It had to happen someday. I hope we can weather this and come back stronger in a few years.
EdIt: fixed a typo in the title
Am I taking crazy pills or does the first panel does not reflect reality whatsoever? In my experience, Americans (the citizenry) regularly, openly, and loudly criticize and/or mock dictators and oppressive regimes, the federal government historically does not allow for normal business or trade to occur with them, and in several cases in recent history (for better or worse) the military physically intervenes.
A state being a dictatorship has absolutely zero bearing on the US’s relationship with the state only its rhetoric about it.
I think a small percentage of Americans notice dictatorships but most have historically ignored world events. Usually, other country’s problems are more than most Americans can think about.
My point here, was now we have those problems ourselves and a lot of people are freaking out 'cause this is the worst we’ve had to deal with in a long time.
Wow, people think about their own countries more than other countries. Who would’ve thought!
As an American, I think we go well beyond that. The average person here totally ignores every other country’s suffering and problems most of the time. And then we (on average) whine like small children as soon as we face any serious problem that’s been widespread around the world. This is more than just “I have my own things to do deal with”. It’s more like “It’s only a problem because it’s happening to me”. IMO, of course.
Yeah world events in American media aside from massive shifts don’t get talked about here. Instead it’s constant divisive bullshit.
I really like the yt channel Warfronts, been watching for a few months and it’s amazing how much world news I was missing before just in war related situations.
Americans in the first panel pretending like it wasn’t the CIA installing their preferred dictator.
Fun fact, the US has been involved to some degree in at least 80 foreign coups or election manipulations just from 1946-2000. With all the ones before and after that time frame, its probably more like 150+
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_involvement_in_regime_change
Either that or they’re really pumped about going in there with guns blazing.
Shameless plug for the Blowback podcast. I’m not affiliated at all. Its just an amazing podcast that covers a different war/coup each season.
Reminder that the showrunners are campist cretins.
Hello? Internet Police? I’m in this meme and I don’t like it.
I became an accelerationist after the last election. The man literally said he was going to do this before the election. This has to stop and Americans need to hurt until they learn. I am also an American so I will also hurt, maybe die, but we need to do better as a country.
This has to stop and Americans need to hurt until they learn.
This has to stop.
Hurting Americans won’t teach them jack shit.
Hitler reduced his country to ashes and still had majority support. What makes you think we’re going to get it worse than Nazi Germany being starved and flattened in WW2?
Hitler got lucky. He got into power when the great depression was ending. So the German economy grew fast. Then he very quickly took Poland and even more importantly France. Then during the war, the Nazis made sure to compensate Germans for bombing losses with looted goods.
Trump came into office and crashed the economy.
I can’t predict the future but we are speed running fascism. Hitler would be proud.
If economic pain gets us to stop, good! If it doesn’t, then what will? Why should the world let America continue to cause harm to not only itself but the world? Should we have let Nazi Germany keep going?
Nah man, I’m all in favor of the world stopping us wherever possible. I just don’t think “Inflicting pain” is going to be useful in changing the minds of Americans.
If we’re hoping for the opposition of the world to create the internal discontent to topple our fascist regime, we’re putting our hopes on the wrong thing.
Put it another way - I do want the world to refuse American demands. I just don’t think that the economic pain that it brings to ordinary people will change their minds about how wonderful fascism is. We, the few non-insane Americans, have to convince them, and no amount of eggs being 25$ for a single will get most people to change sides - hardship generally entrenches tribal loyalties, not erodes them.
I see. Sorry I took it the wrong way.
I think that is what we have been trying to do and I think we will continue to do so. Suffering gets people to look for other answers, when they go looking I hope they find ours. If they don’t well, we are headed to a revolution either way. I am not looking forward to a revolution, but I don’t think we can avoid it at this point in time.
The people liked Hitler. Shit was actually bad in Weimar Germany, Trump’s support is built on the sand of pure propaganda. That’s where my hope lies.
I completely get where you are coming from.
The Republicans have been pushing all this shit since before I was born and the Democrat’s answer has been small business loans to compete against the corporate consolidation they take no steps to slow and other neoliberal bullshit. The Democrats complete capitulation to the right wing surge, and complete fumbling of creating economic policies that doesn’t breed disillusioned youth ripe to be picked by fascists, has left a festering wasteland. I don’t think more hurting will somehow make anything better or convince people that the grifters selling them snake oil are wrong. I’m worried that the muscles of empathy and compassion are too weak to pull anything good from the ashes.
I don’t know how to convince more people to care about their neighbors, but I do know that is the only way to make anything worth having. Even if they are an asshole. The system doesn’t need any help destroying itself. Capitalism and fascism are death cults. What we need is more people showing good examples of horizontal mutual aid. Helping someone who needs help can teach a better lesson than hurting them. Even if they are an asshole.
I became an accelerationist after the last election. The man literally said he was going to do this before the election. This has to stop and Americans need to hurt until they learn. I am also an American so I will also hurt, maybe die, but we need to do better as a country.
I sure am glad that you consider vulnerable populations to be acceptable sacrifices to “do better as a country”, even without data suggesting effectiveness. /s
What vulnerable populations would be harmed by accelerationism that wouldn’t be harmed by a powerful fascist US?
Let me see if I track this logic: “it’s ok/acceptable to sacrifice them because the fascists are probably going to try to murder them anyway?”…
Is that an accurate interpretation of what you wrote there? If it is, I suggest that you (metaphorically) look at yourself in the mirror (physically looking at yourself is ok too) because that’s best described as “fucked up”.
None of it is ok/acceptable. It’s about minimizing harm. It’s picking between eating a shit cupcake or a 3 course meal of shit. There is no non-shit option.
What would you pick, 20 year of fascism or 1 year of accelerationism? If you choose 20 years of fascism to keep your hands clean, then you are the one who is “fucked up”.
What would you pick, 20 year of fascism or 1 year of accelerationism? If you choose 20 years of fascism to keep your hands clean, then you are the one who is “fucked up”.
“So my choices are ‘or death’ ?”
No. I think that the premise there is faulty but, if the choices were:
- 20 years of fascism
Or
- 1 year of ultra-fascism with the goal of encouraging a workers’ revolution and/or complete societal collapse. All of the features of fascism but also people undergoing treatment for cancer, AIDS, and other diseases with high risk of fatality will die, mass starvation will occur, transgender people will have no access to medications for gender-affirming care, people with mental illnesses will have no access to medications that allow them to function and prevent their deaths, LGBTQ+, POC, and other vulnerable people will face lynchings and genocide, and people will die en masse from things that are currently uncommon even in developing nations (exposure due to lack of electricity, septicemia from splinters due to lack of antibiotics, malnutrition, etc). With the added “bonus” of all historical data showing the most likely outcomes generations of oppression and violence, not a workers’ utopia.
I’ll reiterate that I reject the premise as a false dichotomy but, with the option of 20 years of fascism there’s a chance of ending up like modern Spain and a possibility for some people that I love and care about to survive (and continue to fight for a more just world), whereas one year of ultra-fascism with potential societal collapse would mean that virtually ever single person that I know and care about in this country would be dead inside the year, unless I were able to somehow find the resources to get them out, which is very unlikely (I already lost a cousin to cancer due to lack of hospital capacity during the height of COVID - societal collapse would make Trump’s excess deaths during COVID look like rookie numbers).
It’s easy to get myopic and not see or empathize with the millions that would be impacted. The world is much easier to deal with when it can be simplified to “society is broken, we should just start over” but, this isn’t a video game where we can just reseat the cartridge and try again without consequences. Our species organizes into societies for many reasons, including protection of the vulnerable. There’s 340M people in the US, 170M of which require a prescription medication at a given time. Not all are medications that are necessary to sustain life but, a good portion are. Accelerationism marks their deaths and those of other populations as “collateral damage” and moves on, without dwelling and acknowledging that each and every one of these individuals is a human being with hopes and dreams that means something to someone (even if it is just the medical staff charged with their care).
Sure, the intention looks better but, by measure of total human cost, it is kinda hard to see accelerationism as the lesser of evils here. As the proverb goes: “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” Additionally, (I can’t emphasize or repeat this enough) there’s no historical data to suggest that accelerationism doesn’t just end up with straight-up fascism or another oppressive society in the end, with history in the West and from Imperial China showing oppression as the most frequent result of similar actions. It is a reactionary ideology, bordering on religion, without direction from data or fact. Sure, one would hope that it results in a more just society built from the ground up but as another proverb goes: “Hope in one hand and shit in the other, then tell me which fills up first.”
What is the difference between fascism and ultra-fascism? Everything you listed for ultra-fascism can and does occur under fascism.
I’ll reiterate that I reject the premise as a false dichotomy
Great, what option am I missing? Without a democracy what options do we have other than revolution (I also don’t like but it is preferable to no democracy)?
with the option of 20 years of fascism there’s a chance of ending up like modern Spain and a possibility for some people that I love and care about to survive (and continue to fight for a more just world)
I get it, you are afraid of losing your love ones dying or being sent to a camp. Me too. What stops that from happening under fascism? Are your family and friends white? Listen, non-Jew Germans got put into camps too at Nazi Germany. Some people are more safe than others, but no one is safe. Due process is already gone. You’re either with them or against them, and my friend, this post you made is more than enough to send you a very fun place if they find you.
It’s easy to get myopic and not see or empathize with the millions that would be impacted.
I am not, I hate this. I have already said this. Empathy is what drives me to accelerationism.
There’s 340M people in the US, 170M of which require a prescription medication at a given time…
My friend, the US has already started a trade war with the world. There isn’t really any coming back from this. Even if I wasn’t an accelerationist, people are already going to die. Lots of them. The die is already cast here. Fascism started the trade war.
Sure, the intention looks better but, by measure of total human cost, it is kinda hard to see accelerationism as the lesser of evils here.
Do you not think fascism kills/harms people or do you not think the US is a fascist state? Listen, to be a moral net good, all accelerationism needs to do is to harm/kill one less person than lasting fascism would. I think that is pretty doable seeing as US fascism will affect the world.
As the proverb goes: “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.”
Right back at you Friend!
Additionally, (I can’t emphasize or repeat this enough) there’s no historical data to suggest that accelerationism doesn’t just end up with straight-up fascism
I agree, also, the US is currently (already) a fascist state! Do you think Trump is going to let an election remove himself from power? I am open to reverting out of my accelerationism if I feel like we are in a democracy again. So we will have to see how midterms and the next presidential elections look. But it isn’t looking great.
World web police
Arrest this man
He talks in memes
He’s making me feel sad
He’s like a freaking oracle
“it’s only a problem is it affects me personally.”
Well just think of it this way. The last time the GOP fucked up this badly, they lost the majority for nearly 60 years. I mean the United States suffered for nearly ten years and we literally had to have a World War to pulls us out, but the GOP was a marginal cockroach for over half a century.
Clearly they’re just missing their old stomping grounds.
They’re at like 40% approval rating or so. I genuinely don’t think the morons that have now flopped on Trump are going to stay that way. They’ll get the majority in the next election and their voter base will blame all the ills on the Dems.
Most of the really negative effects haven’t hit yet. The stock market crashed in anticipation of what’s to come.
Only problem…and I’m asking this genuinely because I’m not attuned to historical politics. What was the approval rating of Democrats back then? Right now it’s abysmal because, aside from some few brave voices, the best they can offer is silence in place of oppression. They’re even confirming some of Trump’s conspiracy-peddling cabinet picks.
Americans when they are the ones impossing a dictator in other countries :D
Are there countries that aren’t like this?
Spain is a monarchy but has a socialist prime minister since 2018. They’re very open to immigration and it seems to be going very well.
I’m on level 8 at Spanish in Duolingo. I can order tacos, a glas of water and coffee, tell my name and where I’m from and ask where the library is and if there is a bomba placed in it. I wouldn’t understand the directions given to the library though.
Edit: Linked to the original source
Modern European limited monarchies aren’t similar to old European monarchies. Queen Elizabeth wasn’t like Henry VIII.
Switzerland and Nordics have been democratically stable for the longest time. Though, it does not mean that they won’t ever experience fascism at any point in the future. Americans didn’t think it will happen to them after all.
Any country that allows billionaires to exist will slowly regress towards oligarchy. Political democracy is not sustainable without economic democracy (small businesses, strong labor unions, worker owned co-ops, publicly owned resources / companies)
The Nordics are as capitalist as any most countries and still have billionaires. The difference is that they hold their politicians accountable. They also have strong unions (in fact, there is no minimum wage but rather it is negotiated between unions and employers). They have progressive taxation, and to deter rich people leaving with their assets, Nordic countries have capital flight tax.
The Nordics prove that capitalism with democracy works, but the difference is that they know they have to work for it. A lot of people around the world forget they hold the power as a collective and could pressure their representatives to do the right thing.
ALL HAIL GENERAL KRULL sincerely little girl
A girl is missing on the left. Americans when put Dictators to other countries. (Girl laughs with a big smile)
Do the American really just whine about it and not doing anything about it?
We have a large population that totally checks out of politics. There lives are rarely effected all that much by it… Until now. People are starting to wake up, the tides are beginning to change. It’s happening a lot slower then it should have, and it’s scary how far this regime is getting before we get our shit together, but it is slowly happening.
😄good to hear!
Wish you all luck over there, let’s hope this results in something that kills bi-party-system and rather than getting a one party system, it gets a 20 party system.
Can recommend swiss voting system, I really like that system (of course, it has many flaws as well, but I have not seen a better system yet)
I fear there might be too many people that will just want to go back to status quo, and not change things to prevent this from happening again. Especially since the banks and corporations will be wanting nothing to fundamentally change so they can keep exploiting people.
But hopefully I’m just being pessimistic
I am allergic to getting shot.
You don’t think the men and women of La Résistance were allergic to lead? You don’t think they fought knowing that getting shot, or captured, tortured and then shot was a very real possibility?
The problem is that unorganized resistance is impossible. It will result in martyrs and nothing more. No one wants to be a martyr for a doomed cause except fanatics who aren’t much use to anyone. And most people are willing to endure extreme pains if it means they get to live. The tipping point comes when there is a plausible way out through resistance. That has not yet show itself.
Organizing is difficult because it must be secret. The US government is proficient in infiltrating and destroying organized resistance and countering the same. (See all the revolutions it has fucked over the years.) An open rebellion will be quashed immediately with the media demonizing any participants.
To the extent that there is a successful or potentially successful resistance, we will not hear about it until it makes a major move. It will then be destroyed or rallied behind depending on how it deals with propoganda and whether it can garner general public support.
A military coup by a high ranking officer who takes their oath to uphold the constitution seriously is more likely to succeed. But such a person is likely not to exist because of the right wing nature of the military in the US.
If things keep going how they are going the rest of the world will need to take military action to end it a la WW1 and 2.
Most foreigners are putting the blame on potential allies in the US for not acting fast enough thus helping to fracture any movement before it can begin.
Yes, let all the other people fix it. Let me guess, you didn’t vote either?
I voted but a billionaire unironically bribed people to vote against me. The remaining options are grim and not enough people are at that point.
Billionaires have been bribing American politicians at a much higher rate than European politicians. Do you think that has something to do with the republicans dismantling regulations for the past 50 years, while Democrats have only focused on social inclusion of minority groups and completely neglected to fight against the billionaires trying to own the world?
Republicans are pure stupid-greed and democrats are too spineless to say anything other than “where’s my cut”. Third party is seen as throwing out your vote as they never pull enough support. The safety rails in law, the rule of law, and balances of power are gone at the federal level.
The only hope I have left is big money removes Trump (IE. buys impeachment votes out of republicans) and his sycophants are too incompetent and hated to get reelected without the cult head, or a blood vessel in his pea brain pops and he drops dead. That may just get us semi competent dictator Vance instead.
I don’t think Americans can overthrow America.
With what happened last years election and what Trump as been saying out in the open, I don’t know if an election will be fair or honored. I think were sinking fast, sold the buckets, and set the lifeboats on fire to try to stay dry.
Do non americans just ignore all the protests happening in america and pretend we’re not doing anything?
If we are solely looking at mainstream media, then there is very little coverage of protest in the US itself. We get more coverage on us Europeans, Canadians and Australians boycotting US made goods. Therefore, it might look like Americans aren’t really doing much. Of course, most of us know that’s not the case.
I was referring to the meme as the girl there is just whining and is not getting stuff done
We saw the April demo, yes, but where is the ultimatum?
It’s been three months. Things move fast on the internet but it’s important to keep some perspective.
