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.
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Trump Open Thread: June 2017 End of the World Edition
@SFHC
So I was very wrong. My apologies. And yeah, all the reading and learning in the world doesn’t make me an expert on Australian culture over actually spending time living there. It was a reasonable question to ask you, since I didn’t feel like being lectured on “shit that you’ve heard 2nd hand about life in America”. But now I’m all ears.
I didn’t even realize you were actually calling me a racist. Just to clarify… I’m a racist, how? Because I am annoyed when some people assume that any working class person is able to financially withstand job loss, as long as that job loss is aligned with goals like preventing climate change? Because I’m annoyed that Dems don’t focus more on promoting job growth and spreading the jobs around?
If this is because economic anxiety is often used to overshadow other issues, especially racial issues, we don’t disagree. Economic anxiety is not the only issue on the planet. But why the fuck does shit have to be to the extremes? It’s like you either act like working class economic anxiety is the only issue on the planet, or you pretend that working class people that get upset about job loss are fucking whiners that need to STFU.
@Kupo-
I don’t want anyone to die, any more than you wanted Africans to die for the lithium in your computer. But it’s not just a job. It’s independence, healthcare, buying your kids school supplies, sleeping in a bed, buying food. It’s getting into debt, because you need a steady work history to be poor enough for debt, kupo.
It’s being able to considering something OTHER than suicide as the cure for your mental illness, as you’re losing Medicaid, again, and what the fuck else do you have?
@Axe
Likewise, axe, I’m all ears. I mean unless this is just a general “Fuck you, all Americans are all economically privileged” thing. Because yes, yes we are.
“Of course it’s the Democrat’s fault.”
No it’s not the Democrats fault at all.
But for any Democrats that want to resond to this by going “hahahahahahaha, now all the poor folks there get to suffer
whether they voted for the Republicans or not, fuckers”, they’re assholes. And fuck them.[Edit] Let me restate that I am not aiming this at anyone here. This is aimed at a certain section of Democrats that seem to have forgotten that they should help the poor. ALL the poor.
@mrex
Don’t fucking condescend to me like I don’t know what debt is. Like I didn’t support myself on minimum wage. Like I didn’t rack up debt supporting my partner while he died from cancer that medicaid kept refusing to pay the bills for.
Democrats aren’t the ones taking away your fucking healthcare. And republicans aren’t doing a god damn thing to help you keep that job, despite their silver-tongued lies.
Edit: Who the fucking is saying that? Did you see that on Fox news or something?
Yes, who needs a liveable planet as long as coal miners have jobs, right?
@Kupo
Not trying to condensend or act like you haven’t been through through tough times. But… you had a job. You could only support your partner because you had that job.
For what it’s worth, I’m sorry to hear about your partner. Differences aside, that shit really sucks. I’m truly sorry.
And no, that particular nugget was said to my face.
Edit: Also, why do you think I’m Republican?
And he was jobless for a long time (before he got sick) but that doesn’t mean he should expect democrats to get him a job in a fucking coal mine.
That’s your argument, isn’t it? You think democrats don’t care about coal miners because they actually want a planet that’s liveable?
I never said you were a republican, btw. You said dems aren’t doing enough for the jobs of the factory workers and coal miners. I’m reminding you that the only other major political party isn’t, either. The excuse of economic insecurity is just that, an excuse. The real issues are sexism (anti-abortion) and racism (those foreigners are stealing our jobs!).
Look, Kupo, I’m sorry for upsetting you.
@Pagan
“Yes, who needs a liveable planet as long as coal miners have jobs, right?”
Sounds dramatically black and white. HRC’s plan was to find ways to bring new jobs to coal miners. Much better plan. Too bad it was too hard to hear over the Republican war drums.
[Edit]
That’s your argument, isn’t it? You think democrats don’t care about coal miners because they actually want a planet that’s liveable?
No, it’s annoyance that some can’t realize that joblessness is a problem that deserves a space on the table.
And what infrastructure there is in the rural south, is mostly there due to the New Deal. That Democratic program that Republicans hated.
We can’t win. If we say working class rural people vote Republican because they’re too ignorant to know that the GOP is the ones hurting them the most, we’re condescending.
If we say they vote Republican because they’re racist, misogynistic and homophobic, then we’re mean and don’t you know they have economic anxiety that makes them want to scapegoat.
I’m also not sure why it’s assumed that Democrats are wealthy elites. On average, Democratic voters have less wealth than Republican voters.
I do have more privilege than a lot of people but I am from a white working class family and there are a wide variety of political opinions. Being a white working class person does not magically turn you into a right winger who scoffs at the liberal elites.
The right wing members of my family are racist as fuck. They could not care less about economic issues. When they talk politics it’s mostly the Muslims or black people or how icky it is for Ellen Degeneres to not hide the fact that she’s a lesbian. I’ve done a lot of door to door political stuff, including in rural and the working and middle class conservatives always talk about abortion or scary black and brown people or how horrible it is that Democrats only bomb countries full of brown and black some of the time instead of all of the time like the Republicans do. It’s the rich Republicans in the wealthy suburbs who talk economic issues and they want low taxes and poor people to be subservient to them and/or die.
I know it’s not. That was an utterly sarcastic response I gave you for talking about the rural communities that are hurting because of GOP policies fucking them over, and your seeming inference that the Democrats somehow are at fault for not fighting harder for them.
And nobody but assholes are rejoicing because they’re losing their coverage, because Democrats are losing their coverage, too!
Try not to sound so goddamned divisive. And selfish.
And who are these “some”? You said democrats earlier. Care to name names? All of my representatives up to the state level are dems and they’re all in favor of programs to help the jobless. I don’t know the policies of every representative, though, so if you could fill us in on who your beef is with?
Why would someone say that to your face if unless you were Republican? That makes zero sense.
Y’know pollution isn’t some vague concept for factory workers and coal miners, the people doing the job are the first to get sick and die. At my ex’s old job just about everyone in one room got brain cancer. (Total concidence, mmmhmmmmm). I could go on.
The people doing these jobs aren’t doing them because we think getting cancer from pollution and chemical exposure is great. We’re doing it because, until the moment we have a socialist utopia, we have to work to survive.
@ mrex:
Yes and no. Mostly no.
If you’re familiar with the concept of kinetic vs potential energy, that’s a decent analogy. If you have two objects moving down a slightly slanted track at the same speed (for the moment), then they have the same kinetic energy. But if one is higher up on its track than the other is, there’s a disparity of potential energy.
Similarly, a POC, or a woman, or an LGBTQ person, will find it more difficult to earn more money than what they have right now, compared to you. So though you might be equally poor in this moment, your prospects are still better than theirs. It’s easier for you to find a job. It’s easier for you to get a raise. It’s easier for you to get a loan.
I’m not saying it’s EASY, just that it’s EASIER. You’re higher up on the track.
Not understanding this is a hallmark of privilege. And I know it’s difficult for people with economic difficulties to imagine that they’re privileged; most struggle with this. “I’m hurting, so don’t tell me I have it good” is a common refrain. And nobody here is saying you have it good; merely that others have it worse, because the system is stacked against them in ways it isn’t stacked against you.
@kupo I doubt that any elected leader would have the balls to actually go on record with that. Or at least mine are too awesome.
Tell you what. What’s your email? I’ll spend the next 6 months collecting all the dumb shit I hear Democrats say, and then email you the results. I won’t promise that 90% won’t be from me.
Wait what? Didn’t say that.
Mrex,
What is it that you actually want Democrats to do?
You come out with a tone argument.
People point out that lots of Democratic voters and/or progressives do care plenty about economic issues and plenty are poor themselves.
People point out that while the Democratic party is far from perfect but that they have better records than Democrats.
You continue with tone arguments and strawmen arguments like this
Did anyone say that it’s wrong for people in coal mining towns to take jobs in that industry? I’m sure someone somewhere who identifies as liberal said that, but in all the time I’ve spent around people on the left end of the spectrum from Democratic party loyalists to left wing anarchist and everything in between, I’ve never actually heard anyone say it’s wrong for poor people to work the jobs they had to work to survive.
You seem to have decided on the conclusion that Democrats are elitists and it’s all our fault that Republicans ever win any elections because we’re all smug assholes and then had to scramble to make the information fit the premise when your conclusion was challenged.
If you don’t anything more concrete than just Democrats being meanie pants, please just stop posting in this thread. Because I don’t even know what you’re trying to accomplish other than annoying the rest of us anymore.
@mrex
Why would I want you to spam me with emails about this nonsense? Just fucking say you don’t have an answer.
Oh, yeah, asking for Kupo’s email? Not a red flag at all.
You’re partisanship is showing. You’re here to bash the Democratic party.
@Dreemr
Because those evil Democrats want infrastructure for the colored folks too, you see. And that would mean that their tax dollars would be spent on [ethnic slur]s, and that’s simply unconscionable to them.
@Dalillama
That would be giving hand-outs to people who didn’t earn it!
As an aside, I’ve been training my cat to take medicine twice a day. I was talking about it to a colleague who is republican and when I described giving her a reward after she gets her medicine he got huffy and said how some people don’t think animals deserve rewards for doing what they’re supposed to. It just struck me as so incredibly irrational but also so close to their stance on government aid. In his mind, my cat should do something above and beyond to “earn” a reward. In my mind, I care about my cat’s mental and emotional health as well as her physical health, and I know this helps make her happy after she has to do something she doesn’t want to do. My cat comes over to get her medicine now because she wants the reward. Before the training was done she was hiding from me under the bed every time she saw the medicine in my hand.
@ kupo:
I’m glad your cat now takes her medicine without a hassle. I hope whatever condition calls for that ends soon with a full recovery, if possible.
That colleague is clearly neither a (good) pet owner nor a (good) parent. Most animals (people included) need to be encouraged to form good habits. And how in the fuck does he think the cat will know what it’s supposed to do? Just magic? Or should all beings just be perfectly compliant at all times to the will of their betters? Oy. There’s a deeply stupid yet self-congratulatory tone to your colleague that just sets my teeth on edge.
“Similarly, a POC, or a woman, or an LGBTQ person, will find it more difficult to earn more money than what they have right now, compared to you. So though you might be equally poor in this moment, your prospects are still better than theirs. It’s easier for you to find a job. It’s easier for you to get a raise. It’s easier for you to get a loan.
I’m not saying it’s EASY, just that it’s EASIER. You’re higher up on the track.
Well, if you’re going to use “you”, I’m a bi-sexual single mother that has been long term unemployed and has severe mental illneses that cause problems with work performance and severe relationship problems. I’ll probably be committed soon, or dead. I’m going to be unemployed for the foreseeable future. (And yeah, I have an ex that pays support. I have family that helps me. I am VERY appreciative of all the good in my life).
And yes, I am also white. I have white privilege. And yeah, I have it better than a crazy BPD longterm unemployed bisexual single mom WOC, but I’m not so convinced that “you have it better financially than someone” means economic privilege in the general sense.
And if that’s the case, then fuck everyone in the US, POC included. With their computers . And microwaves . And fans .
@ mrex:
I’m sorry to hear about your health and economic issues, sincerely. I do wish you well.
Privilege just means advantage. Intersectional feminism is about seeing that there are a lot of overlapping kinds of privilege, including but not limited to racial, sexual, religious, familial, socioeconomic, physical, mental, and so on. That’s the basis on which I replied. I’m not trying to lecture, merely to note that I disagreed with your statement, and then to explain why.
Again, I’m not trying to in any way suggest that you’re facing an easy set of circumstances. From the sounds of it, the opposite is very much the case. Other people have their own set of privileges or lacks thereof, though. And so any two people with similar economic situations are not necessarily as poor as each other; they each have different paths forward.
I was specifically addressing that one sentence, and that one idea, in one of your posts. I’m not trying to make a broader argument here. 😉
Yay, Pittsburgh, my hometown!
‘Outmoded, irrelevant vision’: Pittsburghers reject Trump’s pledge
The president said he was exiting the Paris climate deal on behalf of Pittsburgh – but his view of the environmentally minded city is off by decades, residents say
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jun/02/pittsburgh-trump-paris-climate-deal#img-1
Although pollution in Pittsburgh was bad back in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, it was by no means hell with the lid off then. Pittsburgh started to clean up its act in the 1940s. This is the corner of Liberty and Fifth Avenues, 8:38 a.m., in 1940:
It makes me want to cry to think of what my relatives went through to have the privilege of living and working in the Steel City.
We’re not going back!
Here’s the link for photos of Pittsburgh back when it was, as my mother put it, “H E double hockey sticks”:
https://www.citylab.com/design/2012/06/what-pittsburgh-looked-when-it-decided-it-had-pollution-problem/2185/
@WWTH
“You seem to have decided on the conclusion that Democrats are elitists and it’s all our fault that Republicans ever win any elections because we’re all smug assholes and then had to scramble to make the information fit the premise when your conclusion was challenged.”
It wasn’t challenged though, because my premise was never that all Democrats are meanie pant elitists that win Republicans elections. My premise was that some Democrats are raging classist assholes who shit in the punch, including on issues such as joblessness, and then seem to go along their merry way, since questioning other Democrats is bashing, or tone policing, or something.
What would make me happy? A little more openess to criticism, and discussion, of any kind. We’re a party that’s shedding seats and struggling. Obviously something is going wrong.
And I’m not saying I know the answer to that.
I don’t really remember my point anymore either. Don’t worry, after this I’m out.
@Kupo, OK. I don’t have it, yet. But if you want proof, I will get it. Without spamming you, or being weird.
@CT
Ok, that makes sense.
I guess I just get confused when people pull “white” like it’s the end all of all privileges, and no other intersections matter. And maybe I really am just racist, and blind, but that just seems incredibly wrong to me. Even if being white matters A. Fucking. Lot.