Pick a side
Pick a side
117 comments
-
-
Opposing fascism isn’t far left. That’s just being a decent person.
-
This meme is made by a leftist, and that community does have an issue with the same "if you don't explicitly agree with everything we say, you are other and therefore evil" attitude that the MAGA crowd has.
-
Thank God a brave centrist was willing to come here to criticize the left and defend the right to protect us from evil socialist extremism.
Please, oh holy enlightened central one, tell us the errors of our thinking. Is it our sins of universal healthcare, anti-genocide, and equal rights for all?
Please, oh please, do sermon us on the benefits of the right like unregulated capitalism, environmental destruction, and thought policing
-
Leftists barely agree with each other, let alone anybody elsewhere on the political spectrum. You aren't entirely wrong, though - there is a tendency to say that anything good is leftist and anything bad is right-wing, but right-wingers also do the same (see how anything they don't like is either woke or communist, or both)
-
if you don’t explicitly agree with everything we say, you are other and therefore evil
"Vote Blue No Matter Who"
(Except Mamdani)
-
bOtH sIdEs
-
-
Opposing fascism is illegal, and centrists have a fetish for Law And Order. That shoves a lot of people leftward by default.
-
-
i think the "current far left" supports authoritarianism, so not the opposite, just different flavor of the same side.
-
That's because the political compass is two-dimensional, but everyone insists on thinking of it as a one-dimensional thing.
You've got left wing and then you've got right wing, and then in the vertical direction you've got authoritarianism and libertarianism. When people say far right and far left what they really mean is that the extreme edges horizontally and right at the top vertically. Think Castro, and not Gandhi. Both were left wing but are nowhere near each other in political phasespace
-
Even the 2 dimensional compass is a simplification, though orders of magnitude better than the binary "left or right" simplification, and also better than the 2 dimensional gradient as well.
-
-
-
Well, if youre a "centrist" like me, then you used that designation to try to get out of talking about politics with ass holes on both sides. And also i hate getting "prejudged" -everyone does- because i might like or dislike a certain politician. I am a centrist, truly, but I dont need to prove that to any of you. And this is what I mean when I say "both sides are the same" I mean you assholes harras, insult, degrade, tease, berate, and nearly threaten about how your side is "the good side" and the "otherside" equals the destruction of America. Yeah, well, both sides do that annoying shit. You want to tell me "there's no such thing as a centrist anymore" and that i am actually on the _________ side. Well f you, you dont get to tell me what side im on.
Maybe you just feel that since im not with you, that I must be against you? If that overly simple reasoning is where you are at, I dont think we should be friends anyway.
I dont want to be identified as red or blue, dem or repub. Honestly, im pretty conflict avoidant in general, and politics gets to be such nasty topic and can ruin family and friends. I see it happen more in the past few years than ever. Its really sad! And you know it too!
Can everyone please just put a sock in it for at least the rest of December? Can we all look for common ground and the things that we can share? Dont look at family through red or blue tinted glasses, but through the lens of love. Let's put our pride aside for a while and produce good times and love this holiday season.
Done :).
-
From a Canadian instance, really? This shit is so frustrating to see. The whole two party nonsense that this bullshit pushes is exactly why the usa is in the mess they are in now.
No, people don't have to "pick a side" the ones who think in terms of teams are our enemy.
-
The problem is not there are two sides. The problem is that there is only one side with 2 parties with the rest left unrepresented.
-
The reason it is like that is that over many years the us system pushed the teamification of politics and enshrined only two parties in law. This was inevitable with only two parties, and should be a lesson to all other nations on the dangers of two party systems. The "us vs them" tricks of control are very easy when there is only two parties. It is poison to any democracy as no one is represented by ether "side" but everyone is sorted into a side and convinced the only way to fix anything is by having your side win (but of course there is no insensitive for ether party to actually fix anything, often the opposite).
The us has been trained (and sadly a lot of the world) that coalition rule is bad, even when its the only real way to have any sort of representation or guard rails in government. And you are right no one is represented now due to years and years of only two options that both know they are built into the systems of government so deep that their removal would require a new nation. After all this time there is no longer meaningful representation, but there is convenient scapegoats and excuses in pointing at the other side, so people in the us still think they live in a democratic system.
-
-
-
Centrists are actually with maga, they just don't wear the hat. See Fetterman, Schumer, Jeffries, etc
-
I'll summarize something I said before:
Democrats will hurt you for money, but Republicans will pay for the privilege. Both parties subservient to capital but there are still meaningful distinctions. Change must come from the bottom.
-
Counterargument: Centrists are actually a diverse group with many very different positions, that just have in common the fact they don't agree with either of the currently dominant political factions.
Aggressive reposte: what you just did (political stereotyping, where you label everyone who disagrees with you as basically being the same cartoon villain) is, in my experience, an example the left-wing bigotry that drives centrists away from your political faction. Disagreeing with your doesn't mean that I agree with the hateful morons on the right, it just means I also see and won't tolerate your bigotry.
-
So hating a hateful ideology and people who hold that ideology is bigotry. Damn, you need to see a chiropractor, you just twisted yourself in knots for that poor argument.
-
Counter-counterargument: Centrists are actually a diverse group with many very different positions, but they all end up supporting fascism by staying inactive. I don't think you're evil for not picking a side, I think you're short-sighted for assuming "staying out of it" is possible and preferable to fighting for change. Winner-take-all, first-past-the-post elections will always result in a two-party system, if you want to change that without literally burning it all to the ground, you have to do it from within the system. You can still be a centrist, just try to take the context of the whole political structure into consideration when you vote. You can say you don't tolerate bigotry, but your actions (or rather, lack of actions) make you a liar.
-
Ok buddy. Enjoy slurping Trump.
-
-
Okay but the Far Left is antisemitic because they don't support Israeli
genocidefreedom and democracy. So they're even worse than MAGA.
-
-
The only thing I gather from these posts.
The right: We prefer a two party system.
The left: a vote for a third option weakens us in the battle against the right.
Centrists: I just want a third option that isn't democrats or republicans...
-
Me coming into the comments section:
-
-
the strawman further polarizes me away from your perspective. if i didn't know better I would say you're trying to make things worse.
-
-
-
What if I informed you that there are more than two options, and they don't have to be extremities? And what if I followed up by informing you that what we have in the US, for a political spectrum, is not the norm elsewhere in the world?
-
The political spectrum in the U.S. omits leftists entirely. Both Republicans and Democrats are pro-capitalism and pro-U.S. imperialism.
-
And what if that not only changed nothing, but didn’t refute the post?
-
My reply was more aimed at the title of the post and its sentiment. "Pick a side"
I'm not a believer that there are only two political options for the US, long term, and would love to see a true political multi-party representation in the US government. I believe that something not completely (EU) far left will prevail in the US. And absolutely not the (US) far right. (Perhaps I'm just being a wishful fool, and the US will crash and burn in the next 1-5 years. Hopefully, we can make it out of this mess without doing so. But if it has to happen, so be it.)
-
-
I'd respond by saying you're too stupid to safely walk and chew at the same time and advise you to stop talking
-
-
-
How about we stop pretending that the left doesn't have its own share of emotionally damaged asshats and try to pick leadership that solves problems instead of pandering to one side or the other?
-
tankies are probably the worst presentation of the "left"
-
Who's pretending ?
-
-
Yet another poorly made fallacy meme. Is there a bot just crapping out this same template every few days?
-
Yes, believing centrism to be a valid political position, due to it being the centre, is a fallacy.
-
what
-
8 days ago https://lemmy.world/post/39694498
These "Leftist good, right bad, central dumb dumb I see no difference" meme's are to Lemmy what the Big Mac is to McDonalds. This place is littered with the same, tired, fucking false fallacy. Dear lord, leading up to Dementia Donny winning his second term, 3/4ths the post on Lemmy were just that. Wasn't accurate, original, or funny the first 50 fucking times, not sure it's going to be any other time.
Fw: Fw: Fw: Fw: Lemmy post (FUNNY!!!!!)
-
Memes must be logically sound at all times
-
-
-
Far left citizens may oppose fascism but their leaders aren't doing a good job of it. America needs a better left wing party.
-
your right because there is none
-
People thinking the Dems are left. They're left of the GQP, they're not left of the spectrum, far from it. The neoliberal is as much not your friend as the fascist is.
-
-
-
Yeah, both are too loud and impeding the centrist ability to go back to Brunch lmao
Brunch: May or may not include stuffing their own pockets
-
Isn't it just left & right ?
-
Far [insert preferred political allegiance] simply means extremist, usually unwilling to compromise. Whether you think that's a good thing or a bad thing depends on your personal political opinions, but generally speaking an inability to reach a compromise is not a desirable trait regardless of your political leanings.
As a saying goes, perfect is the enemy of good. We don't want people refusing to embrace more libertarian policies simply because they don't get everything that they want. Progress is achieved by steadily grinding away at the norm, not by having a big explosive change all at once. That's what communists want.
-
Why does the left have to keep being represented as long hair, man bun hippy types?
-
Yeah, I'm a balding hippy type
-
I mean..... I'm not in a position to disagree with it.
-
still better than the other two in this meme 🤭
-
Fair, dude probably cares about his hair.
-
-
I'm a step away from a high and tight, and with my thining hair, close to just needing clippers.
-
-
Social democrats are what centrists actually are and they're generally on board.
"Centrists" tho
-
If you can only paint 'your side' as the hero, then you are a naive child with 0 life experience.
-
Reading 19th-20th century theory on the internal contradictions and inherent exploitation of capitalism offers a very convincing framework for understanding our current reality. To paint such analyses as naivete ironically reveals a lack of familiarity with the subject matter.
-
Those who have been critiquing, reading critiques, and debating about it for a long time are naive for not blindly buying Carl's Jr's Big Bucket of Fries!
-
-
Pure projection
-
-
WTF happened to centrism, instead of measured response to right and left it has just turned into the place where cowards hide
-
Because both make money.
-
EDIT: after thinking about it for a couple of hours, my take was really bad, and i'm gonna clarify:
There is significant difference between the republicans and the non-republicans in the US, which is that the republicans are extremely racist. And that's not just a "little bit of racist", but a "fucking huge bit of racist", on top of that. So there's a clear distinction.
As a side fact, i'd still like to point out that "fascism" as a term is surprisingly difficult to define. Everybody likes to be "against" fascism, but it's an emotional catch-phrase without a cut-and-dry definition. That's why i tend to avoid it in discussion, or if i do use it, i give it the following meaning: "Fascism is an illegal way of seizing power in order to do something that you want." Note that illegal does not inherently imply immoral. There can be moral causes for why somebody does something illegal, such as with slave uprisings as happened around 1800 in northern america. That, according to my definition, is illegal (in the sense that the law said it's illegal), but not immoral, but since the definition of "fascism", according to me, concerns whether it's illegal to do something, not immoral, it would have been fascist too, by that definition. That's to show that fascism is not inherently good or evil, but it depends on what you do with it.
the original comment is below for historical purposes
I used to think that "left" and "right" were diametrically opposed terms, but i don't see it that way anymore:
- imperialism: Imperialism means to conquer other countries for the sake of imposing your own norms and values on them. That's actually what the northern states of the US did to the southern states of the US before they became the US. sure, lots of people argue that the values were worthwhile (being against slavery), but it's still imposing your values on somebody else.
- fascism: at this point, i'm not sure what "fascism" even means anymore. isn't it just to do something illegal to get what you want? isn't every change in human history illegal, before it becomes the new norm? wasn't it illegal for gay people to stand for their rights in the 20th century?
- because it's a recent topic, i'd like to give another neat example: liberals from the coastline will loudly proclaim that the conservative "child marriage" (starting at age 14) laws are a monstrosity (because that's, idk, child abuse or sth), but at the same time, you will find in many schools in the coastside a subject called "sex education" where people learn to use condoms and such. such classes are typically held at about age 13 or sth (well, it was for me). guess why they do it? because they recognize that teenagers do in fact have desires to experiment with sexuality, and offering the courses is simply recognizing that and making the best out of it. [EDIT - ok nvm this point, i don't actually know exactly what the "child marriage" laws say precisely, and i'm not aware how they're actually interpreted in practice, so i guess this point is void.]
-
I don't even know where to start with how wrong you are.
-
Seriously. Is this what a degree from Prager U looks like?
-
-
used to think that "left" and "right" were diametrically opposed terms, but i don't see it that way anymore:
I mean.... It depends on the definition you are utilizing. The term originated from the seating arrangement from the French National Assembly prior/during the french revolution. With advocates for a republic on the left, and monarchist on the right.
The most common modern geopolitical definition is now the left supporting socialism and the right supporting capitalism. Two economic systems which are fairly diametrically opposed in an economic sense.
imperialism: Imperialism means to conquer other countries for the sake of imposing your own norms and values on them.
Again, it depends on your definition. But imperialism is generally a policy of a powerful nation who extends it's rule over another country through direct or indirect means. This can be for economic, strategic, or even political gain, most usually to exploit the resources or labour of another nation.
That's actually what the northern states of the US did to the southern states of the US before they became the US.
No...just no. You can really do an imperialism on yourself, that's just definitionally incorrect.
isn't it just to do something illegal to get what you want? isn't every change in human history illegal, before it becomes the new norm? wasn't it illegal for gay people to stand for their rights in the 20th century?
What?
Fascism is purposely hard to define as it's a reactionary response to the democratic process and thus depends on vagueness to grow within a democracy.
However, fascism can be recognized by its extremely hierarchical structure of governance, its goals as a political body, and how it organizes capitalism to serve its own goals.
liberals from the coastline will loudly proclaim that the conservative "child marriage" (starting at age 14) laws are a monstrosity (because that's, idk, child abuse or sth), but at the same time, you will find in many schools in the coastside a subject called "sex education" where people learn to use condoms and such. such classes are typically held at about age 13 or sth (well, it was for me). guess why they do it? because they recognize that teenagers do in fact have desires to experiment with sexuality, and offering the courses is simply recognizing that and making the best out of it.
Child marriage laws are bad because it gives a legal avenue for adults to prey upon children...... Not because people want to prevent teens from sexual exploration. What is wrong with you?
-
... wanting equality for gay people is fascism? Okay. Okay. Going to go vomit.
edit oh and a pedophilia fan too wow.
-
117 comments
Advanced strawman. Opposing fascism isn't far left. It's just not-right.
The wall of lies and whataboutism goes below.