Resident_Hazard
Possessed by Starscream's Ghost
Joined: Thu Oct 07, 2004 2:33 pm Posts: 2905 Location: United States
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Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2018 4:03 pm |
Xlxlx wrote: Resident, you're clearly a very smart man and I have an appreciation for the depth your posts usually have, but I think we're just never gonna agree on this one. Where you see someone being manipulated and falling into the wrong crowd, I see a gullible, arrogant dimwit. Like circleofdestruction said, these people are basically just losers with nothing going for them save the priviliges their skin colour provides them, and they choose to use that as an excuse to attack people who have done them no harm. My heart is very hardened when it comes to their plights and problems, because victims only deserve pity until they become victimaries themselves.
You say you've been in very similar places in life as they have been, and yet here you are; not a Nazi. In fact, quite a reasonable fellow. Yes, people can learn and change, but not nearly as much as I'd like. Far too many of them are too idiotic or stubborn, clinging to their ridiculous ideas out of mere pride and fear. My country mirrors the USA in many ways, and after years of seeing similar things here, I've just given up on trying to educate people like this. Better focus on the newer generations, who aren't as down the drain as their predecessors. I would not consider myself smart. Only that I try not to seem as dumb as I am. In general, I try to avoid extremes (which is probably ironic, listening to music generally defined as "extreme", but as with movies and video games, in music, I enjoy intensity), and think that considering people lost causes, of a sort, is ultimately counter-productive. If for no reason beyond, and I apologize for the cliche', that is what they do and I would prefer not to fall to that level. Trump's defense that "they're fine people" is, of course, bullshit. Nazis are, by definition, just about the worst. As a whole, people who identify that way and get right in there are monsters. Richard Spencer is a monster. Roy Moore is a monster. Trump is a monster. But this is a movement, and even within movements, there are just people, as terrifying as that prospect may be. And people are fallible, easily broken things. I'm sure there were people conscripted into the Nazi army in WWII that weren't 100% on-board with that shit, but had really no other choice. And that was definitely a time when compassion was not going to put an end to the war. Hell, one of the most notable Star Trek episodes, written by Harlan Ellison, The City on the Edge of Forever toyed with this exact mentality, where a pacifist movement in the United States not only kept us out of the war, but also left the county in a state to be steam-rolled by the Nazis. So, I'm also not going to say force isn't an option. It is clearly sometimes the only one. People can't seem to avoid extremes right now, and I read a wonderful analysis/hypothesis about how Trump could lead dangerously to the Democrats and the left supporting their own Leftist version of him (rumors of Oprah running in 2020 already threaten to bring about this extreme). A horror show of believing we "need to combat extremes with extremes." When you fight fire with fire, you end up with a charred battlefield and little else. So, as much as I loathe Trump and how he scammed his way into the White House, I am equally annoyed by seeing people on the left adopt his mentality towards his voters and dwindling supporters. What are we going to accomplish here? Trump's support isn't dwindling because people are yelling at them, it's dwindling because people are realizing they were scammed. Arguments of "well what did you expect?" aside (people make mistakes, I'll leave it at that), he's hurting himself. Minds can be changed, and they do. Indeed, anyone unwilling to change their mind or accept that they were wrong is useless. I have a go-to judgement on this: Stay away from people with "No Regrets" tattoos. That is a person proud of never learning from their mistakes. This all noted, his support isn't dwindling fast enough, and seems to be, sadly, stabilizing. His "base" is doubling down. The Republican party itself is doubling down on him for some idiotic reason I cannot fathom. Now, that all said (and I'm sure I'm missing something I intended to add, but this is getting long), I don't disagree with you that sometimes, unfortunately, we just need to wait for some generations to just fucking die off already so the rest of the world can move forward. And hey, why don't we all fucking remember this for when we get older, so then we are not part of the fucking problem. And maybe this is where our compassion needs to be--to make sure we are working toward a world where, no matter what, Nazis are not considered an attractive (for whatever reason) option. Where extremes are not the answer. My thing, though, is that minds can be changed. Sure, not all, and sure, sometimes it seems like a lost cause, and sure, all-too-often, it seems that the good guys not only finish last, but are sometimes lucky to just be able to keep their salaried job while evil sits atop a golden toilet while they shit. Giving up on people was not, in my experience, a mentality of people on the left, or progressives. That is part of why people are against the death penalty, for instance, or 3-strikes style laws. Even when I was more of a conservative, I was under the impression that progressives were more understanding, more forgiving, and less inclined to consider other people in such black or white views. It is one of the things that has made it easier for me to accept my changing views. /diatribe Personal anecdote follows, you can skip it if you want. Personal anecdotes are not data.
I think I detailed this once, but eh, once more won't hurt.
During my mid-20's, my life was trainwreck after trainwreck, mistake after mistake, failure after failure on top of failure. I was buried beneath failed relationships, an unplanned pregnancy, a poorly-planned marriage (to someone other than my son's mother), crippling debt, endless fighting, dropping out of school (was working towards a Bachelor's after getting my 2nd Associate's), failure to secure a job in my fields, dead-end jobs, depression, anger, and a general feeling that I was never not going to be a failure.
When trying to find help to straighten out my life concerning my son--his mother and I hated each other for years and fought constantly, also the child support was crippling on top of my crippling debt--I encountered extremes. I was living an extreme as one of life's ultimate failures, and while looking for help, I ran into the proto-form of modern MRAs. At first, I thought they might offer help, but there was a lot of toxic terminology in their language. It made me uncomfortable, and some of these guys spoke in ways that seemed counter-productive.
I could understand why fathers abducted their own children and ran away. The options were against them, the government was against them, the family court system was a one-sided horror show (things have improved since then), and it left me feeling totally powerless.
I had a friend at the time that was fond of Nazi stuff (he listened to a lot of NSBM, and actually posted on here very briefly), and among that world, you run into a lot of the "blame the other people for our problems." Whites have it tougher, men are discriminated against, etc. I experienced the latter, at least, in the family court system. Things were so bad, I was desperate to feel like there was some control. I didn't get too much compassion. My mom even once made a completely useless comment about how I just shouldn't have had a kid if I didn't want these problems. That enraged me to no end and it still irks me now, thinking about it. What a fucking worthless thing to say. Thanks Captain Hindsight.
I can't say for sure why I didn't fall more completely into these extremes. I had a bunch of NSBM music in my library, but never really cared for it. Last year, I realized some was still there and deleted it, not wanting people to even stumble upon that part of my life if they sifted through my music. I was ensconsed in hard-right and conservative bullshit. The left was part of the problem, they were ruining white people, executions were fine, global warming was bullshit, etc., etc.
I try not to blame others for my problems--and in defense of myself and my son's mother, we got over our bullshit, I think, both realizing that we were in danger of fucking up an innocent child who neither asked to exist, nor deserved a life of watching his parents fighting. I hated watching my parents fight during the 7-year separation leading up to their divorce. (Prior to this, we worked together to put him up for adoption before he was born, but we both decided to keep him, and then the fighting started.) She and I raise him together. She killed the child support order, so my credit and life could improve, and we discuss everything about him. Last night, we attended his 8th grade band concert, she with her boyfriend, me with my girlfriend, and our son, a thus-far well-adjusted human being who picked the trumpet because he was lazy like his dad when it was time to pick instruments and that one looked easy.
I skirted extremes. I was very easily considered a Republican. I would watch shit like American History X and walk away having learned the wrong lesson. I watched Fight Club and instead of reading the parody and criticism of man-culture, I stupidly agreed with how they clung to MRA-style thinking. Life was a them vs me mentality, and I was always a victim. A loser. A nobody.
Now, I'm still a nobody, but eh, I'm less likely to be considered a straight loser (I hope). I turned things around (this is a story by itself), and over the years, I went from a staunch conservative (albeit, one who loathed Christianity the whole time, so figure that one out) to staunch Libertarian to a, I guess, a generally soft liberal. I don't want to get completely wrapped into something because I felt it was mistakes before. I dove headlong into my old love of skepticism and atheism and realized I couldn't hold certain views anymore along with these.
I went from a youth of making gay and racist jokes to having a best friend who is trans. I remember moments where people were less than compassionate to me, and how it made me double down, or just fall prey to raging anger and feeling worse. I also remember dating someone who I credit with being a large change in my life. An ex-girlfriend (one who I'd noted recently, as I discovered she died a year ago), was very liberal, very political, and very feminist. I went from "No-Bama" rhetoric to seeing him as one of our better presidents. I prefer stronger, adamant, feminist women, where I was threw around those slurs like Rush Limbaugh-style rhetoric.
My trans friend explains things with patience. My last two ex-girlfriend's were strong, liberal women who would call me on my bullshit. I started caring about the world my son would be growing up into. I can't say why or how my views changed. But I'd hate to have ever been considered a lost cause. No, I was not a full-blown Nazi. I never registered as a Republican or Libertarian. Maybe I wasn't fully into it. I made most of these mistakes in my 20's. I was young, and there was not enough time for me to become entrenched in my views. So that's a score to your point--I was a younger generation that had my mind changed. I even attended the (then) largest anti-war protest in Washington DC when I was in the military (I trained right outside DC).
I wasn't a lost cause, I hope. I hope no one saw me that way. I greatly appreciate the compassionate, stern, strong, and thoughtful people in my life. I am glad that I had the influences I had, despite my mistakes, failures, and regrets (of which, I have hundreds). At some point last year, an old problem nagged at me for a couple months. It ran through my head and bothered me. It was a piss-poor way I had spoken to a colleague in the military. Suffice to say, I had made crude comments to her years ago, thus killing our friendship. Last year, to clear this from my head, I sent her a random Facebook message and apologized to her for them--this was before the Weinstein fiasco, so it was not inspired by that. I kept it brief, said I shouldn't have said the things I said, had no excuse, and that I regretted damaging our friendship. I figured she ignored it. A week or two later, she messaged back, didn't remember details, only a general disgust and said she appreciated my message. I made no other comment after, for fear that I might try to make excuses for it. If I was able to learn from my mistakes, to hate myself enough for that and try to, if nothing else, just admit my error, then I think anyone can. I didn't deliver her a lengthy non-apology diatribe like Louis C.K. did, and I didn't try to make excuses. No one pressured me to this, it was my own self-loathing. I spent literal months with this coming back into my mind, goading me to say something. I'm not proud of that moment from the past, and it is really not part of my character. And it's not easy to admit, for that matter. I didn't tell my girlfriend at the time that I sent this message. I did tell my current one.
So, sorry about the length of this. I should really get back to work. But I just hate dealing with these DWG files, so I guess I was inspired. Progressives inspired me by not being extremists. I came to respect that and find that it appealed to me. I'd hate to see that level of compassion lost now that I finally found my way to it. Sure, some people are lost causes. But people also surprise us, sometimes. Oscar Schindler wasn't a lost cause, was he? Was he black or white, or did he reach that morally gray area where we can acknowledge his errors while praising his good deeds? Life isn't Star Wars, where the universe is entirely made of morally black or white characters except for Benicio Del Toro.
In my view, we should remember that, and not consider people lost causes. Neo-hippie bullshit aside. There are Nazis and there are people, and sometimes people get lost and need compassion to get out. And sometimes we need to wait for them to die so we can move forward. We are not all one or the other. That is how Trump thinks. And that is why Trumpism must be stopped. But not by using a different form of Trumpism, I hope.
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