Political Side Blog

Blog for all my extra ranty bits of politics. Leftist, Queer, Nonbinary (they/them). 23. Anyone trying to pick a fight rather than a conversation will be blocked. I can respond to reblogs from this account, but won't reply in notes because I don't want to use my main blog for that.

[isomerize]

That article really was disgusting in its absolute disregard for human life like when he said that about how he saw where the chat said they were going to strike and instead of idk warning any people who lived there or doing anything to prevent it he used it to "confirm that the chat was real" or some bullshit by going to social media and seeing people's scared tweets as they were being bombed. Useless and voyeuristic scum. Do you understand that when the us drops bombs, people die? Real people?

[madmonksandmaenads]

They collapsed the target's girlfriend's apartment building! That is not a military target, that is a place where people live. All this preamble about protecting the lives of US troops and not even a mention of the idea that the reporter might have some obligation TO PROTECT CIVILIAN LIVES FROM AN ATTACK HE KNEW WAS TARGETING A RESIDENTIAL BUILDING!

[commievoltie-deactivated2021070]

[rev-olution]

California minimum wage ($12.00/hr), without accounting for taxes, equals about $24,960 per year assuming a 40 hour work week.

I live in California. Last year I made almost double the California minimum wage before taxes. I could not afford a one (ONE) bedroom apartment by myself. I couldn't even find a studio apartment that I could afford anywhere near where I work. And trust me, I'm not afraid of a long commute, but I still couldn't find anything within a reasonable distance.

I don't spend a lot outside of bills and groceries. I help my family out when I can. Occasionally I'll buy myself some new clothes or some workout gear. My car isn't anything exciting so my loan payments and insurance bills aren't too high. Most stuff I have that's more expensive I ask for as a group present from family or friends for my birthday or a holiday, I rarely splurge on myself. I try to save as much as I am able to (unfortunately nearly all of my savings got eaten up by necessary car repairs) when I get a little extra from tax returns or something. I even invest when I have a couple extra bucks.

So if I, who earns about double minimum wage and tries to be responsible with money and follow all the little asinine rules society says should let me be financially secure, can't afford a STUDIO APARTMENT by myself in the area where I work (or any areas near it), how the hell do we expect people to survive on half of that?

"Minimum isn't meant to be survived on-" yes the fuck it is! It was literally created to uphold a minimum standard of living to protect employees!

"People should go to college and get a real job-" college is expensive as shit! Even public college! And it takes tons of time and energy that people who are already probably working more than 40 hours per week to afford their bills don't have! Also the concept of a "real" job is fucking stupid- all labor has real value in one way or another. If everyone stopped working at fast-food places and got so-called "real" jobs, you'd probably flip out because you couldn't get a McFlurry or something!

"If they work hard they can get promoted-" That's bullshit and you know it! Promotions are very rare and often given out arbitrarily (or based on favoritism) rather than actual skills and work ethic! Working harder than everyone else often just leads to the company expecting more from you for the same pay! Or sometimes (I've literally had this happen to me) the company will give you a 0.25¢ raise and then never consider you for a raise again because "oh we gave you one already, how greedy are you?".

Minimum wage should be enough to, at the very least, comfortably afford a place near where you work. People deserve to live happily and comfortably and well not based on what job they have, but for the sheer fact of being born.

Also, I recognize that raising the minimum wage that much will unfortunately cause challenges for disabled people who are both working and receiving SSDI, and we MUST work to change those laws as well at the same time so that disabled people are able to benefit from a raised minimum wage rather than be hurt by it. One day I hope my mother who is disabled can receive the SSDI she deserves and also work just one job she loves (she hates being at home with nothing to do and was desperate to get back to work even when unemployment was paying her more in 2020) rather than two that cause her immense physical pain because SSDI/minimum wage are not enough to pay her bills!!!

[bogleech]

Alright, so, you all just spent four years witnessing how insufferable, pathetic, embarrassing and destructive it is for people to worship a president like a god-king and furiously defend their every last bowel movement as if every last criticism of the dude they voted for is a direct assault on everything they believe in. And there were absolutely people who did that under Obama-Biden. Many of his right-wing haters almost never complained about anything real, but many of his left-wing supporters denied reality in their own way when they just kind of ignored things like the drone strikes and deportations he signed off on. Please please continue to hold all presidents to the same standard you held Trump. These are people who can cause millions of deaths with a pen stroke and never answer for even one of them. They don’t actually understand or relate to you. They’re not your friends. They don’t form a “team” with you. Getting angry at them doesn’t put you on the “other side.” They don’t need you to defend them on twitter and they sure as hell aren’t the physical avatar of your moral compass. If you voted for Biden because he was better than Trump, good, I guess, that’s pretty much the only reasonable choice anybody was given, but please treat him like he’s just another pampered, power hungry rich boy who begged and pleaded with you on his hands and knees for this job, because he is.

[fandomsandfeminism]

This. Do not become a “Biden fan.” Criticizing the administration when they do fucked up, imperialist, neo-lib capitalist nonsense is IMPORTANT.

Just because you are criticizing the administration DOESNT mean you are “siding with the Republicans.” The Republicans will scream and wail about every damn thing Biden does, and 99.9999% of what they say will be stupid nonsense.

That doesn’t mean Biden will always be right. It just means he will sometimes he wrong, but for different reasons than whatever Mitch McConnell says.

[rev-olution]

It's definitely been said before, and probably said better than I will here, but I feel like one of the most damaging traits of modern activism that I've seen is the push for ideological purity.

No, I don't mean "cancel culture" (read: consequences of personal actions/decisions) causing bigots to lose their jobs. I also don't mean people (rightfully) refusing to listen to or associate with fascists.

I mean people tearing into others for past beliefs that they have apologized for and definitely no longer hold. I mean people being mocked and ridiculed for saying something when they didn't know any better. I mean people being attacked for making honest mistakes because they're still learning- and we are all still learning, always.

I get it. Terrible beliefs can have terrible consequences, and it's good to want to hold people accountable so they don't hurt others. It's also so easy to feel jaded and spiteful when nothing ever really seems to change, and to use that anger as both a shield and spear.

But no one is perfect, especially in a society where terrible beliefs are shoved down our throats from day one. Every single one of us, from the most privileged to the most marginalized, has been exposed to those beliefs and has the potential to act on them- consciously or subconsciously. If we were to try to round up everyone who had never ever been anything but the "perfect leftist", never had a single accidentally biased thought or said something offhand that hurt someone else, do you think we'd find even one?

I'm not asking you to forgive and forget. I'm not asking you to suddenly like people who are better now than they were before. I'm not even asking you to just play nice.

By all means, criticize. Call out hurtful beliefs. Challenge misinformation. Demand consequences when someone's actions deserve them.

At the same time, allow for growth. Every mistake someone has made is another chance for them to have learned something. If someone is willing to learn, you do not have to teach them, but you should let them learn. And don't pretend like people stay the same forever - who someone was two years ago might be a completely different person than who they are now.

Again, to reiterate, I am not saying to forgive and forget people's past wrongdoings, nor am I saying that someone who has done terrible things should be welcomed with open arms. And I am not saying we need to let bad things slide just because someone is trying to do better. If Trump suddenly began studying socialism tomorrow and wanted to become a leftist, I'd still tell him to get fucked any chance I got.

What I am saying is, there is no such thing as ideological purity. There is no "perfect leftist", no one is born the world's greatest activist. Everyone starts somewhere different, and our progress is never linear. We need to recognize the difference between someone who has honestly stumbled in their journey versus someone who has done irreparable harm with their actions, and react accordingly.

[rev-olution]

If you'd have told me 4 years ago that electing Trump would lead to an uncontrolled pandemic killing thousands in the US alone, a rise in open White Supremacy, millions of people being unemployed, the US teetering on the edge of WWIII because of stupid military decisions, and terrorists storming the US Capitol to prevent the certification of a fair election...

I would've said "yeah no fucking duh".

This is not a surprise. We've been saying things like this would happen the entire time, and so many centrists told us we were being paranoid. So many conservatives said that would never happen. So many liberals said it was "just four years".

Elect a clown, expect a circus.

Elect a greedy, White Supremacist, fascistic douchebag, expect your country to fall apart under his need for power.

I'm glad people are learning and growing and seeing the error of their ways, and I know the US is a breeding ground for right-wing extremist brainwashing, but sometimes it just hurts to see people so surprised by things we predicted years ago. But nobody listened to us and here we are.

I hope this doesn't escalate. I hope Trump gets impeached, goes to jail, and then turns on all his coconspirators in the hopes of a lighter sentence so we can weed out at least a few of the nastiest politicians. And then I hope Trump and all his cronies rot in jail long enough that we have time to fix the damage and build more effective systems of prevention.

But this country almost never fails to disappoint, so I guess we'll see.

(Edit: Forgot to add, posted 6 January 2021 at approx 7pm Central Time)

[rev-olution]

I know this has been said a lot this morning, but if the people attacking the Capitol building were anything besides Trump Supporters, do you honestly believe they would've even made it a single step into the building?

Where is the excessive tear gas and rubber rounds used against BLM supporters this summer? The sonic weapons? The flash bangs? The batons being used to break bones? They've even refused to deploy the national guard to an attack on a government building when before they were more than happy to do so.

I'm not asking for this to turn into a firefight. One person has been shot already, and that's bad enough. I'm asking why there's such a gap in the treatment of these terrorists demanding to overturn an election versus the people protesting murders. I'm asking why the man who encouraged his supporters to "fight back" can now refuse to deploy troops deemed necessary to prevent more violence, and not face any repercussions?

I'm asking for this country to- for once- act like the paragon of democracy, progress, and anti-facism it pretends to be.

Get Trump out. Get Pence out. Get anyone who kowtowed and helped them try to subvert the election out. Get anyone who encouraged this violence out. There are plenty of laws in place for just that- now do something with them. Don't just say pretty things and pretend to take action when you know nothing will really happen.

Trump and his supporters are not the root cause of this country's problems, but there's absolutely no denying that they are exacerbating them to an even more dangerous degree. Use the very laws they claim to be protecting to set an example- and maybe at that point we'll actually be able to put time and effort into fixing everything else wrong here.

(posted 6 January 2021 at 3:50 Central Time)