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Now that we have a new thread, in order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a complete and thorough read before posting! NOTE: When providing a source, please provide a very brief summary on what it's about and what purpose it adds to the discussion. The supporting statement should clearly explain why the subject is relevant and needs to be discussed. Please follow this rule especially for tweets.
Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source.If you have any questions, comments, concern, or feedback regarding the USPMT, then please use this thread: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/website-feedback/510156-us-politics-thread |
On August 12 2025 19:16 Jankisa wrote:Show nested quote +On August 12 2025 17:19 BlackJack wrote:On August 12 2025 16:52 Jankisa wrote:On August 12 2025 16:10 Acrofales wrote:On August 12 2025 15:26 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 12 2025 14:25 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 12 2025 08:38 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 12 2025 06:13 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:We all knew this was coming, especially after women lost their rights. Gay marriage might be next. Supreme Court formally asked to overturn landmark same-sex marriage ruling
Ten years after the Supreme Court extended marriage rights to same-sex couples nationwide, the justices this fall will consider for the first time whether to take up a case that explicitly asks them to overturn that decision.
Kim Davis, the former Kentucky county clerk who was jailed for six days in 2015 after refusing to issue marriage licenses to a gay couple on religious grounds, is appealing a $100,000 jury verdict for emotional damages plus $260,000 for attorneys fees. ... she claims the high court's decision in Obergefell v Hodges -- extending marriage rights for same-sex couples under the 14th Amendment's due process protections -- was "egregiously wrong." https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/supreme-court-formally-asked-overturn-landmark-same-sex/story?id=124465302 On August 12 2025 03:51 Doublemint wrote:... Trump says he’s placing Washington police under federal control and activating the National GuardWASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Monday he’s taking over Washington’s police department and activating 800 members of the National Guard in the hopes of reducing crime, even as city officials stressed crime is already falling in the nation’s capital.
The president, flanked by his attorney general, his defense secretary and the FBI director, said he was declaring a public safety emergency and his administration would be removing homeless encampments.
“We’re going to take our capital back,” Trump declared... Sure seems like what I said is just going to be more true every day until it's too late (if it isn't already) On August 07 2025 03:13 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 07 2025 02:53 Zambrah wrote:
Needed violence to beat the last major batch of fascists, prepare to engage in some violence to beat the current ones. Does really seem like "AmeriMaidan or bust!" could and should more or less be the plan from libs/Dems/ilk. Every day/time they want to emphasize how Trump is being horrible/destroying democracy/is a stooge for Putin, it isn't winning over voters, it is demonstrating yet another reason why they need to support their own "AmeriMaidan". Is "AmeriMaidan" a reference to this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euromaidan + https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolution_of_Dignity (I'm not well-versed in that topic; sorry if I misunderstood.) I don't think that Americans would be willing to overthrow Trump and/or the Supreme Court (and/or Congress). I'm sure our TL thread will focus more on the upcoming Supreme Court case once it starts moving along. For now, it seems, the derailment of Razyda not knowing what a "job" is, and the reversion to the BlackJack/trans conversation, are the most popular topics of conversation. It's a reference to Euromaidan. The gist of it is that Euromaidan was (among other things) a wave of intense protests During the uprising, Independence Square (Maidan) in Kyiv was a huge protest camp occupied by thousands of protesters and protected by makeshift barricades. It had kitchens, first aid posts and broadcasting facilities, as well as stages for speeches, lectures, debates and performances. It was guarded by 'Maidan Self-Defense' units made up of volunteers in improvised uniform and helmets, carrying shields and armed with sticks, stones and petrol bombs. Protests were also held in many other parts of Ukraine. it was ostensibly the government's response that convinced Ukrainians to overthrow it with the "Revolution of Dignity". The sentiment Zambrah and I are sharing is that people in the US have to do something similar (whether they want to or not) or fascism will devastate all of us. Zambrah/Mohdoo more than myself have resigned to the belief that we're more likely banking on fascism imploding than Democrats (or their supporters) recognizing what the moment is demanding of them and rising to the occasion. I have to admit, every time the libs/Dems/ilk around here get sucked into the constant cycle of mocking and gawking (which has helped make Trump more favorable than they are) it does not help me maintain that optimism. Last time you said anything about Euromaidan in the Ukraine thread, it was to lament hegemonic meddling by the capitalist west (particularly the US) in Ukraine's politics, and to say that Russia's invasion was basically caused by the Ukrainians and western influence causing them to reject their rightful place as a Russian puppet state with a corrupt leader who ignored direct outcomes of referenda in favour of licking Putin's boots. Whew, that was a mouthful. But just to be clear, you now want that same Euromaidan protest to shine as an example of how Americans should gather in Washington to demand regime change? Did you (1) come to the realization that Ukrainians have the right to self-determination and not live under the heel of a Russian overlord, and everything you've claimed before about Euromaidan was rubbish? Or (2) you want Putin to invade the US and bring "peace and democracy"? Given his stances on China, I'd say he probably wishes that just like "US coped Ukraine to fuck with Russia" China does the same to the US in order to bring their benevolent and amazing political system. Also, BJ is, in my humble opinion just a reactionary debate lord who got told they can't be a huge asshole to someone in real life by someone on the left 10 years ago and has been doubling down on reactionary politics ever since. He doesn't really have political stances, he'll say whatever he thinks will trigger as many people who are willing to engage, it's a pretty hollow way to go through life but that's so many of these guys, I don't get it but I don't work in pediatric child care so maybe I'm just ignorant and he's fighting a holy, righteous crusade. Just for you here's my stance one more time + Show Spoiler +On July 03 2023 15:00 BlackJack wrote:
Thanks for asking. I guess I’ll add my thoughts on a few “trans issues”
Gender-affirming care
Obviously no sane person would oppose gender affirming care for adults so this is going to be about minors. While I don’t think the medical establishment is infallible (can cite many examples) I think they are still the best ones to make decisions on gender affirming care than politicians. Ultimately you need 3 parties consent here for any intervention, child, parent, and doctor. I don’t think parental rights are limitless but I generally yield to them vs the opinions of politicians. Whether a child ends up with regret may be tragic, sometimes that’s just life
Of course that simply means the medical establishment should call the shots, it doesn’t say what shots I think should be called. For example the medical establishment in America recommends gender affirming care for minors and the medical establishment in Finland/Sweden recommend against it. I don’t think the medical establishment in Finland/Sweden is full of bigots and transphobes and I obviously share some of their concerns e.g the unexplained rise in prevalence of gender dysphoria in female adolescents and rigorous evidence that shows the benefits outweighs the risks. I’ve posted before in this thread about social contagion. I think most people here believe that trans people are “born that way.” I tend to believe most things are a combination of nature vs nurture and it’s only for controversial topics that people will adopt this “it’s entirely genetic” or “it’s entirely environmental” dogma that hasn’t been proven.
In general I think gender affirming care is not something that should be immediately adopted. I’m also not familiar enough to know if it is or not. I don’t think a boy goes to a therapist for the first time and says “I’m a girl and my name is Susan” and the doctor says “Hi Susan.” I would hope there would be some “interesting… well why do you feel that way” beforehand. But ultimately it may be the judgement of the doctor and the parent that it’s not a phase they will grow out of and gender affirming care may be necessary. So I would say generally I think there should be a line drawn between reversible and irreversible interventions. E.g. role playing and puberty blockers as reversible. There’s some evidence that puberty blockers transitioned into hormone therapy in teenagers causes infertility, and I don’t really think anyone should be having top/bottom surgery before 18.
Transgender women in supports
This is anecdotal but most transgender women I meet are not athletes. They are definitely not elite athletes. I also think there’s a gap between men and women in sports, and not a small one. Often high school level boys can compete with professional women at the top levels. I also think Rayzda is right that without protections over time most world records would belong to MTF athletes. I also think most reasonable people agree this is unfair. I think most people think there should be some protections in place. For example to be a transgendered woman there are no requirements other than proclaiming yourself to be a transgender woman. I think if a male athlete just proclaimed themselves to be a transgender woman and wanted to race the next day against women most people would opposed this.
In short, a blanket ban on all MTF athletes doesn’t make sense because for the vast majority of the less talented athletes it accomplishes nothing in protect women’s sports and only excludes transgender athletes needlessly. Obviously there’s a small percent of cases where there is an obvious advantage that allows them to dominate and become champions and they are the few that should be excluded.
Bathroom bans
Just political theater in my opinion. People don’t go into the wrong bathrooms not because it’s the law but because that’s what societal norms dictate. I’m not aware of this being a problem and if it becomes a problem then you can worry about legislating it. I really couldn't be any more clear or concise. I can't control if people would rather talk about public bathrooms and who watches more trans porn, but you can't close your eyes and say I don't have a stance when it's clearly written in black and grey. It's not about the trans issues, hell, I don't really engage with thease kind of discussions because I'm both unqualified and don't care enough about it, I personally mostly align with what you wrote there, but I would never, ever go around and spend inordinate amounts of time being a contrarian over an issue that affects these poor people, the most marginalized and attacked minority in the world over the last 10 years. If, by some miracle you aren't lying through your teeth about how many of them you meet, you are honestly a monster, to meet all these poor people who have the full weight of a whole fucking political movement that's world wide bearing down on them and you think that a good way to spend your time is to pile on, well, buddy, you are a fucking monster with no empathy. Don't get me wrong, I think KwarK, as an example, is similar to you when it comes to Gaza, he obviously spends time thinking about it and continuously attacks the victims and people advocating for them. It's pretty fucked up, and I don't want to single just you out, but yeah, there is something deeply wrong with you if this is how you think and act.
Yeah that about sums it up.
Imagine if every once in awhile I popped into this thread to say "btw people with Fibromyalgia are stupid, psychopaths, and cringe" and eventually someone was like "dude wtf is your problem?" and I responded "well if you must know, I'm a pediatrician, but here's a bunch of my own posts I bookmarked throughout the years where I clearly said Fibromyalgia-sufferers deserve Healthcare so I'm basically moderate, what are you the Fibromyalgia Mafia or something?" that would be exceedingly weird.
Now imagine also it was common knowledge that people hyper-fetishize people with Fibromyalgia when not bullying them.
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On August 12 2025 18:43 Magic Powers wrote:
I think BJ has made it abundantly clear that he's not anti-trans, and neither is he a racist or whatever other label. He's just someone who frequently fights with progressives.
What people may not understand about BJ is that he's very fact-oriented. That doesn't mean he gets every fact right, but nonetheless he focuses on facts. He's good at it. I'm not as good with facts as he is, I'm more of a bigger picture person.
Lets say X is the fact and Y is the bigger picture, then often times the argument goes like this: BJ argues about X and I respond X doesn't matter because it changes nothing about Y. I think Y is the real problem, BJ thinks X is the real problem, and we get nowhere. I also see this dynamic between him and others, which frequently leads to irritation on both sides.
So why don't we see BJ fight with conservatives and other right-wingers as much? Probably the same reason why I don't fight with progressives so much.
Now, I'd argue that we're currently living through a time where more people should fight against right-wingers. The US is turning towards fascism, and this is not a joke anymore. I'd hope BJ also comes around and understands that wokeism is no threat when compared to fascism. I'd wish for him to help provide us with facts that can help expose the fascists - especially since he's good with facts.
BJ is not a troll and he's also not a contrarian just for the sake of it. I think he doesn't agree with other people that the fascist threat is of great concern.
Not bad, actually. Fairly close. You're most of the way there, but I'll complete your theory for you.
X: Healthcare execs denying claims is literally murder
Y: Healthcare companies denying claims is a real problem
X: ICE is literally disappearing people into death camps
Y: Trump's immigration policy is bad
X: The COVID vaccine is the best vaccine ever
Y: Everyone should have gotten the COVID vaccine when it became available
X: The police are murdering black people at an astonishing rate
Y: The police are long overdue for reform
and to your point, you question is why I should care about the fine details of X if I agree with the larger picture of Y. Because typically the only people that disagree with you on X are people that also disagree with you on Y, and it's my own undoing if people mistakenly assume my stance on Y because of my position on X. The missing link to your theory is that I don't really care about X or Y. I care about Z.
Z: We should shoot more healthcare execs in the back
Z: ICE agents are legitimate targets for 2nd amendment folk since they are trying to disappear people
Z: People that don't get the COVID vaccine should be banished from society
Z: We need to defund or abolish the police
It's obvious to me that people can't get to Z without X. Believing in death camps, and a perfect COVID vaccine that will end the pandemic is what allows people to go balls to the wall on Z.
I'm happy to be the contrarian on a forum where people brazenly advocate for murder, assassination, banishment, etc.
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X: Bullying minorities for no reason is wrong
Z: Actually those minorities are godless sodomites that deserve death
BJ: we can clearly see by dialectic that the moderate position is it's OK to bully minorities a little bit for no reason. If you disagree it's because of the groupthink mafia
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On August 12 2025 19:59 LightSpectra wrote:Show nested quote +On August 12 2025 19:16 Jankisa wrote:On August 12 2025 17:19 BlackJack wrote:On August 12 2025 16:52 Jankisa wrote:On August 12 2025 16:10 Acrofales wrote:On August 12 2025 15:26 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 12 2025 14:25 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 12 2025 08:38 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 12 2025 06:13 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:We all knew this was coming, especially after women lost their rights. Gay marriage might be next. Supreme Court formally asked to overturn landmark same-sex marriage ruling
Ten years after the Supreme Court extended marriage rights to same-sex couples nationwide, the justices this fall will consider for the first time whether to take up a case that explicitly asks them to overturn that decision.
Kim Davis, the former Kentucky county clerk who was jailed for six days in 2015 after refusing to issue marriage licenses to a gay couple on religious grounds, is appealing a $100,000 jury verdict for emotional damages plus $260,000 for attorneys fees. ... she claims the high court's decision in Obergefell v Hodges -- extending marriage rights for same-sex couples under the 14th Amendment's due process protections -- was "egregiously wrong." https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/supreme-court-formally-asked-overturn-landmark-same-sex/story?id=124465302 On August 12 2025 03:51 Doublemint wrote:... Trump says he’s placing Washington police under federal control and activating the National GuardWASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Monday he’s taking over Washington’s police department and activating 800 members of the National Guard in the hopes of reducing crime, even as city officials stressed crime is already falling in the nation’s capital.
The president, flanked by his attorney general, his defense secretary and the FBI director, said he was declaring a public safety emergency and his administration would be removing homeless encampments.
“We’re going to take our capital back,” Trump declared... Sure seems like what I said is just going to be more true every day until it's too late (if it isn't already) On August 07 2025 03:13 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 07 2025 02:53 Zambrah wrote:
Needed violence to beat the last major batch of fascists, prepare to engage in some violence to beat the current ones. Does really seem like "AmeriMaidan or bust!" could and should more or less be the plan from libs/Dems/ilk. Every day/time they want to emphasize how Trump is being horrible/destroying democracy/is a stooge for Putin, it isn't winning over voters, it is demonstrating yet another reason why they need to support their own "AmeriMaidan". Is "AmeriMaidan" a reference to this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euromaidan + https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolution_of_Dignity (I'm not well-versed in that topic; sorry if I misunderstood.) I don't think that Americans would be willing to overthrow Trump and/or the Supreme Court (and/or Congress). I'm sure our TL thread will focus more on the upcoming Supreme Court case once it starts moving along. For now, it seems, the derailment of Razyda not knowing what a "job" is, and the reversion to the BlackJack/trans conversation, are the most popular topics of conversation. It's a reference to Euromaidan. The gist of it is that Euromaidan was (among other things) a wave of intense protests During the uprising, Independence Square (Maidan) in Kyiv was a huge protest camp occupied by thousands of protesters and protected by makeshift barricades. It had kitchens, first aid posts and broadcasting facilities, as well as stages for speeches, lectures, debates and performances. It was guarded by 'Maidan Self-Defense' units made up of volunteers in improvised uniform and helmets, carrying shields and armed with sticks, stones and petrol bombs. Protests were also held in many other parts of Ukraine. it was ostensibly the government's response that convinced Ukrainians to overthrow it with the "Revolution of Dignity". The sentiment Zambrah and I are sharing is that people in the US have to do something similar (whether they want to or not) or fascism will devastate all of us. Zambrah/Mohdoo more than myself have resigned to the belief that we're more likely banking on fascism imploding than Democrats (or their supporters) recognizing what the moment is demanding of them and rising to the occasion. I have to admit, every time the libs/Dems/ilk around here get sucked into the constant cycle of mocking and gawking (which has helped make Trump more favorable than they are) it does not help me maintain that optimism. Last time you said anything about Euromaidan in the Ukraine thread, it was to lament hegemonic meddling by the capitalist west (particularly the US) in Ukraine's politics, and to say that Russia's invasion was basically caused by the Ukrainians and western influence causing them to reject their rightful place as a Russian puppet state with a corrupt leader who ignored direct outcomes of referenda in favour of licking Putin's boots. Whew, that was a mouthful. But just to be clear, you now want that same Euromaidan protest to shine as an example of how Americans should gather in Washington to demand regime change? Did you (1) come to the realization that Ukrainians have the right to self-determination and not live under the heel of a Russian overlord, and everything you've claimed before about Euromaidan was rubbish? Or (2) you want Putin to invade the US and bring "peace and democracy"? Given his stances on China, I'd say he probably wishes that just like "US coped Ukraine to fuck with Russia" China does the same to the US in order to bring their benevolent and amazing political system. Also, BJ is, in my humble opinion just a reactionary debate lord who got told they can't be a huge asshole to someone in real life by someone on the left 10 years ago and has been doubling down on reactionary politics ever since. He doesn't really have political stances, he'll say whatever he thinks will trigger as many people who are willing to engage, it's a pretty hollow way to go through life but that's so many of these guys, I don't get it but I don't work in pediatric child care so maybe I'm just ignorant and he's fighting a holy, righteous crusade. Just for you here's my stance one more time + Show Spoiler +On July 03 2023 15:00 BlackJack wrote:
Thanks for asking. I guess I’ll add my thoughts on a few “trans issues”
Gender-affirming care
Obviously no sane person would oppose gender affirming care for adults so this is going to be about minors. While I don’t think the medical establishment is infallible (can cite many examples) I think they are still the best ones to make decisions on gender affirming care than politicians. Ultimately you need 3 parties consent here for any intervention, child, parent, and doctor. I don’t think parental rights are limitless but I generally yield to them vs the opinions of politicians. Whether a child ends up with regret may be tragic, sometimes that’s just life
Of course that simply means the medical establishment should call the shots, it doesn’t say what shots I think should be called. For example the medical establishment in America recommends gender affirming care for minors and the medical establishment in Finland/Sweden recommend against it. I don’t think the medical establishment in Finland/Sweden is full of bigots and transphobes and I obviously share some of their concerns e.g the unexplained rise in prevalence of gender dysphoria in female adolescents and rigorous evidence that shows the benefits outweighs the risks. I’ve posted before in this thread about social contagion. I think most people here believe that trans people are “born that way.” I tend to believe most things are a combination of nature vs nurture and it’s only for controversial topics that people will adopt this “it’s entirely genetic” or “it’s entirely environmental” dogma that hasn’t been proven.
In general I think gender affirming care is not something that should be immediately adopted. I’m also not familiar enough to know if it is or not. I don’t think a boy goes to a therapist for the first time and says “I’m a girl and my name is Susan” and the doctor says “Hi Susan.” I would hope there would be some “interesting… well why do you feel that way” beforehand. But ultimately it may be the judgement of the doctor and the parent that it’s not a phase they will grow out of and gender affirming care may be necessary. So I would say generally I think there should be a line drawn between reversible and irreversible interventions. E.g. role playing and puberty blockers as reversible. There’s some evidence that puberty blockers transitioned into hormone therapy in teenagers causes infertility, and I don’t really think anyone should be having top/bottom surgery before 18.
Transgender women in supports
This is anecdotal but most transgender women I meet are not athletes. They are definitely not elite athletes. I also think there’s a gap between men and women in sports, and not a small one. Often high school level boys can compete with professional women at the top levels. I also think Rayzda is right that without protections over time most world records would belong to MTF athletes. I also think most reasonable people agree this is unfair. I think most people think there should be some protections in place. For example to be a transgendered woman there are no requirements other than proclaiming yourself to be a transgender woman. I think if a male athlete just proclaimed themselves to be a transgender woman and wanted to race the next day against women most people would opposed this.
In short, a blanket ban on all MTF athletes doesn’t make sense because for the vast majority of the less talented athletes it accomplishes nothing in protect women’s sports and only excludes transgender athletes needlessly. Obviously there’s a small percent of cases where there is an obvious advantage that allows them to dominate and become champions and they are the few that should be excluded.
Bathroom bans
Just political theater in my opinion. People don’t go into the wrong bathrooms not because it’s the law but because that’s what societal norms dictate. I’m not aware of this being a problem and if it becomes a problem then you can worry about legislating it. I really couldn't be any more clear or concise. I can't control if people would rather talk about public bathrooms and who watches more trans porn, but you can't close your eyes and say I don't have a stance when it's clearly written in black and grey. It's not about the trans issues, hell, I don't really engage with thease kind of discussions because I'm both unqualified and don't care enough about it, I personally mostly align with what you wrote there, but I would never, ever go around and spend inordinate amounts of time being a contrarian over an issue that affects these poor people, the most marginalized and attacked minority in the world over the last 10 years. If, by some miracle you aren't lying through your teeth about how many of them you meet, you are honestly a monster, to meet all these poor people who have the full weight of a whole fucking political movement that's world wide bearing down on them and you think that a good way to spend your time is to pile on, well, buddy, you are a fucking monster with no empathy. Don't get me wrong, I think KwarK, as an example, is similar to you when it comes to Gaza, he obviously spends time thinking about it and continuously attacks the victims and people advocating for them. It's pretty fucked up, and I don't want to single just you out, but yeah, there is something deeply wrong with you if this is how you think and act. Yeah that about sums it up. Imagine if every once in awhile I popped into this thread to say "btw people with Fibromyalgia are stupid, psychopaths, and cringe" and eventually someone was like "dude wtf is your problem?" and I responded "well if you must know, I'm a pediatrician, but here's a bunch of my own posts I bookmarked throughout the years where I clearly said Fibromyalgia-sufferers deserve Healthcare so I'm basically moderate, what are you the Fibromyalgia Mafia or something?" that would be exceedingly weird. Now imagine also it was common knowledge that people hyper-fetishize people with Fibromyalgia when not bullying them.
So now you're just making up that I've called trans people stupid, psychopaths, cringe? You really need to touch grass
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On August 12 2025 20:09 LightSpectra wrote:
X: Bullying minorities for no reason is wrong
Z: Actually those minorities are godless sodomites that deserve death
BJ: we can clearly see by dialectic that the moderate position is it's OK to bully minorities a little bit for no reason. If you disagree it's because of the groupthink mafia
Who the hell am I bullying? Are you daft?
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On August 12 2025 19:38 BlackJack wrote:Show nested quote +On August 12 2025 19:16 Jankisa wrote:On August 12 2025 17:19 BlackJack wrote:On August 12 2025 16:52 Jankisa wrote:On August 12 2025 16:10 Acrofales wrote:On August 12 2025 15:26 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 12 2025 14:25 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 12 2025 08:38 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 12 2025 06:13 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:We all knew this was coming, especially after women lost their rights. Gay marriage might be next. Supreme Court formally asked to overturn landmark same-sex marriage ruling
Ten years after the Supreme Court extended marriage rights to same-sex couples nationwide, the justices this fall will consider for the first time whether to take up a case that explicitly asks them to overturn that decision.
Kim Davis, the former Kentucky county clerk who was jailed for six days in 2015 after refusing to issue marriage licenses to a gay couple on religious grounds, is appealing a $100,000 jury verdict for emotional damages plus $260,000 for attorneys fees. ... she claims the high court's decision in Obergefell v Hodges -- extending marriage rights for same-sex couples under the 14th Amendment's due process protections -- was "egregiously wrong." https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/supreme-court-formally-asked-overturn-landmark-same-sex/story?id=124465302 On August 12 2025 03:51 Doublemint wrote:... Trump says he’s placing Washington police under federal control and activating the National GuardWASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Monday he’s taking over Washington’s police department and activating 800 members of the National Guard in the hopes of reducing crime, even as city officials stressed crime is already falling in the nation’s capital.
The president, flanked by his attorney general, his defense secretary and the FBI director, said he was declaring a public safety emergency and his administration would be removing homeless encampments.
“We’re going to take our capital back,” Trump declared... Sure seems like what I said is just going to be more true every day until it's too late (if it isn't already) On August 07 2025 03:13 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 07 2025 02:53 Zambrah wrote:
Needed violence to beat the last major batch of fascists, prepare to engage in some violence to beat the current ones. Does really seem like "AmeriMaidan or bust!" could and should more or less be the plan from libs/Dems/ilk. Every day/time they want to emphasize how Trump is being horrible/destroying democracy/is a stooge for Putin, it isn't winning over voters, it is demonstrating yet another reason why they need to support their own "AmeriMaidan". Is "AmeriMaidan" a reference to this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euromaidan + https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolution_of_Dignity (I'm not well-versed in that topic; sorry if I misunderstood.) I don't think that Americans would be willing to overthrow Trump and/or the Supreme Court (and/or Congress). I'm sure our TL thread will focus more on the upcoming Supreme Court case once it starts moving along. For now, it seems, the derailment of Razyda not knowing what a "job" is, and the reversion to the BlackJack/trans conversation, are the most popular topics of conversation. It's a reference to Euromaidan. The gist of it is that Euromaidan was (among other things) a wave of intense protests During the uprising, Independence Square (Maidan) in Kyiv was a huge protest camp occupied by thousands of protesters and protected by makeshift barricades. It had kitchens, first aid posts and broadcasting facilities, as well as stages for speeches, lectures, debates and performances. It was guarded by 'Maidan Self-Defense' units made up of volunteers in improvised uniform and helmets, carrying shields and armed with sticks, stones and petrol bombs. Protests were also held in many other parts of Ukraine. it was ostensibly the government's response that convinced Ukrainians to overthrow it with the "Revolution of Dignity". The sentiment Zambrah and I are sharing is that people in the US have to do something similar (whether they want to or not) or fascism will devastate all of us. Zambrah/Mohdoo more than myself have resigned to the belief that we're more likely banking on fascism imploding than Democrats (or their supporters) recognizing what the moment is demanding of them and rising to the occasion. I have to admit, every time the libs/Dems/ilk around here get sucked into the constant cycle of mocking and gawking (which has helped make Trump more favorable than they are) it does not help me maintain that optimism. Last time you said anything about Euromaidan in the Ukraine thread, it was to lament hegemonic meddling by the capitalist west (particularly the US) in Ukraine's politics, and to say that Russia's invasion was basically caused by the Ukrainians and western influence causing them to reject their rightful place as a Russian puppet state with a corrupt leader who ignored direct outcomes of referenda in favour of licking Putin's boots. Whew, that was a mouthful. But just to be clear, you now want that same Euromaidan protest to shine as an example of how Americans should gather in Washington to demand regime change? Did you (1) come to the realization that Ukrainians have the right to self-determination and not live under the heel of a Russian overlord, and everything you've claimed before about Euromaidan was rubbish? Or (2) you want Putin to invade the US and bring "peace and democracy"? Given his stances on China, I'd say he probably wishes that just like "US coped Ukraine to fuck with Russia" China does the same to the US in order to bring their benevolent and amazing political system. Also, BJ is, in my humble opinion just a reactionary debate lord who got told they can't be a huge asshole to someone in real life by someone on the left 10 years ago and has been doubling down on reactionary politics ever since. He doesn't really have political stances, he'll say whatever he thinks will trigger as many people who are willing to engage, it's a pretty hollow way to go through life but that's so many of these guys, I don't get it but I don't work in pediatric child care so maybe I'm just ignorant and he's fighting a holy, righteous crusade. Just for you here's my stance one more time + Show Spoiler +On July 03 2023 15:00 BlackJack wrote:
Thanks for asking. I guess I’ll add my thoughts on a few “trans issues”
Gender-affirming care
Obviously no sane person would oppose gender affirming care for adults so this is going to be about minors. While I don’t think the medical establishment is infallible (can cite many examples) I think they are still the best ones to make decisions on gender affirming care than politicians. Ultimately you need 3 parties consent here for any intervention, child, parent, and doctor. I don’t think parental rights are limitless but I generally yield to them vs the opinions of politicians. Whether a child ends up with regret may be tragic, sometimes that’s just life
Of course that simply means the medical establishment should call the shots, it doesn’t say what shots I think should be called. For example the medical establishment in America recommends gender affirming care for minors and the medical establishment in Finland/Sweden recommend against it. I don’t think the medical establishment in Finland/Sweden is full of bigots and transphobes and I obviously share some of their concerns e.g the unexplained rise in prevalence of gender dysphoria in female adolescents and rigorous evidence that shows the benefits outweighs the risks. I’ve posted before in this thread about social contagion. I think most people here believe that trans people are “born that way.” I tend to believe most things are a combination of nature vs nurture and it’s only for controversial topics that people will adopt this “it’s entirely genetic” or “it’s entirely environmental” dogma that hasn’t been proven.
In general I think gender affirming care is not something that should be immediately adopted. I’m also not familiar enough to know if it is or not. I don’t think a boy goes to a therapist for the first time and says “I’m a girl and my name is Susan” and the doctor says “Hi Susan.” I would hope there would be some “interesting… well why do you feel that way” beforehand. But ultimately it may be the judgement of the doctor and the parent that it’s not a phase they will grow out of and gender affirming care may be necessary. So I would say generally I think there should be a line drawn between reversible and irreversible interventions. E.g. role playing and puberty blockers as reversible. There’s some evidence that puberty blockers transitioned into hormone therapy in teenagers causes infertility, and I don’t really think anyone should be having top/bottom surgery before 18.
Transgender women in supports
This is anecdotal but most transgender women I meet are not athletes. They are definitely not elite athletes. I also think there’s a gap between men and women in sports, and not a small one. Often high school level boys can compete with professional women at the top levels. I also think Rayzda is right that without protections over time most world records would belong to MTF athletes. I also think most reasonable people agree this is unfair. I think most people think there should be some protections in place. For example to be a transgendered woman there are no requirements other than proclaiming yourself to be a transgender woman. I think if a male athlete just proclaimed themselves to be a transgender woman and wanted to race the next day against women most people would opposed this.
In short, a blanket ban on all MTF athletes doesn’t make sense because for the vast majority of the less talented athletes it accomplishes nothing in protect women’s sports and only excludes transgender athletes needlessly. Obviously there’s a small percent of cases where there is an obvious advantage that allows them to dominate and become champions and they are the few that should be excluded.
Bathroom bans
Just political theater in my opinion. People don’t go into the wrong bathrooms not because it’s the law but because that’s what societal norms dictate. I’m not aware of this being a problem and if it becomes a problem then you can worry about legislating it. I really couldn't be any more clear or concise. I can't control if people would rather talk about public bathrooms and who watches more trans porn, but you can't close your eyes and say I don't have a stance when it's clearly written in black and grey. Don't get me wrong, I think KwarK, as an example, is similar to you when it comes to Gaza, he obviously spends time thinking about it and continuously attacks the victims and people advocating for them. It's pretty fucked up, and I don't want to single just you out, but yeah, there is something deeply wrong with you if this is how you think and act. Funny you mention it as I wrote this of Kwark in the Palestine thread Show nested quote +On July 20 2025 05:40 BlackJack wrote:
Kwark's position in this thread on the whole could hardly be called "pro-Israel" but because he actually offers nuanced takes and assigns blame to all sides deserving of blame he frequently gets shouted down as some kind of zionist sympathizer. Pretty standard as far as conversation in left wing circles goes. Like I said, pretty typical of conversation on Left-wing circles goes. Be a "contrarian" on the border and you're piling on the poor immigrants looking for a better life. Be a "contrarian" on COVID and you're a heartless SOB that doesn't care about protecting grandmothers. Be a "contrarian" on biological males in women's sports and you're piling on trans people and throwing them under the bus. The list goes on and on. You're not looking for a real discussion. You're looking for groupthink consensus led by emotionally charged thinking.
Again, if you spend most of your time bringing up things that are propaganda, demonization, dehumanization and attacks on a oppressed group of people, you aren't nuanced, you are a bad person.
You are not looking for a real discussion, you are there to give cover to people prosecuting them.
This is, as many have said, including me, expressed by you bringing up these propaganda "points", unprompted, all the time with enough frequency that everyone can see through your shtick.
That is not groupthink, that is a clearly recognizable pattern of shitty behavior, you are clearly bothered by this and instead of self reflecting you are, as every contrarian reactionary just doubling down. How original.
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On August 12 2025 20:03 BlackJack wrote:Show nested quote +On August 12 2025 18:43 Magic Powers wrote:
I think BJ has made it abundantly clear that he's not anti-trans, and neither is he a racist or whatever other label. He's just someone who frequently fights with progressives.
What people may not understand about BJ is that he's very fact-oriented. That doesn't mean he gets every fact right, but nonetheless he focuses on facts. He's good at it. I'm not as good with facts as he is, I'm more of a bigger picture person.
Lets say X is the fact and Y is the bigger picture, then often times the argument goes like this: BJ argues about X and I respond X doesn't matter because it changes nothing about Y. I think Y is the real problem, BJ thinks X is the real problem, and we get nowhere. I also see this dynamic between him and others, which frequently leads to irritation on both sides.
So why don't we see BJ fight with conservatives and other right-wingers as much? Probably the same reason why I don't fight with progressives so much.
Now, I'd argue that we're currently living through a time where more people should fight against right-wingers. The US is turning towards fascism, and this is not a joke anymore. I'd hope BJ also comes around and understands that wokeism is no threat when compared to fascism. I'd wish for him to help provide us with facts that can help expose the fascists - especially since he's good with facts.
BJ is not a troll and he's also not a contrarian just for the sake of it. I think he doesn't agree with other people that the fascist threat is of great concern. Not bad, actually. Fairly close. You're most of the way there, but I'll complete your theory for you. X: Healthcare execs denying claims is literally murder Y: Healthcare companies denying claims is a real problem X: ICE is literally disappearing people into death camps Y: Trump's immigration policy is bad X: The COVID vaccine is the best vaccine ever Y: Everyone should have gotten the COVID vaccine when it became available X: The police are murdering black people at an astonishing rate Y: The police are long overdue for reform and to your point, you question is why I should care about the fine details of X if I agree with the larger picture of Y. Because typically the only people that disagree with you on X are people that also disagree with you on Y, and it's my own undoing if people mistakenly assume my stance on Y because of my position on X. The missing link to your theory is that I don't really care about X or Y. I care about Z. Z: We should shoot more healthcare execs in the back Z: ICE agents are legitimate targets for 2nd amendment folk since they are trying to disappear people Z: People that don't get the COVID vaccine should be banished from society Z: We need to defund or abolish the police It's obvious to me that people can't get to Z without X. Believing in death camps, and a perfect COVID vaccine that will end the pandemic is what allows people to go balls to the wall on Z. I'm happy to be the contrarian on a forum where people brazenly advocate for murder, assassination, banishment, etc.
I actually think that's a mostly fair representation of the arguments. I think that Z is somewhat exaggerated, but not entirely. I myself have openly condoned the head-meets-cement treatment of CEO Brian Thompson. I have my reasons, and people are free to disagree. Why I think Z is exaggerated, it's because I don't generally see people siding with the most extreme viewpoint. My viewpoint on Thompson can be viewed as extreme, but most people - including on the left - disagree with me afaik.
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I think I agree with slightly more moderate versions of all four Zs. Heh.
If you're strongly against all four versions of Z... does that make you a pro-corporate, pro-authority, anti-social, libertarian, pseudo-fascist? To me; kinda sorta. What would that look like?
Okay so... I "know" (I don't actually) that BJ is not these things. But what then? We should argue against X & Y because they are a slippery slope into Z? That doesn't seem right.... at all....
Nor has anyone here proposed Z, afaik, and most center-left or left leaning folks [ie. tax paying voting adults] are firmly operating in X & Y. The Y statements are all completely logical. Where does Z even come in?
Are we afraid of some fictitious, radical "alt-left" that doesn't exist IRL and only exists amongst edgy teens on twitter and projecting this boogeyman onto all leftists? Too much time on twitter?? "I'm super smrt and I know that when you say Y, you ACTUALLY mean Z?"
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It's breathtaking to see someone using the straw-man fallacy to such an extent that they are proud of it being their personality.
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United States42743 Posts
On August 12 2025 19:16 Jankisa wrote:
Don't get me wrong, I think KwarK, as an example, is similar to you when it comes to Gaza, he obviously spends time thinking about it and continuously attacks the victims and people advocating for them.
I’m pretty sure I don’t ever attack the victims (the Gazans in case anyone felt like misinterpreting that). I tell posters on TL that they’re wrong sometimes but they’re not victims. People on TL say things that generally fail to understand just how hopeless the situation is like asserting that there can be a peace with Hamas remaining in power or asserting that there’s an international peacekeeping force in the waiting to replace the IDF in Gaza. My stance is, and has been since October 7, that Gaza is considerably more tragic than many TL posters recognize. That Israel doesn’t intend to simply kill all the Gazans but also doesn’t plan to give them full rights in a one state solution (too many voters and Israel may be a democracy but it is committed to Jewish majority rule) and so that leaves us with an indefinite two state scenario in which one of the states is an open air prison that it exchanges fire with. And to be clear, I don’t like that. It’s not up to me. If it were up to me I’d restore Palestine to its 1948 borders.
The problem is that if I say something like “a one state solution with 50 years of apartheid is better than another 50 years of this” or “no Gaza in any two state solution has any potential to be more than a failed state unless there is an exodus of a large number of Gazans” people conclude I’m pro apartheid or pro ethnic cleansing. Anyone pro anything re: Gaza at this point still has some baseless hope for things to get better. Things don’t get better.
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The problem is when, just like BJ, you come into that thread mostly to post only things that paint Israel as being put in an impossible position as if they haven't caused the situation themselves, thus, the people at fault are the people who "breed uncontrollably" and "would elect Hamas every time".
When your contributions are inane like that you look like a heartless monster, especially when you never spend any of your time criticizing what Israel is doing, quite the opposite, you very often have justifications for their escalating violence and vile tactics. What makes it worse is when you ignore and skip pages of discussion of the worse things Israel does only to swoop down when you find something to criticize Gazans for.
I don't care about your little jabs and call outs of people like MP or me who call you out, they are just childish and lazy and say more about you then about me, feel free to victimize and attack me as much as you like, you won't find me complaining about that, you will, however find me criticizing your lack of empathy and your tactics.
BJ does not attack people like that personally, but he is a hard core culture warrior who keeps bringing things up which are tailor made for the culture war and pushed by the people who are actively trying to destroy the world that I like living in, the X and Y world if you will, while pretending like we all want the world of Z which is a very much hardcore minority opinion around these threads.
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On August 12 2025 22:25 Jankisa wrote:
It's breathtaking to see someone using the straw-man fallacy to such an extent that they are proud of it being their personality.
Strawman's not quite the right term. You can find any insane opinion somewhere on social media if you look hard enough.
The real problem is the argument to moderation, i.e. golden mean fallacy. You can normalize anything that's factually wrong or otherwise absurd by mentioning an even more wrong opinion first, vocally acknowledging it's wrong, and then claiming another wrong thing as reasonable because it's not as extreme.
A very blatant example of this would be if one person said 2+2=4, another said 2+2=6, and the golden mediator tried to compromise by saying 2+2=5. In actual conversations it's less blatant than this, but it's the same fallacious argument. "Trans women aren't women" isn't inherently reasonable just because it's between "Trans women are women" and "Trans women are godless sodomites that deserve execution". It is entirely possible that both the conservative and the fascist opinions are just wrong.
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United States42743 Posts
On August 12 2025 22:55 Jankisa wrote:
The problem is when, just like BJ, you come into that thread mostly to post only things that paint Israel as being put in an impossible position as if they haven't caused the situation themselves, thus, the people at fault are the people who "breed uncontrollably" and "would elect Hamas every time".
When your contributions are inane like that you look like a heartless monster, especially when you never spend any of your time criticizing what Israel is doing, quite the opposite, you very often have justifications for their escalating violence and vile tactics. What makes it worse is when you ignore and skip pages of discussion of the worse things Israel does only to swoop down when you find something to criticize Gazans for.
I don't care about your little jabs and call outs of people like MP or me who call you out, they are just childish and lazy and say more about you then about me, feel free to victimize and attack me as much as you like, you won't find me complaining about that, you will, however find me criticizing your lack of empathy and your tactics.
BJ does not attack people like that personally, but he is a hard core culture warrior who keeps bringing things up which are tailor made for the culture war and pushed by the people who are actively trying to destroy the world that I like living in, the X and Y world if you will, while pretending like we all want the world of Z which is a very much hardcore minority opinion around these threads.
Your analysis here is part of the problem. People want there to be a single party at fault. That would be so much simpler, if there was simply some villain with an evil plan who could be stopped and then everything would be okay again. Just identify who is at fault, deal with them, job done.
Someone identifies party A as being the party at fault and then presume from my disagreement that I like party A, that I support party A, that I believe party B is at fault. But my disagreement isn't with their identification of the villain, it's their entire outlook on the conflict.
Let's say someone wanted to assert that Gaza was at fault. I don't think we have many of those on TL so you don't generally get to see what I'd say to them but here we go.
A significant number of Gazan civilians took part in the October 7 attacks and were subsequently involved in concealing hostages. A pro-Zionist would conclude that Israel was attacked, Gazans are at fault etc. There are parts of it that are factual but that argument is still wrong because it ignores the broader historical context. The absolute hopelessness of the situation in Gaza, the fact that they're intergenerational refugees with no homeland to return to (unbelievably fucked), the fact that half of the population of Gaza weren't born when Hamas were elected and were raised under Hamas and lived with the threat of Israeli airstrikes. Someone asserting "well they shouldn't have attacked" can be right but it's a braindead useless comment because of course some Gazans lashed out. Anyone whose idea of peace relies on hopeless propagandized young men with justifiable hate deciding to do nothing to protect a future that literally doesn't exist is a moron. To do nothing Gazans would need to have a hope for a better future that could be preserved. Maybe there was a slim hope before October 7 but even if there was one I can understand why people living in Gaza wouldn't have seen it. I hate it but I get it.
Now let's say someone wants to assert Israel is at fault.
Israel is, somewhat, in a no-win position. There are factions within Israel that are wholly complicit in making things worse for themselves and everyone else, obviously. There are genocidal factions. But for most of the history of the conflict the very worst actors in Israel have not been in charge.
Israel has traded land for peace a number of times. Israel has trusted in the international community before. With Lebanon Israel exited the conflict with a UN backed agreement for Israel to stop defending itself vs Hezbollah in exchange for the UN peacekeepers taking over the job of preventing Hezbollah attacks. For the first 18 years of Hamas rule in Gaza Israel didn't invade Gaza, despite Gaza being at war with them, because tanking the attacks was preferable to leveling the place. For balance, obviously I know that provocations didn't go only one way, this isn't a story of noble Israel being the bigger man while embittered Palestine attacked them, settlements continued, airstrikes continued, parties on both sides kept making it worse. But for almost two decades Israel declined to participate fully in the war being waged against them.
Where did that get them? Northern Israel evacuated because of Hezbollah rocket attacks coming from areas that were nominally under UN peacekeeper control and a terror attack that was, proportionate to Israel's population, an order of magnitude greater than the attack on the World Trade Center. Again we see the death of hope. There were factions in Israel that spent decades arguing for restraint, that Israel should hold back because retaliation would only make things worse. They were discredited by the attacks (although they never had a chance in the first place because things were gradually getting worse anyway, the supposed peace was a negative peace), if October 7 was their idea of a peace worth protecting then a lot of Israelis wanted no part in it. And again, I get it. They're at the point where their answer to "how many Israelis should die to save a hospital filled with people who hate Israelis" is 0. And are they wrong? Let's say that Hamas fire from it and they refuse to return fire on day 1. Hamas will simply scale up their attacks from the hospital until eventually Israel responds. Hope is dead, the hospital is doomed from the start, there is no hypothetical scenario in which it survives so why even try. As with the Gazans, I hate it and I get it.
My stance on the conflict is essentially this.
Hope is dead. If you're an EU aid organization why would you build a school in Gaza if Hamas want to use it as a launch site and Israel has no reluctance in returning fire. It's doomed. If you're a Gazan why not take a shot at the IDF, you'll be martyred and there's not any hope for things to get better if you don't. If you're in the IDF why not shoot first, if they don't shoot you today they probably would tomorrow. It's not like your government has any plan for peace, just day after day of people shooting at you. If enough of you protest maybe you can go home, that'll be nice, then your little brother can walk the streets of Gaza when it's his turn.
This part of your post is the key to my disagreement "impossible position as if they haven't caused the situation themselves". Who caused it doesn't matter at this point, except to people arguing on the internet. The only part that matters is the impossible position part. One group wants Gazans to be at fault while the other side says "well of course they do X, look at the circumstances". The other group wants Israel to be at fault while the first says "well of course they do X, look at the circumstances". Then they accuse each other of exaggerating some crimes and absolving others and round and round it goes forever.
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The pace of progress is insufferably slow, and many times intentionally stalled in an effort not to make the opposition angry. At the same time, massive step-backs can happen quite frequently. Just look at the many controversial rulings by the Supreme Court in the past decade. These step-backs are accompanied by a severe lack of consequences. For example, health insurance denials are causing more and more suffering and victims by the day, but there is no hope of it being addressed. At best, one can hope that after the next elections, there will be a Democratic majority that will push for some minimal compromise. Simultaneously, the people benefiting from the suffering of others are not facing any consequences now or in the future. It is no surprise that people do not trust the system anymore.
The obvious lesson is that you should aim for immediate and maximal change regardless of how moral, ethical or legal your methods are, as there will not be sufficient consequences afterwards if you win big enough. If you look at the Project 2025, you can see one attempt at this kind of change and its current implementation attempt. It will take decades to undo your changes. This is, of course, very destructive to society when everyone tries to implement their own agenda one after another. However, at the same time, it is clear that incremental changes will let many suffer for a long time.
Looking back into history, plenty of things have required much more direct actions to achieve bigger changes. In many places, Women's suffrage, the 8-hour workday, and desegregation all required more than small incremental changes, and they were achieved with much more direct action than voting or writing letters.
The desire for change manifests itself in the more radical opinions on the internet. If these same people had more local grassroots organisations, then the frustration would be funnelled into them. These organisations would probably be much more effective in implementing the change. Heritage Foundation and Project 2025 prove how effective decades-long dedicated movement-building can be, and they do not even need to be popular or do big marches or general strikes for their agenda.
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On August 12 2025 22:32 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On August 12 2025 19:16 Jankisa wrote:
Don't get me wrong, I think KwarK, as an example, is similar to you when it comes to Gaza, he obviously spends time thinking about it and continuously attacks the victims and people advocating for them. I’m pretty sure I don’t ever attack the victims (the Gazans in case anyone felt like misinterpreting that). I tell posters on TL that they’re wrong sometimes but they’re not victims. People on TL say things that generally fail to understand just how hopeless the situation is like asserting that there can be a peace with Hamas remaining in power or asserting that there’s an international peacekeeping force in the waiting to replace the IDF in Gaza. My stance is, and has been since October 7, that Gaza is considerably more tragic than many TL posters recognize. That Israel doesn’t intend to simply kill all the Gazans but also doesn’t plan to give them full rights in a one state solution (too many voters and Israel may be a democracy but it is committed to Jewish majority rule) and so that leaves us with an indefinite two state scenario in which one of the states is an open air prison that it exchanges fire with. And to be clear, I don’t like that. It’s not up to me. If it were up to me I’d restore Palestine to its 1948 borders. The problem is that if I say something like “a one state solution with 50 years of apartheid is better than another 50 years of this” or “no Gaza in any two state solution has any potential to be more than a failed state unless there is an exodus of a large number of Gazans” people conclude I’m pro apartheid or pro ethnic cleansing. Anyone pro anything re: Gaza at this point still has some baseless hope for things to get better. Things don’t get better.
People simply disagree on the hopelessness, and you attack people for proposing ideas that would raise hope. The question that remains unanswered is why you're doing that.
I'm fully aware that you don't oppose real solutions. I've also noticed that you don't oppose hopefulness. I recently expressed a modicum of hope after news came out of Germany planning to stop sending offensive weapons to Israel. You didn't respond to the news or to my comment, which tells me that hope is something you value.
So I don't think that you oppose people seeking a hopeful future. But at the same time we often see you respond to people in an antagonistic fashion. I suggested that Israel ending the war (by that I mean the offensive hot war in Gaza) would give hope to Gazans and could perhaps even lead to a two state solution in the long term. You like to say that Hamas would make that path impossible. But 1) the word "impossible" doesn't exist in my dictionary - unless we're talking about reversing gravity. Who can predict the future like that? But much more importantly 2) even if two states can't exist with Hamas in power, I still find a slow burning war (like pre-Oct 7) vastly preferable to the current intensity. Tens of thousands of Palestinians being slaughtered is intolerable.
So I see nothing wrong with the proposal that Israel should withdraw even if it means that Hamas stays in power. The amount of lives saved would be well worth it.
Edit: well, scratch that. Just before I sent this, KwarK expressed that there is no hope. Guess I was wrong to assume he supports hopeful ideas.
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I won't bother addressing your extremely one sided "analysis" of why Israel is basically not at fault for anything because evil Arabs made them do it. The only peace that I can ask you a question about is when did Israel exactly trade land for peace? Also, you are blatantly lying about Israel not invading Gaza in 18 years, here's a nice graph about that:
![[image loading]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a1/Timeline_of_Israel-Palestine_fatalities_2008-2023.png)
Also, you are absolutely missing the point by a country mile. I don't care who's fault it is, I don't care who started it, I care what is Israel doing and that they are stopped because it's monstrous and it's radicalizing both them, Palestinians and people abroad who are watching it. This is what you don't get, you don't understand that who's fault it is is not important, it's important to point out that what Israel is doing NOW and the escalations they continue to do are evil and need to be stopped.
Hope is dead. If you're an EU aid organization why would you build a school in Gaza if Hamas want to use it as a launch site and Israel has no reluctance in returning fire. It's doomed. If you're a Gazan why not take a shot at the IDF, you'll be martyred and there's not any hope for things to get better if you don't. If you're in the IDF why not shoot first, if they don't shoot you today they probably would tomorrow. It's not like your government has any plan for peace, just day after day of people shooting at you. If enough of you protest maybe you can go home, that'll be nice, then your little brother can walk the streets of Gaza when it's his turn.
Again, your absolute lack of empathy is staggering. We should build schools so children can have an education. A child being treated like a human being and having hope for their future is infinitely more important then some piece of shit terrorist using that building to shoot rockets or another piece of shit using that as an excuse to level the whole neighborhood around it.
We should all yell and protest and do whatever is humanly possible to force Israel to stop, and then to force them to implement a 2 state solution, to actually give land back so Palestinians have a place to live, to stop their settlers taking more and more land, to allow Palestinians to have their own organizations and a government.
To you, that is impossible because just like the Israelis you don't see Palestinians as people. And that is why you don't feel empathy for them. And that is why you write this shit.
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United States42743 Posts
I have plenty of empathy for the victims and I care very strongly about the issue. You didn’t understand a damn word I said.
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United States42743 Posts
On August 13 2025 00:25 Magic Powers wrote:
Edit: well, scratch that. Just before I sent this, KwarK expressed that there is no hope. Guess I was wrong to assume he supports hopeful ideas.
I'm desperate to support hopeful ideas. There aren't any. I hate the status quo. People here really seem to struggle with the idea that I can both describe something and hate it.
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On August 13 2025 00:47 KwarK wrote:
I have plenty of empathy for the victims and I care very strongly about the issue. You didn’t understand a damn word I said.
You just wrote 2 pages of how Gazans were participating in October 7th and Israel is in an impossible situation and how there is no hope and we shouldn't build schools for them, justified attacks on hospitals, explained how Israel tried peace but it didn't work (despite Likud being in power for 90 % of the last 30 years), lying about trading land for peace, about Israel not invading for 18 years, but sure, you care very strongly about the victims buddy, keep telling yourself that maybe it becomes true some day.
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United States42743 Posts
On August 13 2025 00:55 Jankisa wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2025 00:47 KwarK wrote:
I have plenty of empathy for the victims and I care very strongly about the issue. You didn’t understand a damn word I said. You just wrote 2 pages of how Gazans were participating in October 7th and Israel is in an impossible situation and how there is no hope and we shouldn't build schools for them, but sure, you care very strongly about the victims buddy, keep telling yourself that maybe it becomes true some day.
You didn’t understand a damn word I said.
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EPT
