I don’t like memes like this because they are easily dismissed, since the left absolutely has problems, and it’s not just “we want healthcare”
However, the truth is, for all the faults the left has, they pale in comparison to the right wing batshittery.
Sometimes the best you can hope for is things only getting a little worse
Unfortunately it doesn’t take much of a leap to translate that into “Prop up this system which was shaped by boomers for decades just long enough for the boomers to enjoy their retirements.”
No thanks. I’d rather the boomers are still alive to see what happens.
The USA has a left party?
As an outsider I see another problem with most of the US political discussions here. You all say that the republicans are obviously worse, make memes about them to your dudes to laugh at them. Yet half of your country active voters are likely to vote for them, would probably be more if they weren’t inherently apolitical.
This whole American political discourse seems more fit for /r/im14andimsmart because it’s mostly shitting on your opponents despite the fact that after 12 of the 16 years(the whole generation) of the democrat presidents more people want to vote for the other party.
I find it weird how you guys just laugh and meme at that like it’s non issue or just act as those people(hundreds of millions) are just stupid.
Everyone has picked their side and won’t hear a damned thing wrong about them since that would make them also wrong and every American is 100% right about things they feel, cause that is what our media makes us feel. And also is inherently needed for a class of wealthy elites to pretend they know or care at all for any other group of people when taking power over them.
It’s somewhat wrong to say “more” people want one side or the other since we still actually make it quite hard to vote and the rules on victory is convoluted in allowing unpopular (not majority of votes) victory in a political race.
Granted again there is lots of nuance in all of this and Republicans more sell a vibe than thought out ideas, that is usually based on a feeling of superiority that is not earned.
It’s the end of an empire. We haven’t been tending to the stalk and the central pillar of what makes us strong so it’s coming down and things are just gonna be bad as people on all sides argue they know how to fly.
That they managed to convince so many people to completely vote against their own interests is a testament to the power of propaganda. And you don’t have to be spiteful, stupid and/or uneducated to fall for propaganda, it helps a lot obviously, but there are still many progressive and/or smart people who fall for it as well.
The combination of spreading “alternate” facts through complicit mass media AND indifferent addictive social media is something that Goebbels could have only dreamt about.
To understand how people can become so misguided, I recommend reading or watching a few testimonies of people who lost a loved one to alternate fact rabbit holes. It’s similar to losing a loved one to a cult, only now it’s much more widespread than ever before. I did a quick search and found a testimony from an Irishman that is a good read: https://old.reddit.com/r/ireland/comments/171w3kb/my_dad_is_falling_down_a_farright_rabbit_hole/
And for people who did not fall for “alternate” facts propaganda, to put all this history and background into words is not easy, so it’s easier and especially quicker to call people who have joined the far right cult, stupid and hateful. The cultists are stupid because they have fallen for the lies, and they are spiteful/hateful because hate is a large part of the far right cult. The far right cultists might not always have been stupid and hateful, but they sure are now.
Moonbats who promised something to an altar of Joe Stalin are a minority of leftists, including radical leftists such as most people here.
The right-wing nutcases are the hegemon. Those who aren’t themselves that extreme at the very least enable them, if not passively want the same things.
The comparison is such bad faith I wonder if a conservative threw it out there.
Based
Do Simpsons screenshots automatically get that font when you try to put the text on, or is it something that just everyone has decided to do across the board?
Most people get these images from frinkiac.com and that site uses a font called Akbar.
The same people also run morbotron.com for Futurama and masterofallscience.com for Rick and Morty.
a font called Akbar
Named after Akbar of Akbar and Jeff, I assume.
Is that not the Simpsons font?
Too bad USA doesn’t have a viable left party
Hard to have a left party when we’re making new grounds of what a right-wing party can look like.
a viable left party will emerge when the republicans are long gone from politics, just the way the whigs went the way of the do do bird. i don’t know why people can;t see this. it’s a duopoly. everybody knows this. how can a viable third party exist in that format? yes, ranked choice voting would be ideal, but what if it never happens? vote blue no matter who until the choice becomes vote radical left no matter who. this is how you achieve change without resorting to violence.
That isn’t true, actually.
Within the US’ system of Liberal Democracy, the only parties that can afford campaigns are ones that can secure funding from the people and corporations with the most money.
Therefore, whichever party replaces the Republicans will be another right wing party.
Change comes from outside pressure.
Both sides are corrupt, not “the same”
And not the same corrupt, and that corruption doesn’t mean they deliver the exact same outcome.
Yep. But on the idea of the corruption alone the outcome is what benifites the individual politician.
There’s things happening right now that the middle saying “both sides are the same” should be the least of anyone’s worries. We’re now not only making the right the enemy but we are now attacking the middle, which has pretty much zero power and hasn’t done much of note to make everyone an enemy.
We need to stop focusing on what Joe Jackass thinks and believes and start to focus our hate on the government system itself. We’re on the fast road to self destruction if everything is done out of hate and to stick it to’ them’
One side is more corrupt than the other.
Which side that is, I leave as an exercise to the reader. But I assure you one side is worse, and that means we have to vote for the other side.
Corruption is OK as long as one is the lesser of two evils.
If there was actual left, there would be health care already. Instead there are billionaires.
Liberals aren’t left. You guys have far right and neolib mid-right
I only ever see “both sides are the same” as a atrawman, here. I’ve never seen it presented genuinely, generally I see “I have issues with the Democrats” and the only response is either “but the other guys are worse” and “bOtH sIDeS aRe ThE sAmE!!”
ALMOST as if having an actual conversation about the problems people with the Democrats makes people uncomfortable.
The only things liberals know how to do are using whataboutism to deflect all criticism of the Democrats by talking about the Republicans, and doing genocide apologia.
If you really want to change the party, JOIN it, convince like-minded people to join, and start changing it from the inside.
You know, like the way Trump and MAGA changed the Republicans.
The DNC has made it clear they’re not interested in moving to the left and that they’re perfectly happy gradually meandering further right. Sure, 30 million Democrats might see it differently but the people voting aren’t actually in charge.
I’ve been doing that for 20 years. Between that and spit in my hand at least the hand with spit has something to show for the effort.
MAGA had the support of moderate Republicans.
Leftists and progressives do not have the support of moderate and liberals. They made this clear in the 2020 primaries. Anyone to the left of Biden was too radical. Liberals and moderates made it clear again yesterday when they celebrated police breaking up the protestors. When Biden was asked if the protests have made him reevaluate his policies in Israel he simply said “No”.
There’s no room for us in the Democrat party so I’ll be voting 3rd party.
Voting third party for president won’t solve that problem, it will just help, in your case, a more right wing POTUS get into office, one who has proven to be especially dangerous to our democracy. It’s a dumb idea because it’s counter productive to your goals and virtually useless.
If you want better representation you’ll have to work from the ground up by getting people into office that will move to end fptp voting.
You’re trying to play the game with the rules you want it to have, not with the rules it actually has.
Voting third party for president won’t solve that problem
I’m aware I have no way of solving this problem. Never claimed otherwise.
If you want better representation you’ll have to work from the ground up by getting people into office that will move to end fptp voting.
Even if progressives and leftists managed to get a halfway decent candidate through the primaries all that would happen is that liberals and moderates would be the ones who vote Republican, vote 3rd party or don’t show up. We’re at an impasse.
You’re trying to play the game with the rules you want it to have, not with the rules it actually has.
Actually I think that’s what you’re doing. The rules that it has are I get to choose who I vote for. Not you.
I’m aware I have no way of solving this problem. Never claimed otherwise.
Then it makes even less sense to vote for a third party because you know it doesn’t do anything.
Even if progressives and leftists managed to get a halfway decent candidate through the primaries all that would happen is that liberals and moderates would be the ones who vote Republican, vote 3rd party or don’t show up. We’re at an impasse.
I’m not taking about the primary, i’m talking about how the vote is done. If we can get rid of fptp voting system, and replace it with something like star voting, then people are more free to vote for who they want instead of using reason and voting strategically. This is the way to increase the chances of getting more liberal people elected.
The rules that it has are I get to choose who I vote for. Not you.
By no stretch of the imagination did I even remotely suggest I get to choose who you vote for.
Then it makes even less sense to vote for a third party because you know it doesn’t do anything.
I can stay home if that would make you feel better?
If we can get rid of fptp voting system
Never going to happen with the kind of candidates who make it through the primaries.
By no stretch of the imagination did I even remotely suggest I get to choose who you vote for.
Ok then accept I’m going to vote 3rd party and stop trying to convince me to do something else.
They will make an argument like my mom where they just think its all rigged anyway, and then vote for the firsf radical they see even if ifs Traitor Trump. You have to realize these people are not even slightly informee
Cool, one side is more to the left than the other side, so that makes them left. Comments like yours are both extremely fucking useless and getting old.
Liberal just means not conservative. There is no monolithic body called “the liberals” whose beliefs are all alike. It’s a spectrum.
It’s frankly incredible how often this needs to be stated.
There’s distinct flavors of liberalism in political science. For example in Classical Liberalism most modern conservatives are included because they want a democratic government.
That’s kind of my point. Saying ‘liberal just means not conservative’ is so vague that it’s effectively meaningless.
I also think it’s done intentionally to normalize/consolidate voting patterns for a set of people who share very little actual views or policy goals and enforce a political binary. In that way I think it’s worse than meaningless - it’s actively harmful.
Both parties engage in this word play. It’s about creating a team mentality.
Well as long as you’re aware of the coercion
A lot of us speak colloqial, speaking colloquial is more common. You cannot enter a discourse held by laymen, assume and use academic definitions, and expect to be understood or agreed with
Much of the English speaking world uses liberal to mean its formal definition, for example, the Liberal Democratic Party in the UK.
Maybe not if the definition is left assumed to be shared, but you’d think the layman may come to a richer understanding of meaning once presented with a precise distinction .
All peolpe who say all liberals aren’t left are idiots who like to lump everyone into one box to make their point.
Neoliberalism is a far right ideology brought to mainstream politics by Ronald Reagan and Margret Thatcher. Later embraced by the most right wing of the american pseudo left like Clinton who abandoned their traditional union and grassroot support for the big banks and extra large corporate funding. This led to the embracement of neo conservativism by Newt Gingrich and the right in general to differentiate themselves from the new political shift from the pseudo left wings encroachment on their bread basket, the corporations. Enter the US downward spiral to our current political landscape as the neolibral wing marches ever right and the conservative wing courts the endless bag of batshit crazy.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism
Just because the word has the root liber in it does not make it left on a political spectrum.
Liberalism is pro-Capitalist, it was only ever considered left wing when it was revolutionary, ie in feudalism.
In the modern, Capitalist and Imperialist era, Liberalism supports the status quo and is right wing because of it.
Liberals aren’t left.
Leftism is when you’re in favor of a 3% increase in the marginal tax rate, an increase in the number of Pell Grants issued annually, and an expansion of eligibility for Medicaid under a new means testing regime…
What you’re thinking of is the Far-Left, which is when you become an Authoritarian National Socialist and kill 6M Jews, like Joseph Stalin did when he illegally invaded Germany.
Its called Horseshoe Theory. And if you weren’t so busy skipping classes to go protest Joe Biden, maybe you’d have learned about it.
Lol
Lmao
Did you just blame the holocaust on the soviets? really?
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which is when you become an Authoritarian National Socialist and kill 6M Jews, like Joseph Stalin did when he illegally invaded Germany
Maybe, but it really reads like he is saying the soviets killed 6m jews when they “illegally” invaded germany
It’s neither, it’s a sarcastic comment.
This is a sarcastic comment, lol
That’s ironic. You obviously skipped political ideology at the 200 level.
Yes, it’s literally a sarcastic comment.
I don’t know how to tell you this but here goes. There are people who actually believe what they’ve said. It’s not a modest proposal, it’s Holocaust denial which is a central theme to modern fascists.
There are people who actually believe what they’ve said.
From the halls /r/libertarian to the shores of /r/anachy. Its weapon’s grade radical centrism.
If this is a joke it’s gone down rather poorly. At best it reads like Schroedinger’s Joke Propaganda.
Oh, I wanted so much to be with you here, and bits of pieces of your comment are correct, but other bits and pieces are completely fucking insane, that makes me think you’re an alien blob or an undertrained llm trying to mimic human political argument.
Stalin was so happy to be backstabbed by his Hitler friend, so he illegally (wtf is that, can you do it legally?) invaded Germany, starting from destroying Soviet critical infrastructure using German bombersThe number of people completely missing your sarcasm is unfortunately unsurprising.
I will admit that I was jabated by this comment until I read yours and had to go reread it
I genuinely cant parse the sarcasm on my own tbh
I don’t like this meme because the last two panels don’t rhyme.
I think they’re going for tried a coup / want you rhyme but the scanscion doesn’t work
They do rhyme, some of the stanzas
Yeah dude really we get it the right are bad and they’re evil but holy shit how come the Democrats have to be so fucking awful at their job?
You’re going to get downvoted, but You’re not necessarily wrong. So often the Democrats take the “high road” and let Republicans walk all over them because the Republicans don’t care about the rules or about decorum.
And Democrats are SO BAD AT MESSAGING. I mean my god, they should be shouting their successes each and every time they speak, but you really just don’t hear it. And every new movement gets so easily misconstrued by Republicans because of the nature of how complex the ideas and solutions are, so actual intent gets lost in “defund the police” and “black lives matter” (both of which I wholly support, so don’t come at me). Those phrases mean something extremely important, but it’s too easy for Republicans to make them sound like they mean something bad.
And journalists don’t care because controversy sells, not wins.
This has more to do with most media and social media being owned by billionaires putting their thumbs on the scales. They support certain social issues to seem leftist but they are all conservative financially and on anything that could affect their bank account. There is very little true left leaning media in America.
Making the case that the government needs to step in and take control of many if these issues, but Dems dont want that either because wE’rE a cApiTaLiSt nAtIoN.
And DtP and BLM could easily be advanced by simply posting videos everywhere of police brutalizing white people , because the right cheers when they see police brutalize blacks. Dems DO NOT KNOW WHO THEY ARE DEALING WITH
aaaand you just went off into the deepend.
Like I was saying: you dont know who you’re dealing with.
no edgelord, we get it, we simply don’t care about you.
Well that’s great because your way is working so well that we have the same lineup we had three years ago
Yes. If you’d cared back in 2022 to begin campaigning on a replacement candidate (I canvassed for Bernie) I could understand your outrage.
As is, the rest of us have a job to do. If you’re not in on the better of the two, you do you champ.
AAAND the bots/Russian plants have swarmed the comment section.
Ah US politics 2024.
Да ладно тебе, ну заполонили, и что с того?
Weird, I’m just seeing a bunch of NSA bots.
You can tell by how very suddenly the sheer number of comments blows the fuck up once anything not vlad-approved picking up steam.
This is the scene that plays in my head whenever people talk about how great Hamilton is. I can’t help it.
i agree with the rhetorical goals of this meme, but it does its job poorly.
some better options:
-
the right yawns when kids get shot
-
the left seeks to put in place bare minimum common sense gun laws
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the left wants healthcare to be a human right
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the right wants healthcare to be privatized for the benefit of investors
-
the right wants trans people, an incredibly small fraction of the population, to be harassed, abused, and murdered
-
the left doesn’t want that
-
the right is actively looking to get a national ban on abortion
-
the left supports a woman’s bodily autonomy, and recognizes that abortion can also be a life saving procedure but that such decisions should remain between a pregnant person and their doctor
and one very important and fucking atrocity of a similarity between the parties that will be used as a “gotcha” to “prove” all of the left/progressives are a poisoned well:
- Republicans are Zionists and support an active genocide
- Democrats are Zionists and support an active genocide
“Oh, you can see a well defined difference between the only two parties with a chance at winning an election in the US? I guess youre actually a Lib TM bc theres absolutely no way, none at all, that you might be anything left of center.”
Also, you missed,
The left wants to fund the Ukranians fighting their sovereignty,
The right wants vlad the dictator to steamroll eastern europe bc daddy dump says hes big and strong unlike the clearly gencocidal nazi Volodomyr “no, i wont give u dirt on ur political opponents just for protecting my people, you imbecile” Zelenskyy.
- Republicans are Zionists and support an active genocide
- Democrats are Zionists and support an active genocide
“President Biden told the Israeli leader that airstrikes that killed aid workers were “unacceptable” and appeared to condition future support on how Israel changes course.” https://archive.ph/t5tIi
Trump tells Israel to “finish the job” in gaza
https://apnews.com/article/trump-israel-gaza-netanyahu-biden-ba17bedaf2f1b5f2ea220828d0fba73b
Oh and he punished them by stopping the military aid right?
No?
So it’s just political theater then.
Did Biden to tell them to “cut it out”?
these are true but facts picked in bad faith. biden has also said “I am a Zionist” and has shown no restraint in financially supporting the apartheid regime.
Yes, there is nuance and separation to the hows and the degrees of the Zionism and supprt for genocide. But neither side is anything less than culpable.
-
“The left”
Those red and blue dots are damned close together for one guy that incited a coup, kept mein kampf on this nightstand writes love letters to Putin and IL.
Biden is nowhere near where I want him to be policy-wise, But to try to put them close together on social issues is disingenuous
The political compass site is far from scientific.
Because the political compass is a lie meant to perpetuate “both-sidesism”.
It’s also an excuse for the people on r/politicalcompassmemes to act like an “enlightened compass”
Let’s look at the vertical axis. Would you agree Biden is pretty much as Authoritarian as Trump?
Not remotely. Both are very much right wing, but there is a wide and wild ocean between the two in terms of authoritarianism.
Exhibit A against Biden
https://theintercept.com/2021/04/27/biden-antiterrorism-and-effective-death-penalty-act/
What is the Trump authoritarian equivalent?
His use of federal death penalties that he did a record number of at the end of his presidential term as an attempt to raise support for his re-election using illegally supplied drugs that can’t be used for that anymore.
To the point that part of his re-election campaign is still in death penalty but using firing squads or hanging as his alternative to lethal injection since they could be made public to scare citizens against acting out and again he accidentally helped make illegal the drugs he used in federal executions.
Trump is chasing populism, but the Biden team is not exactly proactively against capital punishment.
Biden could tell the Justice Department not to pursue the death penalty, but he hasn’t.
Harris kept the death penalty available when she was California attorney general.
Through inaction, the Democrats are being equally authoritarian.
No. Grow up.
Biden regarding black people: “Superpredators”
Biden regarding Palestinians: “Kill their women and children if you have to.”
Biden regarding black people: “Superpredators”
No that’s Hillary “I deserve whatever I want” Rodham Clinton
He made the bill she used to say that but his actual idea on what made someone a “predator” was being born out of wedlock.
… He’s not great but let’s get it right at least.
Don’t bring black people into this. Obama chose Biden as his VP twice. Also, black people were key voters in winning Georgia, cementing Biden’s victory. They obviously like him.
I’m personally not a fan of Biden. But it’s not like we have real options to choose from.
https://news.gallup.com/interactives/507569/presidential-job-approval-center.aspx
At least among non-white people, his approval has gone from 80% at the start of Biden’s term to 46% now. So… he was popular with certain demographics before. Now he’s not (except democrats, liberals, and postgraduates still have an approval rating above 50%). He has a higher approval rating from boomers than non-whites now.
The thing about approval ratings is, you may dislike a solution but favor it above others. I totally understand disliking Biden but still voting for him.
I think current polls are flawed and the people who “dislike” Biden will still vote for him. The public is fickle and enthusiasm will be determined by an event closer to the election.
At this point in the 2008 election, Obama and Hillary were neck and neck. John Edwards was still in the race for the Democratic nomination. Of course, Biden had not yet been nominated for VP. Literally ignore everything until late September.
Fucking vote.
Please stop using the political compass. Perpetuating right wing propaganda and misinformation is not helpful.
Which one do you suggest?
One what? The left/right spectrum is a complex web of ideals. On the right you have consolidation of wealth and power and on the left you have egalitarianism (equally shared wealth and power).
The extreme right contains power structures like dictatorship, monarchism, and oligarchy.
The extreme left contains power structures like direct democracy, anarchism, and communism (lower-case C; inclusive of, but not limited to, Marxism).
There is no “leftist authoritarianism” - that’s an oxymoron - authoritarianism in any form is nothing more than garden-variety rightism. Rightists appropriating leftist terminology to confuse and control the populace is a bog-standard rightist strategy. It’s really that simple.
And where do you think, no access to free healthcare, no access to free education, legalized lobbying, criminalised prostitution, industrial military complex, for profit prison system, falls into that spectrum?
Correct me if I’m wrong but the democratic party is not about to change any of those.
It seems like you just made the point without getting the point.
The US Democratic party, its leadership, and the majority of its members are right wing. There is nothing to be surprised about here.
Being “less to the right” than violent, fascist Republicans doesn’t make them leftist, it just makes them “less to the right”.
Actually studying political science
Don’t assign good boy and bad boy points to things like “everyone should have access to basic necessities” and “kill everyone with more melanin than me” at all.
That’s how you end with the “Hitler was a centrist” bullshit PCM was selling.
Why don’t you join a political party and start a grassroots campaign to replace First Past the Post?
Or maybe you already belong to a party, and are just trying to create apathy to prevent people from voting Democratic to ensure Trump gets re-elected?
Or maybe I’m not American and I’m just pointing out there is no “Left” in America
Why don’t you join a political party and start a grassroots campaign to replace First Past the Post?
Careful now. That sounds a lot like encouraging people to vote 3rd party in the upcoming election.
They didn’t say anything about voting in presidential elections. They said start a campaign and advocate for the change they want see.
Lol okay buddy.
Fuckin’ wrecked nerd.
Campaign in which party smart guy?
Any party you want in local elections, jesus fucking christ, do you not know what fucking “grassroots” means? God damn.
I think Left and Right should be renaned to People Feeding and People Eating
Thats confusing because the left eats the rich.
Ew. No. I’d really rather they just be mulched.
Head removed and on a pike preferably, just to try to reduce prions in the soil and as a nice decorative piece.
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Yeah, probably just another Democrat bot posting about 🔵 🌊
“Biden is less authoritarian than Trump!” I cry as I’m dragged into the back of a police cruiser for criticizing Israeli. I’d go into further detail, but the police are currently gagging me, beating me with their batons, and harnessing me to the Palestinian Chair
democrats are not leftists, and havent really helped with healthcare in the grand scheme of things
Centrists do tend to abandon rhyme schemes when rapping.