It’s not that the entire mainstream media is in on it, only the billionaires that own it. The editors and journalists go against their best interests because they have no one else who will pay them. The liberal press isn’t profitable, so the billionaires are trying to make them accomplices in their own destruction.

Rotate the compass 45° clockwise, name the new vertical axis to state economy vs private economy, and name the new horizontal axis to left and right. At the far left(green) you have total destruction of hierarchy and flattening of power inequality, while at the far right(blue) you have absolute hierarchy and centralized power.

State centralized economies(red) lead to increased hierarchy by empowering government officials to become powerful lords. Privatized economies(purple/yellow) lead to increased hierarchy by empowering capitalists to become powerful lords. Trying to reach either the top or bottom tip of the diamond leads you the right tip.

Horseshoe theory kind of applies to Marxist-Leninists like its pro-capitalists creators imagined, but they didn’t realize that they were the other end of the horseshoe. This is because both capitalism and the state are the dangers. The problem with both stems from allowing the unrestricted accumulation of power.

Government officials use political capital, while capitalists use economic capital. They can feed off of each other, with the rich helping politicians and the politicians helping the rich. My preferred solution to both is to redistribute capital from the rich directly to the poor, growing the middle class by putting a ceiling and floor on the rich and the poor.

It doesn’t matter what you want the solution to be based on your values. If your solution jeopardizes your values more than the alternative solution would have, all you’ve done is make yourself feel better at the expense of others.

If you let people accumulate power unopposed, they will use less of it on improving the common good than if it was in the hands of more people. Poorer people give a greater proportion of their wealth to charity. A lower portion of the excess wealth controlled by billionaires goes to improving people’s lives than if that excess wealth went to those who had barely enough, or not enough. Wealth has diminishing returns on happiness. A million dollars to a billionaire won’t be noticed, while a million dollars to 99% of people would be life changing.

Taking from the wealthy and giving to everyone is tyranny of the majority on a tiny minority. The wealthy would still be on top and live comfortably, but they would now live in the same economic reality as everyone else. They could no longer burn money for fun while their fortune passively accumulates to see a net gain in wealth. Losing a million dollars would actually be felt, and they would need to adjust their lives in reaction to the loss.

On the other hand, if you rely on voluntary charity in the spirit of freedom, you see tyranny of a minority on the majority. They give far less of their money to the common good, instead spending more of their wealth on protecting their riches. This is what we see in reality. They lobby the government to serve their interests at the expense of the public, or in non capitalist systems, hire guards to protect their interests directly.

Feudal lords pay their workers wages that are lower than the value their work generates because they control the farmland. They control the farmland by protecting it with guards they pay, think knights and samurai. If the workers complain or try to sell food made on the land without giving the lords their cut, the guards suppress them using violence. The lord’s ownership of the land is only valid if they are protected, with violence, by their personal guards, payed for by the workers.

Does that sound like freedom? Do those workers sound free? By allowing people the freedom to gain power over a resource, the land and crops on that land, the workers have lost their freedom to see the fruits of their labor, sometimes literally. The fruits they pick are given to the lord, who trades the fruit for resources, but only give the workers enough resources to survive.

Freedom without limit destroys freedom for most people. Freedom must have a ceiling and a floor, or the freedom of others can be taken by that of another. I value everyone having freedom, which requires a cap on the freedom people can have. No one can be free to horde too much power.

It’s even worse with Ukraine. If Ukraine gets conquered, WWIII likely starts. Poland and others will probably put boots on the ground to prevent Ukraine from losing, triggering attacks from Russia, triggering NATO involvement, and pushing us to potential omnicide instead of genocide.

Israel is pushing towards nuclear war as well, only with Israel as the only nuclear player. Things are bad on a serious level right now that people haven’t comprehended

If he wasn’t worried, Biden would be much worse than he’s been(aka, the average for POTUS). He’s the best we’ve had since Carter, which is a condemnation of the office rather than praise of Biden.

If we got the President lemmy wants, a civil war would be the best scenario, but a coup would be more likely. The better the president, the harder their job. The more left wing candidate is always held to a higher standard.

They haven’t weaponized shit. He’s still being handled with kid gloves. TPTB are still protecting him for the most part. The reason he wasn’t investigated in the past is because TPTB are mostly rich assholes like him that protect each other from being treated like us peasants.

Most of the opposition still isn’t willing to hold Trump to the same standards as most people because even they’re rich, corrupt, conservative shitheads. The prosecutions are politically motivated to be weaker than they should be for his crimes because all prosecutions against elites are weak. Most of them would spend life in prison if justice was blind.

I am very much in favor of using violence to take resources from people that don’t give back to the community they rely on. It’s a good thing to take money from the rich and greedy using violence. There is no imaginable society where people should be permitted to not contribute when they are capable of contributing.

If people are permitted to not contribute excess power, it places more of the burden on everyone else to make up for it. On top of that, as the tax dodger accumulates too much control over resources(wealth), they can use those resources to hire people that then impose violence on the community when they try to take the resources back.

If anything, an anarchist society should be more vigilant of resource accumulation, forcing each other to contribute through violence and ensuring that large power imbalances don’t emerge. There would be no state to handle redistribution, so it’d be the responsibility of every individual to make sure everyone has enough. There’d be no justification for anyone to have too much exclusive control over important resources, nor would there be a justification to not give excess resources to ensure everyone has the essentials.

In a society that prohibits excessive wealth imbalance or centralization of control, there’d be power inequality, but there’d also be a well established ceiling and floor to the inequality. That will always require some form of progressive “taxation” or system of redistribution. There’d also need to be taxation on almost all worker productivity to help develop public goods that everyone will benefit from. Everyone would need to chip in what they can if they need a new communal well, or if they need to maintain the roads, or need to put someone’s home out if it caught fire. People would need to contribute even if they don’t benefit from the particular public service, as they might benefit from another one more than others.

A well functioning society must require people to contribute what they can to maintain & improve the community, must take from those that don’t contribute by force, must tax people even if they don’t consent. This isn’t optional for any system, state or no state. If it fails, exploitation, abuse, and suffering will destabilize the system until it falls apart from under its own weight. A society that taxes properly can minimize violence, maximize efficiency, and be far safer for everyone without exception. Even those on top are constantly in danger of being deposed by someone who wants their position, as well as the people they exploit.

Tldr: Yes, we must use violence to force contribution. Not doing so only causes more violence. Violence is unavoidable, and can only be minimized by ensuring no one gets too powerful to oppress.

Just an FYI, First/Second Thought is a verified Tankie. It doesn’t mean everything he says is inaccurate, but he only opposes Western imperialism. He’s a rich white dude living in Texas who minimizes the evils of empires that his audience is ignorant of. He opposes Israel’s genocide for the same reason China and Russia oppose it. It’s only a tool to bash one empire over another.

Oh, got it. I can only use the term genocide after the genocide is fully completed. I guess it helps you virtue signal by saying “never again” without actually having to put in work when “again” comes around.

Last time I listened to the “boy who cried wolf” argument, I was proven wrong. We should have listened when Trump was called a fascist in 2016. It was unpopular to use that F word then, but what else can you call the Republicans now? It’s just what they are.

If you can’t use the word “wolf” until after it’s eaten all your sheep, you’re not a good Shepherd.

The current genocide being carried out by Israel against Palestinians and supported by almost all American politicians, including Biden? The genocide that we need to not shut up about because it’s a bad idea for literally everyone on top of being evil beyond measure? The imminent slaughter of a million children and adolescents? That genocide?

Nah, I’ve never said a word about that. I totally don’t tell anyone who might listen about how terrible it is. Nope, I’m exactly the liberal caricature you think I am. If I started from the same facts as you, I’d totally share your opinions because you’re an absolute genius about everything compared to me.

You’re right, I must wait until the day before the election to speak up. My bad!

They are in fact liberal, just at the other end of the spectrum to what right wingers mean.

and did that genocide get worse under Hitler, or ridiculously worse under Hitler? Page 69 will shock you.

Sorry. This ethnic cleansing is clearly genocidal by now. They want the Palestinians in Gaza gone, and neighboring countries are not capable or willing to take them. That leaves death as the most likely fate for almost all Gazans. A million kids live there for fuck’s sake. It’s evil Nazi shit being done by the very fuckers who claim criticism of Israel is antisemitism.

They are Judeo-fascists, because no fucking group will ever be immune to fascism: Socialists, feminists, African Americans, trans people, every conceivable group of people for the rest of human history. There is no identity that cannot lead to fascism.

Complicit vs encouraging and doubling down on it. Biden is complicit in genocide, yet Trump will only make it worse and more guaranteed. He cheered on Hamas killing Israeli civilians and cheers on Israel killing Palestinian civilians. He just wants death.

I guess because people still use it. It might be obvious, but it isn’t common knowledge. All people are ignorant about most things. There’s just too much to know and not enough time to learn it unless you’re forced.

Linux users are the homeowners who build and fix everything they can, but look down on people that don’t find craftsmanship fun, claiming that they’re saving money by doing the work themselves. Good on you for having that hobby, but if you don’t enjoy it, spending time to learn those skills costs time that could be spent earning more money than you’d save. Paying an expert to do things you don’t enjoy is usually the cheaper option. They can be found almost anywhere, similar to how Linux users use Apple or windows products from time to time.

Mac users are suburb dwellers who view their way of life as what everyone should aspire to, ignorant to the downsides of sprawl and reliance on cars to go anywhere. Commute times suck, while walkable neighborhoods with public transit make most people healthier and happier. There’s an important classist component, often bundled with racism, that underscores this ideal.

Windows users are people that live in urban areas for work, trying to find reasonable rent or home prices as unchecked capitalism makes everything worse, but unaware why things suck. They get annoyed when people share their passion for handiwork, and dislike suburban folks for thinking they’re superior rather than the downsides to suburban life. However, because most people live this way, and live this way for work, they usually don’t have strong identities like suburbanites or handy homeowners.

Homeless people are those who can’t afford computers, overlapping with actual homeless people, and rural people are those that don’t use computers more than they need to, socializing face to face and literally touching grass.

It’s the subjective experience of not seeing the wage growth themselves, combined with things not being acceptable for a longer time than Biden or Trump’s presidency. Things are improving right now, but haven’t caught up to people having economic security. When you’ve sunk deep enough, it takes a longer period of rising to finally catch a breath. Basically, the current growth must sustain for longer to get more people into a good position. If things continue on their current path, people will calm down.

It’s also true that necessities like housing have inflated in price far faster than other goods, again, for longer than a decade. Unnecessary goods might be cheaper than ever, but you NEED things like shelter and there are NO alternatives. Despite good competition, the demand is inelastic, so limited excess supply translates to soaring prices, plus, other factors are at play.

It also isn’t a good idea ignore subjective experiences in general. Not only are people almost always right to be unhappy on some level, invalidating their lived experiences isn’t a good idea. Democrats will not be successful if they don’t listen to people’s displeasure. Basic economic measures are essential, but not sufficient to make voters happier.

Sorry, but the protection of rights requires that governments limit freedom. All societies and nations on earth do this. If given absolute freedom, some would kill and brutalize to gain power, forcing everyone who wants to avoid this to band together and enforce rules that prevent that behavior. This is the biggest reason to rationally want a government. Even if you believe rights aren’t social constructs themselves, everyone knows they must be fought for.

Some tankies use the fact that governments inherently limit freedom to claim all governments are authoritarian, and therefore states like the PRC and the USSR are no better than liberal democracies. Your definition of authoritarianism supports the bullshit arguments tankies make.

Authoritarianism is a sliding scale, and not every limit on freedom is equivalent in contributing to a country being more authoritarian. Not having the freedom to kill others without consequence doesn’t make a country very authoritarian. Not having the freedom to publicly disagree with the government is a large factor in a state being authoritarian.

Communism and socialism do not necessitate having no freedom of speech or bodily autonomy. Communism, as defined by Marx, was the final stage socialism and anarchistic in nature.

The idea that communism is always authoritarian uses the idea of communism popularized by Marxist-Leninist movements, where dissent is highly controlled and limited. In reality, these regimes were socialist at best, calling themselves communists to claim that only their version of socialism would deliver Marx’s communism. Even to the authoritarian communists themselves, their states never achieved communism at any point.

No. It’d be very difficult to actually have humans go extinct. Bad things will happen, but extinction would require a Children of Men level situation.