• Hey Trainers! Be sure to check out Corsola Beach, our newest section on the forums, in partnership with our friends at Corsola Cove! At the Beach, you can discuss the competitive side of the games, post your favorite Pokemon memes, and connect with other Pokemon creators!
  • Due to the recent changes with Twitter's API, it is no longer possible for Bulbagarden forum users to login via their Twitter account. If you signed up to Bulbagarden via Twitter and do not have another way to login, please contact us here with your Twitter username so that we can get you sorted.

American Politics Thread

Status
Not open for further replies.
Reader mode
prog rocker said:
Just for that I already consider her a terrible person. Like, seriously, WTF?
Click to expand...
It's seriously despicable. If you've ever heard of Alex Jones, that creep made money off of promoting that conspiracy on his show. Some people that believe it went so far as to harass the parents of victims, because they think they're faking it. (It's so bad Wikipedia has to have a whole separate article for it) And while Sandy Hook was the most prominent, I know the Parkland teens got harassed and accused of faking it, too. Plus there's a general conspiracy that every mass shooting is a fake, so there's always people at least disrespecting victims of any attack, if not going so far as to harass them. And notable figures, too- a Fox News host mocking a Parkland victim, a conservative filmmaker mocking the Parkland teens when a gun control bill didn't get passed, and a former Congressman and CNN commentator said the teens trying to get gun control passed were probably being funded by Soros and antifa, which has the fun of accusing a Jewish survivor of the Holocaust of secretly controlling the world with his money on top of mocking victims of a shooting.

I don't know if you would call it a culture war, but somehow America's turned gun control, something which really doesn't have this kind of polarization elsewhere in the world, and make it to where "they're gun grabbers trying to take your guns!" can be turned into a legitimate political talking point. And some people latch on so tightly to "we don't need any kind of regulation" that they don't want to confront tragedies like these, and so they decide they're fake.
 
swiftgallade46 said:
It certainly isn’t only true for economic policy, that’s just where it’s most evident. It’s actually pretty scattered, but the point still stands: the US’s definition of leftist politics and “socialism” is not the same as that of many other developed countries.
Click to expand...

Yes, I noticed something about how most of us in America use the word “socialism.” It reminds me of how my parents referred to every video game console in the 1990s as a “Nintendo.” They called Sega Genesis a “Nintendo.” They called the first PlayStation a “Nintendo.” Any rectangular device used for gaming was a “Nintendo” to them.

That seems to be how many Americans use the word “socialism” for any platform further to the left of ‘all homeless people should freeze to death.’
 
swiftfox said:
This is only true for economic policy. The Democrats are actually well to the left of most major European parties, especially when it comes to civil rights and immigration.
Click to expand...
This is just not true. Democrats are centre-left at most. European left-wing parties are much, much more left wing. Here in the UK, the conservative party is only a bit more right wing than Democrats are in the US.
 
Rantaro said:
This is just not true. Democrats are centre-left at most. European left-wing parties are much, much more left wing. Here in the UK, the conservative party is only a bit more right wing than Democrats are in the US.
Click to expand...

I have to agree with this, too. I’m American, but I left the US almost 15 years ago, and one thing I’ve noticed is how, well, conservative the US Democratic Party is when compared to left-wing movements in Eurasia and Latin America.

Your comments remind me of something a professor told me back in 2005 (yeah, I’m old). It was a research course in political science, and the professor told us: “there is no political left in the United States.” I didn’t understand at the time because I‘d lived in the US all my life, but traveling outside was eye-opening, and watching the Democrats shift further and further to the right has been a shock.

The DNC as a whole has helped the RNC to build the world’s most invasive police state; not even North Koreans or mainland Chinese are as surveilled as Americans. Only Britons come close. Warmongers and former segregationists make up the upper echelons of the Democratic Party, most of whom seem to be far above retirement age. Our new Vice President is a cop. All of these phenomena would pretty firmly cement the Democrats on the center right or just regular right-wing in other electoral democracies, and calls for simple moral centrism - as we saw with Warren and Sanders - are derided as unelectable purism.

I’m not saying who one should or shouldn’t vote for because I don’t live there anymore. However, I am in a pretty good place (as Rantaro appears to be) to comment on the fact that, by world standards, the US indeed has no political left.
 
It's also worth noting that in the US, a lot of "progressive" ideas like Marriage Equality, or a woman's right to an abortion, are only legal due to SCOTUS cases, and could easily be overturned at anytime and made illegal again. Again, here in the UK (since it's where I currently live), there was legislation passed that made it legal. They won't ever be overturned. Being a gay man in the US has been (and probably will be in the foreseeable future) stressful because at any day, the SCOTUS could just decide you don't actually deserve those rights.
 
Rantaro said:
It's also worth noting that in the US, a lot of "progressive" ideas like Marriage Equality, or a woman's right to an abortion, are only legal due to SCOTUS cases, and could easily be overturned at anytime and made illegal again. Again, here in the UK (since it's where I currently live), there was legislation passed that made it legal. They won't ever be overturned. Being a gay man in the US has been (and probably will be in the foreseeable future) stressful because at any day, the SCOTUS could just decide you don't actually deserve those rights.
Click to expand...
Its disheartening for the LGBT community. While we have an administration that is now making efforts to protect their rights, Trump screwed up the SCOTUS in the long term thanks to him stuffing the court with 3 conservative justices and giving them a disturbing 6-3 majority, and that's not something President Biden can fix easily.
 
A Wild Luxray said:
Its disheartening for the LGBT community. While we have an administration that is now making efforts to protect their rights, Trump screwed up the SCOTUS in the long term thanks to him stuffing the court with 3 conservative justices and giving them a disturbing 6-3 majority, and that's not something President Biden can fix easily.
Click to expand...
It's even more frustrating because conservative states are passing laws that they know will be challenged in hopes of getting them up to the SCOTUS.
 
Rantaro said:
It's also worth noting that in the US, a lot of "progressive" ideas like Marriage Equality, or a woman's right to an abortion, are only legal due to SCOTUS cases, and could easily be overturned at anytime and made illegal again. Again, here in the UK (since it's where I currently live), there was legislation passed that made it legal. They won't ever be overturned. Being a gay man in the US has been (and probably will be in the foreseeable future) stressful because at any day, the SCOTUS could just decide you don't actually deserve those rights.
Click to expand...

I've heard that the UK has become increasingly hostile to transgender people over recent years. So it's not all good over there for the whole LGBT community.
 
Aulos said:
I've heard that the UK has become increasingly hostile to transgender people over recent years. So it's not all good over there for the whole LGBT community.
Click to expand...
Oh yeah I forgot about that since it was a recent development.
 
Hm, if it was a running gag over the next four years that Trump kept up with pathetic attempts to undo the election that were easily swatted down, would that help people recognize his self-centeredness/lack of planning, or would that just energize his base more?

Also wouldn't he still have lost even if Georgia did somehow flip on the seventh try? lmao
 
TechSkylander1518 said:
Hm, if it was a running gag over the next four years that Trump kept up with pathetic attempts to undo the election that were easily swatted down, would that help people recognize his self-centeredness/lack of planning, or would that just energize his base more?

Also wouldn't he still have lost even if Georgia did somehow flip on the seventh try? lmao
Click to expand...
Biden won without Georgia so yes.
 
Reader mode
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

Dorothy
  • Locked
International Politics Thread
9 10 11
Replies
217
Views
13K
pokemoll
pokemoll
Juliyet
Thread Recommendations/Suggestions Q&A Thread
Replies
3
Views
404
helperman
helperman
Welkamo
DISCUSSION: Diversity in Writing Thread
Replies
13
Views
709
carpology
carpology
lisianthus
  • Sticky
Rules The NEW Writers' Workshop Rules + Info Thread!
Replies
0
Views
821
lisianthus
lisianthus
lisianthus
  • Sticky
The Rating Check Example Thread!!
Replies
3
Views
211
lisianthus
lisianthus
Back
Top Bottom