No one has said anything remotely as stupid as this in this thread. Anyone who said anything like this would be a nutters.
The actual positions I’ve seen that disagree with you in this thread are:
There is actually a genocide going on: the one in Gaza, and it is funded by Trump. This is what people are referring to when they say there is an active genocide. They are not talking about what is going on locally.
There is not locally an active genocide, but there are a lot of things that are very easily the start of a genocide, and pointing this out is not a problem.
The term genocide is a broader concept that you seem to recognize, and you need to acknowledge this.
You are way too obsessed with the words people use rather than trying to work together with people who ultimately agree with you. You’re just creating division by making a big deal out of a single word, when it doesn’t really matter.
Refusing to use the word genocide is just as bad, as it means that, if these are the start of a genocide, this will be harder to stop.
I may have missed some, but none of them are being hysterical. And I see no good argument from you that these arguments are problematic.
Your position of “we should not exaggerate what is going on and be careful with our wording” is not a bad one. That was the last time you had any broad agreement. The thing is, none of the counterarguments seem to be exaggerations.
Just people who either support using the word “genocide” or think it’s not a big deal either way. They do not argue “it is okay to exaggerate.”
He was proposing literal genocide in Gaza, dressed up as some lovely plan to ‘rehome’ the population and then turn their land into a resort. It’s his mercurial nature and general incompetence that is, to some extent, insulating the world from the true outcomes of his ambitions.
I appreciate the fact that you are actually willing to have a discussion of the topic.
I acknowledge that people are using the word genocide in a way they feel is legitimate. But you need to see that I am not the only person who is going to see these uses of the word as exaggerations.
The problem I have with using the word genocide is that I feel it undermines what I think should be the central goal; that of getting Trump and the Republicans out of power.
I have said that we need to get more people to join the opposition to Trump if we are going to succeed.
I feel that there are a lot of people who are going to see accusations that Trump is committing genocide, reject those accusations (fairly or not), and then decide that the opposition to Trump is not a serious cause that they should join.
What exactly are you basing your opinion on? More and more Democrats are coming to accept that yes: it’s a genocide. In fact, most do right now. You, along with the Democrat establishment, are in the minority.
Or are you talking about MAGA? Do you think the Democrats should be moderating their language to appeal to the MAGA vote? How well did that work last time?
It’s a genocide. Amnesty International says it. Human Rights Watch says it. B’Tselem says it. Physicians for Human Rights-Israel says it. Omer Bartov, Holocaust and genocide studies scholar at Brown University says it is. The Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention says it is. Human rights agencies and genocide scholars the world over say it’s a genocide.
The case presented to the International Court of Justice makes a convincing case for genocide: so convincing the court ordered a number of provisional measures to prevent genocide: all of which Israel ignored.
When you see “accusations that Trump is committing genocide” what most people (like me) are really saying is that Trump and America is supporting, providing material support, and funding that genocide. You are, once again, arguing a strawman.
And it isn’t enough to have a central goal of “getting Trump and the Republicans out of power.” You have to give people something to vote for as well. And when two-thirds of Democrats think it’s a genocide, and not even Bernie can bring himself to even just say that word, you are going to have trouble getting your own supporters out to vote for you.
And it isn’t even just this one issue. Remember voter suppression? How was this not even a topic of conversation this election?
You are hyperfocused on just this one thing.
But there are multiple things the opposition to Trump need to be doing now.
The first thing is recognising it isn’t just about Trump. It isn’t game over for MAGA if Trump goes away.
You have to fight every battle. Not just the state and national elections. But for school boards. City councils. Sheriffs. Judges. Fight, fight, fight.
You’ve got to fight voter suppression.
You’ve got to fight in the courts.
You’ve got to fight the Democrat establishment, who are fighting to maintain control, and will, if given the chance, screw over popular candidates like Mamdani.
You’ve got to stand for what you believe in. Because thats the only thing that has a hope of breaking through the grip MAGA has over the media and the social media channels. No wishy washy messaging. No Hillary “I’d vote to give Trump the nobel prize” Clinton. Stand up and be counted. Defend trans people. Defend the marginalised.
Its about taking actionable steps. “Not talking about genocide” isn’t an actionable step. Its not something you can police. Its not something you can stop. And when people have been watching babies get slaughtered on their phones every single day for the last two years, is NOT a thing that will ever get them on your side.
For a long time I was like you, Little Nemo. I didn’t ever want to get angry at Trump for things he didn’t really do or won’t do. And I dislike Trump just as much as anyone. I can’t stand him. I’m always looking for more reasons to dislike him, and I’m one of his worst critics (well, among the millions that already exist)…..
But like you, I didn’t believe things like “he’s a nazi” or “he’s gonna restart slavery”…
….now, I still don’t think that…… but more and more, I AM starting to wonder more so now than I did. It’s stuff like this:
That makes me wonder. Really? Upset that a place is making slavery out to be BAD??? Uhhhhhhhhhhh….. What are they supposed to do, recommend it?
This is one of those things. Obviously slavery is bad… really bad. Bad doesn’t even begin to describe it, and yet, he wants them to dial it back?
Yeah, it’s things like that that is slowly changing my opinion away from your own to those who think “hm, well, he MAY just support bringing back slavery if it comes to it”. I feel he’d be more on the SIDE of it than AGAINST it.
You have to understand that there are a lot of people out there who just don’t care about bad things happening to others. In fact a lot are proud of how much they don’t care and love to tell you how much they don’t care.
In more over-the-top stuff, I see posts on Twitter now warning that we have to get rid of RFK Jr. “before he kills all of us” (one comment to that effect came from Keith Olbermann).
Sheesh, people, get a grip. He’s not going to kill all of us with his anti-expert and anti-science rantings and intent to ban vaccines.
Just a whole bunch of us.
That really seems to be the intent of the MAHA brigade. It’s our patriotic duty to eat well and get healthy, sabotaging our health care will force us to toughen up and fly right, and it’s too bad that weaklings will be left on the side of the road..
So just to gauge the crowd here, how do you rate the possibility of vaccination programs being eliminated and the possibility of slavery being restored?
Personally, I’d rate the first possibility as realistic and the second possibility as not realistic.
Personally, I think just getting rid of Trump and his cronies should be Job #1, and waiting until we have micro-analyzed each and every possible transgression before that main step is taken is either asinine, or deliberate stalling.
I admit to being deeply, deeply cynical and definitely in the “over-the-top” camp. I’m convinced that all the medical quackery and weakening environmental and public health programs is explicitly designed to kill off “undesirable” segments of the population, including a lot of the MAGA schmoes.
The elitists in control will always have access to, and avail themselves of, the best vaccines, the most effective drugs, state-of-the-art OB/GYN care (including abortion on demand), clean, fluoridated water, etc. But when they are not outright making medical care for the general public difficult and expensive to access, they are also steadfastly intent on making everyone else suspicious of medicine, public health, and “big pharma” while encouraging belief in “supplements” and wacko home remedies like ivermectin and chloroquine.
The next big pandemic is going to be a test of this hypothesis.
I also think getting rid of Trump and the Republicans should be Job #1.
But engaging in hysteria isn’t doing anything that helps. At best, you’re indulging yourself and having no effect. More likely, you’re making the job more difficult for those of us who are actually working at it.
