But bad systems create the incentives. Chalking it up to “bad people doing bad things” is a shallow analysis that does nothing to address the underlying problem. If you replaced all the “bad people” with “good people” you would see the same problems re-emerge due to the perverse incentives created by the profit motive.

Tbf the guys up top were mostly on board with slavery.

The guy denied sexual assault by Hamas during Oct 7, got upset when I called him out for it, and then immediately downvoted a bunch of anti-fascist posts, for which I banned him from the comm that he did it in. In that thread, for that matter, there are all sorts of people falsely calling me a transphobe and saying I refuse to use neopronouns.

They denied “systematic sexual abuse by Hamas,” which is a specific claim in the report made by the Dinah Project, and which the UN has been unable to find evidence for in its own fact-finding missions (partly due to the Israeli government’s obstruction of their investigation). The UN’s own reports find some individual cases of sexual violence committed against Israelis on Oct. 7, not sexual violence committed against Israelis by Hamas as a systematic tool of war. That you refuse to acknowledge these are separate claims is the issue at hand here.

On Lemmy, it’s widely recognized that the Dem party is fucked up, but as seen in this very comment section, there are numerous people who still think outright not voting when literal fucking Nazis are running against the anti-fascist coalition candidate is not only fine, but commendable and even morally necessary.

One drum clearly needs beat here more than the other.

You beating this particular drum is not helping and will never change non-voters’ minds. The message of “you have to vote for us to stop the fascists and that’s the only thing that matters” didn’t work on most people before the election and it isn’t going to work now just because you’re repeating it more angrily this time. Yes, it sucks, but that’s the reality and you need to come to terms with it.

I understand the anger; I voted for harm reduction myself and am just as distraught that it didn’t succeed, but instead of doom spiraling and angrily lashing out at non-voters I am focused on identifying and fixing the problem. People didn’t vote for Democrats in large enough numbers to stop fascism, and the reason is that they are disappointed in and uninspired by Democratic leadership. The solution then is not to try and browbeat them into voting, it’s to replace the leadership.

The solution is in the primaries, and this is where “purity politics” as you call it is necessary. Railing against “purity politics” in primaries only serves to perpetuate the status quo that led to this defeat in the first place.

Or they’re bi. I grew up ultra religious and the choice explanation made more sense to me because I had both homo and hetero urges, and I assumed it was the same for everyone (I thought of people who claimed otherwise as self-righteous). In my mind at the time homosexual urges were just part of people’s sinful nature they had to overcome. The whole thing only seems so incoherent from an outside perspective, which I was fortunately able to arrive at after experiencing the world more.

Short of massive, unprecedented, and devastating civil action, there is no hope.

Then call for massive, unprecedented, and devastating civil action rather than portending doom. Pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will.

This exactly. The only reason it even works at all is because they are building on top of an already functioning imperial system. Fascists are like prions emerging from within and taking over a far more competent - and more subtly evil - host, and making it lash out violently while melting its brain into goo. Even if it is not rooted out it’s still doomed to kill its host and by extension, itself.

Perhaps you should reflect on why you feel the need to play defense for establishment Democrats despite claiming to support the paradigm shift that Zohran Mamdani represents. You have been obsessively commenting all over this thread trying to deflect criticism of the DNC by gaslighting people into believing that the DNC are all supporting Zohran Mamdani and that all these centrists coming out against him are outsiders. Are you secretly a campaign consultant for Biden or something?

extracting rent

That’s their right

lemmy.ml

Have I discovered a rare pro-capitalist user of lemmy.ml?

I remember when I had been fooled into believing it was.

Some people are, it’s called antitheism. I confess when I was an edgy 16yo I was like that, but I had just left a religious cult so don’t judge me too harshly.

That doesn’t mean the character of an economy that is dominated by public ownership is capitalist, either, just that it is on the “socialist road,” ie it is socialist, and working its way to higher levels of socialization until communism is achieved.

This is the crux of the disagreement between anarchists and MLs. I would argue that state ownership - if the state does not adequately represent the will of the people - is not public ownership. A hierarchical state with a flawed and bureaucratic democracy that is prone to corruption inevitably creates and maintains a class of bureaucrats with social, political, and economic privilege. The state - in order to preserve itself - maintains a monopoly on collective ownership, preventing workers from organizing on their own terms.

This is what anarchists mean when they call something “state capitalist.” They are arguing that the state itself is a private entity pretending to represent the will of the people.

They’re not the same, but it’s easy to see how people become too jaded and cynical to vote.

I appreciate the well thought out response. My main point of contention is the enforcement mechanism. I agree with point 3 as a strategy, and I have actually participated in groups that follow this general principle, but I have always had the option to simply leave and find another group or form my own. The problem arises when the group is the only permissible form of organization (such as, for example, if it is the one party in a one-party state). You actually see this problem in China, when the state cracks down on workers who attempt to organize on their own terms by forming independent unions. I see this as an unambiguous moral failing of the Chinese state, and is an issue on which I will not budge. Bureaucracy makes determining the will of the majority complicated (no democracy is perfect), but even if it is indeed the will of the majority, tyranny of the majority is still tyranny.

There are things more important than unity. I do not believe that a better world must necessarily come at the cost of individual autonomy.

It’s still a net positive for candidates like Mamdani to achieve electoral victories. Even if you believe that a true socialist can never make it to a high enough office to establish a socialist government (which I agree is likely correct), making the attempt and achieving some reforms in the face of very public resistance from the bourgeoisie is great for class consciousness. It sends the message “hey, it actually is possible to improve your material conditions, and the rich really don’t want it to happen.” Give people a taste and they will want more, which is why the establishment is so terrified of Zohran Mamdani.

Personally, I think that Democratic Centralism is too strict. I understand the idea behind ensuring the subordination of the minority to the majority, but as the party grows and especially after it seizes state power that subordination becomes enforced, and at that point it becomes oppression. It doesn’t get rid of factions either, it just hides them and fosters resentment towards the majority faction.

Just so we’re clear on what we’re talking about, here are the tenets of Democratic Centralism as I understand them:

1. That all directing bodies of the Party, from top to bottom, shall be elected.

2. That Party bodies shall give periodical accounts of their activities to their respective Party organization.

3. That there shall be strict Party discipline and the subordination of the minority to the majority.

4. That all decisions of higher bodies shall be absolutely binding on lower bodies and on all Party members.

I believe that point 3 should be a suggestion, and never enforced. It should be up to the individual whether any given disagreement is enough to warrant going their own way, and an option should be given to “stand aside” in cases where someone would prefer not to participate in an action but otherwise wants to remain with the group.

Point 4 is backwards IMO, and a recipe for authoritarianism. Any sort of elected authority should always be instantly recallable by the electorate, and any “lower” body should always have the autonomy to make their own decisions.

Factionalism is not a bad thing if you embrace it rather than trying to fight it.

Here’s an article from the corporate media about the DNC’s response to Mamdani’s victory, and Here’s an article from independent leftist media about the Islamophobic attacks against him.

I won’t include an article from right-wing media, but I’m sure you can guess how they’re coping with the electoral victory of a Muslim socialist immigrant born in Uganda to Indian parents (not well).

The post we’re commenting under has also included some articles.

Capitalism describes a system of exploitation by which a privileged few profit from the labor of others. Regulated capitalism (also known as welfare capitalism) has only ever come about as a result of popular labor and social movements (which tended to be explicitly socialist) fighting for labor rights and threatening revolution, causing the owning class to allow reforms and expansion of welfare as a form of appeasement. This happened in the US mid-20th century and it succeeded in taking the wind out of the sails of the movement, and since then the owning class has steadily eroded the welfare state through austerity.

Capitalism should not be preserved because it creates inequality by design; that is its purpose. You can claim that is a childish perspective, but here are some of the people you’re calling childish:

• Albert Einstein
• Helen Keller
• Martin Luther King Jr
• Malcolm X
• Bertrand Russell
• George Orwell
• Oscar Wilde
• Pablo Picasso

You have a limited perspective right now because you’ve been conditioned to dismiss alternatives with little thought. So was I, but I’ve since learned the history of capitalism and how it functions, as well as the various movements against it and what they’ve accomplished.

We’re up against literal fascists today, too, but this time it’s made much more progress before facing adequate resistance.

They’re all maintaining decorum (something they would die before dropping) by congratulating him on his win while denouncing his policies and stopping short of endorsing him. Ever since his victory all the “liberal” corporate media has been praising the “energy” of his campaign while criticizing his policies as dangerous and painting his pro-palestinian views as anti-semitic. Don’t even try to pretend the way the DNC has been responding to this is normal. In nearly every other democratic primary the DNC have been quick to line up behind the victor.