It’s like saying “Sure my husband’s a serial killer, but he’s great with the kids.” If someone said that to you, the only conclusion you could possibly come to is that…
It’s a flawed analogy sure, but the point still stands. It’s easy for non-politicians to have moral clarity and take principled stances, but if you’re in government trying to actually effect positive changes to society, it’s not that simple at all.
They are not “trying to actually effect positive changes to society”. That is exactly what being a liberal is all about - zero understanding of the material reality. What they are actually trying to do every day is upholding the interests of capital. And that means serving a specific economic group - the capitalists, or “the bourgeoisie”. Whether by starting wars all over the globe, instigating coups, financing fascist death squads, supporting actual genocide, what have you. They don’t give two shits about you, positive changes to society, anyone really but their donors and themselves.
And yet so many privileges that worker enjoy today were brought about through collective bargaining, trade unions, and pro-labor legislation (not to such a great extent in the US, but whatevs) introduced through principled politicians who weren’t wholly under the boot of the ruling classes.
I know in this sub that sounds like a cop-out, but it’s true. Not everyone has the stomach for yet another bloody revolution.
You drank too much of Bernie “Zionazi apologist” Sanders. They did not do it because they were “principled”. Even your precious socdems don’t give a shit about you, though their rhetoric may suggest otherwise. And while yes, labor unionization can win you a few crumbs, you gotta remember that these are 1) crumbs that the capitalists 2) were willing to give them should the workers start to get annoying, and 3) these crumbs are only possible because of US/Western imperialism. There “principled politicians” do this to bribe the working class, to pacify it - because it is easier than the stick. Once you ask for too much, or once the empire starts to crumble - then you’ll get the stick. And don’t worry, the militarized police in the US get to have a VERY big stick nowadays.
Thing is, those things had to be fought for and paid in blood (Literally, look at the history labor conflicts which involved plenty of massacres and assasinations).
And these struggles were only successful because 1) WW2 had militarised the working population 2) the Soviet Union was a powerful threat to the bourgeoise and 3) the profit rate was high
By the 1970s, all 3 conditions had started to disappear, and the oil shock gave the capitalist class the opportunity to pull a soft coup essentially and embark on their project of destroying the positions of the international working class movement. The crowning jewel of their achievements was the destruction of the soviet union and the opening of China, which allowed a recovering of the profit rate.
Today, we live in a world where the capitalist class won the battle of the 20th century. In these conditions, no “principled politician” or insider will be able to win you any rights. Only under changing conditions (the recent ascent of China, the fall of the empire, the profit rates falling again) will the political state of the world substantially change. And frighteningly enough, the changes in the conditions we are seeing will mostly likely lead to at worst, a new world war (the lead up conflicts are already underway) or at best, a new cold war.
The world the previous generations lived in has long vanished. 2024 America is not 1955 America. Nor is it Europe (where the bourgeoise has never had a racialised underclass to easily exploit and undermine worker bargaining power, although this is beginning to change). What might work in 1960s America or Europe won’t work in America today.
It’s a flawed analogy sure, but the point still stands. It’s easy for non-politicians to have moral clarity and take principled stances, but if you’re in government trying to actually effect positive changes to society, it’s not that simple at all.
They are not “trying to actually effect positive changes to society”. That is exactly what being a liberal is all about - zero understanding of the material reality. What they are actually trying to do every day is upholding the interests of capital. And that means serving a specific economic group - the capitalists, or “the bourgeoisie”. Whether by starting wars all over the globe, instigating coups, financing fascist death squads, supporting actual genocide, what have you. They don’t give two shits about you, positive changes to society, anyone really but their donors and themselves.
And yet so many privileges that worker enjoy today were brought about through collective bargaining, trade unions, and pro-labor legislation (not to such a great extent in the US, but whatevs) introduced through principled politicians who weren’t wholly under the boot of the ruling classes.
I know in this sub that sounds like a cop-out, but it’s true. Not everyone has the stomach for yet another bloody revolution.
You drank too much of Bernie “Zionazi apologist” Sanders. They did not do it because they were “principled”. Even your precious socdems don’t give a shit about you, though their rhetoric may suggest otherwise. And while yes, labor unionization can win you a few crumbs, you gotta remember that these are 1) crumbs that the capitalists 2) were willing to give them should the workers start to get annoying, and 3) these crumbs are only possible because of US/Western imperialism. There “principled politicians” do this to bribe the working class, to pacify it - because it is easier than the stick. Once you ask for too much, or once the empire starts to crumble - then you’ll get the stick. And don’t worry, the militarized police in the US get to have a VERY big stick nowadays.
Thing is, those things had to be fought for and paid in blood (Literally, look at the history labor conflicts which involved plenty of massacres and assasinations).
And these struggles were only successful because 1) WW2 had militarised the working population 2) the Soviet Union was a powerful threat to the bourgeoise and 3) the profit rate was high
By the 1970s, all 3 conditions had started to disappear, and the oil shock gave the capitalist class the opportunity to pull a soft coup essentially and embark on their project of destroying the positions of the international working class movement. The crowning jewel of their achievements was the destruction of the soviet union and the opening of China, which allowed a recovering of the profit rate.
Today, we live in a world where the capitalist class won the battle of the 20th century. In these conditions, no “principled politician” or insider will be able to win you any rights. Only under changing conditions (the recent ascent of China, the fall of the empire, the profit rates falling again) will the political state of the world substantially change. And frighteningly enough, the changes in the conditions we are seeing will mostly likely lead to at worst, a new world war (the lead up conflicts are already underway) or at best, a new cold war.
The world the previous generations lived in has long vanished. 2024 America is not 1955 America. Nor is it Europe (where the bourgeoise has never had a racialised underclass to easily exploit and undermine worker bargaining power, although this is beginning to change). What might work in 1960s America or Europe won’t work in America today.
But seeing Palestinians die is fine? I don’t think the lack of bloodlust is the issue at all.
Workers in the west only care about westerners they want a part of the imperial loot they are complicit in colonialism
Edit: ah the fuck you got mine ladder puller attitude
Ding ding ding. You win, the whole thing undergirding this is this. They just want a bigger cut.