NoneOfUrBusiness @ NoneOfUrBusiness @fedia.io

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And there's getting shot by regime snipers. I'm not trying to make an "others had it worse" argument, but let's not have any illusions about the scale of action and the amount of risk necessary for America to get out of this. The more you wait the more likely it becomes for this happen in the next protest where you live. Also, as I said, they can't fire everyone. Maidan and Arab Spring protesters returned to their jobs just fine after their revolutions.

WhyTF do we even have primaries then!

So progressives don't get any ideas. As I said elsewhere in the thread: I better not hear another liberal saying we can't split the vote again.

He's probably trying to save face; he's on record in May saying he's running no matter the result of the primary.

Why don't you want to say what makes a protest effective?

I can't find the article now, but I read one yesterday about LA protesters doing things like blocking ICE vehicles, towing them away and making noise outside their hotels so they can't sleep. They're actually confronting ICE and LAPD, draining away their energy and reducing the pace of arrests. Here's an example. Do this on a national scale and Trump's little Gestapo won't stand a chance.

Good luck not getting fired.

They can't fire everyone, but more importantly look up the events of Euromaidan, the various Arab spring revolutions and the recent Serbian (or was it Slovakian?) protests. It's impossible to overthrow authoritarianism without personal risk; that's just not how that works. You're free to choose the authoritarianism instead of the personal risk, but then you can't claim that you're resisting, because you're not; it's either or.

The gist is what the other person said, but to expand on the the point I wanted to make: Whenever you (or, well, I) suggest that the left should antagonize the DNC, liberals come out of the woodwork saying that splitting the anti-conservative vote will only lead to conservatives winning and that instead leftists should vote in primaries. The idea is that if the leftist candidate wins the liberals will respect party norms and support the winner of the primary, providing a safer path to progress. Here we have the liberal favorite completely shitting on party norms and running as an independent even though he lost the primary to a leftist, so the whole proposition of a united front against the right through primaries falls apart. This would fatally discredit the idea that primaries are a viable substitute for a leftist third party if liberals cared about facts.

I better not hear another liberal saying we can't split the vote again.

Nonsensical general destruction of your neighbors' property?

No, real obstruction of fascist activity. And, you know, turning out on a weekday. Mass protests work because, aside from the implicit threat of violence, they grind economic activity to a halt. That is simply not what happens when you parade for two hours on a Saturday.

The US does have a left, but it's atomized, disorganized and has a severe case of Stockholm syndrome towards liberals.

A mass protest, in and of itself, is not "nothing".

It is. What happened on June 14th was technically a mass protest, but it has none of the aspects that make a mass protest effective. In essence, that wasn't a protest; it was a parade. They can, in theory, be used as a launching point for something more effective, but on their own? Yeah, nothing.

You haven't noticed the National Guard and Marines being deployed there?

Okay and? They were deployed because ICE wasn't able to do their jobs, and even now they're suffering widespread harassment and obstruction. Not getting backlash because you did nothing isn't the flex you think it is.

Because they shouldn't be doing only symbolic gestures; they should be doing things that matter. Symbolic gestures are nice in addition to that, but when all they're doing is one symbolic gesture every few weeks or months while bending over the rest of the time you've got a problem.

I'll say this as many times as needs to be said. Liberals will see this shit and then tell you to rally around the Democrats with a straight face.

Wow, I have to say that is fascist as fuck.

Mass protests where people did nothing in particular. That is, in fact, not resistance. People in LA are actually making it harder for ICE to terrorize them.

Is it me or is LA the only part of America doing anything resembling resistance?

I agree; I just wanted to push back against the idea that American soldiers who go invade countries halfway across the world for oil and genocide are innocent. Victims yes, but not innocent. Glorification and whitewashing of the military is part of how America got here.

How are you gonna stop "the rich" from simply taking all of their digitally stored wealth and leaving the country that taxes them?

Their wealth is digitally stored, but their business isn't. A car dealership or a Walmart are physical things that they can't take with them unless they close up shop entirely and miss out on the revenue, and those are taxed too.

We live longer and longer, retirement age is something that needs to be adjusted with the human lifespan.

Should it? We live longer and longer, but we're also more and more productive. 50 years ago, for example, the national labor force produced enough for them and (almost) everyone else to retire after about 40 years of labor. Certainly lifespans have increased, but have they increased more than the productivity of the national labor force? I doubt it. Productivity has definitely increased enough to make up the difference in lifespans, especially since most women now work, meaning essentially double the number of workers. In that case, should we not spend the extra time (which we have earned with our own labor) with our families and friends rather than sacrifice it to some rich prick whose only contribution to society is a portfolio? There's something distinctly dystopian about the idea that living longer means we should dedicate our time to enriching the already filthy rich rather than enjoy life.

I know they think he's a terrorist, but I just wanted to point out that technically the tweet never actually calls him a terrorist or Hamas or anything of the sort. It's more of a minor nitpick than anything.

Brain drain from an institution that only does evil is a good thing, yes.

Oh that's what you meant. In that case I see what you mean, but I'm not convinced. First, doing such a thing would destroy their own seat of power, as most revolts tend to start in the capital or reach it pretty quickly. Second, it would immediately spark a coup, civil war or intensify the revolution, for the same reason Assad's gassing didn't stop the Syrian revolution. The level of destruction a nuke can cause can be more or less replicated using conventional means, using a nuke means dealing with nuclear fallout which even the most maniacal governments wouldn't put themselves through and using drastic violence tends to push people towards militancy rather than compliance. Third, it'd destroy their international legitimacy, give Western countries an excuse for drastic intervention and discourage their allies from helping them defend against such an intervention. Iran's government is certainly evil, but they're rationally evil, and nuking one's own people is very much not rational.