I looked at a list of the people who took over immediately after the French revolution, and it looks very much like a bunch of aristocrats used a mob to take over.
It certainly wasn't handed over to the likes of you and me.
You can see this being emulated right now by people like Trump. "The people won't stand for it", "there'll be civil war", etc. If Jan 6th was more than a rabble of trailer trash dumbfucks, they might even have been talking about it the same way by now...
it looks very much like a bunch of aristocrats used a mob to take over.
Not unusual for educated professionals to form the intellectual and financial backbone of a revolution, because... they are the ones with money and education.
But there was an enormous gulf between the mid level bureaucrats of the French Revolution and the senior aristocrats they deposed. That is, in large part, because the French aristocracy was married into all the other European royal families, while the insurrectionists were not.
If some junior office workers at Exxon executed the board and the C-level staff with the help of the blue collar roughnecks, that would be an enormous change in the governance of the company. Imagine how Wall Street would respond. Not unlike how France's neighbors responded to their revolution, I'm sure.
Oh they'd respond exactly the same.
it looks very much like a bunch of aristocrats used a mob to take over.
Mostly bourgeois actually, aristocrats were very much profiting of the system. Bourgeois are the ones who had enough money to get education and rethink the political system to end the aristocrats' birth privileges. How would an illiterate peasant be able to rethink the political system beyond tax reduction?
One of the most salient things I think I hace ever learned is that the US revolution against British rule was instigated by less than 1000 people of a population of over 2.5 million people, and it didn't have the support of more than 45% of the population at any point in the war. (https://www.nps.gov/teachers/classrooms/loyalists-in-american-revolution.htm)
Most people did not want the inconvenience then and proportionally 0 of them had any say in it starting.
And this is why we will not beat climate change. That would mean giving up a LOT. People don't want it, so politicians won't campaign on it and thus we are doomed.
This is a fundamental belief of most conservatives I know. "If I don't do it, everyone else will and I'll be the loser who didn't."
I’m willing, now let’s do it.
Yeah. Once a couple people raise their hands, more will follow.
From what I've learned revolutions are often accompanied by circumstances where people are desperate due to lack of basic necessities, especially food.
The French revolution was preceded by a serious food shortage. Remember that "let them eat cake" comment? One of the key events, the Women's March which displaced the king and queen from Versailles, was specifically motivated by demands for food.
The European People's Spring saw lots of revolutions across Europe in 1848-1849 including in France, Italy, Bavaria, Austria, Hungary. That was about the same time as a continent-wide grain shortage on top of an economic crisis.
The Russian revolution of 1917 came at a time when a combination of WW1, bad leadership, and an extra cold winter led to food shortages, and fuel shortages so people were starving and freezing at the same time.
For the Russian revolution you've also got that whole World War 1 thing where the rulers were expecting the freezing starving people to repeatedly bayonet charge machine gun positions with zeal and elan for years on end.
I think there was crazy inflation in some countries during the Arab Spring, too. Which also makes it hard to get food.
If you wish to eat the rich, you must be willing to risk dying to do so. Until then, you are just whinging and the rich know it.
Most people I know are doing something to help. Maybe not radically changing their lives but they seem to be doing their best.
I don't see these people that are not willing to change anything. Maybe I'm not in the right country?
What country do you live in?
Most North Americans are too obsessed with cars to consider a world where they don't drive everywhere.
Maybe that's it. I live in the Netherlands where people mostly cycle and use public transport. Sure we have cars too but you can live your life without needing to own one here.
Also lots of people are installing solar panels due to government incentives and a similar incentive has people switch to electric cars.
The company I rent my house from has installed solar panels, thicker windows and wall insulation to get my home to an A energy label. And I am using LED light around the house, put on a sweater instead of turning on the heat, am using a newer computer that uses a lot less power, and I try to conserve water by showering shorter and not doing a full flush of the toilet if it isn't needed. Oh and I've removed some tiles from my garden zo that there is more ground available to take up the rainwater. And I've installed a rainwater barrel so I can collect water to use in the garden. I'm trying to move to cooking on electric but my homes electrical wiring is not quite up to that yet.
[edit] Oh and drinking tea all day from a thermos so I don't have to keep boiling water all the time.
On The Nature Of Mass Movementa, by (I think) Eric Hoffer. One of the things he claims is that mass movements are generally made up of the dispossessed and dissatisfied who want better conditions but are not quite suffering enough that their entire focus is on acquiring food. People have to feel as if they could improve their circumstances by revolting, but not be actively starving.
The problem is: what does it mean to do that? Right now, we don't have an organized revolution or movement. There needs to be a specific call to action. If you want people to "give up the comforts" of their lives, they need to know what doing that will accomplish, what the specific goal of the movement is, and how "giving up the comforts" will help to achieve it.
What you might actually be asking is for people to risk their jobs by going on general strike, their homes by not paying rent, etc. This is really more than "the comforts of their lives", it is their ability to survive and feed their families.
The other problem is, any cause that only requires people to "give up the comforts of their lives" likely won't be highly impactful. For instance, general strike and protest might help the climate crisis, but giving up plastic straws and driving less or whatever really won't make much of a dent compared to the massive impacts of global capitalism.
Driving less would make a huge impact, around 45% of all transport related emissions are from passenger traffic, that's buses, taxis, and most of all regular people driving their cars. Transport related emissions accounts for 24% of global emissions, so just passenger traffic is almost 11% of global emissions. Everyone hates aviation, but that's "only" around 3% of global emissions, shipping also around 3%, and road freight is 7%.
Source: https://ourworldindata.org/co2-emissions-from-transport
That is a fair point. My only counterargument would be that due to the way cities are set up, a large portion of those emissions come from commuting. The reason people commute is they have to earn money to pay bills so they can feed their kids and keep a roof over their heads.
So, asking people to drive less could mean asking them to give up their employment, which could be much more than "giving up the comforts of their lives" like the OP suggested - again, it could really put their livelihoods in jeopardy. And, without an organized cause, clear goal, a call to action, and clear communication about why their specific sacrifices are necessary, people will not take such huge risks.
We don't need to give up comforts, we need governments to stop multi-billionairs from hording wealth and driving the economy stale
We do need to give up comforts in that we'll face jail time, we'll lose our current housing, we'll have to greatly decrease our standard of living, etc... if we're to truly bring the revolution the comic is alluding to it's going to hurt a lot.
As another comment put it "we're just whinging" and those in power know it.
I don't like it any more than the next good person, but all throughout history the only thing that brings true change is bloodshed. "We" as workers/non-owners have literally never in history had necessary changes happen that take money/power from the owning class without bloodshed.
THEY make it so. When you remove the power from the ballot box the ammo box is the only place left to go.
Noted, staying away from the usa
They had a wealthy enclave of British aristocracy who realized they had enough money to militarily fight the British on land, and eventually the crown would get tired of bleeding, and cut and run. Then they would be the only and direct masters of the colonies.
“Two things only the people anxiously desire — bread and circuses.”
Wow. It's not like the state is quite good at repression. /s
Posting this on International Day of Solidarity with Long Term Anarchist Prisoners is quite tonedeaf, too.
Don't you feel it's a bit counterintuitive to call someone tonedeaf for being unaware of "International Day of Solidarity with Long Term Anarchist Prisoners", something that more than 99.9999% of people are likely unaware of?
Wouldn't you be better off, say, helping build awareness of such a day instead of simply berating someone for not knowing about it? At the moment, you're teaching people to treat it like a joke.
Right... like you didn't grow up watching the International Day of Solidarity with Long Term Anarchist Prisoners special every year with the rest of us
something that more than 99.9999% of people are likely unaware of?
Western liberals aren't aware of it because they've segregated themselves off from the folks in their community most subject to political prisoners.
But then lots of Western Liberals clap and cheer when an anarchist group gets raided by the police and dragged off to prison.
You must be one of a few hundred people on the planet who know about it so I don't know why you're expecting people to care and not post memes that might be related to it.
Still a stupid meme. People are fighting for a better tomorrow. It's just that the state also cracks down on revolutionary movements (remember Tortuguita and the Stop Cop City protests? Or Lützerath? The fucking Black Panthers?)
Also, activism burnout is also a thing, framing it like people are just too complacent is simply disrespectful. Basically a leftist version of the "still you partake in society" meme.
It also reeks of the defeatist mentality/capitalist propaganda that lefties are fighting for a miserable future. Simply a stupid meme all around and to top it all off on an unfitting date.
There is no way that’s actually a thing
Yeah, I made that one up 🙄 /s
They were just drunk with promises from Washington to be able to get more booze.
You sonofabitch I want a revolution to IMPROVE my situation, not to make it worse
raises hand
The government in 1700 didn't have as strong of a grasp on the military as it does now. And the police kind of didn't exist in this time. The biggest inventions of the 20th century are mass surveillance, repression, and propaganda. An armed force being able to go from one side of the country to the other in a few hours is also a strength for government stability.
"Are you, Mr. Speaker Guy?"
*1950s
