*typed a comment, decided it was worth it’s own post
It gives them cover for all the other ways Biden is garbage too. They get to pretend it’s just that ONE issue (which mustn’t be named because genocide sounds bad), and they align with the left on everything else. Grossly inadequate action on climate change all but certainly dooming millions to death by climate disaster, white supremest border policies and foreign policy more broadly, failure to increase the minimum wage, failure to control cost of living, failure to protect reproductive rights, failure to protect LGBTQ+ rights, massive infrastructure failures like train derailments and Boeing and bridges, funding a corrupt military industrial complex grift in Ukraine, stoking a world war with China while simultaneously denying us affordable electric vehicles, robustly funding the police while discrediting and neutering BLM movement and then siccing their paid piggies on us first chance they get, expansion of domestic surveillance, failure to meaningfully address the rise of mask off fascism in America, healthcare please, no college debt relief, the list goes on and on.
But no, they just have to pretend we’re all holdouts and unreasonable for caring about ONE issue. It’s the only one they can’t rationalize away because genocide is truly a bridge too far, so they retreat behind rhetoric and flatten the magnitude of that issue by pretending it somehow has to be considered in the larger picture while simultaneously refusing to give the larger picture any kind of sober analysis. These people are truly the smoothest of brains. I’m fully convinced of the criticism of the “white moderate” by MLK and, more pointedly, Malcom X. These polite Toadies of bourgeoisie democracy and capitalism are just as if not more complicit in these crimes by insisting there is no solution to our problems, all we can do is politely pull the blue lever so they can politely administer our misery instead of the rude red guy. They reduce all politics to civility and norms and crush whatever imagination or genuine action might spring up for a better future. Disgusting worms worth less than the dirt on the boots they lick.
It’s honestly been so eye-opening to me. The fact that we’re even talking in this framing, in which liberals and their socdem/radlib ass-kissers insist that it’s perfectly viable to cape for someone who’s “good” at home and virtually Hitler abroad, highlights the inherent cynicism and opportunism of Western electoral politics, particularly on a national level (and fundamentally the reason why the latter group will always fail at even getting crumbs on their own volition). If this doesn’t show to prospective socialists and communists that it’s futile to cast our ticket with liberals neck-deep in the shit, even just for single issues at home, nothing will.
This has made it crystal clear that their politics are entirely vibes based. The fact that there’s no practical difference means nothing, it’s all about having the feeling that The Adults in the Room are in Charge. Fundamentally, they’re mad at the left for not just the possibility of denying them their security blanket, but pointing out that their security blanket is just that.
Of course, conservatives are guilty of the same mindset just in a different mode. Like the massive military and economic imperialism isn’t enough to impose America’s will, no, it’s the president having belligerent swagger that’s their security blanket.
But no, they just have to pretend we’re all holdouts and unreasonable for caring about ONE issue. It’s the only one they can’t rationalize away because genocide is truly a bridge too far, so they retreat behind rhetoric and flatten the magnitude of that issue by pretending it somehow has to be considered in the larger picture while simultaneously refusing to give the larger picture any kind of sober analysis. These people are truly the smoothest of brains. I’m fully convinced of the criticism of the “white moderate” by MLK and, more pointedly, Malcom X.
Most Liberals...
that aren't using the Signifiers of Liberalism to hide their own illiberalism...
give them a scratch to find out
…don’t want to look bad, but they also don’t look deeper into an issue or admit they got it wrong. Many times this strategy works (see, superficial LGBTQIA support), but it bites them in the ass all the time (see, every civil rights movement, actually supporting LGBTQIA, anti-colonialism, anti-genocide, etc). It wouldn’t surprise me if Liberals fell into the Commitment to Consistency trap, where they make a knee-jerk support gesture in the beginning and double-down every time contrary evidence emerges rather than admit fault.
EDIT: Pushing this further, propaganda doesn’t exist to convince anybody, but rather to seed initial support for an idea making it hard to dislodge when counter-evidence is shown.
I’ve still been seeing “The holdouts are stubborn because
of the genocidehe’s old” recently.He IS old.
Old enough to have supported segregation.
For libs it sure seems like their worldview consists of a binary of ‘civility or barbarism’, which only shows how poorly they understand the world and how it functions under capitalism.
This is why the talking point about how this is all working as designed is helpful in radicalizing them. They think that the game is well balanced, but the voters are too misinformed for it to progress correctly. They don’t realize they are the ones that are misinformed about how this game works. Pointing that out to them often triggers a civility immune response that raises up from their individualist ego-mind. “How dare you think you know better than me! Civility and manners are the glue of our society!”
It’s a very thinly veiled version of “I got mine, fuck you for complaining”. They take offense to anyone that points out the cognitive dissonance of western liberalism being an ally of white supremacy. An inconvenient truth they would rather just gloss over.
