‘This is not about Ukraine at all, but the world order,’ said Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, a month after the invasion. ‘The unipolar world is irretrievably receding into the past … A multi-polar world is being born.’ The US is no longer the world’s policeman, in other words – a message that resonates in
I hear you, but it’s not a billion people in the West. It’s a small minority composed of wealthy psychopathic bloodsuckers in the West that’s been charting that course.
Yeah, that’s a good point. On the other hand, the rest of the population is at least somewhat complicit by allowing this nightmare to continue unabated. Given that westerners claim they have democracies in their countries, that makes them complicit by their own admission.
Yeah as an American I didn’t mean to absolve that, and personally it’s tough not to struggle with the immense guilt that comes with. Most people are genuinely kind in this country but they are also genuinely brainwashed. I think one thing to note when it comes to US imperialism specifically, is that most Americans have never actually experienced war, which lets politicians weaponize their compassion. Americans that do support war genuinely think they’re doing the world a favor by spreading “democracy.” In the US, the citizens are so removed from geopolitical conflict that it makes them extra susceptible to propaganda because they don’t actually face the direct violence of imperialism like the global south does. We feel the consequences still, but it’s economic and it takes more logical steps for people to connect their struggles with what’s happening outside their borders.
There’s also a huge generational divide. Millenials and Gen Z are more left than the US population has ever been in its history. There may be an overall lack of knowledge when it comes to foundational theory, but that’s where the current struggle is.
It’s not an excuse, but for most people here it’s not malice either. If more Americans genuinely understood what our military and financial system did, there would be a whole lot less complicity in it. Which is why there is the most sophisticated propaganda system in history obscuring those truths and keeping people ignorant. But even if most people here weren’t ignorant and pushed back against Western imperialism, they would still have no say in their farce of a political system. We have absolutely no say in what our government does when it comes to militarization and imperialism, even on the more local level.
While it is technically true that only a small minority have any real power here, at least in the US (where I live, can’t speak for the rest of the West) a lot of the “powerless majority” still voice support for a lot of the horrific things we do. In my hometown there are plenty of people I hear vocalizing their desire to turn the lands of whoever the enemies are at the time “to glass” and other similar genocidal talk.
Fuck, even a survey by a bourgeois “neutral pollster with a great reputation” (Pew or Gallup, can’t remember which) found that one in three respondents who were Trump supporters during his first campaign in either North or South Carolina (can’t remember which) wanted the return of chattel slavery as it was before the US Civil War. So since about half the population wanted Trump, that means about one in six people you walk past in that state want to fully re-enslave minorities plantation style.
So even if the US was a “true democracy” and people’s votes and wishes did actually matter, the course would likely not be different and if so, could very possibly be even worse.
I hear you, but it’s not a billion people in the West. It’s a small minority composed of wealthy psychopathic bloodsuckers in the West that’s been charting that course.
I believe there are about 2600 billionaires worldwide. An even smaller number of those are in the west.
Yeah, that’s a good point. On the other hand, the rest of the population is at least somewhat complicit by allowing this nightmare to continue unabated. Given that westerners claim they have democracies in their countries, that makes them complicit by their own admission.
Yeah as an American I didn’t mean to absolve that, and personally it’s tough not to struggle with the immense guilt that comes with. Most people are genuinely kind in this country but they are also genuinely brainwashed. I think one thing to note when it comes to US imperialism specifically, is that most Americans have never actually experienced war, which lets politicians weaponize their compassion. Americans that do support war genuinely think they’re doing the world a favor by spreading “democracy.” In the US, the citizens are so removed from geopolitical conflict that it makes them extra susceptible to propaganda because they don’t actually face the direct violence of imperialism like the global south does. We feel the consequences still, but it’s economic and it takes more logical steps for people to connect their struggles with what’s happening outside their borders.
There’s also a huge generational divide. Millenials and Gen Z are more left than the US population has ever been in its history. There may be an overall lack of knowledge when it comes to foundational theory, but that’s where the current struggle is.
It’s not an excuse, but for most people here it’s not malice either. If more Americans genuinely understood what our military and financial system did, there would be a whole lot less complicity in it. Which is why there is the most sophisticated propaganda system in history obscuring those truths and keeping people ignorant. But even if most people here weren’t ignorant and pushed back against Western imperialism, they would still have no say in their farce of a political system. We have absolutely no say in what our government does when it comes to militarization and imperialism, even on the more local level.
Yeah, I very much agree with all that. Hopefully, younger people will be able to change course going forward.
While it is technically true that only a small minority have any real power here, at least in the US (where I live, can’t speak for the rest of the West) a lot of the “powerless majority” still voice support for a lot of the horrific things we do. In my hometown there are plenty of people I hear vocalizing their desire to turn the lands of whoever the enemies are at the time “to glass” and other similar genocidal talk.
Fuck, even a survey by a bourgeois “neutral pollster with a great reputation” (Pew or Gallup, can’t remember which) found that one in three respondents who were Trump supporters during his first campaign in either North or South Carolina (can’t remember which) wanted the return of chattel slavery as it was before the US Civil War. So since about half the population wanted Trump, that means about one in six people you walk past in that state want to fully re-enslave minorities plantation style.
So even if the US was a “true democracy” and people’s votes and wishes did actually matter, the course would likely not be different and if so, could very possibly be even worse.