I try to view the liberal “this isn’t us” and “wow, this is just like [other country]” as a sign of progress because it means that not only do they acknowledge it’s bad, they are trying to form a national identity that explicitly rejects these values.
It’s far from perfect, but it’s a lot better than condoning it.
Rotten apples
…spoil the bunch.
Which means it doesn’t excuse the white people who sat by and watched and did nothing about it.
That looks like a few barrels worth
At least a tonne
TIL, my grandparents were white.
Well its a black and white photo, color had not been invented yet.
it says “most of”
American liberals spent YEARS fighting anyone who suggested racism was still alive in america. But how could it be? They elected a half black man as president?
Nevermind the indiscriminate bombings by said psychopath and the first election of trump. During bidens term, racism was dead again! Somehow!
Until those very same liberals used racism to explain kamala harris’ rejection by the public. Even to this day they won’t attribute racism in explaining ice’s actions. In fact most didn’t care how many people died at ice’s hands until white people got shot in the face.
In summary, americans, and yes american liberals are deeply racist, selfish and uneducated people. Their worldview makes no sense. And they are all unfathomably, profoundly stupid.
American liberals spent YEARS fighting anyone who suggested racism was still alive in america.
The standard line was that racism was a Southern trait, while Northern and Western liberals had somehow expunged themselves of the habit. At the same time, you had liberals from the Carter era onward bemoaning failures within the African American and Latin American communities to integrate properly. It was always the minority’s fault for failing to conform. It was never racism among liberals that widened the divide.
Even to this day they won’t attribute racism in explaining ice’s actions. In fact most didn’t care how many people died at ice’s hands until white people got shot in the face.
You can run this all the way back to the LA Riots, easily enough. Nevermind the anti-Muslim racism of the post-9/11 era, the Obama-era backlash to civil rights movements during Occupy and then again during BLM. It’s always and forever the minority’s fault for objecting to oppression. People of Color are never sufficiently civil. They don’t respect the norms. They want special favors. They can’t be trusted to argue in good faith. They’ve got dual loyalties. They’re not real Americans.
Even when you have Obama or Harris on the fucking ballot, you need them or their proxies effectively apologizing for their blackness and denouncing anyone of color who doesn’t agree with their neoliberal politics.
In summary, americans, and yes american liberals are deeply racist, selfish and uneducated people.
I don’t think they’re uneducated. All too often, I’ve seen racism taught - implicitly or explicitly - as justification for the modern social order. They’re educated in bigotry. They’re trained to think like this.
This is a phenomenal take. I have no notes and agree with that perspective. It is reinforced and baked into educational institutions, on top of implicit education like social control. Fantastic stuff, thank you.
Its funny, if liberals spent half as much energy actually fighting racism rather than the idea it still exists maybe we would actually be getting somewhere
Please tell me you’re from a troll farm. Bcz this is a hot take if I’ve ever seen one.
No, it’s actually pretty lukewarm to anyone who has been able to engage with critiques of liberalism without jumping into defense mode these past few years.
Yeah, sometimes I think this site is really stupid. Everything is an argument about who is the most left wing pure individual. And then we wonder why the right has taken over this country and we’re closer than ever to a literal christiofascist dictatorship.
The reason is that liberal democracies are dictatorships of capital, where the elites have massive power over who even gets to run as a candidate, what ideas are acceptable and so on. We can’t win in this system because the system is rigged from beginning to end, and even when we do miraculously win we can get our elected officials killed and replaced. Look at what they did to Salvador Allende in Chile.
The game is rigged in such a way where one party can simply be extremely exploitative and violent and the other party can be 99% the same and sometimes win by saying “we’re not THOSE guys”. You need money for campaigns, so you can’t realistically threaten billionaires, and if you do betray them they won’t have any qualms getting rid of you illegally.
It’s not our collective fault, or purity testing, or whatever else, it’s the system working as intended for the people who pull the strings, just look at the people in the Epstein files and notice that both parties engaged in the debauchery, look at how Bernie was betrayed by the DNC, and so on and on.
But hey, if purity testing is not being okay with genocide or invading and bombing people in the global south I’m glad there are leftists who do purity testing.
Right…I’m so glad we are now importing our awful foreign policies at home 🙄
You make me sick. If you find what I said surprising, then what your country is was made for and by you.
Open your eyes and demand better.
Every time someone says ICE is “unamerican” i have a little aneurism inside
Can they be historically American, but ideologically unfit for what we want America to be and the values many of us hold, and therefore align with the values of change for the better?
I understand the urge, but at what point are we having to pull out so many wires that it’s no longer the same thing? I think America exists beyond that point. Anything worthwhile we build out of this rotten mess will need to be so different that it won’t make much sense to call it by the same name.
It’s like the donald trump is a russian asset talk,
Because no american could do such heinous things right?
Donald trump is AMERICAN and is a reflection of america. People just can’t come to terms with reality, regardless of how clearly it’s spelled out for them.
He is a Russian Asset though, I would place most of his actions on the heritage foundation but they’ve been warning for years before he took office that he has Russian strings.
Sure it’s not the reason he does everything but he has big enough lips to kiss many asses.
So “asset” just means fucking anything to you people huh?
Yes, also it feels like people think “He is a Russian asset” to mean “he will always do what Russia wants and Russia wants to take over the US.”
The goal is destabilizing their primary opponent in the world stage. And Trump and the GOP are doing a stellar job.
BUT WHY IS HE DOING THIS FOR RUSSIA?!?! IS HE A SPY? Why would he “destabilize russias primary opponent”?? Does he have some crazy ulterior motives?
What kind of conspiracy bullshit is this? Is your reality so fractured? You people will do anything to justify your politicians fucking you, and it’s maddening. Heres a thought,
He’s a bad man. Bad people do bad things even when those things include hurting americans. Why would he do this? If you’re still confused as to why, read the first sentence of this paragraph again.
“But it’s so un-american”. Yeah well your “american values” are nonsensical made up bullshit that mean different things to different people.
I’m sick of having to explain things to americans like they are fucking toddlers.
I think the Russian asset angle makes sense. The hate Trump has tapped into is All-American, but a lot of his actions seem to advance Russian interests at the expense of traditional American interests
Please, at least for the simple sake of self-preservation, can you not look at who is behind Trump, all those billionaires, do you really think they would allow for an Asset to rule over their country? Seriously?
Can you not see how ridiculous it sounds? They’re using you and you’re defending them, while they destroy the entire world and they will destroy you too. Stop licking their boots.
People like you are why america is fucked.
Trumps actions are merely hurting america’s hegemony, and many benefit from this. One of those country, Russia’s interests are in being a global super power, thus competing with america. And america and russia have generally been ideological enemies. It doesn’t take a genius to put 2 and 2 together.
Seriously man, it’s not fucking hard. Why does nobody think he’s a chinese asset? Or a north korean asset? Or a venezuelan asset? Or a myriad of other countries who compete with and strongly dislike america (and growing).
Now you need to wake the fuck up to the fact that this is what america is! You know those concentration camps trump is using? They were built by obama. That genocide in gaza? Cosigned by biden. What is happening now was orchestrated and carefully built by your leaders and countrymen for CENTURIES. It’s also what you have been doing abroad ALL ALONG.
So no trump isn’t a fucking asset, he’s just using the system YOU BUILT to advance his interests, and the interests of stephen miller and those around him. And here is the part that will really blow your goddamned mind. Every one of them ARE AMERICANS.
THIS IS WHAT YOU ARE, THIS IS WHAT YOU DO AND THIS IS WHAT YOU ALWAYS HAVE BEEN so shut the FUCK UP about the asset talk already. Why would he not lift sanctions on russia if he was an asset hmmm? Or why bomb and attack one of russias most important and key allies? Actually 2 of russias key allies, in january alone?! During a war? SEEMS LIKE THAT WOULD REALLY HURT RUSSIA RIGHT?!?!?!?! If he’s an asset then his actions don’t make a lot of fucking sense now, do they.
Enjoy living in homegrown fascism. You’ve earned it.
Sorry I didn’t realize it was my fault.
The decline of American Hegemony helps China as much as Russia, sure. It likely helps them more as they’re better positioned to take advantage of it. But his Rhetoric towards Russia has warmed up a lot, whereas China not so much.
He asked Russia to hack his opponent, and they did.
He took the word of Putin over his own intelligence.
He’s said he wouldn’t support NATO allies if attacked by Russia if they had contributed enough.
Paul Manafort was his campaign manager.
And the action in Venezuela could be seen as a net positive for Russia. It makes them seem like hypocrites for complaining about Russia attacking Ukraine when they don’t respect sovereignty either. It suggests that maybe the super powers can do as they like in their own backyard, like Russia attacking Ukraine, or China planning to attack Taiwan.
So it doesn’t seem crazy to me. I don’t think it’s a driving factor anymore, as being a rapist isn’t the deal breaker we thought it was, but its possible they had something on him and that it affected policy.
I think it’s crazier to suggest that Trump hasn’t dramatically shifted policy, and its just a continuation of the same general direction as always. In some ways Trump has gone ‘mask off’ while continuing on the same as always, but just taking off the mask is a big change in itself. But beyond that, yes, policy has clearly changed and the US has shifted away from Nato im ways that scare western Europe and are celebrated in Russia. So Trump has stopped pretending the US is acting on behalf of justice when it uses its military to advance it’s interests, but has also changed those interests in significant ways.
And no it’s not like these changes arent being implemented by and supported by Americans in power ($). Some are driven by hate, most of it is just about money though as the billionaires arent rich enough yet. Putin isn’t pulling the strings on Trump, but it seems naive to dismiss it entirely. The hate that enables them is homegrown American hate, but its again naive to suggest Russia wouldn’t try to steer the US into a downward spiral by supporting politicians more aligned with their interests, just as it would be to dismiss the CIA meddling in other countries to support politicians aligned with them.
But am I am sorry for bringing facism to the US. It was not my intention and im pretty disappointed to hear that I did. Sorry guys
I just don’t understand why you only focus on russia. Many people root for the downfall of nato. If this is your level of analysis of the situation, then there’s really not a lot to say.
You deserve your country and president.
Sounds like something a Russian asset would say taps head in american
Joking aside, I agree, the US has rotten bones and that’s hard to shake or build upon without the rot spreading. I’d argue, though, there aren’t many nations in the world that aren’t built on racism and genocide, xenophobic white people really got around a couple hundred plus years ago.
There are people in the US that weren’t raised racist, and ones who were but fell far from the tree, just like there are anywhere else. I think the major failing those people (I’d like to say we) have here is a lack of imagination of how we can move to a better tomorrow. The problem is so big and runs so deep its hard to think about its shape much less ways to change it.
Our media pushes us very specific propaganda, our health care is a joke, our education floundering (broken if you live in some places), and our lives demand most of our waking hours to pay for food and shelter. Its no good excuse, but largely Americans aren’t evil, just tired, sick, and poor, and they don’t have the extra to give until everything around them is crumbling. That looks lazy to people who haven’t lived it, but you’ll have to trust this lefty on the internet when I say its not lazy, maybe some learned helplessness, but definitely tired. Come to Mississippi (please don’t do this and don’t read it as a threat) and live for a couple weeks, you’ll see it quick.
Shoot we’re also talking about a pretty big place. Oregon to Virginia is a long way and there’s a pretty big culture gradient in the middle.
I hope our friends around the world block us out, push their leaders to dismantle the crap institutions the US has exported for generations, and really question their own biases before it gets as bad as this. I don’t think the US is unique in any significant way, y’all are susceptible to these things too, it’ll just be a different flavor and a different time, and I’d like to hope we will have fixed our shit by then in time to have your back, but I’m pessimistic.
I try to differentiate between nations and citizens here, where I can. We aren’t our grandparents, but our government literally is and was made by them.
Also trump did get help from Russian organizations to get elected in 2016, so there’s clearly ties, and not in the same way to China or Venezuela. Also also he can be both a fundamentally American creation and a Russian asset, that would be very effective as a way to dismantle the post WWII status quo, which seems to be a specific goal of Putin’s Russia. FWIW I don’t really think he’s a direct asset, though there are 100% people around him on the take from whoever will pay, I’m just imagining why someone might believe that.
Yes many countries have horrifying origins. Yet there is one country that overwhelmingly exports white supremacism, violence, death, xenophobia and racism en masse. This country has been doing it, and still does it today, if not forcing other countries to adopt it by threat of it’s overwhelming military.
Americans just sat back and let this happen. In fact they continue to do so , and I have no doubt they will in the future too. It’s a fundamental lack of empathy. Yes propaganda, crumbling systems, blah blah blah, it all plays a part, but american “leftists” can’t help but welcome these psychopaths or platner or be useless when it comes to meaningful change. Your country is deeply sick, and I’m sick of pretending the people are merely victims instead of also being complicit.
And then comes along people like you to make justifications, downplay attrocity, and push blame around. Good job doing your part, now Fuck off. Don’t reply to me anymore.
ICE is as American as political violence and providing safe refuge for Nazis.
You might get that looked into
You think he can afford that?!
Heyyy that photo was taken a couple miles from where I am sitting. Terrifying.
When I moved here, we rented a house in an all-black neighborhood. They weren’t um, super warm. In my “post-racial white savior” mentality, I’m like, this is odd, I’m trying to desegregate this place! Eventually one neighbor took the time to kindly educate me. Many of those older folks had family, grandparents and uncles, who were lynched in pubic. Many of them remember that photo being taken, most knew the Little Rock Nine personally. Their neighborhood was about safety, about a place they could be without constant worry. They reflexively did not like seeing young white folks move in. Holy shit I suddenly got it. As a gay guy I could imagine that applying to my own minority status.
I live in a gayborhood now and sure enough, as the house next door goes on the market, we’re trying to make it clear conservative straight folks are not welcome.
Perspective is interesting. I keep my mouth shut and my ears open when it comes to race, cause I grew up in a literally all-white town.
I’d be careful about saying you “got” it. You got a glimpse of it.
I remember going into a segregated laundromat in 2005 in Alabama. It wasn’t legally segregation, but they absolutely had a black and a white laundromat, and I (white dude) went into the wrong one and felt very uncomfortable with all the looks I was given. I was eventually approached and told to leave and go to the white one, which happened to be much nicer, of course.
I thought at the time that I suddenly understood it. But black people deal with thay every fucking day, and I do not “get it” because of 10 minutes of racial discomfort in my 20s.
be “European religious”
genocide the locals
depend on chattel slavery to work the now empty land
even though they do what you won’t and would never do what you do, you still find them inferior somehow, less than human
same with any group that isn’t too Anglo/Germanic, actually, on a colour gradient
use gunboat diplomacy and raids to keep your neighbours subservient
use racism to push for war, generation after generation, and they still eat it up
rape and pillage brown places to your heart’s content
abuse, murder and incarcerate brown people back home because slavery is still legal if you’re in jail
But ICE is shocking, lol. No, American hatred, amorality and self-centeredness to the point of psychopathy allowed for both.
Racism is imbued in America’s DNA. It’s never easy to root out something so foundational. It takes a real hard look in the mirror and, let’s be honest, when America looks at itself in the mirror it isn’t for self-reflection.
Members of labor unions, and unorganized unskilled workers, will sooner or later realize that their government is not even trying to prevent wages from sinking or to prevent jobs from being exported. Around the same time, they will realize that suburban white-collar workers—themselves desperately afraid of being downsized—are not going to let themselves be taxed to provide social benefits for anyone else.
At that point, something will crack. The nonsuburban electorate will decide that the system has failed and start looking for a strongman to vote for — someone willing to assure them that, once he is elected, the smug bureaucrats, tricky lawyers, overpaid bond salesmen, and postmodernist professors will no longer be calling the shots. A scenario like that of Sinclair Lewis’ novel It Can’t Happen Here may then be played out. For once such a strongman takes office, nobody can predict what will happen. In 1932, most of the predictions made about what would happen if Hindenburg named Hitler chancellor were wildly overoptimistic.
One thing that is very likely to happen is that the gains made in the past 40 years by black and brown Americans, and by homosexuals, will be wiped out. Jocular contempt for women will come back into fashion. The words ‘nigger’ and ‘kike’ will once again be heard in the workplace. All the sadism which the academic left has tried to make unacceptable to its students will come flooding back. All the resentment which badly educated Americans feel about having their manners dictated to them by college graduates will find an outlet.
Achieving our Country by Richard Rorty (1998).
America isn’t alone in its racism, it’s everywhere.
By no means is it alone but it is absolutely unique in having imported millions of slaves across an ocean, predicating its initial society and economy on a race based caste system. Yes a civil war was fought but, even afterwards, many supported continuing this race based caste system and so it persisted in the form of segregation, which existed during the lives of our parents and grandparents. Without a legitimate act of national reflection and reconciliation these wounds and fault lines won’t heal.
wait. they were protesting for segregation?
the civil rights movement has been incredibly whitewashed in US education. Americans were overwhelmingly against de-segregation, there was tons of violence against black Americans, and that violence was not solely committed by police officers.
The Klan might seem like a relic of the past now, but the KKK was incredibly powerful during the 50s and 60s, to the point where in my home state, 1/3 of men were Klansmen and were a significant political bloc. They weren’t just voting in politicians that supported their vile views though, they were lynching people and burning crosses on lawns and shit.
1/3? Man, those are rookie numbers. Something like 80% of my home state were members at one time.
(Which makes sense, as back then we had actual laws on the books that made us a ‘whites only’ state.)
Yes. Many baby boomers (and their parents) are racist as fuck. Especially in the south.
The baby boomers are a mixed bag, some have learned to change their perspective. The ~1920s - 1940s generation, not many left now, were often racist to the core and only believed that certain people of color were “one of the good ones.”
Yup. My grandmother was born in 1922 and the amount of casually racist things she dropped was crazy.
It’s so unbelievably fucked up to me that this is a surprise for you.
Yep, they are protesting for a real cause/s
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What’s crazy is in my area, most people are Cajun, the Cajuns faced so much discrimination, deportation and even an attempted genocide, and successful assimilation, Cajun French is essentially a dead language. Their Great and great great grandparents were facing discrimination for being accepting of people of color and for not speaking English. Yet due to lack of education of their own history most Cajuns don’t realize they’re perpetuation the very I justices their ancestors went through, hell, half there’s a huge population of cajuns that are POC and don’t even realize it!
Imagine how embarrassing it would be to be related to anyone in this picture.
I imagine it’s a point of pride for many americans
it is and they only express this pride when this think that it’s safe from being shared w the general public.
European settlers when they pretend to be distinct from Europeans:
That uppity bitch wearing pants at a pro-segregatuon protest. We’ll fix her.
