Board 8 > Politics Containment Topic 391: My Son is Also Named Abort

(+) Yeah! (+)

Look all I'm saying is that The Guardian and the BBC are more transphobic than like, I don't know, the New York Times or CNN (even though I hate both of them)

The whole protected belief thing in general needs looking at and further legal clarification because its led to some beyond wacky rulings, Forstater included. My favourite was the person who lost the claim over staying home from fear of COVID, effectively because the belief was too rational!

Just to be clear Im very worried about an eliminationist ramp up in the UK. Like I said, yet. There are definitely people in the government who want it. My hope is that the removal of Johnson leads to the end of that, as him coming in was part of what enabled it at a government level. My worry is that the Tories are so out of ideas they dont have anything left but culture wars, transphobia included.

And yeah, just to be clear GMUN is absolutely right, Im not doing that, and like I said the US is often used as a cover for how bad things are at home.

Ireland does the same thing with the UK by the way, eg using brexit nonsense and xenophobia to cover for how harsh Irelands immigration laws are or how a guy went from being a nobody to second place in the (powerless, but still) presidential election purely because he was racist towards travellers. Everywhere is terrible.

but Id still rather be here than back there!

Leafeon13N posted...

The revisionist history to the 2020 election is kind of interesting.

It was supposed to be a huge blue wave to swing power in the Senate but in actuality just squeaked a tie after needing to win two runoffs.

It was not a success.

What am I revising? Democrats literally won with record turnout for maybe the most uninspiring candidate in Democratic history.

They didnt win hard enough or whatever is not a compelling argument and is exactly the problem here, theres always an excuse when its convenient, but if there are risks to be taken and stops to be pulled (to literally save the Democratic Party and freedom for leftish ideas as we know it), they need to be fuckin pulling them or else theyre admitting they dont want to LEAD hard enough.

I mean, there are a few things about Europe that I find are generally overlooked when these comparisons tend to come up.

Re: Racism/Xenophobia. The US is far more diverse a country than pretty much every country in Europe. (Majority demo in the US (white) is 60%; Most of Europe is 80+% and a lot are 90+%) So I think the tension is a lot more omnipresent in the US - and white supremacists whole "whites will stop being a majority of the country soon" shit amps that up. A shit ton of progressive economic legislation dies because of the whole idea of "welfare queens" that Reagan popularized though the concept long predated that. LBJ's line about how if you could convince the poorest white he was better off than a well-off minority and he'd empty his pockets for you rings true. Hell, what progressive economic policy we got in the past (like the New Deal) was specifically written to be racist in its application to secure the votes needed to pass. I'd hypothesize these problems are lessened in a more homogeneous population. I'd point to a lot of supposedly leftist/progressive European countries reactions to the refugee crises over the past decade as evidence for my theory.

Second would be that a lot of the welfare infrastructure for Europe was put into place in the aftermath of World War II. That was a pretty unique situation where populations would be a lot more willing to take a communal approach to things and band together to rebuild. Meanwhile, the US mainland was largely untouched by WWII so there was no similar sentiment... on top of the whole "American exceptionalism" and "rugged individualism" that pervades our culture. We never really had a moment like that. The closest would have been 9/11 but that still doesn't compare to the devastation of World War II plus we had W in charge there who used that communal sentiment to invade countries instead.

Like, idk, in a way I feel like a lot of Europe should see the US and fear that they're looking at their future. We're definitely closer to the cliff than a lot of them are but I'm not so sure a lot of them aren't on the same trajectory just further back. I hope they can prove me wrong because while I think we're probably beyond the point of no return that may not be true for them.

GuessMyUserName posted...

as a non-American I have to say that the need for non-Americans to pat themselves on the back for not being the US is incredibly annoying and fosters complacency

For me it's less patting myself on the back for not being in the US and more just vaguely trying to speak to the crowd and relate to the discussion, considering 90% of these topics are US politics only. I think I've picked up this habit of comparisons from talking politics with family living elsewhere, but I can definitely understand your irritation. It's not like the UK (or many other places) should be proud of how things currently work, and it's never far removed from issues elsewhere.

And yeah, protected beliefs absolutely need clarifying. I'm always for more employment rights, but it'd also be lovely to not have arbitrary laws.

I mostly agree with that xp, but the one point Ill disagree on is welfare. Even untouched countries like Ireland got the same left-wing wave post-WWII, and of course America had the most left-leaning option it had. It was a global phenomenon, even Japan elected socialists and if you know anything about Japanese politics you know how unusual that is. I think there are other reasons America didnt build welfare systems like the rest of the world (not just Europe), though frankly I am not educated enough on the topic to definitively say what they were beyond the individualist culture you mentioned.

That's fair, it's surely a complex picture that can't be summed up as neatly as I portrayed it there though I'd like to think that was a force that contributed. Though as you say there are definitely counter-examples that challenge it.

Europe does not get more racist the less ethnically homogeneous it becomes. I'd often say the opposite, in fact. It's just hard to point to examples of racism internally when a country makes efforts to keep itself homogenous (and like, yeah, if somewhere is ethnically homogenous you won't see many examples of ethnic discrimination). Also, anecdotally, and as someone white but with an obviously not-British name living in the UK, I got so much more shit for it in entirely white towns than in diverse cities. The most racist people are the ones who have no awareness and have never met someone darker than milk, not the people in cities who live on the same street as three mosques.

Anyway. Look at how some of the whitest EU states like Poland, Hungary and Czechia reacted to the migrant crisis when hardly anyone had arrived in them. A lot of EU countries just straight up elected neo-fascists because they were scared brown people might come to their country. People are already conditioned to be racist and xenophobic, and the second they get told there'll be any impact on their lives it comes pouring out. In my experience, it's just less apparent cause you don't see it day to day unless you're there (compared to the US where you can live anywhere and know everything that's happening).

I'll also say that ethnicity is a little different here than in the US, too. There's so many nationalist movements and ethnic conflicts within states that it's kinda inaccurate to point at there being lots of white people and say there's no diversity. It's just different to the US conception and makes it difficult to spot if you're going in with those assumptions.

Right. Being white is a concept, not an actual ethnicity

Paratroopa1 posted...

Look all I'm saying is that The Guardian and the BBC are more transphobic than like, I don't know, the New York Times or CNN (even though I hate both of them)

Yes, I was being flippant in the original post but the media environment angle is what I was getting at.

I promise I do not think the US needed any help being violently transphobic. Inexplicably, the UK helped anyways! The way TERF rhetoric circulated specifically in "liberal" British news media sort of acted as an incubator and platform for the ideology, and the mainstreaming of that in US "liberal" media is a much more recent trend. That's mixing with our developing American fascism which we will then export back. I mean, they were already pretty bad but still.

I don't think either country "started" it or whatever, both of them have a long history of hating queer people so it's just the pointing Spiderman meme. I was talking about this very specific set of circumstances.

uhhhhhhhhhhhhh speaking of international news

Shinzo Abe has been shot in the chest what the actual fuck

That's super messed up. Going to be the center of a lot of conspiracy theories going forward

what the fuck

wtf the alert I got on Twitter was that he collapsed during a speech. Which is true I guess but holy shit way to bury the lede.

Shot from behind in broad daylight while having the normal full security detail, with a shotgun.

That's unreal.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/5/4/8/AAGQPmAADbX0.jpg

i mean even if that's gonna be your take this does mean the LDP will now be stronger than ever

progressive movements were already facing a steep uphill battle without the nationalism that an assassination of a prime minister would bring

Thats true, but I should have posted this instead:

https://twitter.com/rohmerfan1127/status/1545247483718238209?s=21&t=Pvc9EpZI0HLbwLSfLyHUpw

Edit: Obviously people just say shit online, but Twitter so far seems to think the shooter himself was an ultranationalist member of the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force.

At this rate I wouldn't be surprised if like 40% of white women in the US are functional misogynists.

Shinzo Abe shot and killed

Jesus

Not Japan!

Nobody should be shot and killed unless theres an immediate threat to life thats impossible to deal with any way. Even terrible people like Abe.

This is also going to lead to the nationalist wing of the LDP getting even more power, which is ironic given that he was killed by an ultranationalist.

ChaosTonyV4 posted...

The national party has admitted they cant/wont do anything unless something impossible happens, so we just keep saying vote harder and then what? Scold people for giving up hope on a party willing to risk anything for them?

There's only two things you can do:

#1. Viva La Revolution

or

#2. Make sure Republicans become a non-entity in American Politics.

If you don't have the stomach for either of those things, I'm not sure you're any better than Nancy "We need a Strong Republican Party" Pelosi. Like yeah, Democrats need to do more. But let's be honest: Needing to do more is very much preferable to doing active harm. And that's what the Republican party is doing. And the more power they have, the more likely Option 1 is going to be the ONLY solution. Because when Republicans have power, they 100% will use it, and will use it to make sure they stay in power.

I mean a lot of Americans frankly understandably glorify revolution as a means of getting actual change and removing the Republicans, but the issue is unless you commit to social change that only builds resentment. In 1960 in Turkey the military coup removed a right-wing party from government that had been promoting politicised religious extremism and organising violence against ethnic minorities (stop me if youve heard that one before). They put in a new explicitly secular constitution based on human rights and restored democracy the next year. Spoilers: it didnt hold, and actually galvanised the religious extremists which in the very long term led to the current state Turkey is in.

I think if you want to get change in America, I would start by getting the people you know to change their views. The issue is thats hard!

I really don't think we could pull off a revolution, to begin with. I think the government outstrips us pretty bad on infosec and arms even if you could get the popular support.

https://twitter.com/joshuapotash/status/1545149394806358016?s=21&t=njw9Y9DLrr00VQvgs4ZXTQ

Within 8 feet, but guess who gets to judge that 8 feet in the moment

Such a good idea to keep citizens from recording police brutality when they turn off their body cams all the time to avoid exposing themselves not that theyre ever truly fairly punished anyways.

Need a return of the Black Panther plan of just following police around while extremely heavily armed.

It would absolutely not stop police brutality but history shows it might get us gun control.

To the people saying "Guys the president is doing all he can. He can't do anymore. He's helpless to the system". No, he can do more. Because after yelling about how we want him to do something, he's finally done something. Good on Biden and his team. Keep yelling about them when they aren't doing something because they literally always can.

https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1545447455558406145?t=z5NUyhQHEseWjb2nLjsVAA&s=19

PrivateBiscuit1 posted...

To the people saying "Guys the president is doing all he can. He can't do anymore. He's helpless to the system". No, he can do more. Because after yelling about how we want him to do something, he's finally done something. Good on Biden and his team. Keep yelling about them when they aren't doing something because they literally always can.

https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1545447455558406145?t=z5NUyhQHEseWjb2nLjsVAA&s=19

To be fair, this is rather toothless in practice because there really isn't much they can actually do via executive order, but it's better than nothing at all.

I'm already watching r/politics pivot from "Biden can't try anything" to "that doesn't do anything!". Maybe it doesn't, but I swear these people will reject even the pretense of effort

Doesnt restore abortion rights but its something.

So lets say that the Supreme Court overturns Griswold and states start to ban contraception (lol), what happens to the protect access to contraception part of this executive order? And how would that work to begin with?

I will gladly take "It's better than nothing at all" because at least it's something to at least PRESENT an idea that Dems are actually willing to fight for anything and aren't the completely helpless losers they usually seem to be.

If the executive order does nothing to all the red states that fully banned it isnt it not all that effective/helpful? Better than nothing, but not really the major movement people want to see.

The major improvement we want to see probably isn't possible because the system sucks.

For me it just comes down to what Jakyl said yesterday -

At least make me believe that if Joe Biden had a magic wand to federally legalize abortion that he would actually use it.

this kind of thing at least suspends disbelief a little

Yeah this is toothless but it's good theatre at least.

PrivateBiscuit1 posted...

I will gladly take "It's better than nothing at all" because at least it's something to at least PRESENT an idea that Dems are actually willing to fight for anything and aren't the completely helpless losers they usually seem to be.

Kenri posted...

Yeah this is toothless but it's good theatre at least.

Oh, I'm not disagreeing at all that it was the right thing to do and it looks good. I'm just saying people weren't really wrong when they said he couldn't do much by way of executive order.

Making it look like he's trying is absolutely better than nothing, for sure.

To be fair it kind of takes a lot of effort to pass even something like this. There's a reason Spielberg was able to make an entire movie about the ratification of the 13th Amendment.

HashtagSEP posted...

Making it look like he's trying is absolutely better than nothing, for sure.

There is an argument to be made that it isn't and everything is fucked and hopeless.

I don't think Biden was yelled at into doing this. More than likely they took their time to write up an EO that will be harder to defeat in court.

Reports do say they've already been prepping lawyers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wG0c_uWF7Dg

good video for perspective tbh.

Got warned for posting a textless picture of Jeremy Clarkson and cant contest it for some reason.

Who marked it, fess up lol. Which one of you was offended by ambivalence towards a warcrime and sextrafficking denier dying?

Lord help the GameFAQs userbase when Dick Cheney dies, youd hate to see anything but respect for that man.

you misunderstand. it's Jeremy Clarkson that's banned

Apparently, in Texas, a pregnant woman attempted to drive in the HOV lane since fetuses count as people, and was pulled over and fined by police because somebody doesn't count as a person unless they're "outside the body."

StealThisSheen posted...

Apparently, in Texas, a pregnant woman attempted to drive in the HOV lane since fetuses count as people, and was pulled over and fined by police because somebody doesn't count as a person unless they're "outside the body."

Imagine that.

She should fight that since they ruled a fetus counts as a person. No reason why it shouldnt have all forms of human rights now haha double-edged swordem

StealThisSheen posted...

Apparently, in Texas, a pregnant woman attempted to drive in the HOV lane since fetuses count as people, and was pulled over and fined by police because somebody doesn't count as a person unless they're "outside the body."

"Ma'am, you don't understand, that was just our justification for taking away your rights -- we don't actually believe it."