It's pretty obvious that to affect meaningful change you need both an inside and outside game. King knew this, the conservative movement that has seized power in this country knew it. Everybody to the left of Susan Collins could stand to learn it.
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
Peaceful protest can absolutely be effective. You don’t need to block roads, and so on. You just need what you have always needed, the support of key workers who enable the lives of other Americans on a day to day basis. A mass strike by teachers, or grocery store workers, will bring any opposition to their knees within a week. If US meat packers said, “not a single days work until we have a direct popular vote for President and term limits for the Supreme Court” then it would get done.
But, that’s a tall order! It requires the actions of a near monolith of the people.
Doesnt this cut both ways?
Not a single days work until abortion is In the hands of the states, etc. There might be some areas with enough critical mass of that opinion to bring some system down. Truckers in a few states, perhaps.
If trucks stopped delivering we'd have no choice but to cave on any demand of theirs?
Yes, absolutely. The people as a monolith have immense power, if some basic shit doesn’t get done, things crumble. So if they truly want those things and are willing to demand them, and others do not counter their demands then they get what they ask for.
I am not so sure. I mean in this example, we are talking about protests in say, all of the South, as a means to influence federal legislation to make abortion illegal.
But you know, it really isn't some representatives problem in California if another state is going to shit. And given that their own constituency is willing to do the same to get their demands, and they have enough power to block, say, Arkansas getting a thing, why do anything?
The President sure would like to help but can't force anyone to do anything.
Peaceful protest can absolutely be effective. You don’t need to block roads, and so on. You just need what you have always needed, the support of key workers who enable the lives of other Americans on a day to day basis. A mass strike by teachers, or grocery store workers, will bring any opposition to their knees within a week. If US meat packers said, “not a single days work until we have a direct popular vote for President and term limits for the Supreme Court” then it would get done.
But, that’s a tall order! It requires the actions of a near monolith of the people.
Doesnt this cut both ways?
Not a single days work until abortion is In the hands of the states, etc. There might be some areas with enough critical mass of that opinion to bring some system down. Truckers in a few states, perhaps.
If trucks stopped delivering we'd have no choice but to cave on any demand of theirs?
Yes, absolutely. The people as a monolith have immense power, if some basic shit doesn’t get done, things crumble. So if they truly want those things and are willing to demand them, and others do not counter their demands then they get what they ask for.
I am not so sure. I mean in this example, we are talking about protests in say, all of the South, as a means to influence federal legislation to make abortion illegal.
But you know, it really isn't some representatives problem in California if another state is going to shit. And given that their own constituency is willing to do the same to get their demands, and they have enough power to block, say, Arkansas getting a thing, why do anything?
The President sure would like to help but can't force anyone to do anything.
I think this oversimplifies things. Our political system may have clear boundaries delineated by state lines, but our economic system does not. A strike in California can affect the bottom line of power brokers in Alabama. I agree that revolt in red states is more effective in the context of abortion than is resistance in blue states, but in a highly interconnected social system like ours, resistance on one end of the map affects conditions on the other.
We do not have the intersectional, militant, organized, and coordinated labor movement that would be necessary to affect political change in this way. That is also something that must change if we are to reverse the rise of fascism and the deterioration of our society.
Peaceful protest can absolutely be effective. You don’t need to block roads, and so on. You just need what you have always needed, the support of key workers who enable the lives of other Americans on a day to day basis. A mass strike by teachers, or grocery store workers, will bring any opposition to their knees within a week. If US meat packers said, “not a single days work until we have a direct popular vote for President and term limits for the Supreme Court” then it would get done.
But, that’s a tall order! It requires the actions of a near monolith of the people.
I can't speak for anyone else, but I am not necessarily presenting "disruptive" as the opposite of "peaceful." A mass strike would be way more disruptive than blocking a couple roads.
Though it is also worth noting that historically, strikes that target critical infrastructure are not generally permitted to stay peaceful for long
Peaceful protest can absolutely be effective. You don’t need to block roads, and so on. You just need what you have always needed, the support of key workers who enable the lives of other Americans on a day to day basis. A mass strike by teachers, or grocery store workers, will bring any opposition to their knees within a week. If US meat packers said, “not a single days work until we have a direct popular vote for President and term limits for the Supreme Court” then it would get done.
But, that’s a tall order! It requires the actions of a near monolith of the people.
If you wanna hit Congress where it hurts: flight attendants.
Now we're talking. I remember how quick Congress got over its stupidity when flights weren't happening a couple years ago.
Peaceful protest can absolutely be effective. You don’t need to block roads, and so on. You just need what you have always needed, the support of key workers who enable the lives of other Americans on a day to day basis. A mass strike by teachers, or grocery store workers, will bring any opposition to their knees within a week. If US meat packers said, “not a single days work until we have a direct popular vote for President and term limits for the Supreme Court” then it would get done.
But, that’s a tall order! It requires the actions of a near monolith of the people.
Doesnt this cut both ways?
Not a single days work until abortion is In the hands of the states, etc. There might be some areas with enough critical mass of that opinion to bring some system down. Truckers in a few states, perhaps.
If trucks stopped delivering we'd have no choice but to cave on any demand of theirs?
You aren't wrong, a CIA-funded truckers strike helped bring down the Allende government in Chile in the early 70s.
Usually, however, the left is better at that sort of thing than the right. The fact that the right hates organized labor and tries to atomize workers undermines their ability to employ such tactics.
Unless the GOP stops being super shitty. It far more realistic to focus on keeping he GOP from gaining the Senate or the House, kill the filibuster, expand and fill the court and then codify things into federal law.
The filibuster has been killed 0 times in US history
Social progress has been coerced through mass organization and civil unrest more than 0 times in US history
I'm not sure why you're asserting that the method with the worse track record is the more realistic avenue
I mean don't get me wrong, I'll take the W any way we can get it and we are not obligated to employ only one kind of tactic
But we should probably prioritize the ones that have been proven to work
Or, alternatively: the democrats are a lot more likely to kill the filibuster and make some good things happen if they are sufficiently intimidated into doing so by a large social movement
The filibuster was killed literally three months ago to raise the debt ceiling.
Brynn Tannehill is a political writer and think tank analyst
Just a reminder: because of non-proportional representation and demographics: in order to break the filibuster and overcome the R+6-7 bias in the Senate, Democrats would need to win 3 straight elections by 19 points to make abortion legal nationally. 1/n
They need to win the national vote several times in a row by 5+ points to have a shot at breaking even.
Most forecasters look at the 2024 landscape, and don't think there's much of a chance for Democrats to hold the Senate past the 2024 election. 2/n
Mitch McConnell has promised that if Republicans regain control of the Senate in 2022, that he will not let Biden put any more Supreme Court justices on the bench. He would keep seats open for up to 6 years if he had to. 3/n
Mitch McConnell has promised that if Republicans regain control of the Senate in 2022, that he will not let Biden put any more Supreme Court justices on the bench. He would keep seats open for up to 6 years if he had to. 3/n
Starting in January 2023, there is probably no meaningful hope of changing the composition of the court.
It is estimated that the US's already sky high maternal mortality rate will rise by 21% as a result of Dobbs v. Jackson. 4/n
Most states are so gerrymandered that changing the composition of the state legislature is effectively impossible. The GOP has been able to maintain super majorities in the WI legislature despite losing elections by up to 10 points. 5/n
Because SCOTUS has approved political gerrymanders vis GIll, in most states that ban abortion there is no realistic hope of reversing these bans by voting out the incumbents who put the bans in place.
Only 8% of US House seats are competitive due to gerrymandering. 6/n
A few states allow voter initiated ballot initiatives or state constitutional amendments. However, SCOTUS has allowed state legislatures to effectively overturn them. Example: Floridians voted to restore the voting rights of felons overwhelmingly. 7/n
The (gerrymandered) state legislature turned around and passed a law requiring felons to prove they have paid all court fees before rights can be restored. Problem is, records in Florida are so sloppy that it is effectively impossible to do so. 8/n
This requirements was as fair as a 1950's literacy test to vote, and thus the ballot initiative was thwarted by politicians who cannot be voted out of office, aided and abetted by a SCOTUS put in place by Presidents who lost the popular vote. 9/n
There are VERY few good options for bringing back abortion rights after Dobbs v. Jackson. The US political and legal system is so broken that it is completely immune to the will of the people. A lot of legal minded folks can see the writing on the wall. 10/n
[…]
Anyone who studies this is well aware that the US has basically stopped being a functioning Democracy, and that it's only going to get worse from here. The right wing populist GOP is clearly telegraphing where it wants to go: permanent minoritarian Christian nationalist rule 17/n
People who don't study this within this analytical framework, but understand broadly that losing Roe v. Wade is bad and it FEELS like we're heading towards the Republic of Gilead, are rightly alarmed: they may not be conscious of all these things, but they sense the trend. 18/n
And they grasp in a general sense where this goes (though not the specifics)
We're heading towards either a corrupt, authoritarian dystopian nightmare for women, LGBT people, and non-Christians, or a fracturing of the US that ends the American experiment permanently 19/n
Unless these more than one HUGE black swan events, those are basically the options on the table. Pick one.
But somehow, institutionalists want to deny the facts of the situation as I detailed them. 20/n
They demand everyone behave as if voting and protests in designated zones is their best chance to change things, when anyone with a lick of analytic sense can clearly see that the GOP and SCOTUS DGAF about what the majority of the population want. 21/n
They're oblivious to the fact that these systems have failed, and that the public can no longer show their displeasure by voting incumbents out of office, put in different judges, pass ballot initiatives.
The GOP, and SCOTUS, know protests have no effect. 22/n
Which brings me to my point: I look at the hand wringing over the supposed optics of peaceful protesting outside of Kavanaugh's home, and want to put my head through my desk.
This is a mild escalation of things. 23/n
If they're so worried about the decorum, they should be be focused on the reasons WHY people have felt that protesting in front of the court is effectless. It's like complaining that about the fire department using axes in your house when it's burning to the ground. 24/n
Yeah, it's destructive, but way worse than what's happening in the bigger picture.
And the big picture for the US is ****ing terrifying. 25/n
Electoralism is insufficient to save us.
Milquetoast protests that focus more on being polite than about grinding the function of power and wealth to a screeching halt are insufficient.
We can no longer afford to gamble on our future and our freedoms by hoping we will get enough people at the ballot box to overcome the GOP and it’s co-optation of the electoral system, a system designed from the founding to play to the very people who now are clamping their talons tightly into it
It's still amusing how you basically use voting as a slur. But anyway, electing people to actually change the law is really the only way any of this changes. This tweet chain is correct in that it may take a long time. But that shouldn't be surprising, it took a long time to get to this point.
The funny thing is the tweeter, like you, is all "protests have no effect". And then goes "so the key is ... more protests". I think Hakkekage is entirely correct about how protests work and what they do. And some of that is valuable. But it also has it's limits. No matter how much Collins or Alito might clutch their pearls about what people are doing outside their houses, I'm not sure how it's gonna make them change anything.
I think the one thing Hakkekage is wrong about is that these people think their actions are approved of by a majority. I think they know they aren't and they think that just doesn't matter that much. The entire strategy that has led here has been largely anti-majoritarian. They know a lot of people don't approve of what they are doing and just don't really give a fuck because you don't need large scale approval. Coming out and demonstrating that disapproval only means so much.
I don't know why you are so certain of this. Would you not agree that major gains in our society have been achieved by non-electoral means? I keep bringing up the Civil Rights movement because it does not appear thay voting was the primary factor that led to its successes. What of the labor movement of old? Hell, what of women forcing the state to allow them to vote? They obviously did not win that right by voting!
Electoral politics does have to be part of the strategy. In a society where the state encompasses so much of our social sphere, interacting with its systems seems unavoidably necessary to me as well. But the idea that it is the only way to change things is ahistorical, and even the idea that it is primary means of affecting change seems highly dubious to me.
The elected politicians still needed to do something. This is why the civil rights movement was working for, in part, legislative goals after all. Same with the suffragettes you mention. And afaik with the suffragettes because women's voting rights were rolled out piecemeal in the US before the 19th amendment some of the support for that amendment came from people catering to those voters.
And I think in the end politicians have learned over time. I just don't think they are that worried about protests. I think the last 50 odd years have shown they are not as scary as they once might have thought. Especially not when the ones that are the main problem have a massive multi-headed media apparatus to control the narrative. The basic issue is that why should any Republican politician give a fuck how much you are protesting them? Why do they care? They probably aren't even their constituents. And this is an issue they are very committed to politically.
shryke on
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zepherinRussian warship, go fuck yourselfRegistered Userregular
edited May 2022
Targeted disruptions would be key. Figure out the biggest businesses in Missouri, Texas, Etc. Learn the logistics. And then organize Wildcat strikes against transporting their goods, protests that block their shipping lines. Wreck their ability to conduct business from afar while allowing other states business to go unobstructed, can be very effective, but it would require time research and a long term concerted effort. And being able to react when they try to reroute their logistics.
Unfortunately it’s something that would take years and up to a decade of constant pressure. I don’t think the left has the willpower for a sustained campaign.
Unless the GOP stops being super shitty. It far more realistic to focus on keeping he GOP from gaining the Senate or the House, kill the filibuster, expand and fill the court and then codify things into federal law.
The filibuster has been killed 0 times in US history
Social progress has been coerced through mass organization and civil unrest more than 0 times in US history
I'm not sure why you're asserting that the method with the worse track record is the more realistic avenue
I mean don't get me wrong, I'll take the W any way we can get it and we are not obligated to employ only one kind of tactic
But we should probably prioritize the ones that have been proven to work
Or, alternatively: the democrats are a lot more likely to kill the filibuster and make some good things happen if they are sufficiently intimidated into doing so by a large social movement
The filibuster was killed literally three months ago to raise the debt ceiling.
Brynn Tannehill is a political writer and think tank analyst
Just a reminder: because of non-proportional representation and demographics: in order to break the filibuster and overcome the R+6-7 bias in the Senate, Democrats would need to win 3 straight elections by 19 points to make abortion legal nationally. 1/n
They need to win the national vote several times in a row by 5+ points to have a shot at breaking even.
Most forecasters look at the 2024 landscape, and don't think there's much of a chance for Democrats to hold the Senate past the 2024 election. 2/n
Mitch McConnell has promised that if Republicans regain control of the Senate in 2022, that he will not let Biden put any more Supreme Court justices on the bench. He would keep seats open for up to 6 years if he had to. 3/n
Mitch McConnell has promised that if Republicans regain control of the Senate in 2022, that he will not let Biden put any more Supreme Court justices on the bench. He would keep seats open for up to 6 years if he had to. 3/n
Starting in January 2023, there is probably no meaningful hope of changing the composition of the court.
It is estimated that the US's already sky high maternal mortality rate will rise by 21% as a result of Dobbs v. Jackson. 4/n
Most states are so gerrymandered that changing the composition of the state legislature is effectively impossible. The GOP has been able to maintain super majorities in the WI legislature despite losing elections by up to 10 points. 5/n
Because SCOTUS has approved political gerrymanders vis GIll, in most states that ban abortion there is no realistic hope of reversing these bans by voting out the incumbents who put the bans in place.
Only 8% of US House seats are competitive due to gerrymandering. 6/n
A few states allow voter initiated ballot initiatives or state constitutional amendments. However, SCOTUS has allowed state legislatures to effectively overturn them. Example: Floridians voted to restore the voting rights of felons overwhelmingly. 7/n
The (gerrymandered) state legislature turned around and passed a law requiring felons to prove they have paid all court fees before rights can be restored. Problem is, records in Florida are so sloppy that it is effectively impossible to do so. 8/n
This requirements was as fair as a 1950's literacy test to vote, and thus the ballot initiative was thwarted by politicians who cannot be voted out of office, aided and abetted by a SCOTUS put in place by Presidents who lost the popular vote. 9/n
There are VERY few good options for bringing back abortion rights after Dobbs v. Jackson. The US political and legal system is so broken that it is completely immune to the will of the people. A lot of legal minded folks can see the writing on the wall. 10/n
[…]
Anyone who studies this is well aware that the US has basically stopped being a functioning Democracy, and that it's only going to get worse from here. The right wing populist GOP is clearly telegraphing where it wants to go: permanent minoritarian Christian nationalist rule 17/n
People who don't study this within this analytical framework, but understand broadly that losing Roe v. Wade is bad and it FEELS like we're heading towards the Republic of Gilead, are rightly alarmed: they may not be conscious of all these things, but they sense the trend. 18/n
And they grasp in a general sense where this goes (though not the specifics)
We're heading towards either a corrupt, authoritarian dystopian nightmare for women, LGBT people, and non-Christians, or a fracturing of the US that ends the American experiment permanently 19/n
Unless these more than one HUGE black swan events, those are basically the options on the table. Pick one.
But somehow, institutionalists want to deny the facts of the situation as I detailed them. 20/n
They demand everyone behave as if voting and protests in designated zones is their best chance to change things, when anyone with a lick of analytic sense can clearly see that the GOP and SCOTUS DGAF about what the majority of the population want. 21/n
They're oblivious to the fact that these systems have failed, and that the public can no longer show their displeasure by voting incumbents out of office, put in different judges, pass ballot initiatives.
The GOP, and SCOTUS, know protests have no effect. 22/n
Which brings me to my point: I look at the hand wringing over the supposed optics of peaceful protesting outside of Kavanaugh's home, and want to put my head through my desk.
This is a mild escalation of things. 23/n
If they're so worried about the decorum, they should be be focused on the reasons WHY people have felt that protesting in front of the court is effectless. It's like complaining that about the fire department using axes in your house when it's burning to the ground. 24/n
Yeah, it's destructive, but way worse than what's happening in the bigger picture.
And the big picture for the US is ****ing terrifying. 25/n
Electoralism is insufficient to save us.
Milquetoast protests that focus more on being polite than about grinding the function of power and wealth to a screeching halt are insufficient.
We can no longer afford to gamble on our future and our freedoms by hoping we will get enough people at the ballot box to overcome the GOP and it’s co-optation of the electoral system, a system designed from the founding to play to the very people who now are clamping their talons tightly into it
It's still amusing how you basically use voting as a slur. But anyway, electing people to actually change the law is really the only way any of this changes. This tweet chain is correct in that it may take a long time. But that shouldn't be surprising, it took a long time to get to this point.
The funny thing is the tweeter, like you, is all "protests have no effect". And then goes "so the key is ... more protests". I think Hakkekage is entirely correct about how protests work and what they do. And some of that is valuable. But it also has it's limits. No matter how much Collins or Alito might clutch their pearls about what people are doing outside their houses, I'm not sure how it's gonna make them change anything.
I think the one thing Hakkekage is wrong about is that these people think their actions are approved of by a majority. I think they know they aren't and they think that just doesn't matter that much. The entire strategy that has led here has been largely anti-majoritarian. They know a lot of people don't approve of what they are doing and just don't really give a fuck because you don't need large scale approval. Coming out and demonstrating that disapproval only means so much.
I don't know why you are so certain of this. Would you not agree that major gains in our society have been achieved by non-electoral means? I keep bringing up the Civil Rights movement because it does not appear thay voting was the primary factor that led to its successes. What of the labor movement of old? Hell, what of women forcing the state to allow them to vote? They obviously did not win that right by voting!
Electoral politics does have to be part of the strategy. In a society where the state encompasses so much of our social sphere, interacting with its systems seems unavoidably necessary to me as well. But the idea that it is the only way to change things is ahistorical, and even the idea that it is primary means of affecting change seems highly dubious to me.
The elected politicians still needed to do something. This is why the civil rights movement was working for, in part, legislative goals after all. Same with the suffragettes you mention. And afaik with the suffragettes because women's voting rights were rolled out piecemeal in the US before the 19th amendment some of the support for that amendment came from people catering to those voters.
And I think in the end politicians have learned over time. I just don't think they are that worried about protests. I think the last 50 odd years have shown they are not as scary as they once might have thought. Especially not when the ones that are the main problem have a massive multi-headed media apparatus to control the narrative. The basic issue is that why should any Republican politician give a fuck how much you are protesting them? Why do they care? They probably aren't even their constituents. And this is an issue they are very committed to politically.
They would care because they would be afraid that they can't afford not to, because they will face personal consequences for not caring
This is why the pearl clutching over the protests at Kavanaugh's house. They can ignore a crowd waving signs downtown. They can't ignore a crowd gathering outside their windows. And if they try to, the crowd might not be content to peacefully gather there indefinitely.
If conservative politicians cave on foundational issues to small groups violently protesting their homes, would you expect a liberal politician to do the same?
Id be pretty disappointed if they did! Caving to tiny, personal shows of force is bad politics!
If our opponents are as committed to their cause as we are I expect protests not to work very well as long as their constituents don't move their own positions.
If conservative politicians cave on foundational issues to small groups violently protesting their homes, would you expect a liberal politician to do the same?
Id be pretty disappointed if they did! Caving to tiny, personal shows of force is bad politics!
If our opponents are as committed to their cause as we are I expect protests not to work very well as long as their constituents don't move their own positions.
If conservative politicians cave on foundational issues to small groups violently protesting their homes, would you expect a liberal politician to do the same?
Id be pretty disappointed if they did! Caving to tiny, personal shows of force is bad politics!
If our opponents are as committed to their cause as we are I expect protests not to work very well as long as their constituents don't move their own positions.
The fact that a lot/most of these people are cowards is an asset for us.
Unless the GOP stops being super shitty. It far more realistic to focus on keeping he GOP from gaining the Senate or the House, kill the filibuster, expand and fill the court and then codify things into federal law.
The filibuster has been killed 0 times in US history
Social progress has been coerced through mass organization and civil unrest more than 0 times in US history
I'm not sure why you're asserting that the method with the worse track record is the more realistic avenue
I mean don't get me wrong, I'll take the W any way we can get it and we are not obligated to employ only one kind of tactic
But we should probably prioritize the ones that have been proven to work
Or, alternatively: the democrats are a lot more likely to kill the filibuster and make some good things happen if they are sufficiently intimidated into doing so by a large social movement
The filibuster was killed literally three months ago to raise the debt ceiling.
Brynn Tannehill is a political writer and think tank analyst
Just a reminder: because of non-proportional representation and demographics: in order to break the filibuster and overcome the R+6-7 bias in the Senate, Democrats would need to win 3 straight elections by 19 points to make abortion legal nationally. 1/n
They need to win the national vote several times in a row by 5+ points to have a shot at breaking even.
Most forecasters look at the 2024 landscape, and don't think there's much of a chance for Democrats to hold the Senate past the 2024 election. 2/n
Mitch McConnell has promised that if Republicans regain control of the Senate in 2022, that he will not let Biden put any more Supreme Court justices on the bench. He would keep seats open for up to 6 years if he had to. 3/n
Mitch McConnell has promised that if Republicans regain control of the Senate in 2022, that he will not let Biden put any more Supreme Court justices on the bench. He would keep seats open for up to 6 years if he had to. 3/n
Starting in January 2023, there is probably no meaningful hope of changing the composition of the court.
It is estimated that the US's already sky high maternal mortality rate will rise by 21% as a result of Dobbs v. Jackson. 4/n
Most states are so gerrymandered that changing the composition of the state legislature is effectively impossible. The GOP has been able to maintain super majorities in the WI legislature despite losing elections by up to 10 points. 5/n
Because SCOTUS has approved political gerrymanders vis GIll, in most states that ban abortion there is no realistic hope of reversing these bans by voting out the incumbents who put the bans in place.
Only 8% of US House seats are competitive due to gerrymandering. 6/n
A few states allow voter initiated ballot initiatives or state constitutional amendments. However, SCOTUS has allowed state legislatures to effectively overturn them. Example: Floridians voted to restore the voting rights of felons overwhelmingly. 7/n
The (gerrymandered) state legislature turned around and passed a law requiring felons to prove they have paid all court fees before rights can be restored. Problem is, records in Florida are so sloppy that it is effectively impossible to do so. 8/n
This requirements was as fair as a 1950's literacy test to vote, and thus the ballot initiative was thwarted by politicians who cannot be voted out of office, aided and abetted by a SCOTUS put in place by Presidents who lost the popular vote. 9/n
There are VERY few good options for bringing back abortion rights after Dobbs v. Jackson. The US political and legal system is so broken that it is completely immune to the will of the people. A lot of legal minded folks can see the writing on the wall. 10/n
[…]
Anyone who studies this is well aware that the US has basically stopped being a functioning Democracy, and that it's only going to get worse from here. The right wing populist GOP is clearly telegraphing where it wants to go: permanent minoritarian Christian nationalist rule 17/n
People who don't study this within this analytical framework, but understand broadly that losing Roe v. Wade is bad and it FEELS like we're heading towards the Republic of Gilead, are rightly alarmed: they may not be conscious of all these things, but they sense the trend. 18/n
And they grasp in a general sense where this goes (though not the specifics)
We're heading towards either a corrupt, authoritarian dystopian nightmare for women, LGBT people, and non-Christians, or a fracturing of the US that ends the American experiment permanently 19/n
Unless these more than one HUGE black swan events, those are basically the options on the table. Pick one.
But somehow, institutionalists want to deny the facts of the situation as I detailed them. 20/n
They demand everyone behave as if voting and protests in designated zones is their best chance to change things, when anyone with a lick of analytic sense can clearly see that the GOP and SCOTUS DGAF about what the majority of the population want. 21/n
They're oblivious to the fact that these systems have failed, and that the public can no longer show their displeasure by voting incumbents out of office, put in different judges, pass ballot initiatives.
The GOP, and SCOTUS, know protests have no effect. 22/n
Which brings me to my point: I look at the hand wringing over the supposed optics of peaceful protesting outside of Kavanaugh's home, and want to put my head through my desk.
This is a mild escalation of things. 23/n
If they're so worried about the decorum, they should be be focused on the reasons WHY people have felt that protesting in front of the court is effectless. It's like complaining that about the fire department using axes in your house when it's burning to the ground. 24/n
Yeah, it's destructive, but way worse than what's happening in the bigger picture.
And the big picture for the US is ****ing terrifying. 25/n
Electoralism is insufficient to save us.
Milquetoast protests that focus more on being polite than about grinding the function of power and wealth to a screeching halt are insufficient.
We can no longer afford to gamble on our future and our freedoms by hoping we will get enough people at the ballot box to overcome the GOP and it’s co-optation of the electoral system, a system designed from the founding to play to the very people who now are clamping their talons tightly into it
It's still amusing how you basically use voting as a slur. But anyway, electing people to actually change the law is really the only way any of this changes. This tweet chain is correct in that it may take a long time. But that shouldn't be surprising, it took a long time to get to this point.
The funny thing is the tweeter, like you, is all "protests have no effect". And then goes "so the key is ... more protests". I think Hakkekage is entirely correct about how protests work and what they do. And some of that is valuable. But it also has it's limits. No matter how much Collins or Alito might clutch their pearls about what people are doing outside their houses, I'm not sure how it's gonna make them change anything.
I think the one thing Hakkekage is wrong about is that these people think their actions are approved of by a majority. I think they know they aren't and they think that just doesn't matter that much. The entire strategy that has led here has been largely anti-majoritarian. They know a lot of people don't approve of what they are doing and just don't really give a fuck because you don't need large scale approval. Coming out and demonstrating that disapproval only means so much.
I don't know why you are so certain of this. Would you not agree that major gains in our society have been achieved by non-electoral means? I keep bringing up the Civil Rights movement because it does not appear thay voting was the primary factor that led to its successes. What of the labor movement of old? Hell, what of women forcing the state to allow them to vote? They obviously did not win that right by voting!
Electoral politics does have to be part of the strategy. In a society where the state encompasses so much of our social sphere, interacting with its systems seems unavoidably necessary to me as well. But the idea that it is the only way to change things is ahistorical, and even the idea that it is primary means of affecting change seems highly dubious to me.
The elected politicians still needed to do something. This is why the civil rights movement was working for, in part, legislative goals after all. Same with the suffragettes you mention. And afaik with the suffragettes because women's voting rights were rolled out piecemeal in the US before the 19th amendment some of the support for that amendment came from people catering to those voters.
And I think in the end politicians have learned over time. I just don't think they are that worried about protests. I think the last 50 odd years have shown they are not as scary as they once might have thought. Especially not when the ones that are the main problem have a massive multi-headed media apparatus to control the narrative. The basic issue is that why should any Republican politician give a fuck how much you are protesting them? Why do they care? They probably aren't even their constituents. And this is an issue they are very committed to politically.
They would care because they would be afraid that they can't afford not to, because they will face personal consequences for not caring
This is why the pearl clutching over the protests at Kavanaugh's house. They can ignore a crowd waving signs downtown. They can't ignore a crowd gathering outside their windows. And if they try to, the crowd might not be content to peacefully gather there indefinitely.
Effective protests are threats.
Collins was fainting about chalk on her sidewalk. Not because it's scary, but because it's rude. It's out of line. It's Not How It's Done. But that's "complain to Politico" concerned not "actually change anthing I do" concerned. It's the same kind of concern she has about the people she put on the Supreme Court "lying to her". It's bullshit. I think you can protest outside Kavanaugh's house all day and it'll annoy the hell out of him but he's just gonna laugh his way to work and vote to repeal interracial marriage.
If conservative politicians cave on foundational issues to small groups violently protesting their homes, would you expect a liberal politician to do the same?
Id be pretty disappointed if they did! Caving to tiny, personal shows of force is bad politics!
If our opponents are as committed to their cause as we are I expect protests not to work very well as long as their constituents don't move their own positions.
The fact that a lot/most of these people are cowards is an asset for us.
It's easy to characterize them as cowards but haven't a handful of party leadership been forced out of polite company from time to time, been harassed in public, and not moved any of their positions? In fact, their positions have gotten more and more extreme.
There is also some skill in the Republican party to lightning rod onto the members most tolerant of controversy. Alito writing the opinion isnt an accident, Im sure. Roberts is still getting to give the appearance of wringing his hands and oh what can you do now that he got the Court he wanted.
I think having a belief that your opponents are any less ideologically and personally committed or willing than your side to fight, or less able than your side, in the face of all the work Republicans have put in and their success at campaigning and monetary expenditure and organizing activity is mistaken.
Protests that are disruptive and protests that are “polite” would both be necessary. And both need to be done in large numbers, by a lot of people in areas where it would be inconvenient for Republicans.
One doesn't work without threat of the other. Disruption doesn't necessarily mean violent and I think one of the problems is that people can mostly only protest locally.
I can't quit my job and go scream at the legislative building in Missouri.
Showing material support with bail funds and donations to the ACLU requires that I have income I can spare.
Going to the closest big city and getting angry would be Portland. Oregon is all aboard the pro-choice train as it is... disruption would be hurting people who are already on my side.
In a very real way it feels like crazy conservatives 1,700 miles away cheated and gamed the system and I can't really participate.
Honestly at this point I feel like my donations to The Satanic Temple is the best spent activism dollar I've had.
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jmcdonaldI voted, did you?DC(ish)Registered Userregular
If conservative politicians cave on foundational issues to small groups violently protesting their homes, would you expect a liberal politician to do the same?
Id be pretty disappointed if they did! Caving to tiny, personal shows of force is bad politics!
If our opponents are as committed to their cause as we are I expect protests not to work very well as long as their constituents don't move their own positions.
The fact that a lot/most of these people are cowards is an asset for us.
It's easy to characterize them as cowards but haven't a handful of party leadership been forced out of polite company from time to time, been harassed in public, and not moved any of their positions? In fact, their positions have gotten more and more extreme.
There is also some skill in the Republican party to lightning rod onto the members most tolerant of controversy. Alito writing the opinion isnt an accident, Im sure. Roberts is still getting to give the appearance of wringing his hands and oh what can you do now that he got the Court he wanted.
I think having a belief that your opponents are any less ideologically and personally committed or willing than your side to fight, or less able than your side, in the face of all the work Republicans have put in and their success at campaigning and monetary expenditure and organizing activity is mistaken.
I’d argue the Republicans are in fact far more dedicated and committed to their fight than the left. As ebum pointed out, they have an inside and an outside game.
If conservative politicians cave on foundational issues to small groups violently protesting their homes, would you expect a liberal politician to do the same?
Id be pretty disappointed if they did! Caving to tiny, personal shows of force is bad politics!
If our opponents are as committed to their cause as we are I expect protests not to work very well as long as their constituents don't move their own positions.
The fact that a lot/most of these people are cowards is an asset for us.
It's easy to characterize them as cowards but haven't a handful of party leadership been forced out of polite company from time to time, been harassed in public, and not moved any of their positions? In fact, their positions have gotten more and more extreme.
There is also some skill in the Republican party to lightning rod onto the members most tolerant of controversy. Alito writing the opinion isnt an accident, Im sure. Roberts is still getting to give the appearance of wringing his hands and oh what can you do now that he got the Court he wanted.
I think having a belief that your opponents are any less ideologically and personally committed or willing than your side to fight, or less able than your side, in the face of all the work Republicans have put in and their success at campaigning and monetary expenditure and organizing activity is mistaken.
I don't actually think this is the Court Roberts wants. I think he believes Alito is an idiot who is drawing too much attention to this whole affair. Roberts wants to quietly suffocate the 20th century in it's bed, not have a public execution for it. It's been an extremely successful tactic for Roberts so far.
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
Peaceful protest can absolutely be effective. You don’t need to block roads, and so on. You just need what you have always needed, the support of key workers who enable the lives of other Americans on a day to day basis. A mass strike by teachers, or grocery store workers, will bring any opposition to their knees within a week. If US meat packers said, “not a single days work until we have a direct popular vote for President and term limits for the Supreme Court” then it would get done.
But, that’s a tall order! It requires the actions of a near monolith of the people.
I can't speak for anyone else, but I am not necessarily presenting "disruptive" as the opposite of "peaceful." A mass strike would be way more disruptive than blocking a couple roads.
Though it is also worth noting that historically, strikes that target critical infrastructure are not generally permitted to stay peaceful for long
Effectively I'm presenting peaceful, disruptive and effective action (teachers just stay the heck at home and refuse to work) vs peaceful, disruptive and ineffective action (blocking roads in your home town where everyone agrees with you) vs violent disruptive action (burn down all starbucks!)
The former is the most effective, but the hardest to achieve. The latter two are rarely infective at achieving immediate change, and the last is also frequently ineffective at building support for other actions.
Fear of the latter is effective at preventing some changes (its why, for example, the red states don't just straight up bring back slavery) but the fear of it is more useful than its application, because people who feel kinda meh about your cause can be upset by you doing it.
The state exists because we have consented that it should have a monopoly on violence, because it is required that something in society be able to perform legal violence if needed. Violent protest challenges its ability to perform violence. Disruptive protest challenges the consent we give it to hold its monopoly on violence. Since the state is good at violence, disruptive protest is more effective than violent protest.
It's really annoying how people love bringing up the civil rights movement and then claiming it was nothing but protests. If it was nothing but protests, nothing would have changed. The reality is that the leaders of that movement made full use of the tools available to them. They didn't just limit themselves to protests, they also organized and voted where and when they could.
Christ, is is sad to see how we've got people here that used the whole "if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail" analogy in the threads dealing with policing and US foreign policy threads. That are now essentially advocating that the left should throw away tools, that are at it's disposal and essentially limit themselves to just having a hammer.
Things aren't going to be fixed, if people intentionally unilaterally disarm. The right has no interest in playing fair. They literally stole court seats to finally get us tot his point. That's not a a side that you can get away with throwing out usable options. Honestly, some of the responses to the leaked drafted, highlight one aspect of the left that continues to piss me off. There is a really shitty selfishness, that insists it's okay to sit by and let others be harmed because one's damned purity trumps taking actions that could make things better. That's it's a literal justification to make perfect the enemy of better.
Like Hakkekage said. You use protests to get the message out that this isn't widely being accepted, to prevent the right from making it appear that their position has majority support and to organize. With that last one, the organize bit, we use that to find leaders and raise funds to tackle the election end. In the election end we try getting people that will tell the right to fuck off, into office.
The current court makeup isn't going to change it's mind. Conservatives have a shitty mindset where backing down is considered a weakness and they value power over all else. On the end, we're not going to get enough republicans on board with removing any of these federalist fuckers from the court, even if we got DC and PR statehood and they delivered democrats four more reliable seats.
What we can do, is get a democratic majority that isn't reliant on two certain jackasses to get anything done. The filibuster has gradually been chipped away and I'll bet this decision has effectively killed it as far as most democrats are concerned. You kill the filibuster and you're back to only needing a majority vote for like 99.999999999999% of what the Senate does. That means you can get a simple majority vote to expand the court. You can also get a simple majority vote to say pass a code of ethics that member of SCOTUS has to follow. It's a simple majority that is needed for federal legislation to protect abortion rights. Simple majority needed to get a new voting rights act, that make sit harder for the right to rig elections, sot hat they can push shit like killing Roe V Wade through again. Can even use a simple majority to make DC and PR states, so that the senate is less favorable towards the GOP, which again makes it hard to go after abortion rights. Hell, could even expand the house, which again would make it harder for the GOP to undo thing.
The reality of the matter is that the rights bullshit is going to get people killed. We don't have time for people's selfish "I'm holier than thou!" bullshit. We do not have the luxury to cast aside tools, nor should we do so with voting, which is one of the hallmarks of a functional democracy. The quicker people organize and push for getting women's rights protected once again the more people that will be saved and the sooner we put the right in its plus, out of power.
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
I'm gonna trim down the quote tree a bit
They would care because they would be afraid that they can't afford not to, because they will face personal consequences for not caring
This is why the pearl clutching over the protests at Kavanaugh's house. They can ignore a crowd waving signs downtown. They can't ignore a crowd gathering outside their windows. And if they try to, the crowd might not be content to peacefully gather there indefinitely.
Effective protests are threats.
I agree with a lot of this, except the last line. I don't think it necessarily has to cross that line, but I would say that effective protests are ones that cause major inconvenience to those making the decisions. If they cannot ignore it, they have to do something about it.
Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
To be an effective protest, there has to be a threat if the target does not comply with what the protesters want. (This can be many, many different things, sometimes something as simple as withholding electoral and financial support!) The threat has to be credible and tangible to the target. (ie something that will actually prove a hardship to them if it is acted on) If they do not comply, the threat must be followed up/acted on or is it seen as empty posturing and the threat is defused.
Note how the state responds to various protests and figure out which ones they perceive as legitimate threats to the current power structure and which ones they do not.
"Go down, kick ass, and set yourselves up as gods, that's our Prime Directive!"
Would ~300 people come to a more disruptive protest?
Yes
BLM was the largest mobilization of protests in the history of the US and it’s fair to say they were more disruptive (though still overwhelmingly peaceful)
It's really annoying how people love bringing up the civil rights movement and then claiming it was nothing but protests. If it was nothing but protests, nothing would have changed. The reality is that the leaders of that movement made full use of the tools available to them. They didn't just limit themselves to protests, they also organized and voted where and when they could.
I think that's a strawman. I've repeatedly said that demonstrations are one of several necessary methods of resistance, along with strikes boycotts, and electoral politics. Others who have argued along similar lines have generally taken a similar tack.
Can also be effective by provoking assholes into doing something so obviously unconscionable that action becomes a necessity (Selma, for example).
Seems to me it's really, really hard to reach that bar these days.
(Though if anything, that seems to encourage this bunch to keep trying...)
We've all learned the lesson that if you don't keep your finger on the pulse of the limits of public morality, you will pay the price. It's a lesson that really only has to be learned once before you can vaccinate against windfalls of self destruction
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
So found via this comment from Jamelle Bouie (NYT columnist), apparently conservatives are getting huffy that the current gen of Yale Law is seeing their progressive students basically going “fuck this” and deciding to ostracize their conservative cohort (given, you know, said cohort backs the travesties we’re seeing)
it is a violation of the rights of conservative law students for their classmates not to like them
You can click through to get to the original tweet and the Free Beacon’s whining that these students are being so unfair and terrible
Also kind of refreshing to see Yale Students go “guys maybe the document created by a bunch of slave owning white land barons isn’t sufficient to preserve a diverse and equitable pluralistic society!”
(The beacon is, of course, in a tizzy about that one too)
It's really annoying how people love bringing up the civil rights movement and then claiming it was nothing but protests. If it was nothing but protests, nothing would have changed. The reality is that the leaders of that movement made full use of the tools available to them. They didn't just limit themselves to protests, they also organized and voted where and when they could.
I think that's a strawman. I've repeatedly said that demonstrations are one of several necessary methods of resistance, along with strikes boycotts, and electoral politics. Others who have argued along similar lines have generally taken a similar tack.
Elections are useful when you actually live in a functional democracy
Which, let us be clear: the United States is no such actual thing. Unless you’re a middle class white dude, perhaps.
So found via this comment from Jamelle Bouie (NYT columnist), apparently conservatives are getting huffy that the current gen of Yale Law is seeing their progressive students basically going “fuck this” and deciding to ostracize their conservative cohort (given, you know, said cohort backs the travesties we’re seeing)
it is a violation of the rights of conservative law students for their classmates not to like them
You can click through to get to the original tweet and the Free Beacon’s whining that these students are being so unfair and terrible
Also kind of refreshing to see Yale Students go “guys maybe the document created by a bunch of slave owning white land barons isn’t sufficient to preserve a diverse and equitable pluralistic society!”
(The beacon is, of course, in a tizzy about that one too)
So found via this comment from Jamelle Bouie (NYT columnist), apparently conservatives are getting huffy that the current gen of Yale Law is seeing their progressive students basically going “fuck this” and deciding to ostracize their conservative cohort (given, you know, said cohort backs the travesties we’re seeing)
it is a violation of the rights of conservative law students for their classmates not to like them
You can click through to get to the original tweet and the Free Beacon’s whining that these students are being so unfair and terrible
Also kind of refreshing to see Yale Students go “guys maybe the document created by a bunch of slave owning white land barons isn’t sufficient to preserve a diverse and equitable pluralistic society!”
(The beacon is, of course, in a tizzy about that one too)
This was the dynamic at my law school after the 2016 election. It did further radicalize some right wing students but if your significant other fundraised for Trump, well, we’re allowed to call you out for it.
So found via this comment from Jamelle Bouie (NYT columnist), apparently conservatives are getting huffy that the current gen of Yale Law is seeing their progressive students basically going “fuck this” and deciding to ostracize their conservative cohort (given, you know, said cohort backs the travesties we’re seeing)
it is a violation of the rights of conservative law students for their classmates not to like them
You can click through to get to the original tweet and the Free Beacon’s whining that these students are being so unfair and terrible
Also kind of refreshing to see Yale Students go “guys maybe the document created by a bunch of slave owning white land barons isn’t sufficient to preserve a diverse and equitable pluralistic society!”
(The beacon is, of course, in a tizzy about that one too)
Free beacon: “look at how terrible this student is! What happened to decency and the free exchange of ideas!”
Me: hot damn, how do we get more law students this ideologically sound and with a grasp that the nightmarish foundations of this country are reaching their skeletal grip through the centuries to crush us back into a landed gentry’s dream?
So found via this comment from Jamelle Bouie (NYT columnist), apparently conservatives are getting huffy that the current gen of Yale Law is seeing their progressive students basically going “fuck this” and deciding to ostracize their conservative cohort (given, you know, said cohort backs the travesties we’re seeing)
it is a violation of the rights of conservative law students for their classmates not to like them
You can click through to get to the original tweet and the Free Beacon’s whining that these students are being so unfair and terrible
Also kind of refreshing to see Yale Students go “guys maybe the document created by a bunch of slave owning white land barons isn’t sufficient to preserve a diverse and equitable pluralistic society!”
(The beacon is, of course, in a tizzy about that one too)
That violin is way to large for the amount of pity I feel for those poor souls right now.
The sky was full of stars, every star an exploding ship. One of ours.
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FencingsaxIt is difficult to get a man to understand, when his salary depends upon his not understandingGNU Terry PratchettRegistered Userregular
It's really annoying how people love bringing up the civil rights movement and then claiming it was nothing but protests. If it was nothing but protests, nothing would have changed. The reality is that the leaders of that movement made full use of the tools available to them. They didn't just limit themselves to protests, they also organized and voted where and when they could.
I think that's a strawman. I've repeatedly said that demonstrations are one of several necessary methods of resistance, along with strikes boycotts, and electoral politics. Others who have argued along similar lines have generally taken a similar tack.
Elections are useful when you actually live in a functional democracy
Which, let us be clear: the United States is no such actual thing. Unless you’re a middle class white dude, perhaps.
Are we less of a democracy now than we were during the CRM?
It's really annoying how people love bringing up the civil rights movement and then claiming it was nothing but protests. If it was nothing but protests, nothing would have changed. The reality is that the leaders of that movement made full use of the tools available to them. They didn't just limit themselves to protests, they also organized and voted where and when they could.
I think that's a strawman. I've repeatedly said that demonstrations are one of several necessary methods of resistance, along with strikes boycotts, and electoral politics. Others who have argued along similar lines have generally taken a similar tack.
Elections are useful when you actually live in a functional democracy
Which, let us be clear: the United States is no such actual thing. Unless you’re a middle class white dude, perhaps.
Are we less of a democracy now than we were during the CRM?
Filibuster being standard means in some ways yes. In other ways, obviously no.
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
It's really annoying how people love bringing up the civil rights movement and then claiming it was nothing but protests. If it was nothing but protests, nothing would have changed. The reality is that the leaders of that movement made full use of the tools available to them. They didn't just limit themselves to protests, they also organized and voted where and when they could.
I think that's a strawman. I've repeatedly said that demonstrations are one of several necessary methods of resistance, along with strikes boycotts, and electoral politics. Others who have argued along similar lines have generally taken a similar tack.
Elections are useful when you actually live in a functional democracy
Which, let us be clear: the United States is no such actual thing. Unless you’re a middle class white dude, perhaps.
Are we less of a democracy now than we were during the CRM?
Filibuster being standard means in some ways yes. In other ways, obviously no.
The myriad ways of disenfranchisement also is a thus far successful attempt to undo the extension of the franchise, aided by the dissolution by Roberts of the VRA
It's really annoying how people love bringing up the civil rights movement and then claiming it was nothing but protests. If it was nothing but protests, nothing would have changed. The reality is that the leaders of that movement made full use of the tools available to them. They didn't just limit themselves to protests, they also organized and voted where and when they could.
I think that's a strawman. I've repeatedly said that demonstrations are one of several necessary methods of resistance, along with strikes boycotts, and electoral politics. Others who have argued along similar lines have generally taken a similar tack.
Elections are useful when you actually live in a functional democracy
Which, let us be clear: the United States is no such actual thing. Unless you’re a middle class white dude, perhaps.
Like what nation is actually a functioning democracy then?
It's really annoying how people love bringing up the civil rights movement and then claiming it was nothing but protests. If it was nothing but protests, nothing would have changed. The reality is that the leaders of that movement made full use of the tools available to them. They didn't just limit themselves to protests, they also organized and voted where and when they could.
I think that's a strawman. I've repeatedly said that demonstrations are one of several necessary methods of resistance, along with strikes boycotts, and electoral politics. Others who have argued along similar lines have generally taken a similar tack.
Elections are useful when you actually live in a functional democracy
Which, let us be clear: the United States is no such actual thing. Unless you’re a middle class white dude, perhaps.
Are we less of a democracy now than we were during the CRM?
Filibuster being standard means in some ways yes. In other ways, obviously no.
I'd say definitely arguably more so then when women couldn't vote at all.
So found via this comment from Jamelle Bouie (NYT columnist), apparently conservatives are getting huffy that the current gen of Yale Law is seeing their progressive students basically going “fuck this” and deciding to ostracize their conservative cohort (given, you know, said cohort backs the travesties we’re seeing)
it is a violation of the rights of conservative law students for their classmates not to like them
You can click through to get to the original tweet and the Free Beacon’s whining that these students are being so unfair and terrible
Also kind of refreshing to see Yale Students go “guys maybe the document created by a bunch of slave owning white land barons isn’t sufficient to preserve a diverse and equitable pluralistic society!”
(The beacon is, of course, in a tizzy about that one too)
That violin is way to large for the amount of pity I feel for those poor souls right now.
Am I the only one who looked at that picture, and saw that it's playing it like a cello, so the joke doesn't work quite right?
So found via this comment from Jamelle Bouie (NYT columnist), apparently conservatives are getting huffy that the current gen of Yale Law is seeing their progressive students basically going “fuck this” and deciding to ostracize their conservative cohort (given, you know, said cohort backs the travesties we’re seeing)
it is a violation of the rights of conservative law students for their classmates not to like them
You can click through to get to the original tweet and the Free Beacon’s whining that these students are being so unfair and terrible
Also kind of refreshing to see Yale Students go “guys maybe the document created by a bunch of slave owning white land barons isn’t sufficient to preserve a diverse and equitable pluralistic society!”
(The beacon is, of course, in a tizzy about that one too)
That violin is way to large for the amount of pity I feel for those poor souls right now.
Am I the only one who looked at that picture, and saw that it's playing it like a cello, so the joke doesn't work quite right?
Posts
I am not so sure. I mean in this example, we are talking about protests in say, all of the South, as a means to influence federal legislation to make abortion illegal.
But you know, it really isn't some representatives problem in California if another state is going to shit. And given that their own constituency is willing to do the same to get their demands, and they have enough power to block, say, Arkansas getting a thing, why do anything?
The President sure would like to help but can't force anyone to do anything.
We do not have the intersectional, militant, organized, and coordinated labor movement that would be necessary to affect political change in this way. That is also something that must change if we are to reverse the rise of fascism and the deterioration of our society.
I can't speak for anyone else, but I am not necessarily presenting "disruptive" as the opposite of "peaceful." A mass strike would be way more disruptive than blocking a couple roads.
Though it is also worth noting that historically, strikes that target critical infrastructure are not generally permitted to stay peaceful for long
http://www.audioentropy.com/
Usually, however, the left is better at that sort of thing than the right. The fact that the right hates organized labor and tries to atomize workers undermines their ability to employ such tactics.
Edit - sorry for double post
The elected politicians still needed to do something. This is why the civil rights movement was working for, in part, legislative goals after all. Same with the suffragettes you mention. And afaik with the suffragettes because women's voting rights were rolled out piecemeal in the US before the 19th amendment some of the support for that amendment came from people catering to those voters.
And I think in the end politicians have learned over time. I just don't think they are that worried about protests. I think the last 50 odd years have shown they are not as scary as they once might have thought. Especially not when the ones that are the main problem have a massive multi-headed media apparatus to control the narrative. The basic issue is that why should any Republican politician give a fuck how much you are protesting them? Why do they care? They probably aren't even their constituents. And this is an issue they are very committed to politically.
Unfortunately it’s something that would take years and up to a decade of constant pressure. I don’t think the left has the willpower for a sustained campaign.
They would care because they would be afraid that they can't afford not to, because they will face personal consequences for not caring
This is why the pearl clutching over the protests at Kavanaugh's house. They can ignore a crowd waving signs downtown. They can't ignore a crowd gathering outside their windows. And if they try to, the crowd might not be content to peacefully gather there indefinitely.
Effective protests are threats.
http://www.audioentropy.com/
Id be pretty disappointed if they did! Caving to tiny, personal shows of force is bad politics!
If our opponents are as committed to their cause as we are I expect protests not to work very well as long as their constituents don't move their own positions.
Small groups, no
Which is why we're talking about a mass movement
http://www.audioentropy.com/
Collins was fainting about chalk on her sidewalk. Not because it's scary, but because it's rude. It's out of line. It's Not How It's Done. But that's "complain to Politico" concerned not "actually change anthing I do" concerned. It's the same kind of concern she has about the people she put on the Supreme Court "lying to her". It's bullshit. I think you can protest outside Kavanaugh's house all day and it'll annoy the hell out of him but he's just gonna laugh his way to work and vote to repeal interracial marriage.
It's easy to characterize them as cowards but haven't a handful of party leadership been forced out of polite company from time to time, been harassed in public, and not moved any of their positions? In fact, their positions have gotten more and more extreme.
There is also some skill in the Republican party to lightning rod onto the members most tolerant of controversy. Alito writing the opinion isnt an accident, Im sure. Roberts is still getting to give the appearance of wringing his hands and oh what can you do now that he got the Court he wanted.
I think having a belief that your opponents are any less ideologically and personally committed or willing than your side to fight, or less able than your side, in the face of all the work Republicans have put in and their success at campaigning and monetary expenditure and organizing activity is mistaken.
One doesn't work without threat of the other. Disruption doesn't necessarily mean violent and I think one of the problems is that people can mostly only protest locally.
I can't quit my job and go scream at the legislative building in Missouri.
Showing material support with bail funds and donations to the ACLU requires that I have income I can spare.
Going to the closest big city and getting angry would be Portland. Oregon is all aboard the pro-choice train as it is... disruption would be hurting people who are already on my side.
In a very real way it feels like crazy conservatives 1,700 miles away cheated and gamed the system and I can't really participate.
Honestly at this point I feel like my donations to The Satanic Temple is the best spent activism dollar I've had.
I’d argue the Republicans are in fact far more dedicated and committed to their fight than the left. As ebum pointed out, they have an inside and an outside game.
I don't actually think this is the Court Roberts wants. I think he believes Alito is an idiot who is drawing too much attention to this whole affair. Roberts wants to quietly suffocate the 20th century in it's bed, not have a public execution for it. It's been an extremely successful tactic for Roberts so far.
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
Effectively I'm presenting peaceful, disruptive and effective action (teachers just stay the heck at home and refuse to work) vs peaceful, disruptive and ineffective action (blocking roads in your home town where everyone agrees with you) vs violent disruptive action (burn down all starbucks!)
The former is the most effective, but the hardest to achieve. The latter two are rarely infective at achieving immediate change, and the last is also frequently ineffective at building support for other actions.
Fear of the latter is effective at preventing some changes (its why, for example, the red states don't just straight up bring back slavery) but the fear of it is more useful than its application, because people who feel kinda meh about your cause can be upset by you doing it.
The state exists because we have consented that it should have a monopoly on violence, because it is required that something in society be able to perform legal violence if needed. Violent protest challenges its ability to perform violence. Disruptive protest challenges the consent we give it to hold its monopoly on violence. Since the state is good at violence, disruptive protest is more effective than violent protest.
Christ, is is sad to see how we've got people here that used the whole "if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail" analogy in the threads dealing with policing and US foreign policy threads. That are now essentially advocating that the left should throw away tools, that are at it's disposal and essentially limit themselves to just having a hammer.
Things aren't going to be fixed, if people intentionally unilaterally disarm. The right has no interest in playing fair. They literally stole court seats to finally get us tot his point. That's not a a side that you can get away with throwing out usable options. Honestly, some of the responses to the leaked drafted, highlight one aspect of the left that continues to piss me off. There is a really shitty selfishness, that insists it's okay to sit by and let others be harmed because one's damned purity trumps taking actions that could make things better. That's it's a literal justification to make perfect the enemy of better.
Like Hakkekage said. You use protests to get the message out that this isn't widely being accepted, to prevent the right from making it appear that their position has majority support and to organize. With that last one, the organize bit, we use that to find leaders and raise funds to tackle the election end. In the election end we try getting people that will tell the right to fuck off, into office.
The current court makeup isn't going to change it's mind. Conservatives have a shitty mindset where backing down is considered a weakness and they value power over all else. On the end, we're not going to get enough republicans on board with removing any of these federalist fuckers from the court, even if we got DC and PR statehood and they delivered democrats four more reliable seats.
What we can do, is get a democratic majority that isn't reliant on two certain jackasses to get anything done. The filibuster has gradually been chipped away and I'll bet this decision has effectively killed it as far as most democrats are concerned. You kill the filibuster and you're back to only needing a majority vote for like 99.999999999999% of what the Senate does. That means you can get a simple majority vote to expand the court. You can also get a simple majority vote to say pass a code of ethics that member of SCOTUS has to follow. It's a simple majority that is needed for federal legislation to protect abortion rights. Simple majority needed to get a new voting rights act, that make sit harder for the right to rig elections, sot hat they can push shit like killing Roe V Wade through again. Can even use a simple majority to make DC and PR states, so that the senate is less favorable towards the GOP, which again makes it hard to go after abortion rights. Hell, could even expand the house, which again would make it harder for the GOP to undo thing.
The reality of the matter is that the rights bullshit is going to get people killed. We don't have time for people's selfish "I'm holier than thou!" bullshit. We do not have the luxury to cast aside tools, nor should we do so with voting, which is one of the hallmarks of a functional democracy. The quicker people organize and push for getting women's rights protected once again the more people that will be saved and the sooner we put the right in its plus, out of power.
battletag: Millin#1360
Nice chart to figure out how honest a news source is.
I agree with a lot of this, except the last line. I don't think it necessarily has to cross that line, but I would say that effective protests are ones that cause major inconvenience to those making the decisions. If they cannot ignore it, they have to do something about it.
Seems to me it's really, really hard to reach that bar these days.
(Though if anything, that seems to encourage this bunch to keep trying...)
To be an effective protest, there has to be a threat if the target does not comply with what the protesters want. (This can be many, many different things, sometimes something as simple as withholding electoral and financial support!) The threat has to be credible and tangible to the target. (ie something that will actually prove a hardship to them if it is acted on) If they do not comply, the threat must be followed up/acted on or is it seen as empty posturing and the threat is defused.
Note how the state responds to various protests and figure out which ones they perceive as legitimate threats to the current power structure and which ones they do not.
'Fiery but mostly peaceful.' -CNN
We've all learned the lesson that if you don't keep your finger on the pulse of the limits of public morality, you will pay the price. It's a lesson that really only has to be learned once before you can vaccinate against windfalls of self destruction
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
You can click through to get to the original tweet and the Free Beacon’s whining that these students are being so unfair and terrible
Also kind of refreshing to see Yale Students go “guys maybe the document created by a bunch of slave owning white land barons isn’t sufficient to preserve a diverse and equitable pluralistic society!”
(The beacon is, of course, in a tizzy about that one too)
Elections are useful when you actually live in a functional democracy
Which, let us be clear: the United States is no such actual thing. Unless you’re a middle class white dude, perhaps.
This was the dynamic at my law school after the 2016 election. It did further radicalize some right wing students but if your significant other fundraised for Trump, well, we’re allowed to call you out for it.
Free beacon: “look at how terrible this student is! What happened to decency and the free exchange of ideas!”
Me: hot damn, how do we get more law students this ideologically sound and with a grasp that the nightmarish foundations of this country are reaching their skeletal grip through the centuries to crush us back into a landed gentry’s dream?
That violin is way to large for the amount of pity I feel for those poor souls right now.
Are we less of a democracy now than we were during the CRM?
Filibuster being standard means in some ways yes. In other ways, obviously no.
The myriad ways of disenfranchisement also is a thus far successful attempt to undo the extension of the franchise, aided by the dissolution by Roberts of the VRA
Like what nation is actually a functioning democracy then?
I'd say definitely arguably more so then when women couldn't vote at all.
Am I the only one who looked at that picture, and saw that it's playing it like a cello, so the joke doesn't work quite right?
I'm a fucking nerd.
Violins can only get so small!