will happen to them at all as a result. Because they have no conception of actually living in an authoritarian society (although that will change in a hurry if Trump gets elected again, God forbid), they are able to tell people not to vote, to complain about Oppression, and otherwise do things they would not actually ever be able to do if they hadn't grown up in a western democracy, however flawed and bedeviled. So yes, they absolutely do insist that voting is meaningless because they have never lived and grown up in a place where it is either restricted, just for show, or not available at all, and they refuse to listen to anyone who tells them differently, because they secretly think the "right" kind of dictatorship would be fine.

[wispforever]

Some thoughts on Itachi

So, I've seen a lot of comments circulating about my tags on this post, and I'm intrigued at the interest. I didn't expect it, as I see much more pigeonholing of Itachi's character than honest to god analysis. No hate- I'm no stranger to Kishimoto's writing. Some of his characters were unfortunately butchered or never given the chance to be developed properly, and Itachi is most certainly no exception. That said, I like to grant him a bit more nuance than I see on most blogs. I think people get a little wrapped up in the supposed "moral implications" of exploring how Itachi was also a victim of the system, as well as someone who victimized many people. But it's silly to equate character analysis and context consideration with condoning genocide.

I have a good laugh every once and a while at the metaphorical gymnastics people do in order to stay in the good graces of a bunch of internet trolls who are just Waiting for any opportunity to tell you you love murder and think it's delicious just because you made a post exploring a character's background. Media is grey; it's layered and wonderfully complex. There are many wrongs and rights in every story, and many wrongs and rights within those wrongs and rights. That's what I love about Naruto. Often times it's really too much like real life. Instead of people being black and white, right or wrong, bad or good- they're usually in a tough situation, trying their best and falling short, don't have all of the information, acting with good intentions or acting on what they believe will bring about a lesser evil, and then end up hurting others.

But it is much easier to assign blame and move on. A so-called bad person will always be the perfect scapegoat for issues bigger than them. In Itachi's case, the fascist government in the Leaf. It's easier to say Itachi could have just refused and decided not to be involved, than to recognize that like almost every other character in the narrative, he was under extreme duress, living in a military state. He was a child whose existence, along with all the other children and adults in the Leaf, was only valuable as long as he could serve as a tool for the war machine in the shinobi world's fucked up political system. And saying this is not the same as saying he was not capable of better decisions or that everything that he did thereafter or in general should not be read critically or subject to hypothetical consequences. It is the same as a saying his actions cannot be fully understood without complete context, and the themes of Naruto will never come through if every villain is just "evil" with no further nuance. And it would be boring too LOL

That said, I love to think about Itachi's situation back then. The ages in Naruto are a bit muddled, a little inconsistent, subject to change and interpretation, but Itachi was a child when he murdered everyone in the Uchiha compound. Most sources say he was 13. It should go without saying that someone so young isn't capable of the same decision-making or critical thinking as say, a 30-year-old, someone whose brain is finished developing and has much more experience on Earth.

Itachi's experience at this point in his life is informed by his age, and it's obviously informed by his childhood, as he has no other place from which to draw conclusions. Itachi grew up in a warring state. He saw people die and was subject to extreme violence in his formative years. To make matters worse, he was taught that war was inevitable and the only thing he could do to guard against it was kill others before they got the chance to kill him (threaten the village). Thusly, Itachi internalized at a very young age that what was in his power was to minimize damage (to himself, to his village, and to the world). What was not in his power was to stop this violence entirely (by adopting a critical mindset and going against fascist powers).

A part of this I think people often forget is that Itachi has absolutely nowhere to adopt this mindset FROM, as even though his father and the other members of the Uchiha clan seek equity in the Leaf, if they were to overthrow the Hokage and create a new system, it would still presumably center around the same ideals (minus, of course, the oppression of the Uchiha as a group). Fugaku is the head of the Uchiha clan at this time. As someone who imposed near impossible performance-related expectations on both of his sons, and withheld love and affection whenever they came up short (so often that it was at the cost of having any considerable emotional bond with either of them), there is absolutely no good reason to believe that Fugaku would reform the Leaf using a non-fascist ideology. And if he did, there is no good reason to believe that he would be some kind of visionary LMAO

This is important to remember because when it comes down to Itachi's decision to either kill everyone in the Uchiha compound and his family, or be part of the coup that would overthrow the Leaf, some people treat it as though it's a choice between fascism and non-fascism, which it most certainly is not. And if it was, Itachi, as a child who had grown up immersed in this ideology, would not be able to appreciate the difference. This context allows us to understand further what Itachi was really weighing in that moment. Accounting for his young age and limited worldview, the only valuable difference in this moment to Itachi was the amount of bloodshed that he would "allow" to happen. Essentially, he sees the options as follows:

Either give in to Danzo and kill everyone in the Uchiha compound, or facilitate a coup where the current government is (hopefully) overthrown and risk starting another war.

Here, Itachi pauses. He has known war. He knows how it affects children, adults, families, and whole nations. The peace he's living in currently is bought with blood, but it's the only peace he's ever known. The alternative is horrifying. And a war in this context, Itachi likely thinks, would be his fault, as he has now been put in the position to "prevent" it. Danzo and the whole shinobi system have groomed him into thinking so. Itachi, at age 13, cannot understand that there would be no war; it exists only as leverage for Danzo's argument at this point. His sensitivities are being played on.

Fugaku, though he is not the same as Danzo, offers about as much help as he does (that being none). Fugaku has no interest in avoiding war; if a war breaks out, it's justified because it will still mean his clan will no longer be living in oppression. This idea is valid, as fascist systems and discrimination can only cease to exist when we rise up against them; unfortunately, this most often calls for righteous violence, as the oppressive powers will not be moved with peaceful shows (not to mention they are willing to go to extreme lengths to avoid losing their hold on the people they have crushing power over, i.e. the Uchiha massacre). But Fugaku has no words to explain this to Itachi, who fears the worst and further fears being responsible for the worst. All he does is act as if it's a moral failing that his 13-year-old son is unwilling to stage a coup, which he believes could mark the abrupt end of a peace that's only just begun.

That said, let it be known that Itachi does appreciate this situation with SOME nuance, though it isn't of the kind that might have enabled him to see he was being manipulated. He at the very least understands that Danzo is a warmonger and oppresses those he fears (the Uchiha). He understands that the rights of his clan have been sorely disrespected, and that the issue needs correction. He understands the anger of his friends and family. This is why it takes him much deliberation before he can even come close to making a decision. He plays both sides right up until the end, listening to Danzo, as well as Fugaku and Shisui, paying attention to the current atmosphere in the Leaf as he tries to decide.

It is something he doesn't want to do. Here's where I get to the part I put in the tags of my drawing.

In this situation, it's almost worthless to write an analysis about Itachi's feelings at this time, his understanding of what was actually going on, his loyalty to his clan or his loyalty to the Leaf, because really, he could not grasp it. He was never prepared for this. He never knew he would be asked to make a decision he could only understand as "your family or the world?"

Itachi was put in a position that had no happy ending. There was no decision he could make that would not hurt. That could not result in a cataclysm that split him right down the middle. There was no version of this story that a 13-year-old could carry out thinking "I have done the right thing."

And that's the important part. Both sides asked him to make this decision, and so both sides are guilty of placing an immeasurable pressure on a child who should never have been put in such a position. Regardless of ideology, regardless of price, regardless of oppression or loyalty or devotion or any other thing- someone else should have made this decision for Itachi. Someone else should have been responsible. An adult, at the very least. Someone who COULD understand the implications of both options. Someone who COULD go forward and appreciate the evil of fascism and know that a coup was necessary. Itachi was never capable of such a thing. If he made the "wrong" decision, than every child who can't explain to you what a fascist government in a military state looks like and explain what the difference is between a hate crime and resisting a hateful power, is also wrong. Here is the nuance. These are things a 13-year-old in this universe cannot be expected to understand unless they are taught. And Itachi had no teacher. Quite the opposite. There were only forces pressing him from both sides, saying "choose."

Had his father done this for him, had Shisui been in this position, had any other adult Uchiha acting as a spy been put to this task, it would be a much different narrative. But of course, it had to be Itachi, who Danzo knew he could manipulate. It had to be a child, someone skilled enough to do the job, but inexperienced enough, afraid enough, to be willing to sacrifice everything they had to see the mission through. Someone you could whisper "greater good" to and have them hand over their well being on a plate. Someone who didn't understand they had the power and strength to destroy the system threatening them.

On a narrative level, Itachi exists to illustrate this point. How young people are systematically indoctrinated to serve a greater purpose, be it under a specific government, religion, or otherwise. We see it in real life fascism, in real life cults. There's no mistake. It isn't an accident that Itachi's story begins like this.

Which brings me to the rest of his life. The reason I drew the picture in the post referenced at the top. Itachi's character is a bit of a mystery the rest of the anime. Be that because of bad writing or an intentional omission, his motives, thoughts, and opinions are largely left ambiguous. However, there are still a few moments that interest me as far as the implications of his development.

When Itachi first comes back to the Leaf village, he faces Kakashi. On the one hand, this could simply be a narrative tool- the big bad meets the big good. He takes Kakashi out of commission! The first rogue shinobi we see who is able to defeat the pillar of the Leaf, the Copy Ninja, and without even breaking a sweat!

On the other hand, I find the brutality of Itachi's attack very intriguing. Again, it could be the tough guy act, but he's able to keep three jonin busy easily using standard genjutsu (with the help of Kisame). It wouldn't be a stretch to say that using the tsukuyomi is overkill, and at a considerable price, we learn later.

Why then would Itachi, who has been shown to have excellent battle intelligence, who is strategic to a fault, be willing to jeopardize his health among other things just to... scare the Leaf? Make sure Kakashi wouldn't be a nuisance in the future? Sure, the last one would make collecting Naruto less complicated, but they dispatched Kakashi easily enough, and surely Jiraiya, who Naruto was with at the time, would pose a bigger problem than Kakashi.

It doesn't make strategic sense, which makes me wonder if Itachi has a special animosity toward Kakashi. Being his superior in the ANBU before the Uchiha massacre, someone who was willing to conduct surveillance of the Uchiha compound without question, Kakashi could have become a symbol of the indifference of the Leaf for Itachi. He could very well have been a reminder of the inoperable position Itachi was put in when he was still a child, and Kakashi, of course, was an adult. Another adult who did nothing. Noticed nothing. Did not help Itachi.

And while I'm certain that Kakashi would have taken severe issue with the goings on in the Leaf at that time, judging by his reaction when he finds out the truth in Shippuden, Itachi knows him only by what he did then. Facilitated surveillance of the Uchiha compound, was a supportive superior, but nothing greater. A bystander whose compassion, while well meaning, was entirely unhelpful.

I don't think it's far fetched that Itachi fucking crucified Kakashi because he was so angry at what being in the Leaf did to him. At some point, as he got older, he realized how terrible it was. He realized there were people like him. Children who were "born killers". Pawns in the game of the shinobi powers.

After leaving the village, Itachi joins the Akatsuki, who are also seeking peace through war (another story). He is supposed to spy for them, but doesn't follow through in any enthusiastic way (that we're shown). He works alone for quite some time, or else with a group (briefly he was shown with Conan and Kakuzu). He is partners with Orochimaru before he's expelled from the Akatsuki. He is partners with one of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist. He grows up and meets many people, sees lots of stories unfold. He learns that he isn't in a minority. Many shinobi are just like him.

And then, as an adult, he is partnered with Kisame, who he finds excellent camaraderie with because of their similar backgrounds. We see in this relationship that he understands what happened to him and what he did enough to acknowledge that, while neither of them are monsters, as many people say, they are human. And humans make mistakes. Humans are complicated. Wrong and right and wrong and right. They understand each other, and Itachi understands more clearly what the world puts these children up to. What it forces shinobi to become. That it isn't all his fault, but he still did it. And so he is responsible. He appears to be able to live with that.

But when he returns to the Leaf, those feelings bubble up. He hates the Leaf. He hates that system. He hates what he did. Maybe he even hates being a shinobi, how his excellence was weaponized, how being an Uchiha doomed him and his clan. And for what?

Itachi is played as a character who is only sensible, only logical, only interested in practical things, has nothing to express. But the way he behaves toward Kakashi in that moment bares all his grief and anger. I just like to think about it. We have so few moments where we get to see Itachi genuinely. The fight with Kakashi, the Sasuke/Deidara fight, his thoughtful moments with Kisame. Just makes me wonder what could've been if Itachi's story had gone a little differently.

Anyway, if anyone would like me to expand on any points or has additional thoughts, feel free to hop in my ask box or leave a comment. Thanks for the interest, I love to talk.

[spyderslut]

I know you mean well but you're defending systems of oppression. The idea that queerphobia is part of human nature is inherently queerphobic.

I apologize if thats how it came across, but I do not mean to say that queerphobia is a part of human nature. Essentially, I strongly feel that Christianity isn't an inherently evil thing. How could I not, given how deeply ive been in and researched it for several years. What I know is that people have been hurt by Christians and christian institutional power, and that an instinctual revulsion to things that have hurt you is reasonable. I know that about as well as anyone could. But it isn't always rational. It is not Christianity that is inherently homophobic or inherently bigoted or inherently domineering or imperialist or whatever. It is, rather, power. Power, as they say, corrupts. Itd be shitty of me to be extremely hostile to the Hellenic pagans as a group because of stuff the roman empire/ancient Greek city states did or as the occasional esoteric fascist does. It'd be silly/irrelevant of me to be sour with the Heathenry for the vikings bringing slavery back to Ireland. It would be irrational of me to point towards bad things people/institutions of any faith have done and declare that faith to be as a whole irredeemable/unconscionable.

Those in power will take anything and everything and twist it into a tool for their continued domination. It is those people in power that get to write doctrine. It is those people that decide that the queer are degenerate. Its those people that twist the doctrines of the faiths they proclaim to represent. I simply refuse to acquiesce to the lies of the reactionary revisionists.

[xylionet]

Clone Force 99 was in trouble

We don’t really talk about just how bad a situation CF99 was in post-Aftermath.

So we have a group of guys who have been raised as soldiers and have functioned in a military their entire lives. They have been fed, clothed and supplied by a military their entire lives. Zero experience with anything else. And then they have to run away from everything they know with nothing but a ship, whatever is on that ship, whatever they are wearing and +1 child.

We then see that they really have no clue how to function outside the military. They have a fairly limited understanding of the value of a dollar. They do not know how to get a job, despite having valuable skills. There’s no indication they are living anywhere but on their fairly small ship.

Most importantly, they are unable to identify that they are being financially manipulated by Cid. Tech occasionally mentions that she’s unreliable and shorting them pay, but none of them seem to understand that she is systematically taking advantage of them. Cid is effectively a loan shark, intentionally locking them in with arbitrary debt and using their financial naivety to keep them working for her.

Echo is the only one to point out that they could just leave, but they don’t. Rex even comes along and offers them a way out. Hunter isn’t wrong to say they want something different, but he’s struggling to achieve that and doesn’t really know what the options are.  It kind of feels like he misses the big picture of what is being offered.

Rex is in a much better position because he is a bit more worldly but also has support from Ahsoka and other contacts outside the military. People who can help him with all of the things that CF99 is struggling with. He also has a goal and a sense of community with other clones that CF99 lacks.

It does feel like CF99 takes comfort in having a chain of command and being in a position where someone is taking care of supplying them, even though it’s actually digging them a deeper hole. It isn’t until mid-Season 2 when Phee comes along and introduces them to a community that they start learning how to cope outside of those structures.

Crosshair is kind of in the opposite situation. He’s still getting supplied by the military but he’s also getting love bombed by the fascists with his fancy new title and all the fun explosives and stuff. He thinks he’s being valued for being special, rather than being used as a convenient tool. He feels like they could just have all this great stuff too, if only they come join the Empire, when in reality he is also in a lot of danger.

It’s rather ironic that Crosshair and Hunter are both able to see each other’s situations for what they are, but not their own.