GenZedong

It's also kinda sad because without Argentina it turns into a regular European Cup tournament again

It definitely sounds like those companies are discriminating against disabled people. I wonder if you'd have better luck not telling them?

economic stagnancy

Seems more like economic free fall.

But also, my sympathies, that is rough.

The books were unironic fascist propaganda by a "libertarian" who idolized the military.

The movie was made by a guy who read the book, clocked it for what it was, and decided to make fun of its ideology instead.

Helldivers is a much less subtle mockery of the same ideas.

Living in Seattle I often found myself missing work to just ride around on LINK and the bus system all over the place. I completely understand.

It was almost 33 at 23:00, last night. It's been so hot and humid during days that I felt cold, at 26.6 inside.

The cost to benefit of expending the resources necessary to extract and purify the recycled materials is infinitely more expensive then simply importing or buying the raw material outright.

Not to mention that no one would be willing to send you only “good trash”, and you face the daunting challenge of sorting through megalithic quantities of useless trash for a few paltry recyclable materials. You additionally face the issue of now needing to dispose of the massive quantities of leftover waste with no recycling potential.

In some extraordinarily desperate fringes of the globe there are communities of people who do make a sustenance living performing such recycling, however the output is utterly tiny and non-viable for expansion.

The example of Japan prior to WW2, the scrap metal the US was sending Japan was fairly expensive and seen as a viable resource. The Japanese just needed to spend the time sorting the various metals. Further, such imports were a desperation move as the metals imported were of varying grades, types, purities; and so forth, making refinement and usage difficult, but for a country stuck in a perpetual war economy desperate for resources, something is better than nothing. However, replicating that system within a globalist world makes little sense beyond extreme siege examples.

Excellent idea -- but currently it is more expensive to ship reusable materials than it is to bury it, burn it, or send it to a poor country in the global south where it ends up in a river then makes its way to the great garbage patch in the Pacific. We people de-prioritize some really important stuff. You're right -- but the focus has to shift economically away from endless money printing and ever-increasing profits. We need economics that focus around human need first. Reward companies for putting people first, rather than capital. Until that happens, or I don't know -- luxury communism under fusion energy happens first -- (you know, where scarcity basically disappears at scale because we can suddenly apply energy to big projects like global water access via desalinization and vertical farms in low-food-density areas like the desert, etc.) -- we probably will continue to be under the thumb of this shitty system. Nobody wants to fight the powerful. Not really.

I've been reading The Jakarta Method. It's very sad that neither Sukarno nor the PKI could rise to meet the moment. Mao told them both explicitly to arm up and prepare for violence but they were over confident.

The lesson here is to be armed and willing to fight because the reactionaries will kill you.

Caitlin Johnstone said Bernie was wrong, we've had ten years to see it, and .world are losing their collective mind.

My question is, what is an ML’s place in this whole ordeal, or more generally when it comes to spectacularized electoralism?

Basically, the ML take is "If you fell for this bullshit, don't fall for it again the next time."

It is meant to be a spectacle: Like a sport. Two teams. Lots of news about the ins and outs. Personalities and celebrity worship.

Any tiny wins or gains can be reversed by the next election until the system itself is thrown out.

I think Platner is awesome. It's like a thermobaric weapon went off in a private party & every compatible left figure came spilling out holding their guts into their torso, leaving us to ask "why are these people hanging out"

Oh you're looking to convince these people? Can't help, sorry. I only want to help Americans who are exactly like me

FWIW, and keeping in mind this is only my personal experience with transitioning from lib to ML, I distinctly remember someone online who helped move me further left after Bernie faceplanted and their MO went something like: Being gently understanding of why people are supporting Bernie, but also being plainly a communist and talking about communism in detail, trying to educate people further, explaining why they don't think Bernie is enough, etc.

I think there were some others I encountered who acted similarly to this too. In other words, there was no impression of condescension or superiority, but of being understanding of how someone would arrive at the position of supporting Bernie, while also being firmly not a soc dem.

The end result was that when Bernie failed, they were still there to pick up the pieces and explain what went wrong and why, with someone who was even more willing to listen to them now. In a way, I guess what I'm describing is what we talk about sometimes with regards to building relationships with people. These do not necessarily have to be close friendships. Even having a relationship of respect as acquaintances is worth something.

During an electoral campaign, true believers in the bougie electoral system can get swept up in the energy of the campaign and stave off doubt in order to push for a win. In the aftermath of a failed campaign, I think it is easier to get through to people, so long as they see you as someone who may be worth listening to.

On the topic of electoralism, the ML position is simple: it is useful to engage tactically with electoralism, so long as it is done under the banner of an actual communist/socialist party. The real psyop is the DSA itself, as a pipeline into the Democratic party. The real psyop is "lesser evil-ism". As for Platner, i haven't really followed that situation because it was always deeply uninteresting and irrelevant in my opinion, but if the whole Nazi thing and having served as a murderer for hire for imperialism was not a deal breaker for the socdem/demsoc radlibs who supported him prior, why should this latest scandal be? That was far worse than him being a drunk rapist. The whole DSA project is fundamentally misconceived to begin with. The point of socialists engaging with electoralism is to build and expand the power base of their own independent party, not to attract votes to a neoliberal imperialist party. As it stands it's all just a different name for "Vote Democrat". Platner, Mamdani, all the same because the outcome is the same: leftists getting tricked into campaigning for Democrats. I thought the US left had learned their lesson after Bernie and the "Squad" betrayed them. Apparently not.

I absolutely get the psyop theory, and have been leaning that way myself when I consider Platner. That said, I never considered him much because I'm also nowhere near Maine.

I would see posts about him where people are legitimately yearning for the reformist policies that would lesson the tension the workers of the imperial core are under, and I desperately want to grow that inkling of class consciousness. Unfortunately, it was obvious that these people are still too trapped in capitalism-as-default to seriously imagine a real alternative.

To me, American Exceptionalism (tm) is still the dominant narrative, even within the movement that is looking at Platner and Mamdani.

Unfortunately, I don't have a solid recommendation for how to actually address this with people beyond the tender prodding you've already illustrated. Mostly, I just wanted to reply to tell you that I definitely understand that feeling/though.

Stay strong.