Who seriously listens to Zizek and bases their view of the world on him?

Many people do. But nobody “bases” their worldview on Zizek. He has made some important contributions to psychoanalysis and critique of ideology. One has to separate Zizek the philosopher, Zizek the politician and Zizek the pop culture philosopher.

I’ve seen people use the word “degenerate” and “degeneracy”, get upvotes and no warning. The words always rub me the wrong way, but since there was no reports/action taken I figured it was tolerated on lemmygrad.

Masks, just like the “litterbug” campaign, are a way to offload responsibility and blame onto the working class, responsibility that should fall to the government and companies.

Case: a person is sick, maybe covid maybe not. Instead of telling the person to stay home (cutting productivity, therefore cutting profits), they just tell the person to wear a mask.

Case: a person works from home, and is sick. Instead of the government providing groceries and ensuring the person doesn’t have to go out during the 4-5 days they are contagious, they tell them to mask up and go grocery shopping.

People don’t even know how to wear a mask. I have seen so many people wear a mask under their nose, or have a mask on that is used and wet from sweat (ineffective). I also see many people have gaps on the sides, or under their chin, might as well not wear a mask at that point. Don’t even get me started on those visors…

The media lied to people. First they said masks don’t work, told people not to buy, but then couple of months later there was a mask mandate.

Their mask rules were ridiculous. When the restaurants opened (for example), the rules were that you had to wear a mask while not seated, walking between tables, but then you could take it off once you’re at the table. LMAO

Those thin masks don’t offer much protection. The ones that do are the N95 and surgical ones, yet people were allowed to wear homemade knitted masks, cloth masks, novelty masks, etc. There was no enforcing of a standard. Masks other than N95 or surgical simply don’t work.

“Well, what’s the alternative??!!”

• when sick, people should stay home (they should have paid sick leave)
• covid tests should have been free and people should have been testing themselves every few days, I’d much rather that everyone around me had been tested in the last 24-48h, than everyone wearing a mask (improperly) while not knowing whether they have covid or not
• ventilation, UV lights (like others have said)
• hand sanitisers everywhere, plus free hand sanitisers given out (this has been done for the most part)
• quick, population-wide vaccination, no dilly-dallying, no vaccinating this group, then this group, then this group

But you did? How are we discussing it if it’s not in the article?

So nothing happened.

Yeah, no shit. What did you expect? The US to go “oh sorry, we’ll stop existing now”? The US empire won’t crumble after one embarrassing video. You can’t make the claim Assange/Wikileaks is a US asset just because their leaks didn’t lead to the collapse of the US or significant change.

It ties his mom. A kid hardly has influence on what parents do.

It is also not my goal to conclusively prove or even allege that Assange is a federal asset. Rather, I think there are enough worrying questions that should be made known more broadly

Please don’t do this. This is a right-wing tactic: “I’m not making any claims, I’m just asking questions.”

At the same time, the two leaks were not entirely damaging to the US government.

“Collateral murder” absolutely was damaging to the US government. It showed the callous disregard the US military had for (non-white) human life and it put them under a lot of scrutiny. It also helped a lot of “fence-sitters” take a side opposing the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The murderers were never prosecuted.

Because that’s US policy. Not prosecuting them was also a bad look for US govt.

Wikileaks, however, was never formed to build credibility around damaging the US or the West in general; it was purposely founded to go after the enemies of the US government.

What? This claim needs arguments.

confined to a small room in the Ecuadorian embassy with no possibilities of ever leaving — a golden prison.

“A golden prison.” lmao. As someone who has experienced prison, his freedom taken away, you can lock a person up in a 5-star resort for 10 years and I guarantee you that person will go crazy, experience negative mental and physical effects. When criminals commit crime, they expect and are ready for the consequences, Assange never expected to be prosecuted by thr US never having stepped foot on US soil.

I think Assange’s release signals a new chapter for Wikileaks

I assume part of the plea deal is that Assange will not engage in any similar activities that landed him in trouble the first time. And even if it wasn’t, if I were Assange, I’d probably take a loooooong break from it all and spend time with my family.

There is also a part I didn’t write into the article about how when he was a teen in the 70s his mom dated a cult leader for a few years who had some ties to MK Ultra edit: dated a cult member when Assange was very young,

How is that Assange’s fault?

You can be anything and a communist, however certain activities might result in internal/personal contradictions that will plague you and get worse over time. It will be up to you to resolve them, one way or another.

General Kalashnikov himself has told SAR in the past that he used the M1 Garand as a model to derive ideas from and denied any connection to the German MP44, and he once told veteran small arms designer Charles Rostocil that he made five prototypes before he got one to work

https://smallarmsreview.com/the-assult-rifle-comparison-of-the-soviet-ak47-to-the-german-stg44/

This is not the case in socialist states.

Is there no private property in currently existing socialist states? Do you think if you go to sleep in someone’s yard in China the police wouldn’t come and take you away?

It’s a material undeniable fact.

How can “they act in the interests of the workers” be a material, undeniable fact? You can’t just throw words and terms around.

In capitalist societies yes.

How can you be counter-revolutionary without a revolution?

Are all traffic lights bastards whether they’re in capitalist or socialist societies, since they have power over you?

Sure. There are more traffic lights

You’re reeking off anarchist “thought”.

You should learn to argue/debate without throwing insults. It makes you look insecure and immature.

Lenin replaced the police with a local “militia”, literally what I am saying now.

I was wrong about the Soviet Union’s militia. The local Moscow militia fought on the side of the parliamentarians against Yeltsin. So it helped a bit that there wasn’t a country-wide “police” to be shipped from other cities to Moscow.

There’s a fundamental difference between cops in socialist countries and those elsewhere.

And that difference is…?

The police serves the state

The police serve whoever pays them.

they act in the interest of the bourgeoisie in capitalist countries and the workers in socialist countries.

That’s an idealist view, just because you say it doesn’t make it true. Yes, in theory the police should “act in the interest of the workers in socialist countries”, but then why didn’t they do that in the Soviet Union before its dissolution? Why did the police side with the people who wanted to tear down the Soviet Union?

edit: I was wrong here. The Moscow militia actually fought against Yeltsin.

“ACAB” is implicitly limited to capitalist countries; otherwise, it would be akin to anarchists denouncing all states

Not at all. It is recognition of an institution that has no revolutionary potential. It is an institution that has historically been instrumental in counter-revolution.

Sure! Can’t hurt. I can’t make any promises though, cause of the whole expectation-anxiety and letting people down thing, but if I’m around I will participate.

Up to you. :)

You’re a mod of https://lemmygrad.ml/c/creativewriting, can’t fan fiction be posted there?

Don’t ask, just say you’re starting a book club, the book you’re reading, and where people can contact you/post about it. You’ll get more engagement/response that way.

Seems like a cool book, btw, I’m downloading it now.