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   Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 04:20:47 JST Nowhere Girl

   Conservatives impose artificial austerity to create economic precarity because they know it makes white people, at least, more susceptible to conservatives' bad faith explanations and so-called solutions. But it only really works because those white people would rather believe bigoted bullshit than blame the wealthy white people above them, whom they aspire to be like someday. Ignorance persists because they refuse to surrender their belief in their superiority.

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     anderbill (band@hachyderm.io)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 04:20:46 JST anderbill

     in reply to

     @gwynnion spot on. despondent and despairing i am today.

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 04:20:47 JST Nowhere Girl

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     The primary thrust of conservative activism in the past 30 years has been about ensuring bigotry and bad faith bullshit not only continues to circulate in society but is accepted into the mainstream, by force if necessary, by control of the media and the courts, attacking opposing points of view as inherently illegitimate and anti-white, anti-male, and anti-capitalist to protect the underpinnings of their power.

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 04:20:47 JST Nowhere Girl

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     The "pro-life" movement doesn't believe its own rhetoric, for example. It only cares about sexually controlling women and AFAB people and ensuring more white babies are born by any means necessary.

     The rhetoric exists as a necessary dodge; fake compassion as an excuse for imposing pseudo-religious restrictions on other people.

     The worst thing you can do with these people is take them seriously and treat their rhetorical maneuvers as sincere instead of masks over their authoritarian impulses.

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 04:20:47 JST Nowhere Girl

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     This occurs to me in light of last night's VP debate where Tim Walz generally treated JD Vance like he's decent guy and not a fucking Nazi, arguably with the goal of appearing reasonable to the undecided (white) voters at home.

     The problem is, Democrats have been using this approach for a long time and all it has accomplished is normalizing these people. When CBS is treating "deport 25 million people" as a reasonable affordable housing proposal, things are definitely pretty far gone.

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 04:20:47 JST Nowhere Girl

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     Modern American Nazis have figured out they're supposed to smile and talk friendly and wear a nice suit and pretend to be normal people with normal values even as they talk about committing atrocities on a daily basis.

     The useless format of these debates allows them to get away with it, as most viewers are woefully uninformed by the media of what these people stand for and the so-called moderators aren't going to tell them about it either.

     That would be biased!

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:37:02 JST Nowhere Girl

     in reply to

     If Trump wins, again, I guarantee "the economy" is going to be the big glaring message from the exit polls, just as it has been for the past several years.

     And when I'm done crying and throwing up, I'm going to be furious that so many people allowed this to happen because, eh, "the economy is good," for them, and because they would apparently rather lose than move against their donors and their own conservatism.

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:37:03 JST Nowhere Girl

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     It would obviously be incredibly stupid and horrific for people to elect Trump and Vance. But many Americans are incredibly stupid and "throw the bums out" is their solution to everything.

     And it's absolutely no help that Democrats have turned a blind eye to the cost of living crisis because "line go up" for the older, white, affluent, and conservative voters they're after. The DNC broadcast that very loudly.

     And that's not the only way Democrats are alienating their core base of support.

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:37:03 JST Nowhere Girl

     in reply to

     But the fascists are riding the normalization of "good Republicans," they've been creeping into power at every level of government, their voters are zealots, and while they're a minority, they have control over the media, vast amounts of money via Citizens United, and an electorate that is generally feeling bad about how things are going.

     And the Democratic response has been to shrug and position themselves to the right of their own voters.

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:37:03 JST Nowhere Girl

     in reply to

     Conservatives have spent 40 years building out this situation, driving most of the country into financial distress while subverting democracy and imposing racist, misogynist theocratic bullshit everywhere they can, and Democrats have largely treated it as politics as usual while trying to keep their own left flank and minority voters in check.

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:37:03 JST Nowhere Girl

     in reply to

     Which is to say, the fascists have been winning, a lot, for years. Even when someone like Trump loses an election, they win through the courts.

     Biden's election was supposed to buy us time to deal with some of this, which didn't happen for various reasons including Biden was never the guy to seriously challenge Republicans.

     I hoped for something similar from Harris / Walz until it became clear they were intent on hugging Republicans to death, which has never worked.

     Now I'm just scared.

     Bill repeated this.
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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:37:04 JST Nowhere Girl

     in reply to

     Clearly, Vance wanted to bait Walz into an ugly verbal fight, and Walz wanted to pin Vance down on the actual ugliness of his beliefs, but the whole thing ended up being a bit of a wash.

     But the part that stuck, as it always does, is the idea that JD Vance is a Normal Politician with Normal Beliefs that Just Happen To Be Different from his opponent because that's how the whole thing was framed. And that is ultimately a small victory for the fascists.

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:37:04 JST Nowhere Girl

     in reply to

     But to bring this back around, the fascists have succeeded since Reagan in imposing austerity on the country, to the point of full oligarchical rule.

     Marginalized people suffer the worst, of course, as they always do. But the grumbling of white voters who feel they should be better off -- and it's someone else's fault that they're not -- is fertile ground for a fascist takeover.

     These people are looking for someone to blame and the fascists are giving them a list of targets, literally.

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:37:04 JST Nowhere Girl

     in reply to

     We've had 40 years of Democratic capitulation and complicity with austerity, deregulation, tax cuts, and negligence toward the core issues that matter to their base such as voting rights, abortion, and LGBT+ rights.

     Simultaneously, Democrats have pursued white centrist and conservative voters, embracing hard right policy on immigration, for example.

     As the GOP has become radicalized, Democrats have normalized previous extremists like Bush and Cheney, trying to "outflank" from the right.

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     Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:37:04 JST Nowhere Girl

     in reply to

     As I lay awake last night thinking about the election, this is what came to mind:

     Elections are won and lost on vibes, and there's usually one big thing rankling the electorate.

     If there's one thing that's going to cost Democrats this election, it's going to be their apathy toward price gouging, "inflation," and the cost of living crisis.

     Polls have been screaming this in bold letters for years.

     Because everybody except the top 10% is pissed off about it, and it exacerbates everything else.