[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 92 points 1 month ago

Israel’s national anthem loudly jeered before Olympic soccer match against Mali

Israel’s national anthem was loudly jeered before its soccer team kicked off play at the Paris Olympics against Mali on Wednesday night.

When it came to Israel’s anthem, boos and whistles immediately rang out. The stadium speaker system playing the anthems then got notably louder in what seemed like an effort to drown out the jeers.

This is just the appetizer… I’m hoping that Israel gets booed hard during the opening ceremonies. Though I strongly suspect the broadcasters are expecting this and there will be shenanigans to ensure the broadcast will barely register any booing at all, no matter how loud it actually gets.

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Based on the coconut tree from which I fell, my IRL social circle skews heavily towards white, conservative evangelical and Catholic types. I also have an unhealthy obsession with following these same politically conservative white evangelical individuals and groups on social media.

And what’s surprising to me is, since shortly after Oct 7, it seems that the overwhelming opinion of relatively younger (let’s say under 40) people in this demo is at least some sort of soft anti-Israel opinion. The boomers, they still have that Fetterman-esque love for Israel. But younger conservatives… I usually see opinions about how we shouldn’t send Israel any more money, or acknowledging that Israel is committing a genocide. And it seems like it’s the overwhelming opinion from young conservatives, too. I’m sure there’s plenty of younger conservatives that do support Israel, but anecdotally that group feels very small.

That’s not to say I’m seeing a lot of pro-Palestinian sentiment, because I’m not. That’s probably a bridge too far for them. Also probably related to the fact that most Americans are just so incredibly ignorant about what goes on in other parts of the world, they can’t formulate full thoughts on these issues.

For months now, I’ve been all geared up to argue with anyone I know IRL who supports Israel. But it’s just never happened. Either people care or have any opinion one way or another, or they are critical of Israel. Not what I was expecting.

I wonder if AIPAC and Israel realize just how much they’ve lost younger Americans, probably for good (not that they care, they’ll just keep buying off American politicians).

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Not exactly a revelation to Hexbear users but it’s a shower thought I just had.

Death to America.

[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 102 points 2 months ago

Remember in the first days of the genocide, when Israel bombed a hospital (I think it was Al-Shifa?) and killed like 400-500 people? Except Israel came out and said “oh that wasn’t us that was a wayward Hamas rocket”. And then the American media did a full court press of taking everything Israel and the US govt said at face value. And even beyond that, all the major news outlets would keep bringing on OSINT guests who would explain how it could have been a Hamas rocket, but rarely if even did they explain why it was Israel?

No one can possibly think that it was anyone other than Israel now. But that whole thing has been memory holed (like the beheaded babies) so even if you try to remind people about it, they don’t care.

[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 99 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

The new theorized death toll numbers (from Lancet) are too much to bear. If those numbers are true, then the genocide of Gaza - in terms of a percent of the population killed and wounded - is right up there with the worst crimes of the 20th century. The Nazi invasion of the USSR, the American genocides in Korea and Vietnam, the bombing of Cambodia, etc. And all of those took place over a matter of years, not months.

Death to America and Death to Israel. Libs in the US had better pray to whatever deity might be out there that this country never gets what it actually deserves. Because Jeremiah Wright was right. We absolutely deserve hell on earth.

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Obviously it wasn’t like those child emperors wielded any power whatsoever. They were just a sieve by which whatever the rich and powerful wanted would happen.

I was thinking about how Trump himself isn’t “dangerous”. He’s a moron who doesn’t actually care about anything policy-related. But it’s specifically because of that, he simply enacts whatever the capitalists pulling the strings in the GOP want - and no doubt, the GOP’s agenda is awful.

Of course, that doesn’t make Biden any different. The man clearing has pudding for brains now. It’s obvious Nuland was and Blinken now are running the show in foreign policy. And even if there’s a different group of capitalist who support the Democrats, ultimately what they want is largely the same as the GOP capitalists.

Good times up ahead…

[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 103 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Just citing Biden’s twitter account here… he is “appalled” at the protest of land being auctioned off in occupied Palestine (where all the violence came from the Zionist side) but merely “disturbed” that a white American woman tried to drown a Palestine child in a pool recently.

Fuck you Genocide Joe

[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 97 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Violence outside L.A. synagogue taxed LAPD, sparks condemnation from Biden, Newsom, Bass

Sharing this article only to highlight how the propaganda machine works.

The article first talks about how all these very important people (Biden, Newsom, Bass) are condemning pro-Palestine protestors for targeting a Jewish synagogue.

The last part includes several sympathetic interviews with members of the congregation.

Sandwiched in there is a brief mention of why that specific synagogue was protested at the specific time: there was a presentation/meeting going on about buying up land in Gaza. So… just a little “how can we take advantage of the genocide and ethnic cleansing going on?” shindig. Never is anyone on the pro-Palestine side even interviewed to give their side.

The way it is written gives the uncritical reader (most readers) the impression that Jewish congregants are being targeted just for being Jewish. That they give a mention of the stated reason is irrelevant when you soak your article in condemnations from government officials and when you only provide statements from one side.

Edit: turned on Hasan a moment ago, he’s discussing the protest. Pretty awful stuff coming from the Zionist side that was never mentioned in the LA Times article like “sand n-words go home!” And the violence was entirely one-sided (Zionists attacking protestors) but the article never mentions that, it conveniently focuses on “arrests”.

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submitted 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) by Greenleaf@hexbear.net to c/games@hexbear.net

I’m in the fortunate and privileged position of having some very long term friends in my life. Unfortunately, we’re now spread across the country. We’d like to try and keep our social connection by playing a TTRPG over zoom or something.

I have never played a TTRPG before. I really got into Disco Elysium and that’s got me interested in TTRPGs. Other friends have been interested for years but no one’s bothered to try and organize something. So all of us have zero experience with running an actual game. And no one to guide us through it who has experience.

I’m looking for recommendations for a TTRPG for us get started on. Needs to work over Zoom. I’d say the most important aspect is that it’s fun and social. “Fun” sounds like an obvious one but the reality is I have one shot to make playing TTRPGs “stick” with this group. If my friends don’t have a great time with it we’ll probably not play after this.

Happy to answer any questions about myself or my group that would help you come up with a recommendation.

[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 139 points 3 months ago

Reminder that “Stockholm Syndrome” isn’t real and isn’t recognized as such. It all comes from one instance (and apologies, I’m going off of memory) of a woman who was kidnapped but she didn’t want the pigs to intervene because she knew they would make the situation worse and would be more likely to kill her than work the situation out (which she was working on). Later, a psychologist evaluated her and was basically “well that’s just silly to not trust cops, you’re a woman and irrational so clearly you must have fallen in love with your captors”. And that’s literally how we got “Stockholm Syndrome”.

[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 98 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

We are self-deprecating and irony poisoned enough, time for a bit of an antidote.

This news mega, and Hexbear writ large, is such a great resource for understanding what’s going on in the world. Proof that the immortal science of Marxism-Leninism really is the most powerful lens for understanding the reality around us.

I sat down and ate breakfast for a long time at a hotel over the weekend. The breakfast room had Fox News blaring the whole time. Obviously you’re getting a heavy reactionary slant on things with them. But beyond that, it’s just the quality of information was so low, it was actively harmful to watch. You’d better informed not watching anything and absorbing information about the world around you from the ether. Saw some MSNBC last month and it’s not much better. Not so much inventing reality from whole cloth like Fox News, but still leaving out plenty of critical information, without which you still really can’t understand the world around you.

It’s never been more clear to me how deeply propagandized mainstream news is. It’s not even always a conscious act (though it definitely is a lot of the time), just your normal base/superstructure stuff.

And this news mega, this site, and Marxism broadly is such an oasis. Helps you not only stay properly informed, but keeps your sanity as well.

[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 93 points 4 months ago

Multiple outlets reporting (I’m reading the Al-Jazeera live feed) and a spokesperson for the UN secretary-general has confirmed that Israel attacked a UN-marked vehicle on the way to the European Hospital in Gaza as a part of their duties. One UN staffer was killed and another injured.

I am 1,000% sure this is was intentional and retaliation for the UN vote last week. Death to “israel”.

[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 116 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Hasan brought up a good point on his stream earlier. The “safe zone” is like 20 km from Rafah. That is not an easy hike to make quickly for a young person in good health. Now consider how much harder it is for an elderly person, a child, or someone who is injured. And that’s before considering that Gazans have been living in famine conditions for a while now. As a parent, even as a matter of life and death, I don’t think my little kids could walk 20 km in the timeframe the IOF is demanding.

This is inhuman evil. The Zionist entity is truly on an eye-to-eye standing with the Nazis, and all their enablers like the US are with them too. Death to “israel” and death to America.

[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 100 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

The following is a comment left by user Emma under the Naked Capitalism story about Türkiye cutting off trade to Israel. Sharing it because it makes me hopeful, and I think we all appreciate having some hope:

I will say that I don’t think there’s going to be a real day after for Israel or the West, even if they ethnically cleanse all of Gaza or put it under some sort of PA led Vichy regime.

Ilan Pappe said that he thought the next 12 to 24 months will be very hard, but then Israel will break from its internal contradictions. People will leave, the struggles in the West Bank and with Hezbollah will intensify, and there won’t be a sustainable Jewish entity on the other end.

The external factors will also be very harsh on Israel. Once Russia is done in Ukraine, it and China will look to help Syria recover its territory and economy. Iran and China will also want to bring Iraq fully into the BRICS system and out of American domination. The salvo from this new Bahraini resistance organization suggests that Iran’s Axis of Resistance is spreading into places ruled by Western placed emirs and kings. The actual positions of ISIS and other regional players has been unveiled by their actions. All in all, an Israel that is now clearly intolerable to basically all Arabs is not going to last in a sea of Arabs.

Yes there are the nukes and the Samson option, but I don’t think Israelis have it in them to die for the land. Look how quickly the fanatical settlers in the north and around the Gaza envelop abandoned their homes. Look at how quickly the ultra orthodox deeply implicated in pogroms in the West Bank and lies of Zaka, threatened to leave the country if they’re called up for conscription. Look at the desertions of reservists in the latest call ups.

Would any of these people, who can still have comfortable lives in the Levant or in the West, really give up their lives for a land that they’re only willing to kill for (and in many cases, brainwash the young into killing for them)?

Especially now that their finally waking up somewhat from their October 7 freakout and are confronting the fact that Mass Hannibal was likely responsible for the majority of civilian deaths, and that their ‘most moral army in the world’ shot 3 white flag waving defenseless hostages in cold blood.

The Afrikaans didn’t use their nukes, even though their ties to the land go back centuries and their ancestors did die in large numbers in the Boer War. So while the chances of the Israelis using nukes is not zero, I hope and think its quite unlikely

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Claiming you want to see the downfall of the CPC is akin to wishing for the deaths of all 1.4 billion people:

Reverse uno card on all those “criticizing Israel is antisemitic” freaks.

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Thought this was an interesting analysis, though I think it needs to be taken with a bit of a grain of salt (I think it’s power is what is qualitatively describes rather than precise numbers, and I think the author might even agree with me).

I’m always on the lookout to see it quantified how much the average American benefits from imperialism. My guy says if the US was unable to exert hegemony, the US would experience at least what Russia experienced in the 90s. These numbers align with that; and this is only talking about dollar hegemony and not, for example, the US using military pressure, sanctions, or other methods for extracting cheaper resources and goods from the global south.

That said, I’m not sure you can just run a regression and get your answer. I don’t see how you can isolate the US losing dollar hegemony without it then creating an uncountable number of secondary effects. All this stuff is deeply interconnected. But that said, I think this does a good job of highlighted at least in a qualitative sense just how much Americans benefit from dollar hegemony, and how losing that would be huge problem for the US economy.

[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 97 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

I can’t find an article that explicits says so, but it looks like by my math every House democrat voted in favor of sending tens of billions of $ to Ukraine and Taiwan. So that includes AOC but also Cori Bush, Ilhan Omar, and Rashida Tlaib.

It could be as simple as these “progressives” don’t want to upset the apple cart with DNC leadership; or have to explain why they broke from the party. Possible - but unlikely - that these social fascists recognize how important US and NATO hegemony is the preserve imperial spoils.

Honestly though, I feel like the answer is as simple as:

USA good

Russia bad

China bad

I was watching the super lib “Handmaids Tale” last night (not really by choice). Gilead - the former USA turned into an evil religious conservative state - shoots down some planes from the old, “good” US government. One of the Gilead leaders says “we’ve already been congratulated by the Russians, Chinese, and North Koreans for sticking it to the Americans”. The episode finished with a schmaltzy scene of Americans reciting the pledge of allegiance. And made me think… libs really just see Russia and China as “bad”, and are utterly incapable of seeing the USA as anything other the good guys who occasionally get it wrong but it’s nobody’s fault, really. Russia and China bad because “authoritarianism” and any reason they have for hating us isn’t based on material reality but because they hate the goodness we represent.

I have met a few House reps in my life, and know people who know some of them even better. I can tell you with a high level of confidence that these people as group don’t have a level of geopolitical understanding that’s any higher than your typical college-educated American. This news megathread alone operates on a level these people will never think at. They cannot (and refuse to) see American imperialism. The US is good and these “authoritarian” countries are bad. NATO keeps the world safe. Taiwan should be free. These cliches are the terms in which libs - including those who make policy decisions - think at and it never goes beyond that.

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My single issue is “anti-genocide”. I wonder which party is more anti-genocide 🤔

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submitted 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) by Greenleaf@hexbear.net to c/art@hexbear.net

Can’t find the year it was painted.

comfy

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submitted 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) by Greenleaf@hexbear.net to c/news@hexbear.net

The girl’s mother and her sister were also murdered in the same attack on Khan Younis.

Reminds me of this photo from 20 years ago.

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As always, Death to America amerikkka

[-] Greenleaf@hexbear.net 150 points 5 months ago

Numbers 2, 3, and 4 wouldn’t even cost the US government or Americans anything. Literally just “stop being assholes to Cubans, Venezuelans, and Mexicans living in the US” and of course the US will reject this.

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This wasn’t in a rural area or impoverish inner ring suburb. This was in an older but perfectly nice suburb of a large midwestern US city. I had two friends at the time who were just out of college and teaching in public schools. And they both bought houses. One had a spouse who was working (normal job, not high pay or anything) but the other was single. I know for a fact they didn’t have any help from parents. I do know they both had most of their school paid through scholarships so little to no college debt, fwiw. Went on google street view to check out the houses - not large but definitely comfy. Around 1,600-1,700 sq ft single family homes with a yard and everything. Something a small family would be comfortable in.

And I mean, I was looking at buying a home around that time, too (and for years afterward). My salary was above the national median but not that much above it. There were lots of options - the only reason I didn’t buy was because my life situation was not stable. I don’t live in that city anymore but looking at my salary now and what’s available on the market, buying a home is pretty much out of reach for me. Certainly what I could get now, in terms of square footage, is drastically reduced. I’m not even taking into account current interest rates, I was just plugging in numbers at the old 4%.

That’s how fast material conditions have eroded for a lot of Americans. This is what journalists who write this articles about “aww why are young people so down these days, they should just cheer up all that bad stuff is all in their head” completely miss. Probably because in all likelihood, they bought a house a couple decades ago and are secure themselves. It’s why the dems’ bullshit about how the economy is so great is so offensive to us. It’s a denial of reality.

Generational politics is bunk, but I also think inequality should be thought of along multiple axes. One is whether or not you bought a house 15-20 years ago or not. If you did, then you’re sitting on a mortgage that is relatively low which makes your material conditions comfortable. You’re not feeling the effects of the bad economy as much. If you’re under 30, then it’s not possible to be in that situation.

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Greenleaf

joined 9 months ago