I didn’t vote for Trump, this is not a justification for anything he is doing, this is purely me trying to find any crumb of hope in this abysmal situation.
The country was in decline for at least a decade before Trump took office. So far everything has been a slow boil and we Americans just take it imo.
Maybe Trump will make everything so awful so quickly it will force actual change. Basically we were slowly heating the water and when it turned lukewarm Trump just cranked the heat up to max, maybe the frog realizes this and jumps out.
Things have to get real bad before people realize they need to get better. I’m hoping that happens here
That’s a legit societal theory called “accelerationism”. Make everything so awful that people will realize what’s happening and instigate massive backlash.
Except… the first time this was tried, in the 30’s, we got WWII instead of solutions. So maybe not that great of an idea after all.
It’s not a theory. It’s a religion; sociopolitical homeopathy. Theories require supporting data and accelerationism has none. It just has people willing to sacrifice the vulnerable on the altar of fascism in the belief that magic will happen causing class consciousness, resulting in utopia, despite all evidence showing that it’s more likely to result in dark ages.
“Nah bro, we just need to let the fascists exterminate one more vulnerable group and the workers will rise up and form my version of a leftist utopia, just one more group, I promise, you just gotta read more theory if you don’t believe me”
I’ve blocked more people on here for their accelerationist bullshit than for anything else. At least the fascists will tell me to my face that they want to see me dead.
There’s also the social cycle theory. Things always change.
I feel like the arrows are backwards
It feels that way, but that is correct. Here’s an article that helps to understand a little better. Usually there’s a buffer between Democracy and Monarchy/Tyranny. In the case with Trump, went straight from democracy to Tyranny because they elected a monarch who was also a tyrant.
https://www.history.com/articles/what-are-platos-5-forms-of-government
I thought this when I first looked at it as well, perhaps it is because we are both under the delusion that we are currently in a democracy.
This was first proposed in “The Republic” by Plato writing down Socrates’ arguments.
That’s what I thought COVID would do and here we are
Long-winded product of a quick brainstorm session incoming…
So, Americans will have two options:
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Wait it out passively. Corporate infrastructure/services will become more prevalent and take the place of governmental agencies as they default due to debt and mismanagement (a position they’ve been put in through the decades thanks to defunding, with Elon’s DOGE being the latest of villains in this story). Get ready for corporate cities, and conglomerates being the de facto rulers of America. As governmental power wanes and after the eventual American balkanization, you’ll be part of the Amazon Republic of Arizona or whatever. Idk what happens after that.
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Somehow, Americans fight both corporate and governmental power, through the creation of alternative supply chains, alternative (labour based, for instance) currency and become more self sufficient. Americans are heavily armed as well and, while incapable of fighting an army of drones, it should be enough of a deterrent (especially if the power structure collapses and infighting amongst oligarchs happens but these post American cooperative societies stand by each other). Communities with immigrants that still have connections to the civilized world might help bring foreign aid and intervention. However, this requires trust, empathy, prosociality, generosity and critical thought. You and I both know Americans are famous for lacking in all of those attributes so I don’t really see how they’ll get it together quickly (and no, American Christian dogma, which is even more cursed and against the actual teachings of Jesus than the Catholic dogma, cannot offer a solution).
God willing something will happen to snap Americans out of their white ethnonationalist, imperialistic fantasies and into love for humanity, and God does do miracles, but I’m not very optimistic. It might just be the new Sodom and Gomorrah, NGL.
Finally, there’s a reason the Western mind can only picture Mad Max when the government collapses: even they know they’re completely amoral and uncivilised, the only force holding society together is fear of legal repercussions/getting killed by the cops. By themselves, for the sake of being good and prosocial and to have some self respect, they won’t do shit.
I can tell you that what happens after option 1 is Snow Crash.
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You should read some US history if you think that is going to happen.
At best there will be slight improvement for a couple decades while nobody in the administration or who helped to destroy the government suffers any consequences and they just do it all over again.
I don’t think this will happen
this is purely me trying to find any crumb of hope in this abysmal situation
Yes, I was pointing out why you shouldn’t try to convince yourself to think that there is any possible chance of a positive coming out of this.
Have you read U.S. history?
Despite the land of freedom hype, we started as a country where only land owning white men could vote, and slavery was law. As flawed as things are now (and there will always be a need to improve and fight injustice) slavery has been abolished, all men and women can vote, child labor abolished, 40 hour work week, gay marriage legal.
We should be realistic and honest about the bad things happening right now. But if we don’t believe it’s possible for things to get better (doomerism) then it’s much less likely they will, and believing that ignores the actual historical evidence.
slavery has been abolished
[citation needed]
all men and women can vote
[citation needed]
child labor abolished
[citation needed]
40 hour work week
[citation needed]
gay marriage legal
[citation needed]
[citation needed]
[citation needed]
It’s called observing reality. For example, gay marriage is illegal in several states, slavery only got legalized to ~40 hrs a week, incarcerated men and women are deprived the right to vote, etc.
Come on it’s not that hard.
You seem to have missed the humorous intent of my comment
I mean, gay marriage is legal at least for now
Are you sure? Legal means it has to be legal everywhere, otherwise you can just get the same treatment eg.: doctors get for providing abortion. Nowadays, that means you can get ICEd by an out-of-state order.
slavery has been abolished
Took a civil war
all men and women can vote
Not all and women voting took violent riots to come to be
child labor abolished
40 hour work week
People died in gun battles against the government and hired guns to get these
gay marriage legal
It’s legal but easy to take away, and also took violent riots
I’ll quote my reply to the other person:
OP said “maybe something good will come out of this” and you said look at history, the best that will happen is some minor temporary improvement. I pointed out several significant long lasting advances. I don’t see where anything you said here disproves that.
As I said, yes, there are significant problems we need to address. But being negative to the point of denying reality isn’t some act of resistance, it’s capitulation. Telling people there’s no hope helps the enemy.
As flawed as things are now (and there will always be a need to improve and fight injustice) slavery has been abolished,
Except in prisons
all men and women can vote,
Except for the ones who can’t because of felonies that are arbitrarily decided to be disqualifying.
child labor abolished,
Except for family businesses, and if you haven’t noticed Republicans are bringing child labor back.
40 hour work week,
Except for exempt employees.
gay marriage legal.
Conservatives are working on getting this overturned just like they overturned Roe v Wade.
Yeah, we aren’t as shitty as we were 250 years ago but the gains we have made in those centuries is pretty fucking basic. We still have massive problems and Republicans and their half of the voting population are working turelessly to bring back the absolute worst things.
Yes, I have read history.
OP said “maybe something good will come out of this” and you said look at history, the best that will happen is some minor temporary improvement. I pointed out several significant long lasting advances. I don’t see where anything you said here disproves that.
As I said, yes, there are significant problems we need to address. But being negative to the point of denying reality isn’t some act of resistance, it’s capitulation. Telling people there’s no hope helps the enemy.
The masses are poor and uneducated. Under Trump they will get further uneducated, allowing this to happen more often.
poor and uneducated, and also extremely low information, and prone to conspiracies. also some college educated fall into the latter of low information people.
People forgot what Trump was like 4 years ago and re elected him. So no, it will not facilitate any change.
I like how people think destroying everything will somehow result in a future where people are empathetic.
Phoenix?
It’s more about the less people have to lose the more they are willing to risk
When the people end up with nothing left to lose, things tend to get exceptionally shitty for a few generations. Then it’s a die toss to figure out if what comes after that is any better or not.
It’s not really a die toss because the people with power maintain that power and have the most influence in what comes out of that shit-pool. It needs a functional shakeup at the deepest level, and not superficial changes at the surface level to make an effective difference. Otherwise things will just continue to repeat until we destroy ourselves. The problem is that kind of shakeup requires that people remain vigilant and involved for their entire lives, which isn’t going to happen if their only concern is that their own lives are getting disrupted and they want it to go back to par, which is our current standoff.
Agreed; that jackass has pushed me firmly into the “let leopards eat all their faces” camp as opposed to giving a shit WHY they’re so fuckin stupid anymore.
I’m not an American and I don’t live in America. I don’t have much knowledge in this but, I’m quite pessimistic on that regard.
Have you seen other countries? Fascism, hatred and racism are unfortunately on the rise. To name a few; Israel, India, Germany, The Netherlands and Italy (I think it was Italy that had a years ago or something, bunch of Nazis in standing ovation with their hand ups for their “fallen comrade”);
Chilling Video Shows Hundreds of Far-Right Activists Giving Fascist Salute
There’s three ways to get rid of cancer:
- Poison it. Diminish its numbers to the point where it never comes back.
- Excise it. Cut it away from the rest of the host.
- Do nothing. It’ll die once it consumes the host.
Eating granola and berries or sitting there with hopes and praying for change is option 3. I’m on team option 1. Time to get active.
Option 3.5: Palliative care or euthanasia.
I’m on team Option 2
I’m on team Option Whatever the hell is quickest.
Same here! I’m a lot more comfortable operating a guillotine rather than a gas-chamber.
The problem is that there are 70+ million “frogs” in this country who are being told that being boiled alive is good for them - and they believe it without question, and will fight anyone that says otherwise.
On the bright side, that saying is not a reflection of reality. A real frog will jump out of the pot.
Making things worse only makes things worse.
That was my hope during his first term. I figured he was so massively unqualified that he’d fuck up so badly he’d get impeached and hopefully executed for treason. The frustrating part is that I was right about him being a massively unqualified fuck up, and the impeachment. I just didn’t think that 95% of Republicans were complete traitors that cared more about Russian bribes than Americans.
Yeah that traitor % caught a lot of us off guard.
The USA is taking one for the global team rn. We’re a shining example of exactly what not to do, what roads to avoid, and who to not become.
STUPID Libtard! I LOVE what Trump is DOING!
-People whose FAMILIES have Been Deported and BUSINESSES DESTROYED BUT they can call Autistic Black Kids the N WORD!
Maybe COVID will be so bad that it will facilitate me go get into exercise
Health, being about people or countries, does not work that way.
