![“Charlie Kirk being assassinated is the American Reichstag fire,” Matt Forney, a right-wing journalist and influencer, posted, referring to an arson attack on the German parliament in 1933 that the Nazis blamed on communists and used as a pretext to suspend a swath of civil liberties. “It is time for a complete crackdown on the left. Every Democratic politician must be arrested and the party banned under RICO [Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act]. Every libtard commentator must be shut down. Stochastic terrorism. They caused this.”](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:usktoienjig6rm5cxm46j3zl/bafkreifirwtvr5znjqzknhzx6cxkmrp6xqqimeanmwupyie5s7balhkph4)
The coming crackdown is not the result of anything that radicals or leftists did. Protestations of innocence and statistics about who is more violent are beside the point. They would try to do this regardless.
The crackdown will happen because of what we *did not do.* But there's still time to act.
Of course, it is suicidal for the Democrats, since the Trump regime will also destroy them. But that's the problem with the Democrats: they embody the contradiction of the fact that no State whatsoever, with its militarized police forces and its prisons, can ever be seen as "democratic".
in this sense, it is not surprising at all that the Democrats in the USA, if they are to choose between supporting the "lawlessness" of pro-democratic protestors, or the "lawlessness" of the State (today represented by Trump), will always ultimately choose the latter
There is no such thing as a "democratic" State: even "liberal" states allow a suspension of constitutional rights through the State of Emergency when the constitutional order is seen as threatened by "insurrection" or " invasion" – whatever the definition. Every State is at least potentially Fascist
The funny thing is that Leftists will admit this in the case of Palestine – yes, of course Palestinians has the right to defend its own land – but they refuse to admit it to Ukraine.
Specters of extinction against digital clones
But in positive terms, other people from the Eastern periphery can perhaps have a clearer grasp on the real meaning of Universalism and Internationalism, as the ideologies of the North x the South, the West x the Rest don't resonate with them.
Russia knows it, but it cynically manipulates the rhetoric to get the support of leftists and countries considered as part of the "South". Russia has obviously nothing to do with a global South – it is a disgruntled periphery of the West, a dark doppelganger of the latter
No surrender.
(📷@protest_24) #3E #EndOligarchy #GeorgiaProtests
The question is not whether "the left" can be brought back into life – even if it could, it's arguably not worth trying – but rather, what new way of thinking could be capable of confronting the current Far Right internationalism, and its rule of simulacra.
The ideology in the 21st century is primarily a simulacrum, and those who can rule it are on top of the game. The Left assumed that we are still living in the 20th century era, when ideologies were "real". So the Left became a puppet in another's game, and consequently, it became irrelevant
Trumpism was in always primarily a "clone" of Putinism, which was the "real thing" (the only innovation in the USA is the AI authoritarian aspect). Still, the Left largely supported Russia – they probably had some vague images of hammers and sickles in their mind.
In my view, the leftist support for Russia in the West after 2022 was a large factor in 2024 Trump election, not only because some "horseshoe" leftists went on to directly vote for Trump, but more profoundly because it signaled a complete lack of comprehension of the global Right on part of the Left
Today (saying this as someone from Central/Eastern Europe), it is absolutely essential to support Ukraine, and even specifically Zelenskyy, as part of any just remotely coherent "internationalist" anti-fascist strategy. But to say that "Zelenskyy is a hero" is in fact controversial for many leftists
The left is not in opposition to the far right, nor is it in "internationalist". If there ever was internationalism on the left, it died in 2022, when the left in the West largely supported Putin, or at least somewhat advocated for him
I now feel like I want to change my PhD dissertation title to "AI and Scatology", or something to that effect
Of course, this also means that the simplistic "anti-Western" discourse of the leftists from the Global South and USA is revealed as very vacuous, to the extent that the EU now largely does have a positive role in the global struggle for human freedom
At least the toxic "civilizational" discourse about the struggle between the "democratic" West and the "barbaric" Rest is gone forever, when the core West (USA) is now just as bad as Russia. From an anti-fascist perspective, neither NATO or BRICS can be seen as a bearers of any positive values
Also, we can finally say that in retrospect, 1984 completely *was* like 1984 i.ytimg.com/vi/ErwS24cBZ...
What i can’t understand, though, is that Orwell, as a Marxist, didn’t understand that slavery indeed *is* freedom for the slaveowner.
For me the “yes, this is 1984” moment came when I saw Vance claiming that Europe is “betraying its values” by trying to counter the rise of neo-fascism
Europe will certainly not get relevant by imitating authoritarian economic superpowers like USA or China - if it wants to become relevant again, it can only do so by doubling down on its Enlightenment legacy, its values of “egalitarianism” and rationality. Apart from this it has little to offer
In general, there is so much in this speech. “Soviet-sounding ugly words like misinformation” - so now science is officially considered a relic of communism- communism, considered synonymous with Enlightenment modernity as such, which is now officially a bygone, archaic era
from Russia – where they lived and resisted the authoritarian nightmare long before it also arrived to the West – lockedclub.bandcamp.com/album/it-s-m...
So I thought that if there was a sound that really articulated the zeitgeist of this accursed moment in world history, it was this "electro-punk". It has a sense of deadly vitality in it that refuses to either paint anything rosy or give up on "resistance". lipcritic.bandcamp.com/album/hex-de...
