I’m not a “Israel deserved Oct 7th” person because I think that lends itself to the idea that the victims of the atrocities committed on Oct 7 deserved it. I don’t think they did. I do think Israel as a nation brought it upon themselves in the sense that they have been oppressing the Palestinians for however many years, and if they hadn’t been, the event wouldn’t have happened.

Norman Finkelstein put it in a pretty interesting way – atrocities were committed on Oct 7, but he would not condemn a violent outburst by people who were born in a concentration camp. He urged leniency and grace that would normally be afforded to people who were born into such conditions and who proceeded to commit unspeakable acts.

Playing guitar. I’m bad, can’t really play with others, couldn’t play live, but being able to sing and play along to songs I love, putting my own spin on them, or getting into a rhythm and making up silly lyrics is one of the most valuable things I ever learned to do. Probably the single best thing I’ve done in my life is learn to play.

Part of the issue is that Donald Trump isn’t using these words in any factual sense, but in a purely rhetorical sense. He is utilizing them as boogeyman terms to scare people away from Harris. It doesn’t matter that’s it’s not factually correct because average people don’t know otherwise.

That brings me to the other part of the issue, which is fascism is notoriously difficult to pin down. Umberto Eco talks about this in his essay Ur-Fascism. He notes that fascism isn’t actually dependent on one or two attributes, such as complete totalitarianism, or support of capital, and doesn’t necessarily have a single religious philosophy. He notes historical examples of things like anticapitalist fascism, religious fascism, atheist fascism, etc.

Still he notes 14 qualities that are typically associated with fascism

• The Cult of Tradition
• Rejection of Modernism
• The Cult of Action for Action’s Sake
• Disagreement is Treason
• Fear of Difference
• Appeal to a Frustrated Middle Class
• Obsession with a Plot
• The Enemy is Both Strong and Weak
• Pacifism is Trafficking with the Enemy
• Contempt for the Weak
• Everybody is Educated to Become a Hero
• Machismo
• Selective Populism
• Newspeak

Much of these are relevant to Trump’s campaign, even more than I had anticipated. Definitely give it a listen or check out the Wikipedia page, it’s a worthwhile half hour just to hear the perspective of someone who actually lived through Italian fascism.

I think you’ve said a lot that is in line with the video, tbh. Most of your points accurately spell out why a superhero movie involving a protagonist who disrupts the status quo wouldn’t work, mostly because we are living in the status quo and the general audience’s main frame of reference – that which they use to understand the story – is that status quo is overall good, that there are inevitable bad parts that must come with the good, and that mass change is inherently bad. You even note this last point yourself.

But it doesn’t change the fact that the superheros are still, for the most part, not proactively trying to recognize reorganize society, but keep it the same and react to its threats, which sometimes have interesting intentions of reorganization, but ultimately all end up doing an irredeemable act in the eyes of the audience so to signal that they are in fact the bad guy.

I don’t think this video is really meant to be taken as “superheros should change the status quo,” but more closely look at Graebers generalization and kinda jostle people out of their “the status quo is ultimately good, despite it’s necessary evils,” worldview. Graeber often said he’s not trying to provide an answer or solution to societal organization outside of hierarchical Nation-states, but just to allow people to break out of the traditional mental framework and ask the question, what else could work?

The adjustment period is real. I was showering twice a day when I stopped shampooing, because my hair (lots of it, but fine and not coarse) got greasy quick. After a few weeks, it normalized. I can shower once a day now. I still wash it by running my fingers and water through it over and over, so it doesn’t smell. I still have a somewhat dry scalp though, it didn’t really fix that. Don’t really have dandruff, but if I scratch my scalp a bunch or use a comb directly on it several times, I’ll have to rinse the dandruff out.

Same, although I’ve been going for longer than two years. Honestly, I cant really remember when I stopped use shampoo. But if I don’t shower for a day, it starts looking a little greasy. I have lots of straight fine hair, run the water and my fingers through it rigorously in the shower, and then I come out, scrunch it with the towel (dont rub, it will break the hair fibers) and then air dry. Get compliments on my hair all the time.

As for smell, it just smells like hair. It can get slightly more pungent if I dont shower, but otherwise it just smells like me. Every once in a while I ask my full-poo GF to check if my hair smells because my own noseblindness, and she hasn’t told me to go shower yet.

Definitely when you go from poo to no-poo, your hair is extra greasy. I don’t know the science behind it, but it seems to over produce oils and takes a couple weeks to normalize. During that period I was showering once in the morning and once at night, again running my fingers and water through my hair for ~2-3 minutes straight. After a while my hair didnt get so greasy.

When I use soap or shampoo, my hair loses all of its body and shine doesn’t go back to normal for a day or so.

I imagine for some people this works, but for others it doesn’t. I do feel a little weird when people ask me what my “secret” is and I’m literally like “yeah just don’t wash it lol”

Yeah, wtf, I thought I was going crazy reading this post. Palestinian protesters aren’t going to vote for Trump, and them protesting the DNC is not going to increase his chances of winning.

They should keep protesting and putting pressure on the Democratic party. They should vote for Harris, but keep up the pressure, and not listen to people like OP.

Also, imagine thinking that Palestinian protestors are doing it to feel superior. They’re doing it because their tax dollars have gone toward a genocide that has thus far killed 40k people. They have no choice that their money goes toward this shit. They should not have to think about whether their protest will hurt an election campaign, nor should they care. They care that their country (even when there is a Democratic president) is arming a genocide and doesn’t seem like it has much plans to stop.

I would recommend reading or listening to Noam Chomsky’s Understanding Power. It is a compilation of several of his Q and As about his ideas about the US political and media systems. He has a whole book about the media called Manufacturing Consent, but Understanding Power will give you the lowdown.

Essentially, all mainstream US media is beholden to capitalistic (for advertising) or state (for funding) forces, so a person should always be aware that news sources are never going to print something that is against its own interest. Things like LGBTQ rights and right to abortion don’t put news outlets sources of money at risk, so they’re safe to print, but you’d be hard-pressed to find something that challenges, for example, the military industrial complex.

I’m not doing it much justice but that’s a very very general and incomplete jist of why it’s good to be skeptical of the mainstream media in general.

Yeah, unprecedented event after unprecedented event. Still you could’ve been vindicated if anything mildly unfortunate had happened before the DNC. Like if Harris picked a different VP, if Vance was actually in any way adept, etc. And hey, knock on wood, but you could still be right in the end – we probably shouldn’t count our chickens before they hatch.

Good on you though for being a good sport about your previous comments. I was on the “drop out” side (not that Biden would drop out, but I thought pretty much anyone else would have a better chance), but at the end of the day I kinda think we’re all talking out of our asses to a certain degree, because political science isn’t actually a science at all.

Hey, no need to be rude. I’m using the word colloquially, not in the technical sense. Besides, in another comment I admitted maybe dynasty wasn’t the right word, at least for Obamas and Biden. It’s more appropriate (though, you’re right in that it is still not technically accurate) for people like the Clintons and Bushes.

In those cases, maybe dynasties isn’t the right word – although I do sort of see Michelle Obama as a bit of a politician, herself, even though she hasn’t held office. She at least has more power than, say, you or me. Still, I’m more thinking about Obama and Biden in the sense that I am thinking of Biden and Kamala – it was sort of Joe Biden’s turn. Conservatives see that sorta stuff – they rightly see these people as elites, and it gives them more reason to think the Democratic party is corrupt. The reality is it would be difficult to find a politician who isn’t corrupt in a system that has legalized bribery and has necessitated the solicitation of those bribes by our “leaders.”

I’m about to throw a word salad out here about how I can sympathize (never thought I would say that) with Trump supporters in a sense. Hopefully someone chimes in and can challenge a couple of my views here, because i think they could probably be honed a bit, or explained further, but…

It’s very easy to blame his allure all on racism, all on stupidity, all on nationalism, because certainly Trump espouses all of that. But his populism is also due largely to working-class people seeing (rightly) the Democratic party as corrupt. They see people like Gates and Soros, Hollywood elites like Clooney hanging out with Pelosi and, understandably, get upset seeing all these ultra rich people walking in and out of the private/public sector. They see political dynasties like the Clintons and the Obamas and Bidens as antithetical to the idea that anyone can serve their country in politics, and rightly so. Even Harris – it was essentially “her turn” for the nomination – and they see that as undemocratic and bullshit, which – can I blame them?

Now, where they go wrong (and, ironically, where hardcore Democrats also go wrong) is thinking that their party isn’t also participating in the same bullshit. Trump isn’t anti-establishment, he’s literally a billionaire property magnate. He is part of the ruling class in America that consists of landlords, bankers, and company shareholders. Both parties would uphold our current system of rule by the few, and back up that rule with the monopolization of violence by the police.

This isn’t to say the two parties are completely the same. In terms of willingness to uphold capitalism (ultimately the extraction of money from labor), the military-industrial complex (see, Palestinian genocide), and American hegemony internationally (again, genocide), and police violence, they are similar. But then you also have Republicans trying to ban books, surveil women’s bodies, control what people do in the bedroom, or medical care they receive, espouse various forms of hate, etc. So I do see them as worse, but think you’d be hard pressed to find a person in the US, democrat or republican, who didn’t agree with the statement that “all politicians are corrupt.” It’s just the nature of our political system, which has essentially legalized bribery.

Being able to say to my conservative-ass family, “Yeah, dude, Obama bombed Syria and bailed out the banks – I feel what you’re saying,” gives us that little bit of common ground to start a conversation about the drastic change that needs to happen in the US.

Me too :/ not only that, but it scares people off even more than just the term communism, which in itself is taboo

Radical love, mutual aid, human solidarity, and nonviolent imagery and ideals are more powerful, since they have the ability to tap into a shared ethical ideal, one that can stretch across political and religious boundaries.

my original comment was just meant to be a playful comment about your meme use rather than any analysis about the speech.

Like: “I agree with you, but can we talk about this thing or that?”

But honestly forget about it, next time I wont bother

Not angry, just disturbed that there are even more lol

I’m literally agreeing with you. Not sure what you’re fixing about my phrasing – I didn’t watch the speech, so yes, I am ignorant, but am willing to guess that your comment was totally correct.

I’m also saying your meme-game disturbs my meme-less brain.

But I guess according to you, I have no idea what I’m talking about so in that case…you’re wrong? Idk what youre trying to say dude all I know is that just because O’Brien spoke at the RNC doesn’t somehow automatically make him a Trump supporter

Full disclosure I haven’t watched the speech, but I can believe it was in good faith, no doubt pro-labor/anti-capitalist. (btw, it’s crazy how bad the Democratic party has alienated the working class)

What I can’t believe is these disturbing-ass memes you’re posting lmao…I hate them very much and wish I could unsee. Good job!

This particular attack probably had nothing to do with any of this, but she could probably be described as offensive from the economic equality standpoint, because she is a billionaire, from the environmental justice standpoint, because she is a frequent private-jet user, and from the music scene standpoint, because she seemingly intentionally pushes out other female artists from billboard spots by re-releasing albums in specific locations/time periods during which her peers are releasing their albums.

That’s insane.

Like, no 401k or Roth IRA? Dang. I’m fuckin hard.

We might be, and I’m definitely not an expert or that immediately knowledgeable (hence, why I just listened to two long-ass books in two weeks), but even your banking example doesn’t really satisfy me. I get what you’re saying – not that banking or capitalism were a spontaneous solution or decision or conscious at all, but moreso that they solved a certain problem many human societies had, and therefore it was further adopted, and further, and further, an almost natural propensity to spread. In some sense, there must be some underlying force that’s pushing capitalism and banking along, because otherwise we wouldn’t have their dominance, today.

But that is still the core idea the authors push back against in those two books. I’d probably argue that banking didn’t spread because it solved the problem (hoarding money), but that it emerged out of early hierarchical societies whose states, themselves, hoarded primitive “money” (grain) and lent it out to farmers at interest, and that the underlying force we’re looking for that caused it’s eventual spread is the concept of debt or becoming whole, itself. But then I am also getting into the territory of banking as some natural sociological phenomenon that was destined to be furthered and furthered , which is, again, exactly what those two books seek to dispel, especially Debt.

I’d like to continue, but this would definitely work better as an in-person conversation where we could push back and forth against ideas, but I do have to work :/