#american leftists

[5soswfttwtaf]

being a ukrainian online be like

"listen to victims! fuck the oppressors!"

"oh hey im a victim of genocide by russians, can you please-"

"no you're not lmao and you actually deserve it and america is also bad we're the actual victims you just like attention"

[prof-grace-aspen]

Antizionism isn't inherently antisemitic, but it is an easy excuse to be antisemitic that many leftists are more than happy to take.

[northstareclipse]

There’s a new moral aesthetic taking hold in certain corners of American leftism. A kind of neighborly collectivism that wants to save the world through potlucks, block parties, and community gardens. The vibe is part labor union, part farmers’ market, part Nextdoor thread gone rogue.

On the surface, it sounds wholesome. “Talk to your neighbors!” “Go to the meeting even if you don’t feel like it!” “Community is the antidote to capitalism!”

But, let’s be honest: this isn’t a solution that will work for everyone. It’s a rebrand of conformity culture. When you peel back the veneer, what you often find isn’t true, unconditional solidarity. It’s enforced sociability. It’s the same old Protestant work ethic with a pep-rally mask. In this framework, you’re not valuable because your needs are met or because your community sustains you. You’re valuable because your body is in the room, smiling, talking, eating, proving that you're just like everyone else there, that you're blooming where you're planted even if the soil doesn't contain the particular nutrients you need. What’s being sold as solidarity often feels like a demand for emotional uniformity, where “good politics” means showing up, smiling, small-talking, and signaling that you belong in the right moral aesthetic.

This isn’t the collectivism of shared infrastructure or mutual survival. It’s the collectivism of mutual surveillance.

This is what happens when a hyperindividualistic yet HOA-poisoned culture tries to adopt collectivist values without first unlearning its obsession with performance and social legibility. Americans at large don't really know how to value the invisible labors of coexistence; the quiet acts of maintenance or the small, nonverbal ways people care for each other, so it tries to collectivize by demanding proof of enthusiasm. “Community” becomes another spectacle. Everyone has to be seen being communal.

For neurodivergent, disabled, or simply introspective people, this version of collectivism feels like a trap. It replicates the same exclusionary dynamics as corporate “team culture” and suburban “neighborliness” where conformity is compulsory and difference is subtly punished. The society that once branded certain kids “too weird” for being solitary or intense would then just end up requiring a doctor to sign off on their decision not to attend the block party.

This isn’t a collectivism I would ever consider worth working toward. It’s just affective conformity - a system where shared feeling replaces shared material support. It produces social pressure, not solidarity. It turns radicalism into a beige wasteland where everyone dresses the same, eats the same food, and talks about the same three socially safe topics.

The collectivism I'd want would never moralize solitude or burnout. It wouldn’t shame you for declining an invitation. It would build systems that work whether or not you’re feeling energized that day. It would not need to micromanage anyone’s emotional display. It would not demand that every person be outgoing, agreeable, or “community-minded” in the performative sense. It’d be built on infrastructure, not attendance; public spaces where you can participate without pretense and systems that guarantee survival without moral tests. The collectivism I think would be worth fighting for is one where you could go to a clinic without needing either money or charisma to get care. Where community meals would be varied for both senses and health, and would include to-go containers for those who are anxious or sensory-overloaded or just tired. Where the culture would understand that humans are diverse, cyclical, and not all wired for constant interaction.

You shouldn’t have to be the perfect neighbor to deserve security, dignity, or belonging. You shouldn’t have to flatten your edges to fit into a moralized version of friendliness. If collectivism means being absorbed into a sea of exurban beige, I’ll pass. But if it means building a world sturdy enough to include every kind of person, including the quiet, the analytical, the disabled, the different, then I’m all in.

Let’s stop confusing sameness with solidarity. The future worth fighting for isn’t mandatory enthusiasm; it’s mutual protection. It’s freedom with a safety net, not a singalong.

A genuinely liberatory collectivism would look like this:

- Universal healthcare that treats care as a right, not a reward for participation.

- Public libraries, transit, and green spaces where solitude and connection can coexist.

- Social movements that value asynchronous involvement like writing, donating, listening, and organizing logistics.

- Boundaries and personal preferences treated with respect, not as defects to be coached away.

If you want a litmus test, use this:

Could a disabled, overwhelmed, demand-sensitive person thrive here? If yes, you're probably building something worthwhile. If not, I don't think I want in.

[imyourbadjew]

I try to refrain from commenting on us politics because I don’t know that much about it, but what struck me the most about the whole platner affair wasn’t the naff tattoo or the old Reddit comments, it’s the blatant amateurism. Leftists once again proving themselves to be deeply unserious people unfit for governance.

[guavagyal]

American leftists look forward to a revolution starting someday the same way right-wingers & Evangelicals pray for the rapture to happen any day.

[alexa-santi-author]

I just had an American leftist tell me Hillary Clinton lost in 2016 because she didn’t answer questions about Benghazi and I just … I can’t. We’re fucked. People who claim to be on the left are straight-up regurgitating right-wing propaganda without a second thought and … I can’t.

[chaos-ocd]

I don’t think I have anarchist friends on here yet but hope to. I’m lonely chronically online and need to vent.

I’m a pacifist and rarely have violent thoughts, but this news story gives me rage.

When we talk about non-violence and weather or not that encompasses destruction of property, I can’t help feeling the call that facilities like this should not exist and should not be allowed to be built.

When a fake government takes over democracy and tries to turn it into fascism, we are reminded no “due process” or laws matter to them. Do we just sit on our hands?

My desire to see this facility blown up or otherwise sabotaged and flooded before it can ever function is a peaceful one. These people are sick and are the only ones it should house if it’s allowed to be built. May you be wrapped in your own hell for being such hateful fools.

I’m not interested in people arguing the “proper way to do a revolution” or what works and what doesn’t in here. I’m just expressing that property shouldn’t exist at this scale, and destruction of property being used for Holocaust-inspired purposes is likely the moral thing to do.

Praying for us.

Also if you’re pissed about this too let’s be friends :)

[vettir]

Dear American Leftists

Fuck off with your 'don't vote, we should have a revolution instead'. WHEN. You fuckers won't even riot over our needs not being met, when the fuck are you going to have an armed revolution? Meal Team Six is more likely to try that shit, even if they fail. You know how I know this? They tried on January 6th, 2020. None of you did for ANY of the shit in my fucking lifetime. You are just LARPers. You know what they do in France? When things are bad? They riot. They set up fucking guillotines outside the Bastille. I know you know these things because you share memes. But you don't do the same shit. You'd rather just sit there and smarm at people on the internet. You know what else they do? The fucking VOTE. When Le Pen's party did well in the first set of votes, there was another set, and now Le Pen's party has come in 3rd. Until you can be like the French (and that's all of France, not just their left), you don't get to say shit about 'don't vote, have a revolution', because you won't do fucking either.