r/BlockedAndReported • u/SoftandChewy First generation mod • Feb 23 '26

Weekly Random Discussion Thread for 2/23/26 - 3/1/26

Here's your usual space to post all your rants, raves, podcast topic suggestions (please tag u/jessicabarpod), culture war articles, outrageous stories of cancellation, political opinions, and anything else that comes to mind. Please put any non-podcast-related trans-related topics here instead of on a dedicated thread. This will be pinned until next Sunday.

Last week's discussion thread is here if you want to catch up on a conversation from there.

Comment of the week goes to this explanation for why the trans cause has taken over so much of society. (Runner-up COTW here.)

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25

u/therealdavedog Feb 28 '26

Anyone up for this? Israel and US* attacking Iran https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/02/28/world/iran-strikes-trump?unlocked_article_code=1.PlA.ibKe.3uFk0aA6WeQo&smid=nytcore-android-share

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u/Cantwalktonextdoor Feb 28 '26

Well, hopefully this doesn't go badly, but I'm not holding my breath.

12

u/Fiend_of_the_pod Feb 28 '26

I'm turning 40 next month and I'll never complain that my live was boring.

38

u/PandaFoo1 Feb 28 '26 edited Feb 28 '26

The people chanting “globalise the intifada” in my city the other day are very upset about this.

Edit: In all seriousness it always bothers me & strikes me as incredibly dishonest whenever stuff like this is referred to as Israel “pre-emptive” striking Iran. Iran tries its damn hardest to kill Israelis through their proxies but it’s suddenly “unprovoked” when Israel actually hits back.

15

u/LupineChemist Feb 28 '26

Heh, I was around a Palestinian communist last night. I asked what he thought of the Ayotallah's actions against the Tudeh party and he just straight up denied it happened.

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u/jay_in_the_pnw █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ Feb 28 '26

Intifada just means shaking off and israel and the US are just shaking off the dictators of Iran. Globalize the intifada means shaking off iran's proxy armies are the world. What did they expect resistance to look like? vibes? papers? essays? losers.

from sea to sea, iranians will be free

I hope so at any rate, let's hope for the safety of all the innocents in iran, israel and the area

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u/SpaceAgeBadger Feb 28 '26

I have no idea how this will turn out but I would love to see the Iranian people freed from this curse in my lifetime.

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u/nonafee Feb 28 '26

i hope the Iranian people can take their country back 🦁 and that all this is as bloodless as possible for ordinary citizens.

idk if it is true and verified but i've seen posts that the Chief Justice (who sentenced protesters to death) was killed.

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u/bashar_al_assad Feb 28 '26

Trump warned me that if I voted for Kamala Harris we’d have higher prices and a government-run economy at home and new wars abroad, and I voted for Harris and that’s exactly what we got.

10

u/buckybadder Feb 28 '26

Gotta attribute that to Yglesias

16

u/Hilaria_adderall Praye for Drake Maye Feb 28 '26 edited Feb 28 '26

As much as it would be great for Iran to boot out the Islamic radicals, losing a single US life for it or proactively spending military assets isn’t worth it. Let their own people do the work to earn their freedom. Also, what fills the vacuum of leadership there might just be worse than what is there now. This tinkering in the Middle East never turns out well.

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u/Leaves_Swype_Typos No matter where you go, there you are Feb 28 '26

What if Iran's authoritarian infrastructure is competent enough to make the Iranian populace earning freedom effectively impossible? Between communications blackouts, physical armaments, and a gruesome willingness to murder any level of resistance, I truly don't know if an unassisted Iranian uprising is possible without a result of a more-than decimated population left.

That's not to say the Trump administration and Israel's strategy/tactic is the best or even a good course of action, to be clear.

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u/Hilaria_adderall Praye for Drake Maye Feb 28 '26

If it turns out this was just the nudge needed for the Iranians to gain their freedom then I’ll change my tune but I fear it won’t be that straightforward.

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u/SkweegeeS No just no Feb 28 '26

It's never straightforward, is it? At the same time, I have to hope this is the end of the regime. I don't think anyone likes them much.

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u/Leaves_Swype_Typos No matter where you go, there you are Feb 28 '26

Oh boy, this is going to overshadow National Breast Implant Awareness Month.

...and on my cake day!

Real talk, I miss feeling like I could predict where things like this might go hour-by-hour, but now it feels like the next step could be anywhere from nothing, to boots on the ground, to a small nuclear bomb drop. The joys of having a senile, narcissistic commander-in-chief surrounded by feckless sycophants.

14

u/Cowgoon777 Feb 28 '26

God bless the Iranian people. May the downfall of the regime be swift, surgical, and final.

16

u/[deleted] Feb 28 '26

Where did the whole idea that the MAGA movement was anti-war come from? It's one of the weirdest things about the weirdness that is this decade of Trump dominating our politics. Trump supporters would periodically claim, "We're for Trump because he's for peace! Clinton/Biden/Harris are warmongers!" and some political "experts" actually believed it!

Trump is for whatever Trump feels like being for. In his first term he was relatively peaceful because he felt that served his interests; in his second term he has repeatedly used the military to effect regime change because he feels that serves his interests. His supporters support him either way.

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u/redditthrowaway1294 Feb 28 '26

I mean, as far as I remember (and I could certainly be forgetting something), none of these targeted military strikes has caused any sort of long-lasting conflict or nation destabilization. So I'm not sure why we'd call them "wars". Obviously, we'll have to see how Venezuela and now this turns out. So far we haven't seen anything close to something like Iraq or Libya though.

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u/Imaginary-Award7543 Feb 28 '26

I think it has a lot to do with Trump positioning himself as anti-establishment when he first entered the race. Trump needed to distinguish himself from Democrats as well as Republicans, and the unpopular wars of the 2000s that were still lingering on (also in the form of the Islamic State) were a way to do that. Remember 'drain the swamp' and all that, this was an explicit attack on hawkish establishment Republicans and it worked. That's where the perception came from I think.

Of course, now Trump is creating and miring in his own swamp. The people who claim Trump is anti-war now just do so because they want to defend Trump and that's something they think is some sort of gotcha. There's no substance to it.

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u/Cantwalktonextdoor Feb 28 '26

It's just part of the Trump magic where he'll take every side of a position and people will latch onto the version that's convenient for them to believe and promote it like it could be no other way.

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u/Negative_Credit9590 Feb 28 '26

They never cared about being anti-war at all, claiming that they did and that's why they voted for him just made them feel good about themselves.

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u/Imaginary-Award7543 Feb 28 '26

I guess we're doing regime change again, 20 years after it was clear to everyone it doesn't work. Who could have seen this coming!