Bleeping Lobster

And if you ever get close to him? … he’ll betray you, too.

It’s one of my fav wwii stories, can’t remember what rank the Japanese navy dude was but apparently the idea that Americans had an entire ship just for ice cream was a large factor in him calling to stand down

I think we’re talking past each other.

Sorry if it’s devolved to that! It’s not me downvoting your replies btw. As far as I’m concerned this is an interesting conversation not an argument, we both clearly feel strongly / passionately about our viewpoint and imo are being fairly cogent / non-combative with each other.

Re Al Jazeera, I’ve found their reporting difficult to trust for a while, and their current reporting imo is very strongly biased against Israel. EG the hospital blast, which many indie sources are now saying is almost certainly not due to an IDF strike (which they still haven’t retracted), or the ‘church destroyed’ which turned out to be a compound that Hamas had setup in next door, with one church wall being destroyed (and obv the compound next door). Though it begs the question, where can we turn right now for genuinely independant reporting on this? Israeli sources are going to slant heavily towards Israel / IDF, Palestinian sources are going to slant heavily towards Palestine / Hamas. Which goes back to my earlier point about taking a breath and trying, somehow, to remain objective in the face of rage-inducing content.

Not voting for either party is as powerful a message as a vote since each vote is counted and voter turnout is a very telling sign

Not sure exactly how it works in USA compared to UK, but I encourage everyone who genuinely doesn’t want to vote (I say genuinely because many simply can’t be bothered to engage, which I also understand when people are fatigued after a hard day’s work) to spoil their ballot rather than not voting. That way your non-engagement is directly observed and counted. Though ensure you do it properly, one guy here last election drew a dick on the ballot paper, but because the helmet strayed into a box, that was taken as his vote.

Democrats snubbed Bernie in 2016 in favor of Hillary and fucked its voter base which cost them and us their supporters the elections and unleashed 4 years of hell on this country

Agreed. But, after that happened, you had an unpalatable choice between ‘holding your nose’ to vote for a candidate who wasn’t fucking insane, or staying home. That might not be the choice you wanted but it’s still a choice that enabled the election of Trump.

You’re right, I cannot find any recent articles of Biden personally calling for ceasefire (though I can find historical articles of him calling for ceasefires last time this conflict flared up). I can however find lots and lots of articles re progressive dems calling for ceasefire and putting pressure on him to do likewise. This is what I meant by ‘stronger voice from inside’. You have no voice on the outside.

Again, I get where you’re coming from, but this is how America ended up with Trump. Many people were convinced to stay home and ‘not vote’ for Clinton. Biden, Starmer, whichever politician you want to smear as being ‘complicit in genocide’ is being quite vocal in calls for aid and a ceasefire. The reality doesn’t match with how you’re allowing people to paint it for you.

Now more than ever, we all need to make a concerted effort not to be lead by our feels. Burned babies and tortured civvies are enraging. Cutting off water / supplies / energy is enraging. Tieing a group of children together and setting them on fire is enraging. Bombing Gaza is enraging. The hard-right Israeli government AND the Islamic fundies want us to be enraged because that’s when we make rash judgements and allow the situation to become further enflamed.

Your voice is stronger from the inside than sitting with tape over your mouth in your house. Imo.

I get why you feel that way. Politics is rarely black & white though, sometimes you have to pick the least worst option, so that someone doesn’t pick the worst option for you (FPTP systems)