this post was submitted on 08 May 2025
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I guess you have a point about getting caught up in the American context, where so much imperial power and wealth can be leveraged to keep leftism from ever gaining an institutional foothold. It's probably the major difference between America and elsewhere, as they even work to kill leftist institutional power abroad. Sorry
Man, even the apologies are tinged in exceptionalism. I promise you guys aren't the first (or even best) to persecute dissenters.
Look, I know I come across as just pushing back to be contrarian, but if anything it's a hopeful message. I think the US left and a lot of the worldwide left have been negligent and self-centered in their political action. But I also think American leftists give their ability for action way too little credit.
There's a bit of that exceptionalism. Like if you aren't changing the fundamental fabric of the system at a national scale you are not "making a difference" or whatever, but what I'm saying, for good and bad, is that movement leftward is about institutional networks, unified strategies and long-term groundwork.
Maybe it's too late now, I don't know. But the goal should always be to get the right people to the right places. As a country in the Americas struggling with oligarchy and rising populist fascism in an unstable political landscape I say this now more genuinely than ever: you're not that special.
There are playbooks out there. Problem about playbooks is you need a team to run the plays. It's not going to be a switch flipping from degenerated neoliberalism into socialist utopia.
Definitely. The problem is that America isn't special. It might've been the dominant empire for most of our living memory, but every empire falls, and given the alterations being made to the military, it'll become capable of separating into multiple nations in the long run. That won't happen overnight and won't be caused by leftists, but they have no reason to stop it.
The long term strategy that American leftists failed to use for years was a local one. The local leftist politicians suck at appealing to local issues rather than the bigger picture, and your not wrong about it.