🏳️🌈 hi there, i’m blake! i’m a silly gay bear 🌀
The Metropolitan Police has designated Whitehall, Parliament Square and Trafalgar Square for a far-right demonstration led by Tommy Robinson on May 16, while refusing the Palestine Coalition its requested route for a Nakba commemoration planned for the same day.
My bad, I’m autistic and struggle to tell sometimes! Sorry for preaching to the converted :p
The media are owned and controlled by the ruling class - the same class of people who also own and control for-profit prisons, and also own and control elected politicians through lobbying.
As I always say, under capitalism, democracy means the power of the state is auctioned off to the highest bidder.
Basically, the issue with capitalism is that the more wealth you have, the easier it is for you to make more money. And since money can be used to buy goods, services and influence, there is always a way to use money to gain more political and social power. With that political and social power, you can push society and the legal system in the direction you want to go. So you can use your wealth to gain power, and then you can use your power to change laws and society so that you can make even more wealth and power. It’s a positive feedback loop.
Obviously, though, if the billionaires and ruling class are accumulating more and more of our society’s wealth, that inevitably means that there’s less for everyone else to go around - therefore, working class people feel poorer and poorer. Meanwhile, the economy is going absolutely great for rich people, so inflation continues to go up - everything gets more expensive, but wages don’t increase. The wealthy just keep more and more of the wealth for themselves. To accumulate more and more wealth, they change the laws so that they can avoid paying taxes, so public services collapse. Politicians are lobbied to ensure that public funds are diverted away from where it is most needed - housing, healthcare, transportation, infrastructure - and instead into industries where their class interests most benefit from it, such as weapons manufacturing and extractive industries such as fossil fuels and mining.
The working class are bound to notice that their lives are getting shittier and shittier, and if that situation is left unchecked, the working class would realize that the ruling class are fucking them over, rise up, and overthrow their rulers. Obviously, the ruling class need to do something about this, but there’s no solution that the ruling class can offer. They’re causing all of the problems, to fix them they’d have to give up some of their wealth and power - and that’s not something they’re going to do. So they need to find someone else to blame the problems we have in society on. Unfortunately, though, no matter who they blame the problems on, and no matter what they do to “fix” it, the issue will continue to persist, because the material conditions underlying the issues are, very intentionally, never addressed.
So, the conundrum returns: The ruling class said that minority A caused all of the problems, minority A is persecuted and oppressed, but society doesn’t actually get any better. Either the problem wasn’t minority A, or minority A just hasn’t been oppressed enough yet. So the ruling class can either escalate the oppression, or they can shift the focus to another minority group. The division continues to escalate in terms of how vitriolic and extreme it is, and it also continues to divide the working class into smaller and smaller groups.
To get the working class to buy into this hateful message, they need to take advantage of our worst instincts, and one of those instincts is the in-group bias. The majority are manipulated into being suspicious, then intolerant, then hateful, then violent, then genocidal, towards whatever the targeted minority of the day is. Anything that can be used to divide the working class - sexuality, nationality, immigration status, ethnicity, religion, sex, gender identity, age, all of these will be used as wedges to keep the working class split apart and not working together, because they know that if the working class actually unite against them, they are completely and truly fucked.
That’s exactly how fascism manifests. It’s because it’s possible for people to accumulate power through wealth. This is why capitalism must be abolished. If we do not abolish capitalism, fascism will always return. It’s just a matter of time.
While, of course, some laws to reform capitalism can be passed, and would definitely alleviate the worst harm caused, over the long term, capitalism cannot be reformed.
Any attempts to reform, democratize or socialize capitalism may yield short term improvements to quality of life of the working class, but if capitalism is not abolished, it will always reassert itself, and capitalism inevitably leads towards fascism.
The New Deal prevented the US from sliding into fascism in the 20th century, so that’s ultimately a good thing, but it did not go far enough, and that’s why we have the resurgence of fascism in the 21st century America.
This is gonna sound really terrible, but… I generally don’t recognize people by name so much… maybe something dyslexia related? I think there are a couple of rare exceptions, like the user with two letters and then four numbers in their name.
I recognize lots of avatars, as I scroll around, but I don’t generally register the names or even descriptions of the images, just kind of like… my brain just remembers purplish-blob shape, red glowy circle, monochromatic goblet.
Oh, and dancing banana, and blue name furry. I actually remember his, it’s Kolanki I think
All of you users with no avatar, go get one so I remember you all please! It’s an accessability aid in a way :p
Flying Squid was an auto-block for me, as soon as I made my account. He always used to ban me because he couldn’t win arguments with me in the comments.
Edit to spill the tea:
Hello Lemmy.world admin team, I am writing to complain about the conduct of the moderator FlyingSquid.
On two occasions I have had negative interactions with FlyingSquid on the /world community, both times he has used, or threatened to use, his moderator powers against me, because of his personal disagreements with me.
I am happy to refer you to both conversations:
In this conversation, we had a long conversation about laws and politics. Personally, I feel he acted in bad faith on several occasions throughout our conversation, in my opinion, he was trying to bait me into getting upset so he could righteously ban me.
And your silly prediction is wrong. I am not going to ban you for this despite the incivility rule violation. I am just going to stop talking to you.
But you have just earned yourself the eye of a moderator who will not tolerate your rule-breaking with anyone else. Including if I see any in your recent history.
More recently, we had a conversation today:
Again, in this conversation, he was, in my opinion, highly rude, dismissive and arguing in bad faith. He even admitted as much. I said I wasn’t interested in talking with him, he continued to push me for an answer, and then said:
You didn’t let me down, because I knew you didn’t actually have an answer
I completely understand that sometimes people get heated or struggle to deal with arguments where they care about the topic, so I am totally willing to look past that. However, I am not willing to look past his abuse of power.
What a bullshit cop-out. I have asked you multiple times what the next step is and you’re now claiming I’m not interested?
That’s two lies you’ve told about me now. That is coming close to trolling. This is seemingly a pattern for FlyingSquid - goading people he disagrees with into becoming frustrated with his bad-faith arguments, then accusing them of “trolling” when the people he experiences push-back, and using that as an excuse to ban someone he disagrees with.
I was writing a response to his post pointing out that he was arguing in bad faith when I accidentally submitted it half-way through, when he suspended me for “trolling”.
I do not believe that he has the disposition to be a moderator if he gets so upset at a polite discussion that he feels compelled to use moderator powers to silence dissent. I go out of my way to be as polite, kind and compassionate as possible and to give people the benefit of the doubt, but I do not believe we should allow those in a position of trust or power to use that to settle their personal disputes. I know there has been some issues with that recently regarding the vegan community so I am hopeful that you will do the right thing and either remove his moderator powers or at the very least let him know that his abuse of powers is not tolerated.
I would prefer not to make a community spectacle out of this, hence the email.
Thanks and all the best,
This is why we have trade protectionism - tariffs, “made in X” laws, etc. - to ensure capitalists can continue to generate maximized profits, rather than having to compete with Chinese-made cars.
The oft-quoted argument is “well, we need to protect jobs” - well, tax the rich and subsidize it then, if those jobs are so important. Why should the working class pay the cost of protecting jobs (ensuring ongoing production for the benefit of the ruling class) in industries where capitalists continue to maximize profit?
Can’t believe they’re not letting us move the satellite around, smh
How did the satellite take this picture? We should send another satellite to take a picture of how the first satellite took this picture to confirm the validity of the image.
Edit: my dumb sleep deprived ass tried to rotate the earth on that satellite website 🤦♂️
Yeah I wasn’t sure if you meant for the workers, the platforms or the consumers, haha. But, yeah, tips are the only thing that makes it viable for drivers, I think any delivery without a tip is at best break-even, but they need to accept any delivery they’re offered to keep their ratings up high and so on. Cyclists can probably make more too, at the cost of higher risks of getting hit by a car…
There’s a reason why these jobs are so popular with people who might not be able to find other jobs for various reasons.
I’m guessing something along the lines of Russia justifying the invasion of Ukraine by claiming that it was ruled by fascists and that their special military operation was to liberate the people of Ukraine by bombing their hospitals and schools
My mistake, you’re absolutely right – I neglected to ensure the runway was clear before scheduling that landing. Please accept my apologies for causing those deaths. I’m really glad to be working with you, it’s reassuring that you’ll always keep me honest. You’re not just an assistant traffic controller – you’re a friend.
My mistake, you’re absolutely right – I neglected to ensure the runway was clear before scheduling that landing. Please accept my apologies for causing those deaths. I’m really glad to be working with you, it’s reassuring that you’ll always keep me honest. You’re not just an assistant traffic controller – you’re a friend.
Mate, the rise of fascism is supported by Russia to destabilize Europe. Russia itself is a fascist state. Almost every European nation has a rising far-right. I am just speaking the truth, if you don’t like it, frankly, that’s your problem. Go and get involved in activist efforts in your local area or something instead of shooting the messenger.
Oh!!! You’re a zionist. That makes a lot of sense. Sorry, I kinda forgot people like you still exist on Lemmy, I thought pretty much everyone had accepted Israel is conducting genocide, but I guess there are still genocide deniers among us, unfortunately.
I was low-key expecting you to say that it was uncouth to compare a genocide to a military conflict
The only way these platforms hold together is through VC funding and tipping. They’ll all inevitably enshittify more and more, get bought out and eventually absorbed by some megacorp that just wants data to train AI on or some shit. Many such cases.
I completely understand your frustration, and I am completely on your side that we need to dismantle capitalism.
The thing is, though, if we use mass violence to abolish the ruling class in the way you advocate, will not work at all.
I’m not saying that the movement to abolish capitalism must be completely pacifistic and disavow all violence - on the contrary, we need to be willing and able to defend ourselves against the violence of the ruling class.
Remember, the ruling class has almost all of the advantages, so we need to use the one thing we have: our numerical advantage. That means we need to build an inclusive, people-powered movement of the working class, based on solidarity.
A violent movement will deeply alienate and push away vast swathes of the population. Humans are innately repulsed and disgusted by acts of violence and brutality - especially for acts of killing innocent people, and even children, as you’re advocating here.
The only way that such a movement can hold together for any time is with pure anger, rage, and hatred. That is not the soil that a healthy, non-violent society can grow out of.
I would argue that in many ways the society we have today is because of how violent and brutal our past has been. If we want to get rid of exploitation and violence, we need to make the radical choice to break the cycle, and turn away from violence, except as a very last resort.
I’d be happy to explain my theory of change and share ideas for how we can end capitalism in a non-violent way - and no, I don’t mean just by voting every few years or whatever. Happy to chat. I really hope you’ll hear me out.
Much love, and solidarity forever.
It’s true, I have no chill.
I’ll take that wager! I was born and raised in the EU and I’ve travelled extensively all over Europe. I actually only ever left Europe once, when I visited NYC when I was a teenager.
What do I win? I’m guessing you’re relatively wealthy, so a cash prize would be much appreciated! Happy to work out the details over DMs ;p
Capitalism is a very complicated machine with many moving parts, so explaining how society changes as a function of capitalism in a written medium requires quite a lot of words, but just for you, I’ll try to summarize: