Growing up, I was (and still am) under the impression that hatred requires passion. Like, the "it's personal" sort of thing. That said, you don't necessarily need to "have it out" for someone to be willing to douse them in gasoline and burn them alive. Even less when you sign a multi-page document authorizing someone else to do it hundreds or thousands of miles away. The approach can be frighteningly offhanded.
Last edited by Ragged Maw; 11-24-2020 at 06:24 PM.
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not really sunk-- not as long as gerrymandered districts in states still exist, plus "true believers" among governors and senate members--
and as long as there are cohorts of friends and family (not exclusively, but overwhelmingly) who tend to vote for "whiteness" for their elected representatives, things won't really be getting any better-- you're still going to have outsized influence from comparatively sparsely populated states like Montana, Wyoming, the Dakotas, etc.
“Whiteness”, in this case, isn’t particularly a reference to skin color. Nobody has to be an open KKK supporter to vote for "whiteness". Instead, it is the aggregation of narratives, starting at the beginning of this nation in 1619, that colonization and Manifest Destiny were natural outgrowths of the advancement of a culture. The conceits that still largely attribute a recurring innocence to the motives of the actors that achieved “great” things for a particular cohort of people, while other cohorts of people were deliberately left out, actively attacked, or both. These narratives, gradually assimilated and both implicitly and explicitly reiterated, have led to the ethnocentric conclusions that people of America have about themselves.
Until this is directly and consistently confronted, including primarily by co-members of the dominant culture, it will continue to fester. Cycles of people will continue to believe in Q-Anon, Barack Obama will continue to being the secret Kenyan bogeyman hired by Iran, and other scurrilous, anti-intellectual notions will inform their political choices. The results of the 2020 election proved that more white people are willing to double-triple-quadruple-quintuple-down on gallingly bad candidates because they refuse to let go of "being white" above anything else, including their own health and welfare.
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I think we are in agreement about Sanders and his supporters. It is not that I think there's a parallel there to Trump and his supporters, but that I've seen others make that claim; that it's also just a cult of personality, Bernie is motivated by ego and power like Trump, and his supporters are just as blindly loyal. I don't think any of that is true. That was actually my point about the theoretical situation where Bernie had become president, but then like Trump decided to try and subvert the election process to stay in power. I don't really see people sticking with him for that, but I also think the whole "Bernie Bro" label was created to suggest it was about him, not his political stances. Again, I don't really think that's the case. I don't think Bernie's fans would have remained stupidly devoted to him through even half the things Trump has gotten away with.
And no, Trump the individual is not the problem. Or, he is a problem, but just the tip of that particular iceberg. The entire Republican party is in lockstep behind him, and 70 million people wanted to give him another four years, despite the country being a disaster, compared to four years ago. It's really kind of inconceivable to me that people support him. Or Republicans in general at this point, really.
Be kind to me, or treat me mean
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Last edited by Farealmer; 11-24-2020 at 06:02 PM.
I tend to think that a lot of the passion fo hate can be born from denial in the modern era - people who didn’t waste time and energy hating others are confronted with a reality that demands some hard questions and answers, not just about themselves but about people they love and respect, and once that is revealed, the energy emerges because facing the truth is too painful for them.
Squaring with the fact Thomas Jefferson was likely a rapist because he came from a community and culture completely fine with that and that in some ways encouraged it, and that our culture descends from that and still has much of that apathy and sadism left over, for instance, is a hard thing when you also want to honor his for the good things he did as well that helped form the better aspect of out culture.
And he’s a guy who’s been dead for about two centuries. It’s a much harder thing to look at people you know and love now, and yourself, and be told “You are actively allowing or encouraging evil to be perpetrated for your own benefit,” particularly if they were things that you unconsciously supported or allowed or were raised to think were right or justified.
Last edited by godisawesome; 11-24-2020 at 06:26 PM.
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I wrote a book with them. Outlaw’s Shadow: A Sherwood Noir. Robin Hood’s evil counterpart, Guy of Gisbourne, is the main character. Feel free to give it a look: https://read.amazon.com/kp/embed?asi...E2PKBNJFH76GQP
Last edited by Ragged Maw; 11-24-2020 at 06:39 PM.
I don't know what elected officials are referencing a debunked narrative, but I guess I could agree they shouldn't do that? I mean, I feel like I see/hear "I can't breathe" a lot more than "Hands Up Don't Shoot" ... and I mean, I read your referenced article there, and for one I don't even know if I would say Mike Brown has ever been the most "iconic case" of police killing an innocent man. There were questions/disagreements about what happened there from almost the very start, while numerous other cases of people killed have video recordings showing they were shot in the back or not fighting like Eric Garner. I mean, as of 2020, pretty sure I would say that George Floyd is now your most iconic case. And I mean, before him ... not recorded on video, but Philando Castile was shot and killed for no reason, with a four year old in the back seat, in the same city as George Floyd, just four years ago.
I don't feel like I see people talk about Mike Brown more than these other cases, and as far as even Brown himself, I would again say that I think that focusing on the specific details of his hands being up or not kind of misses the larger point of why Ferguson exploded after his death. It wasn't just about whether he was surrendering, and as well, I don't see how you could possibly want to separate what happened with Brown and Wilson from the larger picture of harassment, brutality, and exploitation that surrounded it. Like, I appreciate your saying we shouldn't ignore the civil rights violations, but the fact is that those violations would never have become widespread knowledge if not for the response to Mike Brown's death.
As well, even for Mike Brown himself, he didn't need to be an angel or a "gentle giant", but I personally find it hard to consider him worse than Kyle Rittenhouse, who not only was not killed, but has had millions donated for his defense. That disturbs me a lot more than whether people want to say "Hands Up Don't Shoot".
Anyway, you are free to doubt that Democrats would abandon Bernie (or someone similar) once he was the clear loser, but I think they would ... to your question, no, I don't think they'd be eager to alienate his supporters, but this is an area where I think Democrat supporters would just be different than Republican supporters. You have to remember all the "they go low, we go high" crap. Democrats would think it more important to emphasize that they have faith in the political process of democracy or whatever, than suggesting it should be undermined to support a single individual. Like, another place you would have seen a difference -- for one, Democrats would not have blocked a Supreme Court nominee as long as the Republicans did with Obama, but if they had done that just four years ago, they would not be so blatantly hypocritical as the Republicans were with Barrett. The Democrats just are not as shameless. I could almost wish they were honestly, because I don't know how you beat cheaters if you insist on playing fair. But, principles or something, I guess.
I'm really not familiar with Ralph Northam, so no comment, there.
Be kind to me, or treat me mean
I'll make the most of it, I'm an extraordinary machine