The far right wants to eliminate the left

[Angry Floof]

The far right doesn't want to beat the left; it wants to exterminate it

In mainstream American media, the political left is frequently portrayed as a nexus of intolerance and out-of-control partisanship. Writers like Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff write entire books warning that left-wing campus protest will undermine academia's intellectual traditions of vigorous debate and fearless inquiry. The Atlantic ran a report at the beginning of March identifying Boston's liberal Suffolk County as the most intolerant county in America. Politically correct liberals, we are told, shut down campus speakers, recklessly identify their opponents as racist, and generally try to stifle debate. Their ideological inflexibility is a threat to the public sphere.

This general hand-wringing about the left tends to distract people from one of the central political phenomena of our time: a growing, rabid, conspiratorial anti-leftism on the right. That anti-leftism has been metastasizing for decades, and it has a growing body count. Yet the right's hatred of and violence against people on the left is rarely treated as a trend by the media. Enforcing "political correctness" is characterized as an obsession of the left, not the right; President Donald Trump's attacks on the media, for example, aren't generally characterized as part of a larger movement of right-wing speech policing.


This blind spot about anti-left animus isn't just a danger to the left. History shows that it's a danger to the country, and to global democracy as a whole.

Like any political designation, "the left" is a somewhat amorphous term, but broadly it refers to political movements that seek to achieve greater equality. That ideal is sometimes defined as being centrally about economic equality. But many modern left-wing movements are also focused, even primarily focused, on anti-racism, feminism, LGBTQ activism, and other efforts to defend and secure equal rights for marginalized people.

What foaming right wing Manchurian candidates don't seem to realize is that we always fight back. Violence is never Plan A for people of humane values and principles like it is for right wing authoritarians, but that doesn't mean we're incapable of fighting back. Quite the opposite. We fought back and won in WWII. We fought back and won in the U.S. Civil War. We fought back and won against numerous bloodthirsty authoritarian regimes throughout history.

Right wing fear mongering and violence will end up pushing us to the limits again this time, no doubt, but we will fight back after all our more humane (and often naive) tactics fail against a conscienceless hivemind of murderous tribalism, antagonized over decades by religious con men and political sociopaths.

More and more people who are not rabid right extremists are noticing that we are not dealing with normal humans. Eventually, right wing morons will get the attention they've been so desperately and violently seeking, to the devastation of our country and possibly the world.

 

[BH]

I am not advocating violence but if it ever should get to the point where the right wing does try to physically liquidate the left when the left kicks butt like it akways does it needs to physically liquidate the leadership of the so called right who stirred the mess up in the first place. I include ultraright business people knowingly stirring up hate and spreading untruths, tv broadcasters knowingly spreading such tripe, think tank so called scholars who helped their patrons stir up mess and so forth. I would also have no problem with so called prominent religious leaders being eliminated who went along with any coup attempt or gave sanction to civil strife to get what they want. And all should get fair trials but when punishment is handed down let it be heavy and enough to make folks like them fear.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

In mainstream American media, the political left is frequently portrayed as a nexus of intolerance and out-of-control partisanship. Writers like Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff write entire books warning that left-wing campus protest will undermine academia's intellectual traditions of vigorous debate and fearless inquiry. The Atlantic ran a report at the beginning of March identifying Boston's liberal Suffolk County as the most intolerant county in America. Politically correct liberals, we are told, shut down campus speakers, recklessly identify their opponents as racist, and generally try to stifle debate. Their ideological inflexibility is a threat to the public sphere.

Haidt isn't wrong. And he doesn't say "the left". It isn't the left that is the problem in this regard. It is a particular antiliberal offshoot of the left. Actual liberalism still exists and isn't this.

This general hand-wringing about the left tends to distract people from one of the central political phenomena of our time: a growing, rabid, conspiratorial anti-leftism on the right. That anti-leftism has been metastasizing for decades, and it has a growing body count.

It has been going on for a long long time indeed. Going back to early Rush Limbaugh gnashing of teeth about the "libruls". To be fair, that isn't all of conservatism either. It is a particularly nasty strain of it. What many don't realize, or don't want to admit, is that these two groups have a lot in common and feed directly into one another, and everyone else suffers for it. The majority of people are neither Richard Spencer nor Antifa, but it is these reasonable rational people who will be caught in the crossfire.

Enforcing "political correctness" is characterized as an obsession of the left, not the right; President Donald Trump's attacks on the media, for example, aren't generally characterized as part of a larger movement of right-wing speech policing.

This is a good point. There is plenty of PC policing on the right, and has been pretty much forever. Social conservatives are about keeping things the way they are, or the way they imagine they had been in an golden yesteryear than never actually was. They speak about family and traditional values, which is political correctness. Liberalism is supposed to be about pushing the envelop beyond this comfort zone, and thus politically incorrect.

Free speech is also clamped down on hard from the right. It was all the young liberal hippies had on their side to fight against the Vietnam War for example, as the politically correct stance at that time was pro-war and anti-communist. As the social power shifts and liberal stances become dominant and take over as being what is PC, free speech becomes more and more called for on the right.

Ultimately as the social power fluctuates back and forth and the pendulum swings, freedom of speech remains vital to all.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

The far left wing as absolutely no power in American government from the federal to the local level.

I keep finding it odd, how the true progressive seems to see them as some sort of threat when the far right has people in the White House, Senate, and a caucus in the House. Trump invited the far right wing media, people that make Limbaugh and Hannity look like people that work for the NY Post, for a conference on censorship. The far right tried to gerrymander the Census... and our true progressive warns us of a movement that has absolutely no political power.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

I keep finding it odd, how the true progressive seems to see them as some sort of threat when the far right has people in the White House, Senate, and a caucus in the House.

It isn't an either or. Both present problems and they feed off of one another. The identity politic authoritarian left may think it fights the identity politic authoritarian right, but it actually boosts it, as they share and push the same baselines. And the one existing or being worse or more of a threat or holding more political or institutional power doesn't make the other not also a problem.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

A few days ago, I caught 5 minutes of Lush Rimjob. Lush was ranting and raving, warning his drooling elderly listeners that if the Democrats won the 2020 election, American would become a communist nation. It wasn't just a one liner crack, Lush ranted at length on the theme. Health care for all? Communism! Acting on climate change? Communism! The hate for the "left" is not confined to brain damaged little websites. It is fed to America daily by Faux cable and radio. Mark Levin, another Faux moron stated that when the Trumps were reported to have cheated and lied in New York to cheat people renting their properties, and governor Cuomo stated there would be an investigation and legal action, that the only reason Cuomo would do that is "because he's a communist".

Faux is still a leading cable and radio enterprise with large numbers of faithful listeners fed this brain damaged rhetoric. I listen only to little bits of Faux, but such garbage is common enough when I do listen.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/201...ogressive-congresswomen-a-bunch-of-communists

...
Lindsey Graham on Monday offered a rabid defense of Donald Trump’s most recent racist meltdown, essentially suggesting to Fox & Friends that the president’s ongoing attacks on progressive women in Congress are justified because the women in question had it coming. “We all know that AOC and this crowd are a bunch of communists,” Graham said. “They hate Israel. They hate our own country.
...

Red baiting and character assassination is not confined to 4chan and Faux news.

 

[Angry Floof]

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/201...ogressive-congresswomen-a-bunch-of-communists

...
Lindsey Graham on Monday offered a rabid defense of Donald Trump’s most recent racist meltdown, essentially suggesting to Fox & Friends that the president’s ongoing attacks on progressive women in Congress are justified because the women in question had it coming. “We all know that AOC and this crowd are a bunch of communists,” Graham said. “They hate Israel. They hate our own country.
...

Red baiting and character assassination is not confined to 4chan and Faux news.

And "It's because she attracts the anger of males" is a very common and widespread excuse from men who can't hold other men accountable, not just confined to right wing authoritarian morons. We know that among men in general, it's rare to find a guy who won't throw women under the bus simply because it's easier and more comfortable than standing up to misogynists.

 

[Brian63]

A few days ago, I caught 5 minutes of Lush Rimjob. Lush was ranting and raving, warning his drooling elderly listeners that if the Democrats won the 2020 election, American would become a communist nation. It wasn't just a one liner crack, Lush ranted at length on the theme. Health care for all? Communism! Acting on climate change? Communism! The hate for the "left" is not confined to brain damaged little websites. It is fed to America daily by Faux cable and radio. Mark Levin, another Faux moron stated that when the Trumps were reported to have cheated and lied in New York to cheat people renting their properties, and governor Cuomo stated there would be an investigation and legal action, that the only reason Cuomo would do that is "because he's a communist".

Faux is still a leading cable and radio enterprise with large numbers of faithful listeners fed this brain damaged rhetoric. I listen only to little bits of Faux, but such garbage is common enough when I do listen.

This past weekend I caught some of a Jimmy Swaggart sermon proudly declaring how victorious they were in 2016 by defeating socialism and demons and Satan and such through their voting. The room roared in applause, more than the other parts of the sermon where he would preach about doing any kind of good works. Utterly staggering.

https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com...ngelicals-make-up-for-it-in-the-voting-booth/

 

[Trausti]

What is considered "far right"? In our current times it appears anyone to the right of Stalin is "far right" and a "Nazi." The title of the thread is a kinda funny as it's the far-left that's engaged in doxing and deplatforming people with opinions they don't like. Lower support for free speech on that side.

 

[ZiprHead]

What is considered "far right"? In our current times it appears anyone to the right of Stalin is "far right" and a "Nazi." The title of the thread is a kinda funny as it's the far-left that's engaged in doxing and deplatforming people with opinions they don't like. Lower support for free speech on that side.

To the right of Stalin??? Care to rephrase?

The right doxes just as the left does. The right also attacks and murders ethnic, sexual, and religious minorities.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

We know that among men in general, it's rare to find a guy who won't throw women under the bus simply because it's easier and more comfortable than standing up to misogynists.

The bigotry remains strong in this one.

 

[Angry Floof]

We know that among men in general, it's rare to find a guy who won't throw women under the bus simply because it's easier and more comfortable than standing up to misogynists.

The bigotry remains strong in this one.

It's ok, JP. #notallmen

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

We know that among men in general, it's rare to find a guy who won't throw women under the bus simply because it's easier and more comfortable than standing up to misogynists.

The bigotry remains strong in this one.

It's ok, JP. #notallmen

No, just "men in general".

 

[Angry Floof]

It's ok, JP. #notallmen

No, just "men in general".

Yes.

 

[Angry Floof]

Anyone else listening to the Senate Judiciary hearing of FBI Director Wray?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxKD_Z29n1w

Talking right now about the serious threat of white supremacist terrorism.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

We know that among men in general, it's rare to find a guy who won't throw women under the bus simply because it's easier and more comfortable than standing up to misogynists.

The bigotry remains strong in this one.

Does it? I was at a fast food place and a woman was in front of me. A guy walks in (older guy), and apparently knows the woman. He comes in, in front of me, and does a full-on Joe Biden. And I'm like... did he just do that? And it isn't like they were facing each other, it was a creepy sort of Joe thing.

But what is my role in this? Am I supposed to say, "Hey, you don't need to pull a Joe Biden?" I didn't say anything.

In another case, a field crew guy was a bit too needlessly friendly with a third party female contractor. I explained to him that he needed to stop it. He said he was making her day, and I told him, she didn't need him to 'make it her day'. I could have been more authoritative about it. Though I did instruct his supervisor to smack him if he continued it.

I remember another case at a technical meeting for a big project and one of the top heads for the client (older guy) made two or three disturbing gender like remarks, I can't remember what it was exactly, but it was forehead slap worthy... I know I did. You going to tell your client his language isn't appropriate?

The owner of my company has made quite a few 'saucy' statements, and generally everyone just kind of chuckles along... nervously. I never chuckled, but I didn't stand up and note his statements were out of their time.

As a male, I think there is a legitimate question of 'when do you step in', 'when is it worth it to step in'?

 

[dismal]

What foaming right wing Manchurian candidates don't seem to realize is that we always fight back.

What of there were a chemical we could put in the water that instantly made people have a decent understanding of economics, math and history.

I don't see how the far left could fight back from that.

 

[Angry Floof]

What foaming right wing Manchurian candidates don't seem to realize is that we always fight back.

What of there were a chemical we could put in the water that instantly made people have a decent understanding of economics, math and history.

I don't see how the far left could fight back from that.

How about a chemical that could enhance the sense of human empathy? Would the far right simply off themselves when they finally grasp how stunted and inhumane they are in their world view?

 

[Toni]

What foaming right wing Manchurian candidates don't seem to realize is that we always fight back.

What of there were a chemical we could put in the water that instantly made people have a decent understanding of economics, math and history.

I’m not sure you would be able to cope with how wrong you are about everything.