Nails Nathan: In general, I think it’s important to remove the argument for leftist positions from the idea there’s an overlooked silent majority just waiting to support them if only for the machinations of the dastardly elite.

In general, I think it’s important to remove the argument for leftist positions from the idea there’s an overlooked silent majority just waiting to support them if only for the machinations of the dastardly elite.

The case for abolition, UBI, universal housing and healthcare has the power of moral force. Couching these positions in the idea they’re actually secretly popular muddles the argument and elides the very real work that needs to be done in convincing people.

This is why I think “Sorry To Bother You” is an actually important cultural text in our current moment, (spoilers) the idea that enough people would be outraged enough to call for an end to labor exploitation through genetic engineering to force Congress to step in is fucking naive.

If I say “defund the police” and you say “oh people won’t like that” you should know I don’t give a shit what people would like, I’m fucking right. And I’m going to keep being right while the police keep fucking shit up until y’all realize this guy is fucking right.

People loved Justin Timberlake at one point, how’d that shit turn out?

I scream-laughed!!!

real jump scare at the end there

Loved this thread its highlighting attitudes that really frustrate me but can be hard to get into words. This idea that 'everyone' agrees really and people must be being either misled or lying if they say they don't.

VINDICATION 🔥 I love that, thanks

you can't fund anything else without defunding them at this point it's all our fucking money for these pigs

Abolition of entrenched institutions always looks impossible, and their defenders will help keep up that aura of inevitability. But as a historian I know ancient evils can vanish overnight, if there's a powerful movement.

"Without [the monarchy/slavery/private property/religion/etc], all civilization will collapse. There'll be universal mayhem and warfare."

Nope. Things were generally better afterwards. Not in spite of, but because a select few heads rolled.

I’m asking a serious question? Without some form of law enforcement we have anarchy. Is that what you want or is there another solution?

Honestly, I think the word you’re looking for here is chaos and not anarchy, anarchism is an ideology centered around mutual relations which are decided in a mass and democratic nature, and yes I’d prefer anarchism to hierarchical racist capitalism if I’m being honest.

It’s also “a state of disorder due to absence or nonrecognition of authority or other controlling systems.” Anarchy.

The most based comment on this site today

Defunding is not eliminating them. Police forces are increasingly living out COD LARP fantasies with purchased military items. Why do my local police need military items? Do they consider themselves at war with the population?

Unfortunately, as long as AR15s and AK47s are on the streets, the answer is YES!

lol. bye

I don’t necessarily agree with everyone who want to end policing, but there are definitely answers to this question if you really want to know. Here’s an example, just from a quick google, but plenty more exist. criticalresistance.org/abolish-poli...

Resources for Abolishing Policingcriticalresistance.org Over the years, Critical Resistance has generated numerous organizing resources to resist policing. As an abolitionist organization, Critical Resistance supports abolitionist reforms to dismantle the ...

I’ll read it. Tyvm.

You might be right, but the police won't ever be defunded, so does it matter?

The idea that the only blocker is a little group of Bad Guys in a smoky room somewhere and everything will be fine if they're gone is so appealing and so toxic. It means people assume all dissent must be coming from an evil plot.

Yep,it really provides an entry point for what can easily lead to antisemitic conspiracies and often leads people from leftist thinking to reactionary right politics

You can’t discount the media’s role is shaping opinions on these matters though. Many people are easily influenced. For example all of the “free thinkers” have the same talking points.

One of the most common 'free thinker' talking points is the idea that everyone else is controlled by propaganda but they're so Smart and Cool that they can see through it all.

Just checking if you are meaning to say that propaganda doesn’t work?

I think a huge part of the struggle is to have more people *believe* these goals can be achieved. Many people don't oppose them, they don't even see them as real possibilities.

I think the point is also that we should emphasize the morality and rightness of a given position vs falling back to authoritarian bogeymen (who are real, mind you) Does it matter whether something like Palestinian independence is popular but suppressed? It's morally right, regardless of popularity

To clarify, are you talking about the "Most people actually *want* " type of argument?

Has anyone tested which Leftist ideas are popular? Tested with whom the ideas are popular?

They do it all the time in polling

What polling is done by Leftists with the goal of advancing Leftist policies (not merely bullshtting a candidate through the next election?

It’s done all the time. Almost every advocacy organization which can afford it polls around their positions and messaging

Sorry, but UBI won't scale because it leads to greedflation. We need state capitalism. We have to end private property and the bourgeois state of we ever want to achieve abolition and any semblance of. That's the only way we're ever going to begin solving the problems capitalism creates.

I mean, without competition to keep prices down, and with the global profit rate being decimated over the past 50 years, what do you think conglomerates are going to do when people have more money in their pockets? Same thing that happened after the pandemic stimulus.

Eventually, even with UBI, working class incomes will end up being just enough to barely survive again, unless ofc there are price controls and good luck with that. We have no choice but to appropriate all private capital, and the sooner the better. We have to start having this conversation.

Would certainly make a lot of things easier. But alas, a lot of that “silent majority” is skeptical at best of socialism, outright hostile at worst.

they might be on board, issue by issue, as long as you don't let on that it's called socialism

In my experience a plurality of folks share all of the basic tenets, you just can't always use the word, over here in the US anyway. Even then it varies a lot by generation and whether they had a Cold War era education or not.

Depends on where you are in the US. I wouldn’t say that’s necessarily true where I live in Virginia. Regardless, it does mean we have our work cut out for us to do political education and counter a lot of reactionary propaganda.

I think age is a stronger determiner, personally -- see also en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millenn...

Millennial socialism - Wikipediaen.m.wikipedia.org

But yes, we have a long way to go either way, and often a lot of reactionary talking points to deprogram, full stop

In general, leftists are not putting forward the positions that any overlooked silent majority waiting to support them would support (if only the machinations, etc. etc.) I blame the Marxism of the 2nd & 3rd International and the PhD dissertation industry. Prove me wrong.

This belies the reality of voting population vs. voting eligible population.

Thing is people like the police, they like jailing Black people, they like the idea of being winners in a meritocracy, ignoring this means we never formulate a coherent argument against it.

This is why conservatives get to dance in that space of “come on, y’know what I mean” all day. We have to show people why this is deleterious to them.

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