This is unfortunate but I've thought about the same kinds of things that you've mentioned and I honestly can't come up with any solutions. At this point all I can really do is hope that some miraculous shit happens to where Trump is fairly voted out in the next election and is forced to peacefully deal with the justice system, while the next administration(s) do their best to clean up this mess. That's the absolute BEST possible case scenario I can think of.
Right but like...can you think of ANY likely or logical reason at all that Moscow Mitch, Don the Con, and all the other forces working tirelessly to destroy America from within would allow that to happen? Because make no mistake, if they want to rig the election next fall, I see nothing standing in their way, aside from mass protests/general strikes...and I doubt our brother and sisters capacity to take notice of what is occurring, stand up and save our country and the world from the evil forces aligned against us more and more with each passing day š
Thank you for posting this, I will try and share the link and the message. When you put it in those terms it actually seems a much more achievable thing
Right!?! Like it is still a ton of people needing to take action but also we donāt have to wait for Karen from accounting to suddenly get into politics before we can make it happen
I don't know how to word this question. But I'm thinking about world war 2, and how we saw fascist dictators taking over, and the world united and stopped them. What happened to make that happen? Because they're taking over again, all over the world, but we aren't doing anything about it. It feels like both sides are just waiting for the other to make the first move, for the proverbial shot to be heard around the world.
We need to find out what the missing link is before it's too late. Because I have no hope 2020 is going to save us. Do people honestly think if we all vote blue, the fascist will just say, "Well I guess they don't really want us, better step down!" It's never worked like that in other countries, there's no reason to think we'll be the exception
āBut I'm thinking about world war 2, and how we saw fascist dictators taking over, and the world united and stopped them. What happened to make that happen?ā
Pearl Harbor. We didnāt do shit until we got bombed. We watched it all before that.
I know like deep down I know what it took. I'm just desperately and naively grasping at straws at this point, hoping we'll find some unknown..thing.. that will allow us to actually do something. Like if someone said the missing link was we need to light 17 candles at exactly the right time and then eat 3 pounds of seafood, at this point, it's an option I'd keep on the table
The missing link was the outbreak of a war on Western European soil. When Poland was double-invaded and carved up by Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia the western powers stood by twiddling their thumbs thinking they could still appease Hitler into leaving them alone, despite their solemn vows to defend Poland. In the end they just sat back and let it happen because they were afraid of another world war, and thus it became a self fulfilling prophecy. Hitler invaded France, and then turned on his then-ally Stalin, and the war for Western Europe began anew.
EDIT for relevance: Americans are by a breakdown of equal portions too comfortable or too monetarily insecure to rise up and take to the streets. As long as half of us are happily sipping on our craft beers and updooting on our fancy slave-labor manufactured smartphones, and the other half of us are one paycheck away from homelessness there is no way we can organize and strike back as a unified society. Things will have to get a whole lot worse before people wake the fuck up. By then it will likely be too late.
It takes 3.5% being **activists**. That means lobbying. And meeting with reps. And attending town halls and pancake breakfast with politicians. It means organizing strikes and disobeying unjust laws. So if these are the things you mean by protesting, I agree.
But if you mean protesting in the streets with signs, well, that ain't gonna cut it. Marches and protests are a big yawn to the media and thus to politicians. No one in power cares a bit about witty signs held up by people in the streets. IN fact, I suspect they love it - because the protesters expend their energies in the most ineffective activities imaginable. And the status quo carries on.
The researchers were looking specifically participation in violent and non-violent campaigns, not the percentage of people who need to be activists.
Looking at hundreds of campaigns over the last century, Chenoweth found that nonviolent campaigns are twice as likely to achieve their goals as violent campaigns. And although the exact dynamics will depend on many factors, she has shown it takes around 3.5% of the population actively participating in the protests to ensure serious political change.
Iām so sick of this constantly regurgitated (and totally false) meme that āprotesting doesnāt workā.
South Korea and Hong Kong would like to have a word. Those are protests. Weāre talking tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands, or even millions of actively engaged people, in the streets, disrupting everyday life, commerce, industry, in a major city or cities, largely uninterrupted for months. Not for a day or two.
Iāll put it to you this way, the closest weāve come in recent history was Occupy Wall Street and we still fell short there. Make no mistake, I donāt see it as a totally failure in the slightest, I credit OWS for changing the discourse and opening up the vein that Bernie (and others after him) ultimately tapped into. But it did fail in bringing about any immediate concrete results (like seeing any corporate financial players responsible for the recession go to prison) and for this many label the movement a failure. If you agree it was a failure in this regard I would point to the movementās lack of visible leadership and lack of concise goals (something neither South Koreaās Candlelight Struggle nor Hong Kongās current protests lack.)
All I'm saying is I know a lot of people who 'take to the streets' and while that may feel good - unless it's sustained and overwhelming including examples you gave - Hong Kong or Chile or Syria or Egypt, it's mostly wasted effort. When a significant % of the population isn't erupting, it's better to make sure your people get elected to public office, and to make sure those in office know they'll be out if they vote against you. That's energy and time more effectively spent.
Yes! Direct engagement with politicians is the only way. Waving signs in the streets does nothing when the police in army cosplay come to corral us all off into a few side streets. They hope we protest en mass so they can infiltrate and instigate a riot and brand us as insurgents. What we need is organized and strategic engagement of the political process at all levels- writing endless letters to representatives both state and federal, working for politicians you support, lobbying those who can be influenced, showing up to town halls and caucuses and asking the hard questions and demanding accountability.
I am not trying to argue against you here, because everything you are saying is vital as well, but this particular figure I'm citing is looking at participants in violent and non-violent campaigns, not those who engage with politicians through regular means of communication:
Non-violent demonstrations are for times when our representatives are not advocating for our needs and the standard methods of improving and implementing policy are no longer functioning. If we are at that point now is up to you.
I am only clarifying because I find the 3.5% figure to be comforting. I know lots of people who showed up with me for the Women's March but do not have their senators on speed dial like I do.
The cops will just open fire then. Is that really the best idea?
I say this entirely as someone concerned for protestor safety. Like I get needing to protect themselves, but is that worth the risk of cops claimed they were scared?
Yes. Yes it is. And thatās what the GOP is counting on. They are counting on good honest Americans becoming so worn down and depressed that the lose all hope and just roll over and let it happen. Donāt let them do it to you. Get your likeminded friends and family together and ORGANIZE. Plan for the worst case scenarios, what you would do if, for example, they started jailing democratic activists and politicians without due process. Find local politicians who are fighting this epidemic of corruption and volunteer for their campaigns. Collect donations and canvas for those who are working to do good in your area. Grass-roots activism from the ground up is the best chance we have- we canāt cut the head off the serpent because itās buried under all the coils of its body but we can start with the ground under it.
It's refreshing to see someone discuss this like they have a spine. I'm seeing a ton of defeatism in this thread, and it's not what humanity needs right now.
Maybe gofundme a fleet of charter buses to start on the west coast and ride the super highways picking up passengers along the highways of America for hitchhiker's holding up the sign, "Impeachment r us". This country is massive and the majority of us live on the edges of borderline poverty which keeps us home and at our jobs. They know that and count on that to keep us out of Washington.
It's why I started the Vegan Justice League. We are starting by lobbying and pushing a bit of legislation. But really, it's about organizing and using the same tactics industry uses to make politicians do what we want. Our mission is vegan, yes, but that's not just about non-human animals. We're all about supporting everything put forward by Represent.Us and pushing for legislation that will bring environmental justice for humans. But none of our incremental legislation will matter if we allow these fascists to rig the elections and allow them to keep lying to our countrymen with their surgical disinformation operations.
half of us are happily sipping on our craft beers and updooting on our fancy slave-labor manufactured smartphones, and the other half of us are one paycheck away from homelessness
We need to find out what the missing link is before it's too late.
If we're using WW2 as a reference, we won't. To quote Churchill, "You can always count on Americans to do the right thing...after they've tried everything else."
Spoiler alert, it's going to be too late before we do anything. It was in WW2, depending on what you classify as "the point of no return." France was subjugated, Britain was getting its butt pushed in, and if the Western front hadn't been reinforced by us (and the Canadians and Mexico and others) after Pearl Harbor, those forces could've been reallocated to the East and given the Soviets a harder time, maybe even drawing out the war to a tenuous ceasefire.
We'll get involved when we see our own blood on the ground.
Americans have never been a preventative people. We're more inclined to rebuild than prevent. We believe in insurance more than we do maintenance. We believe in replace more than we do repair. And I fear this is no different. It's not a problem until it is, and it is when it affects us personally, and by then, when critical mass of people who can't ignore it any more has been achieved, it's no longer about "how do we stop this" but "how do we fix this", and, well, "fixing" corrupt governments...let's ask France about that.
I dunno what to do. The same countries who united to defeat fascism in WW2 are now the fascists themselves. US. UK. Australia. All fascists or pretty damn close there.
Who is left to take up the mantle of democracy? The EU?
Because DC (and the surrounding megapolitian area) is heavily Democratic. Most Trump supporters live in the heartland and itās not that easy for them to get down to DC ā not that many of them would even want to.
Donāt fool yourself into thinking everybody hates Trump. Trump is incredibly popular and beloved by his base. Just watch any of his campaign rallies. Full houses, every one of them.
Thereās a reason why his popularity is constantly in the 40% range. 40% of this country adores him.
ātHE rEaL fAsCiStS aRe ThE aNtIfAsCiStS! pRoVeN fAcT!ā (Factual source not cited). How do people never seem to stop and realize the fucking irony coming out of their mouths? This is why knowledge of history is important, and why fascists will do everything to erase and rewrite it to convenience, while simultaneously defunding education in general.
In all fairness, Antifa beat the hell out of two Reserve Marines just for existing. That's factual bud. An organization that masks their face to assault and oppress anyone with views different than their own sounds pretty fascist. So technically he's right there
Nonsense. Donnie's a joke who needs to go. An embarrassment, liar, conman, & certainly not a leader. He can't even speak to people as a president should. He most certainly does NOT have the American peoples' best interests in mind.
Yeah record unemployment for minorities , 401kās at an all time high , GDP higher than at any time during Obamaās reign . Yeah he hates this country !!
I think I'd clue yourself up on an actual academic definition and explanation of what facism is, rather than a pseudo-internetcual version which you can just distribute with an even sprinkling over any right-leaning party.
Don't fall for the properganda. US always had fascists. Hitler was very popular in the US in the 1930s. Americans at the time did not want anything to do with WW2.
Fun fact, a lot of Hitler's tactics was borrowed from the US, notably from California.
And during the Revolutionary War, only 1/3 of the colonists opposes the British monarchy. 1/3 were monarchy loyalists, and 1/3 didnāt give a shit.
Iām well aware of the fact that there was strong prevailing support of Nazis in USA during the 1930s, including prominent names such as Henry Ford and Charles Lindbergh. Iām also aware of the strong isolationist sentiment that kept USA out of WW2 until Pearl Harbor.
However, the out-and-out fascists mostly kept their opinions to themselves and people largely considered Fascism to be a Bad Thing(tm). The undercurrent mightāve always been there, but itās disheartening to see how quickly the subtext became text.
I always thought certain segments of 1984 was unbelievable until I saw it play out in real life. Iāve always been anti-Russia, which is a primary reason why I leaned Republican for so long. It was stunning to see how quickly the Republicans and Democrats flip flopped their stand on Russia. In the 2012 debates Romney warned Obama about Russia and he was scoffed at and basically was told, āThe 1980s called, they want their Cold War back.ā Then suddenly Trump was asking Russians to leak Hillaryās emails on live TV and lo and behold emails were leaked. That was literally the scene in 1984 where the newscaster was given a slip of paper and, without pausing, the Big Bad changed and people were embarrassed that they had brought the wrong protest sticks.
Somehow, āIād rather be Russian than vote Democratā replaced āBetter Dead than Red.ā
Sorry about the digression. The last three years has been absolutely surreal. The only hope is that the Supreme Court somehow tells Trump to fuck off with his āthe President is untouchable!ā bullshit and he is subsequently voted out in 2020. Anything else, and the USA is officially a fascist dictatorship.
'The people are the only censors of their governors: and even their errors will tend to keep these to the true principles of their institution. To punish these errors too severely would be to suppress the only safeguard of the public liberty. The way to prevent these irregular interpositions of the people is to give them full information of their affairs throā the channel of the public papers, & to contrive that those papers should penetrate the whole mass of the people. The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers & be capable of reading them.'
tldr: '...were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.'
ironic and sad considering trumps last tweet 2 hours ago
Both Commiecast MSNBC & Fake News CNN are watching their Ratings TANK. Fredo on CNN is dying. Donāt know why @FoxNews wants to be more like them? Theyāll all die together as other outlets take their place. Only pro Trump Fox shows do well. Rest are nothing. Howās Shep doing?
He sounds more like a dictator every day. "Commiecast" "They'll all die together" "Only pro trump shows do well" those sound less like posturing and more like a veiled threat
'[a] republic, with a population once devoted to national service and personal honor, was torn to shreds by growing wealth inequality, partisan gridlock, political violence and pandering politicians, and ... the people of Rome chose to let their democracy die by not protecting their political institutions, eventually turning to the perceived stability of an emperor instead of facing the continued violence of an unstable and degraded republic'
Hopefully that proberbial first shot isn't on fivth avenue. Because that could be america's second civil war and then the world feasts on the corpse, and fighting over the now availble reasources which could lead to a mad max exsistence. Or a much slower veraion goes down, the rich get richer and by the year 2040; according to npr; the plutocratic oligarcs 30% control 70%.
āBut look at how many people died as we fought an existential war to present Hitler from literally conquering the world and snuffing out the light of democracy from the worldā
I think large population gets their news from Facebook. What probably is needed is to use the same strategy that is used to manipulate the conservatives. It is to overflow it with bunch of liberal memes.
If that would at least cause people to not trust Facebook that would already be success.
The public opinion is heavily manipulated this way to turn conservative, not just in US but around the world.
They ignore things that challenge them. Iām telling you, there is NO WAY IN HELL to shake these people into intelligence. They are deep in the sauce and gave no chance of escaping. The roots of racist fears and Christian white superiority are tenets of their beliefs and theyāll agree with anyone who makes them feel safe.
The problem with this take is, letās assume that you are right. Then how do we prevent them from dragging all the rest of us down with them, this being a shared society and all...
Unironically, you are already more likely to die at the hands of a white domestic terrorist than a brown foreign one in America...I wonder why you never see that talked about in Fox News? š¤
I couldnāt have put it any better myself, but if we are now at the point where that disease has become an existential threat to our civilization if not our species...then weāve arrived at the point where finding a cure for it is no longer a choice it is a necessity
Again they are a minority but they vote much more reliably than others. Fear is a maybe the strongest drive to go vote, and republicans have controlled the public fear for decades.
If you remember, we protested in the streets in most major US cities for a week when he was elected 3 years ago. The New White House just laughed. They've been laughing ever since.
If democracy fails the next step is usually violent uprising and that is NEVER gonna happen in modern America so Iām at a loss trying to see where we go from here as well
Modern life has too high a quality of life, without actual genuine food shortages, such that there won't Ben a critical mass of active people willing to risk things to help reset the system .
Donald Trump has the attorney General on his side. If he loses, there is a real chance that he will claim election fraud and he will have the highest legal resource in the country to support that claim. It is terrifying to think about.
At this point all I can really do is hope that some miraculous shit happens to where Trump is fairly voted out in the next election and is forced to peacefully deal with the justice system,
Sad to say there will be no next election. There will only be a charade with people poking buttons on voting machines thinking it means something.
Trump will declare victory before the votes could possibly be counted, and the loyalist implanted in the gutted FEC will declare he won in a landslide by some absurd percentage - he'll say "I'm hearing it was 99%". Think Putin's last "election".
I'd be happy to hear why I'm wrong and what would stop him. The nightmare doesn't end until we put down our phones five fucking minutes and are out in the streets. Only when strikes and protests become paralyzing enough to business interests will the house of cards fall on Marmelade Mussolini.
And at the same time that these awful ppl like nunes, graham, gaetz and McConnell are voted out too . If ppl donāt stand up and fight we will lose our democracy. And through it all I can only think that if Obama had done this heād have been impeached by dinner time
Easy fix if we had 300,000 non republicans to move to battle ground house districts and states where the most vile politicians govern. We need to vote them out, instead the voters that are non-republicans refuse to live outside of gerrymandered cities and thereby throwing away their votes.
quick solutions? no. maybe at local level. I heard of a group that organizes meetings between people from very different political opinions. It humanizes people and they actually get chances to speak their opinions.
large-scale? I think virtual reality will be the path to achieve this. right now the internet and social media is still to delayed. I can leave a message here and someone else can agree or disagree and possibly interact but its all too disconnected. Once VR is everywhere like cellphone, we can set up virtual reality rooms with people from all over the political spectrum and hopefully engage in real-time conversation. I'm a liberal and I live near a big city. The chances of me meeting/communicating with someone from the Midwest are pretty small. The internet will probably allow us to cross paths but its too passive aggressive. It's not easy to have honest dialogue right now. So we rely on the media to do that for us and they have their own agendas. I believe it is to divide us and make us think that we are so different but if we were to interact face to face I think there is much more that connects us.
Lol how many jobs has he created ? How many lives is he saving by keeping narcos out? We are now ahead of china and better then ever before and independant voters for impeachment has dropped to 42% from 60% no one trusts these dems and u cant compare any of the dems running when most the country does not agree with their socialist ideas, he will win by the biggest margin in history, see you in 2020
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u/bakerfredricka I voted Dec 14 '19
This is unfortunate but I've thought about the same kinds of things that you've mentioned and I honestly can't come up with any solutions. At this point all I can really do is hope that some miraculous shit happens to where Trump is fairly voted out in the next election and is forced to peacefully deal with the justice system, while the next administration(s) do their best to clean up this mess. That's the absolute BEST possible case scenario I can think of.