With Trump pulling the US out of the Paris Climate Agreement like the huge idiot he is, today seems like a good time for another Trump open thread.
Have at it! No trolls or Trump fans.
Categories
Trump Open Thread: June 2017 End of the World Edition
@Fran
That’s what I meant by kinda sorta 🙂
@Emily
Side eyeing that…
Comments policy. Thanks
@dreemr
Absolutely! I never said your friends are evil incarnate. Just that it bugs me for such people to try and weasel outta responsibility for their actions here. And for everyone else to just let em
It’s not my place to tell you not to love your friends. Not that I would if it were. Life’s way too fuckin short. Hope you and yours enjoy many more years of each other’s company ?
Fuck yeah! Dropping this here, cos it’s literally perfect:
@Axe
Gotcha. I was worried you might have thought this thing about fearing Muslims is new, because it really isn’t, and people like to pretend that just happened recently, so I’ve become accustomed to reminding others that this isn’t a new or original concept, just one that had been dormant for a few blessed years.
The old sins of the past never die, which is why I die a little on the inside when people say “BUT SLAVERY IS OLD STUFF!”
All very interesting information! So the term need not change at all, just not for the reasons I thought.
Still hoping the Republican party destroys itself. Although I hope something worse doesn’t rise up in it’s place.
Thanks @Axe & @Dalilama
I can’t really defend my friends, just as I can’t really defend myself. I mean, I could try, certainly, but it wouldn’t matter and it would be false. Fact is, we’re white, we’re of a certain age, and from a certain background. Fact is, we try not to be racist but there’s no doubt we are, some of us more inadvertently than others, and things we should have questioned more, we didn’t.
Anyway, thanks for the info and for being gracious about it.
The only thing that 65 million Americans wanted a Trump to pull out of was Mary Ann Macleod.
@dreemr
2nd time in, like, 3 days we both got thanked by the same person for schooling em. Do… do we do that a lot? ?
Wouldn’t care to hear it anyway. Apologies don’t do me any good. Like I said, whatever it takes to get the fascists out. Even if that means decent white people need to coddle their less decent white friends into decency
And knowing is half the battle
http://mlb.mlb.com/images/8/0/8/96488808/JetersNephew_wg1w34d6.gif
bless you, Francesca, i know what you mean, but yeah, slavery is old stuff… it’s been around for at least 7000 years, perhaps many more.
dreemr, I believe it already did destroy itself… and something much worse rose up in its place.
Between the self-delusional fundamentalist christians, the “prosperity gospel” christians and the bigots, there’s very little of the pre-nixon conservatism left… hell, even Barry Goldwater was wary of the fundies
@ dreemr
The bigot base really talks up the coming race war, and I think it’s a possibility. It’s not gonna be a video game, and not gonna be the romanticized “cleansing of the earth for white people” that the bigots forsee. It’s gonna be a free-for-all in a nation with 275 million guns, 300 million gallons of alcohol, a three-day supply of food and a less-than-one-day supply of medical care. Think “Cold Mountain”, but with everything on fire.
The mega-wealthy who really control the country won’t “allow” it to happen, but they may find that controlling the money supply and the army is irrelevant when the financial system collapses ant the army deserts.
I will say this:. Not going to say you should join and work with the opposition party against Trump, but I am going to say what I said to a friend of mine on why I got involved as I have (it’s a little scary, now I have a position of low level leadership and people are actually listening to me…):. You don’t like something? Then do something about it. I totally understand if someone is struggling either physically or financially but you’d be surprised how many seemingly healthy people with good jobs complain but don’t take action.
It doesn’t have to be a lot, go to a phone banking session, continue to show up at town halls, if you can afford it donate to the ACLU, or other organization you support working against Trump (I’ll be doing a day of action with the local Dem party on Saturday). Use three calls as a guideline for who to call. But giving up isn’t an option for me.
Hopefully this was sensitive and acceptable as I’m not trying to insult anyone.
@Weird Eddie
Horseshit. Pre-Nixon, conservatives worked to keep the poor poor, women barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen, queers in the closet or the grave, and nonwhites in chains. Post-Nixon, conservatives work towards exactly the same things. The idea that there’s some reasonable, non-evil ‘real’ conservatism needs to be destroyed with fire.
@KaraLora
Yes! Sometimes Governor Jerry Brown really, really does the right thing.
Personally, I didn’t even get upset when I heard that Trump had pulled out of the Paris climate accord. That’s because I’m numb and focused on survival.
BTW, California has made a pact with New York and Washington state to resist Trump:
California, New York, Washington unite to back climate pact
http://enews.earthlink.net/article/us?guid=20170601/ea8346f0-c16c-4f9b-beec-dce8faa8b1ad
Yay!
@David
Secede? No way. I don’t want this country to be ruled by competing warlords.
This is my country at least as much as it is the anti-environmentalists’. More so, when you consider that they don’t mind destroying all life in this country — and on this planet.
You know i’m starting to feel like the U.S.A was a mistake… actually most the world seems like a mistake since we seem to be producing more struggle and suffering per capita then we produce happiness and success… can someone please counter point me and make me not think this stupid thought? (You don’t actually have to counter my stupid thought i just thought it’d be a humourous(?) to end it like that and it’s no’s job but my own to educate myself)
@Overly Long Name
The ghosts of the dead Native Americans agree with you entirely.
Listening to my local Pacifica radio station while posting tonight.
They just played Willie Nelson, “Woke Up Still Not Dead Again Today.”
Take that, Trump! We’re not dead — and we resist every one of your fascist, death-dealing strategies.
@ Karalora
@ Kat
Someone needs to start keeping a tally of how often California flips the bird at this administration (climate change pact, state support for sanctuary cities, turning the state’s healthcare single-payer…). Other states, too, but knowing my own state is participating is doing wonders mitigating some of my own anxiety…particularly since my county is still an unfortunate conservative bastion, and my rep is a morally-bankrupt douchenozzle. >_>
@canadian: no kidding! What part?
I think a good way to resist is to do a bit of good where you can. Trump and his ideology is a complete antithesis to decency and kindness. He literally is a Care Bears villain waiting to be foiled by the power of love.
For some of us, simply staying alive and doing what we can to take care of ourselves is an act of resistance.
I’ve been thinking about volunteering at a nursing home. I’m just recovering from a serious depressive episode, but darn it I really feel for those old people. They might be losing their healthcare, a lot of them are pushed around by younger, stronger people, many lose their social connections as they age and God knows I know how that feels.
Old people in nursing homes another marginalized group that Trump would like to see ran over.
Oh absutely Victoria,
I certainly didn’t mean to value judge anyone or put anyone down. And volunteering at a nursing home (or if they had it at a rehab facility, which also has a lot of elderly patients) would be a wonderful thing. Hell, I’ve used an illustration of Gulliver tied down by Lilliputians as an example of resistance as everyone acting against him, no matter how small can tie him down
I’m in a bit of a better position as my job is unionized, I’m a single man without kids and my parents havey beliefs. So I’m going to do as much as I can, because I’m not at risk(and physical health is good, my mental health is about as good as it’ll be).
It’s funny, I always used to think that that bit in Hamlet where the land itself decays under the reign of an illegitimate leader was, like, figurative.
I had almost no trust in that agreement to actually save anything. Still, Drumpf gonna make everything worse.
I do like how my president sass about every leaders. I mean, that don’t remove the calms I have about him, but at least he can sass.
@Helix_luco
*Applauds
‘I always used to think that that bit in Hamlet where the land itself decays under the reign of an illegitimate leader was, like, figurative.’
I went to a play last night in which this was part of the story–the crops wither and die if someone in the community has committed an unpardonable sin, and the only way to expiate the sin and keep the community from famine is a sacrifice (usually a human sacrifice). It goes all the way back to Sophocles if not further.
“The King is the land; the land is the King” is of course a big theme in Arthurian mythology.
As for sacrifices, really you shouldn’t just use it as an excuse to off criminals and undesirables; the whole point of sacrifice is that you give up your best. That’s why in my little pagan circle I never try too hard.
One old pagan tradition I’d like to see re-introduced is, that after a few years you sacrifice the leader. That way you only get people with a real commitment to the job.
ETA: There was also a tradition in some tribes to sacrifice the last warrior to turn up to the battlefield. Don’t know whether that brought about victory; but I bet it encouraged punctuality.
This was the play btw:
https://www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/shows/common
@ guest
Wow, those reviews! Was it really that bad?