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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 14th, 2023

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  • We’ve had this sort of situation before, FDR was radically progressive on a lot of policy decisions, he made great strides ad pulling us out of the Great Depression, leading us through world war 2, dramatically reduced the wealth disparity and was so popular with the voting public he was elected 4 times. Then the politically connected wanted to make sure that kind of presidency never happened again, so they paid to get the political machinery altered to suit their needs, term limits were introduced, influential think tanks were created to push favorable public policy and install favorable political assets, launched propaganda campaigns to sway public perception and consolidated economic power.

    I agree that a single properly progressive president can do a lot to make things better, and a president who actually wields power can make some very important structural changes within the political party but it doesn’t disassemble the political machinery that led us to our current situation in the first place. It doesn’t disassemble the vast propaganda networks and think tanks, it doesn’t stop the flow of dark money into politician pockets. All these positive changes can be undone if the next guy that comes in is a shitbag.



  • With all the people talking about how the books in this one library have been destroyed, when Israel has completely razed numerous universities, hospitals and libraries. Lives and information that has been burned from the face of the earth. This level of damage pales in comparison to the damage caused by Israel in Gaza.

    If some spray paint in an American library causes you to clutch pearls but the literal bombing and razing of libraries in Gaza doesn’t get this level of response, you seriously have some inverted priorities.





  • I’m not someone deep in the throes of poverty, I’m decently middle class and I work an office job but 12 hours of my day is dedicated in service of my job. My alarm goes off at 6 so I get up, washed, and dressed in the morning, leave by 7 for about an hour drive to work, I have an 8 hour work day with an unpaid hour for work, and an hour drive back home which brings me to about 6 pm. I’m already tired from the day and by the time I’ve made dinner, eaten and cleaned up it’s easily close to 8:00. Before I’m too tired to go much further past 9:00 or 10:00.

    And before you say, “why not move closer to your job” Gee I wish I thought of that but I live at home with my parents because homeownership is quite a bit beyond my economic ability at the present moment and rent is even more expensive than having a mortgage.


  • That’s the way it is with every platform, you only have a comparatively small proportion of people who do a huge share of the posting.

    Reddit has the advantage of being absolutely massive that the power posters is also still a huge number. I’d imagine even the biggest of entire Lemmy instances is smaller than some of the major subreddits, which personally I’m fine with. This emmy instance isn’t some major corporation beholden to growing value for shareholders at all costs, but on the other end it still doesn’t mean the admins can do everything without monetary or labor support from us.




  • blackbelt352@lemmy.worldtomemes@lemmy.worldEvery day.
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    15 days ago

    Just because things were worse in the past and marginally better now doesn’t detract from the shittiness of today. And there are quite a few people trying to reimplement the policies of that time period.

    Things being worse before is not justification for not progressing to something better.


  • blackbelt352@lemmy.worldtomemes@lemmy.worldEvery day.
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    15 days ago

    We do. I’ve got friends who are harassed because of who they are, or what they look like. I’ve had friends almost die because of police kneeling their neck because he defended family from an abuser, friends who’ve been threatened and nearly attacked by homophobes and transphobes, I’ve experienced cops do everything they can to escalate situations to justify violence.

    So yeah we really do live in a dystopian era where basic rights and securities are not afforded to the people who need it most.


  • Yeah I do help locally, I’m lucky enough that I have the means and ability to help others. But that still doesn’t change the fact that people can’t just cope and hope their way out of food insecurity. Plain and simple, every single one of us needs food, our bodies and minds will go through great lengths driving us to find food, we literally cannot turn off the neural pathways that tell us we’re hungry and that we need to eat. You can’t “positive thinking” your way put of an empty stomach while your body breaks itself down for energy.


  • blackbelt352@lemmy.worldtomemes@lemmy.worldEvery day.
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    19 days ago

    Bold of you to assume I just sit on lemmy all day posting memes. Actually join in a bunch of volunteer service events throughout the year, some through work, other times personally. I also encourage others the vote for candidates who are more likely to bring about positive changes for our society.

    So, yes I am being empathetic, and that empathy does actually drive me to take the steps I can take to make other people’s lives better. But at the end of the day, all of this work can very quickly be for naught unless we simultaneously fix the overarching systems in place that led to the unnecessary problems people suffer.