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this post was submitted on 16 Sep 2023
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After reading this, why am I getting a feeling in my stomach that reminds me of being on a roller coaster right before a big drop? Why do I feel like all of America is going to be like that very soon?
My gut says it's going to be more complicated than that. I believe in people and at a certain point the reactionary stuff is going to overplay their hand and I think we're already seeing it.
At a certain point this stuff just breaks down, people will lose their patience. In my wildest dreams the 2020 riots were a kind of dress rehearsal for something more organized in the future. Eventually I think liberals might lose their ability to usurp movements.
Don't get me wrong, we're headed for bad times, but we don't have to feel doomed. Believe in people.
I believe in a subset of people. But that subset of people is not enough to prevent things from getting very ugly.
I expect we'll have something to eclipse 2020. But I also expect there's going to be a very strong reactionary backlash waiting in the wings again. I'm hoping to secure more viable refuges by that point.
Oh yeah, there will be a bigger reactionary backlash, and that backlash will cause even more "normal unaffiliated" people to realize what's at stake. I don't mean to sound accelerationist or apocalyptic, but everything has a breaking point and pronounced change only comes through conflict.
I think we're seeing a little bit of it through the abortion bans. People are genuinely pissed off about that.
We just have to hope there will be enough people who won't tolerate reactionaries. I can't say what will happen, but you're right, it might get very ugly soon. But at the same time we can't say we're already defeated
The abortion ban is why I disagree with your take. Liberals said if abortion gets banned they were gonna riot and stayed out in the streets for exactly 2 or 3 days. Liberals have trained a lot of people to think we can vote our way out of anything. They don't even really support things like abortion related mutual aid bc stuff like that is seen as lesser importance than defeating Trump (or whoever the next Republican is.)
I don't think we are defeated but winning isn't gonna come from us reacting to terrible things happening, it's gonna come from more proactive organizing before shit hits the fan.
there's a balance. arming up and prepping without organizations is pointless - the paramilitaries will crush a lone homesteader. community defense requires a whole community.
If you harbor 5 fugitives, you have something to fear from the government. If you harbor 500 fugitives, the government has something to fear from you.
What I'm saying is, when the time comes, I hope you'll have way more than 2 cows.
I'm not saying we are or will be vanquished. I am saying that the balance of guns and land is not in our favor (although the balance of distribution infrastructure is slightly in favor of the libs).
Liberals will largely stand by if fascism takes over, especially in this country. One of the best hopes we have is that the military would crack down on a coup, and the balance of representation in the military is very much not in our favor. The other best hope is balkanization or at least devolution, where state and local governments become more relevant than the federal government and this allows us to thrive in pockets.
it's a cycle that keeps escalating so long as profits get squeezed tighter and tighter. at some point the whole system breaks and the only question is who seizes power when that happens. if we have orgs and can channel popular discontent, it will be us. if not, we'll be posting from the camps. the future is not yet written - projecting the present forward into the future is good at telling you what will happen next week but it's a shitty approximation before you even get out to a year.
Any way you put it, things are going to get crazy. That's why I'm getting that feeling.