InappropriateEmote [comrade/them, undecided]

For real. I have to say also that it was fascinating watching the frontman for Pop Will Eat Itself, (a band that in the 90s made an Antifa song* a hit in Gammon Isle) go on to become arguably one of the greatest contemporary film score composers.

*Ich Bin Ein Auslander

Life will adapt it always does

Life will, sure. But that doesn’t mean we (humans) will. Or even mammals. Life itself will prevail, that doesn’t mean our favorite clades are excused from the chopping block, including the one we’re on, which is actually in a rather precarious position as a large highly complex animal with highly complex needs and requirements for even the most minimal kind of survival. It frustrates me when people, especially leftists, act like climate change is just going to disrupt the geopolitical order (which yes, it is going to do that lol) and maybe kill off a bunch of species that will be sad to see go, making it “hard” for us, but ultimately won’t effect us much beyond that. No, this threat is almost certainly an existential one. I’ve said it before but it’s not a choice between socialism or barbarism. It’s socialism or annihilation. Communism will win, given enough time, but how long before that time is up? We don’t know, so we cannot afford in any sense of the word to wait any more.

Andor is in large part inspired by the life of Stalin.

And to be clear, that’s Stalin as the good guy, which he was in real life too, despite the mountains of propaganda that the anticommunist west has been shoveling onto pop culture and history education to convince everyone of the blatant lie that he was on par with Hitler.

There are two things going on here causing confusion and the first is the misuse and misunderstanding of the word socialism. DeathsEmbrace is using it to mean something more like the “nordic model” safety net thing but applied to the corporations. It’s incorrect but it’s a common early leftist pitfall. It’s the “socialism for the bourgeoisie/corporations but not for the workers” thing. It’s not actually incorrect analysis - the government does provide a social safety net for the bourgeoisie and will always come to their rescue in a capitalist country. That is true, but it’s a misnomer and misleading to call this “government socialism” or “socialism for the rich” because socialism is not “government does stuff” or “government comes to the rescue,” rather it’s worker control over the means of production. “Socialism for the owners” is nonsensical when you actually understand these terms. As Marxists we know this is simply how capitalism works and is not a special case within capitalism that is only just now happening with things like the 2008 bailouts. Again, it’s not wrong pointing out that the state rescued all the banks to the detriment of working people while simultaneously refusing to help the working people. But it’s a mistake to associate that with the word socialism, even in a “socialism for the rich” sort of way, a mistake that is often made because the general public were never educated about what socialism really is.

The other issue is the difference between what capitalists say neoliberalism is (when they even use the word neoliberalism, which is less often since it is usually a pejorative) and what neoliberalism actually is. This means there are going to be conflicting definitions. RedWizard is absolutely right that it is very much about further leveraging the state on the behalf of capital to more completely dominate over labor. As Marxists we know they were always doing this, but neoliberalism is still a ramping up using new policies specifically tailored to better addressed the the world order given modern global imperialism. DeathsEmbrace is just plain wrong here if they think neoliberalism is simply ultra laissez-fair capitalism. Neither side defines it like that.

Not to be too pedantic, but the first quote RW used actually backs up DE’s mistaken position. RW is right of course, but that quote is not a good one to use to prove the point. “Neoliberalism is contemporarily used to refer to market-oriented reform policies such as […] reducing […] state influence in the economy.” That definition you quoted is doing the “reducing big government” thing. They want us to think their neoliberal policies are “keeping big government from controlling the free economy!” after all, big government control is what they want you to think the “totalitarian” communists do, when in fact the ruling class is of course using the government to control the economy, just on behalf of and for the benefit of themselves, the capitalists.

I know that you know all this, RedWizard, and I’m not trying to educate you on any of it, I just saw an argument going on that I think might boil down to mostly semantics. I am just trying to sus out those semantic differences and maybe help out any lurkers, especially from other instances, who don’t necessarily know this stuff.

As for you, @DeathsEmbrace@lemm.ee, humans can and do “do economy” just fine, even brilliantly in some cases. Some of them “do economy” such that it further enriches a tiny select few, and some of them “do economy” to uplift a population and increase the quality of life of the masses. Both have been done with great success.

don’t take this argument to “reality” or you’re axbout to get an education on what the real purpose of rich communism is.

Oh STFU. I was trying to be charitable, even generous regarding your misunderstandings because I thought you might be a new leftist who means well. Maybe I was wrong. Either way, you’re clearly the one here who needs an education, even on such basics as the meaning of the words you’re trying to use.

Is it just “it’s afraid”? Is it the desperate flailing of a failing colony? No one cares if you say “Free Hawaii” because the powerful aren’t worried about Hawaii being freed?

Yes, pretty much this.

Israel might actually fall relatively soon. And because there are actual existential threats to Israel looming right now, the fascist’s immune response is kicked into high gear specifically for it. The response to opposition is proportional to how much of a threat they think it poses. For example, Red Scares happen when the left has the strength and numbers to potentially harm the bourgeois rule and order. The international and domestic hatred of and opposition to Israel is frightening them, as it should. They’re getting increasingly desperate to tamp it down.

I’d love to read Xi Mingze’s perspective on all of… this. I wonder what she thinks of the rampant, incessant, unhinged sinophobia drooling and frothing out from the mouths and the worm-eaten brains not just of conservatives but of the liberal “intellectuals” here, especially considering she must have been surrounded by some of them at Harvard. Even if most of the ones she would come into contact with might view her as fellow nobility albeit from the enemy side, the absurd hatred of the see-see-pee and her dad, the gommulist dictator Xi must not be an easy thing to endure.

“All the people who try to explain to me the places where I am obviously wrong, they’re all just robots yeah, that’s it. So I don’t need to try to address that nagging sense of cognitive dissonance I get when I read them, I’ll just call them ‘borg’ and block them! Phew, that feels better.”

What was that you were calling others in the thread, was it coward?

I am advocating on behalf of the Palestinians by advocating for the less harmful of the two.

You’re advocating for the ones who started this most deadly iteration of the genocide and calling them “less harmful.”

You, on the other hand, couldn’t care lass about anyone and seem to be driven by ideological purity.

Right, which is why on hexbear we have been giving money (that many of us don’t have enough of to pay rent and buy food) and real material support directly to Palestinians as well as having actual Palestinian posters. While communists actually do things that actually help people in the real world, liberals are the ones who pretend to care oh ever so much while doing nothing of any material value, and in fact supporting the people and the party that set the genocide on it’s course.

Because the real world scares you. Because you are a coward. Because you want to feel correct by ignoring reality. You are of no use to anyone.

And here’s where the “Every Accusation is a Confession” comes in full force! Every single point, so revealing.

Now my fifth or sixth hexbear block.

And as an example of the Every Accusation a Confession principle of the liberal modus operandi, I will go ahead and point out the same thing Dirt_Owl did: “This has to be a bit. He called me a coward while running away and blocking lmao.” But much more than just that, see how the liberal accuses Dirt_Owl of cowardice, but then goes and does the cowardly thing? See how the liberal accuses Dirt_Owl of ignoring reality, while plugging their own ears and saying “lahlahlah I can’t heeeear you!” See how the liberal accuses Dirt_Owl of being afraid of the world while themselves refusing to even entertain a perspective that challenges their own? See how the liberal says Dirt_Owl is “of no use to anyone” as a strange out-of-nowhere insult, when it is widely known that liberals are seen by people across the "political spectrum* as being useless? They just can’t help but tell on themselves with every little “gotcha” or snide insult they try to use against others.

Genocidal politicians are milquetoast centrism (which is good)

• you, a fucking liberal fool

Just because a fascist might sometimes be capable of being a broken clock, that doesn’t mean one should ever be quoted or given any kind of “credit” for their rare broken-clock take. Yes, context absolutely does matter, and in the case where the context includes fascism, that itself informs us that we should be especially careful the fascist receives no praise or endorsement of any kind. It really is not hard to make sure you never hand it to them.

Not only is it a lie that “humanity is inherently selfish, that’s just evolution,” but the exact opposite is the case. Arguably the primary reason that humanity became as successful as it did, evolutionarily speaking, is because of our capacity for cooperation.

(Just a side note, one doesn’t have to be an anarchist to appreciate Peter Kropotkin and Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution.)

Have you ever experienced a stun grenade? Tear gas?

I have experienced tear gas, yes.

Have you been grabbed by a MAGAt as he screamed “RACE TRAITOR” in your face? Have you had your camera grabbed by a Qultist as he screamed “FUCK YOU FAKE NEWS” in your face?

I’ve been beaten (once severely) and abused by chuds for who I am, not for being to them a race traitor. I’ve endured much worse from pigs (probably MAGA themselves, but who knows) acting on the orders of Democrats.

Don’t fucking presume to know me.

lol I didn’t. The only thing I “presumed” about you was that you are a liberal, and considering everything you said (which it seems you did have the sense to since delete), that was a fair and correct assessment, not a presumption. But it’s rich that you would tell me not to presume anything about you when everything you said in your now-deleted comment was a disgusting presumption and misrepresentation of socialists’, their positions, motivations, and actions. You were even using quotation marks around things you think socialists say (including “wah wah” crying) and how “lazy” they are for refusing to vote for war criminals conducting genocide. So yet again… your accusation (that I was presuming to know you) was not only totally false, it was a description of what you yourself were doing. Every Accusation a Confession.

If you actually are out there in the streets fighting MAGA chuds - good, I hope you beat the shit out of them. But when you’re not occupied with that, learn some actual leftist theory and do some self crit rather than defending and upholding your enemies and ridiculing, disparaging, and lying about the people who are not only consistent with their principles in opposition to genocide, but who are out there fighting the fash in the streets too.

Because they’re fucking lazy and would rather shitpost on Lemmy et al instead of doing something.

Liberals, every accusation a confession. It is objectively and demonstrably the coward “lesser evil” voters who are lazy and refuse to do anything of value, patting themselves on the back and thinking they’ve done their “civic duty” by penciling in the bubble endorsing genocide so they can call it a day. Socialists are the ones who realize that actual work has to be done for any material difference to ever be made and you have to constantly fight systemic injustice and materially help marginalized people rather than do a little masturbatory performative nod to the status quo once every couple (or every 4) years. The people you’re calling lazy are the ones who are out there volunteering their labor to provide food and other essentials for unhoused people or people otherwise impoverished by the system of exploitation that both republican and democrat fascists force upon the world. It’s the socialists who are out in the street doing what they can to build parallel power structures that will continue to help actual people while cloistered, privileged, treat-obsessed liberals sit content in their bubble, pretending they spoke truth to power by voting for that same power.

What’s immediately hilarious about your lie is that most socialists did vote (despite knowing how insufficient it is to accomplish literally anything worthwhile) they just didn’t vote for the blue donkey version of the fascists that liberals like you worship, they voted for De La Cruz (or La Riva before her). So saying that it’s socialists who are lazy for not voting is an immediate tell that you’re either painfully ignorant or cynically lying (likely both) since most socialists did do that ineffectual bare minimum thing you foolishly think is so important, they just aren’t stupid cowards like the liberals who pretend they did such hard work by filling out a ballot for fascists. Thanks for outing yourself as being the one guilty of everything you just accused socialists of.

lol, no. No one has ever been banned from .ml for “criticizing Russia.” Even the communist admins of .ml have no love for modern Russia which is a capitalist country, they just know that throwing every single working class Ukrainian person into the meat grinder is the best way forward. And “tankies,” as the above commenter is using the term, are just people who recognize that history existed prior to February of 2022.

I can’t help but hope that if someone writes about this removal on their substack or something, that article can then be posted on reddit. The conversation in the reddit thread would then be about reddit banning discussion of platforms that apparently threaten theirs, which should be even harder for them to justify banning the meta discussion of that fact. It would be nice if this little removal ended up having something of a Streisand Effect on reddit, exposing more people to the existence of Lemmy than the post they removed had been.

It was definitely a comment, but that’s not always a bad thing. I think many people actually don’t know that was the original meaning of the word, and while it’s too late imo to try to use the word ‘meme’ that way, it is a powerful and potentially useful concept that I wish we did have a more exclusive term for.

Upvoting for the edit. It’s rare to see people doing self crit and changing their position after having it explained to them why their initial position is wrong. I wish I saw it more often.

It’s a joke from a bit account. Don’t worry about it, I’m not up on it enough to quite get it either.