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The West was moving to the right — and then Donald Trump got elected again
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Something is happening among America’s allies, and it’s a tremendous relief. For some years now, we’ve seen the MAGA-infused global right gaining a foothold amongst western democracies, largely driven by the same demagogic, nationalist, pseudo-populism that has fueled Donald Trump’s dominance on the American right.
Some countries like Hungary have served as a sort of experiment for the kind of post-democratic autocracies dreamt of by the modern right wing in which government co-opts, intimidates and de-legitimizes the political opposition to create an authoritarianism that dominates the culture and the politics without a lot of overt violence.
But the rise of the far right among the Western allies seems to be stalling out.
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I sure hope this is right…
He only got reelected because Democrats seemed to care about twenty other things more than the working class. If they can’t figure that out things are only going to get worse. They’ll probably get worse no matter what, the only question is who people will blame. It should be the elite class but they’ll blame poor voters on the other team and nonvoters instead.
Great news for ‘the rest of the world’ but I’d prefer not to deal with this shit here for 4 years as well god dammit.
That demotivator about your role in life serving as a teachable moment to others bites hard
Headlines like this are for protecting the oligarchy. We all get involved until our lawmakers aren’t old rich people. We pass laws that require oversight and transparency. We protect those institutions and laws that serve democracy with our lives.
I feel it’s more like a fluke than a rule. We all just got lucky. It’s not like any of us are doing anything to prepare for that next election cycle. But I guarantee you that they are.
I seriously still see mailboxes in my neighborhood with flyers about conservative. They treated the election like they were Punk kids promoting their favorite band around town. They mobilized in ways the left only dream of and they didn’t vaporize when they lost. They will come back more determined
Salon, huffpo, msnbc ffs. These are the hopium sites favored by the beaten left, because actual corporate journalism collapsed under it’s own ignorance and greed a long time ago.
The NYT will trot out a hopium piece every once in awhile like rainbow-flagging-the-logo for Pride month, but it’s all clickbait.
Who are you going to vote for in the midterms? The left needs to get its shit together. Propaganda, corruption, and blatant lies are kicking our ass.
The problem is that we don’t have a left party; the closest are the Democrats and they’re Republicans in all but name.
I don’t buy that. I think there are a number of old corporate Dems who need to get the boot. But that’s all up to the Democratic voters to do.
It’s not that complicated in principle, it’s just that complicated once one is out in the real world.
Copium is my preferred term.
The more cynical cousin of hopium.
One can hope, but each time I get optimistic, some crazy bullshit goes down.
AFD is the biggest party in Germany. National Rally is the biggest party in France. Brothers of Italy is the ruling party in Italy. Reform UK has won a lot of local elections this year.
And as far as I know, the pro-Russian far-right party just won the presidential election in Romania by a large margin.
Support for right-wing parties is larger among young people than among older generations.
I don’t think Trump has postponed Europe’s path toward authoritarian antiglobalism in a meaningful way. I am frustrated about the present situation, and pessimistic about the future.
I’m not even sure what words to use to describe how I feel about those numbers here in Germany. The only way I can see to get out of this is if Trump and his government quickly(!!) “destroy” the US in a major and visible way.
The still ongoing tariff nonsense is one way, but it is not severe enough and Europeans aren’t connecting the dots between one incompetent populist (Trump) and the populists they have at home.
I’ve been hearing about (soon-to-be, if Trump doesn’t back down) empty ports, which may lead to empty shelves in supermarkets. If this becomes big enough that social media is full of people showing empty local supermarkets and the regular media has no choice in turning this into a big story, we might have a chance.
Not that I have any real hope this is would actually change anything …
They will certainly grow if (US) social media keeps dominating voters’ lives. For all the other factors and opposition screw ups, that’s the engine driving their rise.
But yeah, IDK what Salon is on about.
I honestly don’t see a way out of this other than a war against the fascists. Something like the American civil war where the racists got their asses thoroughly beaten, or WWII, where the Nazis got absolutely crushed. I feel like it’s just one of those things that pops up once in a while. Basically, fascists are the herpes of society.
This American situation is partly the long tail of the failure of reconstruction; Confederates got their asses handed to them but they were never properly removed from power. Now the racists are once again in charge, their monuments still stand, their flag is still flown, and the southern strategy is central to their political power.
Compare this to Germany, who stripped Nazis from power, outlawed their symbols, and have guard rails to prevent fascist movements from rising again. (They are now being used against AfD.)
Compare this to Germany, who stripped Nazis from power, outlawed their symbols, and have guard rails to prevent fascist movements from rising again. (They are now being used against AfD.)
Don’t know where you’re getting that from.
Most Nazis were never actually stripped from positions of power after the war (teachers, public services, our secret services, political parties, I could go on). Outlawing their symbols did fuck all obviously and isn’t even enforced as long as you don’t go around outright spraying swastikas on walls in broad daylight (or are an antifascist displaying one thrown into a bin, crossed out or otherwise clearly used with an opposing intention). The people in power are unwilling to use the guardrails and systems that we have to prevent Nazis from rising to power again. Meanwhile we have an extremism problem in our police force who won’t protect anybody from the mob when the time comes, and a “conservative” party that’s just always lagging 5 years behind the AfD in their policies, racing ever further to the right in their wind shadow.
We’re fucked.
Exactly this. The Confederates should never have been allowed to rejoin society.
removed by mod
That combined with the fact that the US in many ways is a confederation jury rigged into a federation doesn’t help. Even if we killed every white person in the South after the civil war I suspect we would still be dealing with the same basil issues just with a different coat of paint. Most of the issues are caused by regional issues, proto-nationalism, and a failing Imperial identity.
While it’s true that tribalism is essentially a human, if not evolutionary trait, we could have made it damn near harder for fascists from gaining power. To start, stripping them from any political office (local or federal) and then banning them or any soldier that fought for the Confederacy.
States that seceded basically should have been converted to non-voting territories unless they agreed whole cloth to codify abolition into the Constitution, reparations to the North and to their slaves.
You have to wonder what infects the minds of people such that they fall for this in other countries.
I have a good idea what does it here.
To put it simply, the prosperity of Europeans and their descendants was paid for through the bloodshed of colonial exploitation. This created an inherently inequal world order.
The world has become more equal post WW2 and the descendants of the greatest beneficiaries of that exploitation are now displeased that they don’t hold the same advantages their ancestors did. That’s why we have to go back. That’s why we have to make _____ great again.
Most PoC can hear these dogwhistles (if you can even call them that) from a mile away.
We might actually get world peace, as for peace in America?…
in the future the trope is going to be “I’m going back in time to k— Tr–p” and everyone has to stop them because it would mean the great global awakening would never happen
Something, something, Dune.
I think that - on a global scale - a fair amount of people has cause to be grateful to Trump. Whether it’s intended or not, he’s tearing down the current geopolitical statu quo and waking up people politically.
On the flipside, I do worry that we narrowly avoided the fire in order to stay in the pan, to subvert the old saying. Over in Canada, we reelected a party that has a lot of flaws, and that their defining benefit is “isn’t the conservative right”. I’m glad we avoided a conservative sweep, but let’s not pretend the shady opposition is significantly better.
*Looks at my fellow Brits*
You’re welcome rest of the world. Now be nice to those of us who have to suffer another 4 years.
Be nice to the people threatening to annex and bomb an ally… ? you be nice first.
As long as you voted against him, yes.
If someone said “oh they’re both the same” or “Kamala didn’t make her position clear enough on ______” or any of the other excuses, they need to bear the full brunt of their (in)decision.
I’ve zero sympathy for those fools.
both parties are the same in many ways doesn’t mean I voted for trump I voted Harris. I knew Trump’s hate was worse than the Dems obliviousness
full brunt of their
(in)decisionstupidity.Fixed it. :3
Very right wing of you to have no sympathy for people born less intelligent than you. Fools should not be blamed. A system that allows fools to be swayed and to be the deciding factor is where the blame should go.
The incels had a choice to listen to reason. They went out of their way to bully. Many ppl vulnerable got affected by this unfairly.
That’s not a stupidity that needs an advocate.
I don’t know. Unintelligent or even uneducated is easy to label the Maga crowd, and certainly many of them deserve that. But not all of them. I know a few who are well educated but just seem racist or 'i got mine" types.
Yes there are woefully evil regardless of education. Even if you tried to nurture them with better ideas they’d reject it.
Incels come to mind.
That’s really the crux. There are two trump voters: There are 1) the easily swayed, misled, gullible, uninformed, and other adjectives that imply they are just not fully aware of what is going on; and then 2) the evil assholes who know fully that they are breaking things because they stand to profit from the breakage.
Class 1 deserves our compassion, and should be helped to understand why their choices hurt themselves and society.
Class 2 needs to be evicted from this reality.
Fools should not be blamed. A system that allows fools to be swayed […bad grammar…] is where the blame should go.
While the system bears its share of blame, it is the unquestioning enablers, those who readily consume its dictates, who breathe life into its flaws. Just as tolerance cannot survive by tolerating intolerance, wisdom cannot flourish when we indulge foolishness. To dismantle a flawed system, we must first challenge those who sustain it.
I agree that “wisdom cannot flourish when we indulge foolishness.” So we need to change the system so that it does not indulge foolishness.
Even the dumbest person knows how to be kind to others. You don’t have to be smart to not want to wish ill upon others.
People vote for Trump purely because they want others to suffer more than they do. If you vote for someone who wants to deport “brown people” then you know fully he won’t be kind to them. If you vote for someone who wants to punish others for doing trade then you know fully well people will suffer. If you think being gay, trans or whatever is a disease and people should be punished for it then there is something very wrong with you.
I indeed have no sympathy for people who voted for Trump. If you voted for him you’re an asshole and just want people to suffer.
The trump voters I know of aren’t really people who want others to suffer. I am sure there are plenty who do of course. But ask why. The answer is that they have been fooled into thinking other people are effectively attacking thier way of life. Or that the people suffering are murderers and rapists. They simply don’t have the mental abilities to realize they have been fooled.
Blaming the system is a cop out. It didn’t happen before, because the electorate held their representatives to some kind of standard. Now, your representatives tell you what to think and y’all just nod your heads like lambs to the slaughter
Social media really changed the playing field. It is much easier to inundate people with messaging and such that will fool a much greater part of the population. Yet the system hasn’t adjusted.
