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[Frumple]

Eh, depends on what you call strongly in favor. You don't have to be fond of communism or somethin', but we fortunately do kinda' get pissed off if you're lukewarm on the subject of goddamn nazis. Lotta' that junk just comes from what jackasses like those have been trying to do, normalize right-wing extremism so they can try to frame basic sanity as, itself, extremism.

Basically less junk on the far left where "with us or against us" is quite so literal as with things like the white supremacist and/or nazis, who are pretty blatant that their end goal is actually killing everyone that's not them. Centrist inclination has a fairly easy time tripping over golden mean fallacy crap when shit like that is floating around, these days. Unfortunately.

I'm talking about their vision, their endgame. Now, I may be wrong, but are they opposed to private property, to keeping around the existing bodies of government (President, Senate, House), the capitalist way of doing business? Do they want to disestablish the quote-unquote traditional family in favor of radical social experimentation? Hell, do they  want to significantly mess with the social stratification at all, apart from lynching a couple politicians and Wall Street fat cats? Are they opposed to the place the military occupies (heh) in American society?

Uh... handful of those, yes. Like the lynching thing, where it's occasionally not so much a few politicians and CEOs as it is our entire fucking minority population. Plenty want to see the government just flat goddamn gone. Union broke, states broke, etc. Some want to do some pretty crazy shit to the traditional family, too -- shades of bigamy, child marriage, etc. Some pretty interested in doing things like fairly literally murdering bankers until there's no more banks, with the consequent results on capital trade, heh. Can poke around that sort of stuff for a while. The hole over there is deep.

In any case, wow. Historical first. USA has made its first settlement in regards to our use of torture. Looks like the first time we've publicly compensated someone for torturing them.

[Not good with names]

I'm talking about their vision, their endgame. Now, I may be wrong, but are they opposed to private property, to keeping around the existing bodies of government (President, Senate, House), the capitalist way of doing business? Do they want to disestablish the quote-unquote traditional family in favor of radical social experimentation? Hell, do they  want to significantly mess with the social stratification at all, apart from lynching a couple politicians and Wall Street fat cats? Are they opposed to the place the military occupies (heh) in American society?


Hell, I'd wager most would agree that the state monopoly on violence should be a thing - once it's the right people wielding it.

Ok, I see where you're getting at, but practically they'd have to concentrate power to finish their plans, so I'd expect something more like the house and senate being dissolved and being replaced (A la venezuela).

Thinking about it, extreme libertarians would be for radical change, though they are kinda on that cusp where the extremes of right and left meet. 

[smjjames]

Your typical (no, the crazy gun but stereotype us not typical, despite the MSM and Hollywood) militia group organizes under a common banner of "should the state ever fail in its civic duty to uphold the law, protect the rights of the citizenry, or repel a hostile force, we can attend to the service of our country."

It is often popularized by the MSM and Hollywood that these are paramilitary groups who threaten the government with overthrow, but actually regular militia groups exclude people with such ideas, as they are incompatible with the goals of those groups. Granted, non regular "militia" exists, and does tend toward absurdity in that vein, and as much as it may seem a no true Scotsman, it really is not when asserting that they are not the same thing.

I do not believe that the guy interviewed by that reporter would condone violent upheaval of social order.

I mean right wing as in radically right wing, like the kind of left wing that helgo was talking about.

Plus I think that even if you included the entire NRA members... they probably couldn't even storm the White House.

It is only scary to listen to people talk about shooting people if America ever was co-opted.

The issue is that I believe the whole Militia thing was if the US was taken over by say... a foreign power or a internal terrorist group... Not if America slipped in their ideals.

Except people interpret the militia thing, which I guess could have it's vocabulary modernized, as being able to have guns outside of a militia.

[Lord Shonus]

Except people interpret the militia thing, which I guess could have it's vocabulary modernized, as being able to have guns outside of a militia.

The Second Militia Act of 1792, which helped to formalized the concept and was written mostly by the same men who wrote the 2nd Amendment, specifically stated that the militia consisted of every "free able-bodied white male citizen" between the ages of 18 and 45, and required every such person to arm himself with the same basic equipment carried by line infantry of the period.

In other words, the militia referred to in the 2nd Amendment was clearly intended to be everybody, within the thought constraints of the era.

[SalmonGod]

As someone who self-identifies as fairly radical (though radicalism has grown quite a bit and now that I think about it, I'm rather more tame these days by comparison)

I'm curious, is not being strongly in favor of one side or the other considered bad nowadays? It seems to be so, at least to me, what with the whole "You're with us or against us" and "We need to be extreme in order to counter their extremism".

Frankly, I'm just disheartened by the whole situation

I don't think so.  There's plenty of people out there who think that way.  But it's more that people in the middle can actually get in the way fairly often.  Current example is the debate over how much respect and free speech to offer "alt-right" types and contest them in the marketplace of ideas vs strictly shunning them.  I think the issue here is varying interpretation of the stakes involved and goals of different groups.    Where those who claim a middle ground think it's because they're at some point on a gradient, others look at the more technical moving parts of the situation and point out that the practical effect they have on the situation isn't very gradient-like or compromising at all.

From the perspective of those who are trying to claim middle ground and propose compromises, what's at stake is the solidarity of some central tenets of our democratic society - freedom of speech and belief and such.  And I can respect that in essence.  And they claim theirs is the middle ground because they still think the nazis should be contested, just in a different way that doesn't compromise our values.  They're also concerned that not extending those same values to them the same way we do to everyone else garners them sympathy, because they play off this true victim narrative and makes them more visible.

From my perspective, what's at stake is literally the nazis ability to legitimize themselves and organize.  To realize their potential strength of numbers and conviction, and prove that the time has come that they are able to band together and pursue their goals again.  I think the true victim narrative is a red herring, and that the more visible our disapproval of them is, the less of them will be willing to come out of hiding, organize, and gather power.  I see the centrist's middle ground approach as literally handing them the victory in this struggle.  Not a middle ground at all.  Their position is not just another point on a gradient.  It is tangibly, by definition in opposition to my stance on the issue.

Does this make sense?

Does third party groups trying to put out the fire include cops? Not surprising that they'd get maligned on both sides because both sides would say "You're not on our side!", whereas cops are usually recognized as being neutral, perhaps TOO neutral at times.

The radical leftist perspective on cops is that they don't just do their jobs.  They do it with psychopathic pleasure, and a healthy serving of corruption on the side.  And the state enables them to do so.  Stake holders in major business or political conventions will literally pay for hosting cities to buy legal insurance policies that allow them to violate protester's rights and then pay out settlements in court later so that the event can go unchallenged.  I wrote a very in-depth post on this in the past, which I will dig up again if necessary.  And they don't go to nearly the same extent in shutting down conservative protest.

And I don't think the difference is in goals.  I think it's in culture.  Shared belief between ultra-conservatives and law enforcement in blunt authoritarianism and black & white worldviews, basically.  That everything should be a certain way because that's just what feels right and if it isn't, then you make it by whatever means of force you can get away it.  Conservatives support police because the law is generally on their side in cultural matters and their side falls into callous just-world view fallacies a lot more when anything about what they do ends up controversial.  Unarmed black guy gets shot by police, they jump right into rifling through the victims history to see what he must have done to deserve it.  The only reason some of them are turning on the police right now is partly over not favoring them strongly enough in their traditional alliance, and partly because they're just a convenient scapegoat right now for avoiding direct blame over how violent things got.

[Max™]

Don't we have fairly extreme [big-L]ibertarians in congress right now?

I'm pretty far out in left field, hence super-left rather than ctrl-left (identity politics ahoy) and alt-right (rubbing shoulders with neonazis) and my biggest problem is with the idea that everything is best handled by "the market" and that the profit motive is great. Similarly the whole protestant work ethic bullshit combined with expansion of automation leads to a dark hyper-capitalist cyberpunk future that I'd really rather avoid via a healthy injection of socialism where needed, just not the nationalist variety thanks, none of that shit.

Fun alternate reality take on the weekend events: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/global-opinions/wp/2017/08/16/what-if-western-media-covered-americas-white-tribalism-the-same-way-it-covers-other-nations/?tid=pm_opinions_pop

Another from a democratic socialist who was there: http://www.dsausa.org/a_member_s_account_from_charlottesville_dl

[smjjames]

Don't we have fairly extreme [big-L]ibertarians in congress right now?

I don't know of any in the House, but in the Senate, there's Rand Paul.

I'm pretty far out in left field, hence super-left rather than ctrl-left (identity politics ahoy) and alt-right (rubbing shoulders with neonazis) and my biggest problem is with the idea that everything is best handled by "the market" and that the profit motive is great. Similarly the whole protestant work ethic bullshit combined with expansion of automation leads to a dark hyper-capitalist cyberpunk future that I'd really rather avoid via a healthy injection of socialism where needed, just not the nationalist variety thanks, none of that shit.

Wouldn't automation happen regardless if the ideology is capitalist or not? Being communist or whatever isn't going to stop automation.

[SalmonGod]

A handful of more summarized personal accounts

Wouldn't automation happen regardless if the ideology is capitalist or not? Being communist or whatever isn't going to stop automation.

It's not about stopping automation, it's how capitalism specifically combines with automation to create hyper-inequality and complete disenfranchisement from the economy, in a system where that equates at the very least to a significant reduction in lifespan and an inability to attain a quality of life that is acceptable by any humanitarian metric... if not your very life itself becoming illegal as you literally cannot occupy space because it costs money directly or indirectly to do so.

[wierd]

Capitalism "works" by attempting to turn a vice into a virtue, namely, greed.

It relies on the principle that all actors will be greedy, and will attempt to finagle the deal in their favor, which with equally powerful buyer and seller, results in a fair market price.

The problem happens when either buyer or seller gains inordinate control over the deal making process, and can systematically force the issue-- which is basically what automation enables; you have a "laborer" that does not get paid, does not eat, sleep, go to the bathroom, or suffer mental infirmity. With such laborers in the market, the human laborers, who are also the buyers, lose their source of capital, and thus cannot enforce fair market prices any more.  Since capitalism says "Greed is good!" suddenly having the state step in and say "Hey yo, sellers-- you are being TOO GREEDY, and are upsetting the system!", the less informed get all bent out of control, and complain about government intervention.

[Neonivek]

Since capitalism says "Greed is good!" suddenly having the state step in and say "Hey yo, sellers-- you are being TOO GREEDY, and are upsetting the system!", the less informed get all bent out of control, and complain about government intervention.

Which is hilarious because Capitalism 101 the basic book and information of the subject (not a literal book mind you) is that without government interference and oversight... Capitalism will eventually spiral out of control in a post apocalyptic nightmare that we will never awaken from.

The fact that we haven't had depressions lately (only recessions) is BECAUSE of rules the government put in place.

When the market fails it is up to the government to pick up the slack.

Yet this "No government intervention" attitude is so obviously pushed by corporate entities and those who would profit... I've never seen a more transparently opportunistic position in my life. Not that people have to accept ALL government intervention or no government intervention... Only that it is very situational.

[smjjames]

We came damn close to entering a depression in 2008/2009 though.

If the Republicans miss the deadline for the debt ceiling, though I can imagine Trump going "Nah, I'll do the OPPOSITE of what the media expects and not sign it.", I wonder how that will affect things ideologically.

[Neonivek]

We came damn close to entering a depression in 2008/2009 though.

If the Republicans miss the deadline for the debt ceiling, though I can imagine Trump going "Nah, I'll do the OPPOSITE of what the media expects and not sign it.", I wonder how that will affect things ideologically.

Yep and it was kind of our own faults for that... Subprime mortgages have apparently NEVER worked out or something... I am not familiar. Basically the information was there, it should have been regulated or banned.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

When the general public pays the consequences and rich fucks who did it get to keep their freedom and fortunes, I wouldn't call it self-inflicted.

[Aedel]

UUUGH!!! MY HEART!!!

Goodness America's Left Wing is much more... sane than other countries.

---

I'm talking about their vision, their endgame. Now, I may be wrong, but are they opposed to private property, to keeping around the existing bodies of government (President, Senate, House), the capitalist way of doing business? Do they want to disestablish the quote-unquote traditional family in favor of radical social experimentation? Hell, do they  want to significantly mess with the social stratification at all, apart from lynching a couple politicians and Wall Street fat cats? Are they opposed to the place the military occupies (heh) in American society?

I thought Communism was just that the means of production is owned by the state. Not the non-existence of private property.

henlo I am here only to answer this

Spoiler: muh gommunism (click to show/hide)

To start off, private property cannot exist under communism. Period. Flat out. It doesn't exist. If private property exists in any fashion it's not socialism or communism. Socialism is defined by the workers owning the means of production, not any one person.

Private property is the means of production like a factory, personal property is a toothbrush or your car, etc.

The MOP controlled by the state is specific to Vanguard Party forms of communism. Marxist-Leninism, Maosim, Stalinism, etc. The kind of stuff you saw in post-Stalinist coup USSR. This is seen as a method to protect the "new socialist state" from the invariable capitalist counterattacks that would try to destroy it. Eventually, the idea is that it would wither away into "real communism," aka the workers having direct control with no government whatsoever. Obviously they're all idiots and we've seen how this turns out. Turns out handing all power to "temporary" dictatorships ends horribly as soon as the trustworthy dictator dies, if one existed in the first place.

Vanguard parties use the logic that as their government represents the worker, the state controlling the MOP is the same as the worker controlling them, and as such it is socialism. This varies(Soviets were semi-independent worker communes in Russia that, ironically, the Soviet Union violently suppressed)

Vanguard parties are significantly less popular nowadays afaik, and most nowadays are libcoms and anarchists, which want direct worker ownership without the state acting as an intermediary. These are the people that Stalin sent to the gulags along with everyone else.

ebic real gommunism xd

[smjjames]

Wouldn't your house still be private property in a communist state? Even a communist wouldn't want people randomly walking in and out of your house if they weren't invited in the first place.