This is not some "one off comment".
Yes it is.
Wer're dealing with a prolonged argument in which one person kindly suggests subjugating every other until they learn to be a good obedient slave and the other kindly disagrees.
Indeed, and that person suggesting subjugation is named Bolsonaro. Did you read the article? About the purging? I really sugest reading the article.
Is Bolsonaro filth? Yes. However, Brazilians elected him and unless democracy is only cool when it's your motherfucker who wins, then you might want to drop the hypocrisy and work around the wannabe dictator.
My hypocrisy? Are you confusing me with FearfulJesuit? I'm not saying that the results should be invalidated, and only one person here suggested intervention; even he suggested it in a way that you would agree with and in a way that shows that it's not a real consideration (i.e. "The US doesn't have the moral authority", the only disagreement is whether the US ever has the moral authority).
Is it good that he won? No! But unless you want to finally drop the act of pretending you give a shit about the people you claim you want to liberate then you should watch what you're saying.
Let's compare some things here, shall we?
I want to move away from intervention-talk, and I can give many reasons as to why:
- It gives autocrats an excuse to dp as they please, so long as they claim they are defending against "American Imperialism", imagined or not
- Related to the former, any American Imperialism in this situation is clearly imagined at best, meaning the discussion serves no purpose.
- Trump is pro-Bolsonaro, so there is somehow even less likelihood of intervention than with other states, adding even more evidence to the claim that it is irrelevant here. American conservatives, who are the interventionists, are pro-Bolsonaro. Edit: There's an editorial from the WSJ endorsing him. Same WSJ who endorses invasion of the middle east to spread American values. So, you know, intervention: not very likely.
- Bolsonaro should be discussed with regards to reality on the ground as opposed to hypotheticals, which I had attempted to draw attention to in the interests of talking about Brazil
- The discussion of America is tangential at best in this thread even when it is relevant, and discussion of state-building in Germany has no relevance to the current situation.
- The reification of all Latin American issues into American Foreign Policy does quite a lot to diminsh the importance and relevance of Latin America. Bringing up intervention when it's not relevant only serves to hinder the cause of Latin American independence from US influence, since it makes the US the primary topic of discussion when it isn't warranted, and furthers the claim that "Latin American issues are American issues".
- You're at war with a strawman, since even the most inteventionist person in this thread declared his position by saying that it was never going to happen, and he was against it in this circumstance regardless.
- I will continue to harp on this point, but Bolsonaro was democratically elected without US intervention: The US has not involved itself at all. Yet here you stand, yelling at me over American Imperialism, while I try to drag to topic back to the actual issues involved. You can't fight American-centrism by just being angrily against it, since you're still focusing on the US as the center of things. You have to stand for something, namely South America. Which means you have to discuss the issues.
In conclusion: this is the equivalent of going into a thread on Syria and loudly denouncing US involvement when the US is one of the least involved sides in the region, far-less involved than Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Lebanon (through Hezbollah), Iraq, and others. It indicates that the speaker doesn't actually care much about Syria and its sovereignty (since they are discussing the least offender among many), but cares a lot about the US. This is the Latin American Politics thread, so if for only that reason alone,
you are off-topic. It's a valuable discussion to have, but not to have here. I tried to jumpstart the conversation in Ameripol so that the discussion, (which I think is an important one!), can have its space, but all it does here is distract from the actual election to what is an indefensible digression. Real people in the real world will have to live with Bolsonaro, so prosecuting an intervention which will not come is bizarre. Let me rephrase: can you explain to me why you are privileging discussion of historical and hypothetical American Intervention in Latin America over discussion of what is actually happening in South America today? And how can you claim that I "don't give a shit about the people" of South America when you only seem to want to complain about the North?
I mean I just want to discuss Bolsonaro here! Is that too much to ask? I want to hear reactions to those quotes by Brazil's newest President! I know Reelya read the article, who else? Are you telling me no one else in this thread has an opinion on
“I would not rape you because you are not worthy of it.”? Or “In memory of Col. Carlos Alberto Brilhante Ustra, the terror of Dilma Rousseff … I vote YES.”? Or "I am in favor of torture — you know that. And the people are in favor of it, too." Quotes that are even worse
in context! Someone, please, work with me here.