this post was submitted on 05 May 2024
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That's not what anyone is suggesting. Stop covering from them at the UN and ICC, sanction officials and settlers in the west bank, implement BDS, publicly condemn their war crimes instead of deflecting and casting doubt on reporting. Nobody is suggesting we flip the table. It isn't just the US's support they risk losing, if the US starts putting pressure the other OECD nations will follow.
Yup.... so what's the disagreement again?
I don't think you do. There's a reason Marxists discuss revolutionary theory: some systems of power are so entrenched that it takes the threat of revolutionary violence to change them. For what it's worth, I don't think this particular issue requires revolutionary violence, but the longer democrats resist taking action the more apparent it becomes that more leverage is needed.
You might have missed the connection. Putting too much pressure on Israel is just going to see Israel cut ties and go elsewhere. If OECD countries begin threatening support, hostile nations will begin shopping to replace them.
It isn't just a function of whether the US decides to exit this conflict. By picking a fight with Israel, there is a distinct possibility that the US gets forcibly removed and replaced. Hence why making a bold and alienating move like condemnation is akin to flipping the table. It's like throwing the baby out with the bath water.
Too much pressure is not something that is going to stabilize the situation. Again, that's why a magical stop button doesn't functionally exist. The right amount of pressure will make progress, and is currently doing that.
The problem isn't that the system needs to be replaced, because we've been due for that since Reagan. The problem is that the current active climate of "violent revolutionaries" are right wing fascists, not leftists. If this system topples, it won't be in favor of a better system. In fact, it's so baked into our political climate at this point that Republicans are campaigning on ruining the electoral process so they can sieze power.
The scales of who is willing to take power by force have been tipping to the right pretty hard lately. The thing that's stopping that from becoming reality is the very pretense of the system we are postulating the need to threaten to overthrow.
You don't see how that might be an issue?
I'm not advocating overthrowing the system, I'm pushing for a single change in international policy. I'm not an accelerationist, I don't want violent revolution to happen. All i'm pushing for at the moment is that democrats recognize the landscape has shifted underneath them and react to it, and there's certainly time left to do that.
This claim bothers me, because if it's true and the democrats know this, then they need to be taking more action against it than just running it as a campaign message. If i'm being honest; I think right-ring extremists are too larpy to be effective revolutionaries anyway. They're far more effective as brownshirt-type paramilitaries, aligned with the state and not against it. So creedance to the threat of republicans taking power again (to an extent), but they're already out and in force now against anti-war protestors, and the dems seem all too happy letting them run out in front of the police when it's convenient. I think liberals tend to miss-identify the threat of fascism within their own party, and I think it's definitely present now.
The two silver linings i see right now are:
While I don't know what happens come november, I know that we will be the most organized we've ever been for whatever comes after.
That's not quite what I'm getting at either. It's the threat of bringing dems out of power that, if we successfully carry through, has a real chance at degrading our democracy. Just like it did last time republicans took power.
But the threat of Republicans taking power is necessary to spur change from democrats. If we vote blue no matter what every single time, there won't be a platform change because democrats will do what they've been doing for the last two decades and assume the fear of Republicans is enough to get them elected.
So how do we spur democrats to change without giving republicans an open door to waltz in?
Democrats have lost their teeth. They won't actually do something about it because they're afraid of that Republicans will use whatever is done for retaliation, which they will.
As an aside, I live in Louisiana where the governor's seat turned red for the first time in 8 years. The blue governor was a good temper against the crazier laws our supermajority red congress tried passing.
Now that there's no obstacle, our red congress is revenge passing everything they can to take marginalized groups' rights away and now they're talking about rewriting the state constitution to allow for even more restrictive laws.
And they're doing it to spite democrats who've stopped them for almost a decade.
All this to say that democrats don't do enough where it matters because they have to keep a base happy that actually judges them on their actions. Republicans' conservative base eats up rage bait and cheers for suffering, so they always have the upper hand in that arena.
Oh absolutely. I mean, democrats are responding to nationwide protests by making it a form of hate speech. We're there.
I hope you're right about young people being willing to organize despite the system, because it's gonna be rough if the worst happens in November.
On the side, thanks for actually engaging me and discussing my thoughts. You could have been an asshole, and I just want to say I appreciate that you weren't.
It's a nice break away from the never ending trolling I seem to encounter. So thank you.
Same to you. Everytime I make a comment on .world I go in with my hair raised, this has been a nice change of pace.
I hope things turn out for the best.