GwenGifTerror
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While I haven't read all of his books, I have yet to read one that I didn't find incredibly insightful. He is definitely one of our great thinkers of this period of time.
martineb72
He did it by convincing people that certain people were 'other'. Once you have done that, any type of atrocity is possible. Like Fox News convincing people that liberals as 'other'.
zenmaster11
Bulldogmum
Shame no one is noticing this attitude towards LGBTQ all over
grosscol
How Fascism Works by J Stanley is a good read for being able to identify modern fascist politics. It's useful to have concrete examples and be able to point out when a policy or stance is fascist politics and why.
NightOwlRally
Yeah, but the people who need to hear it the most just yell WOKE CUCK LOLOLOL then high five each other. Trying to teach people is impossible when they just refuse to accept anything else but their own faux reality about how Trump is some heroic Christian chosen by sky daddy to lead us to the promised land or some bullshit. No amount of the truth or facts will change their minds - that's what's so dangerous about this imho
Dociousaliexpilisticfragicalirepus
I might be visiting a concentration camp next year. I’m a little nervous but I feel like it’s something I should do.
DocWino
If you’re not making correlations with Israel and Gaza, you’re not paying attention.
Moranasaurusrex
Isreal learned nothing but occupation and extermination. And we watch.
MD762708
Noam supported the Khmer Rouge long after the atrocities were well known and advocated for the suppression of dissidents in the USA. Fuck him.
Huor
I liked Chomsky until he started parroting Putin talking points about Ukraine. Then I found myself reconsidering a lot of his work.
BrdCdn
He's a fucking tankie. His entire worldview is that the western nations are evil imperialists and anyone who opposes them is good. He's an anti democratic shitbag.
[deleted]
[deleted]
Huor
“Spoke poorly”
AbdulMasaiev
...and was apparently 93 when it happened for the first time. How old was he when the Khmer Rouge were active, again?
raindirve
I think the general lesson of 'manufacturing consent' is extremely valuable, but I get the feeling he's accidentally taken that lesson a little too far, thinking that any widely repeated media talking point pushed by the establishment must necessarily be false. Sometimes your own interests as an average person really do align with those of the ruling class. That's when you get a certain subset of the left (and the right) being contrarian for its own sake, because agreeing with power feels yucky.
raindirve
(And not to overplay the apologea here. I'm really disappointed that he didn't take a look at his points mirroring the ruling class of a _different_ country instead and do a double, triple take at that. Maybe he's even more of a campist than he lets on.)
AtmaDarkwolf
I mean... I think I wouldn't have the courage to continue speaking MY thoughts, and would choose between parroting the guy with the power,
AtmaDarkwolf
that.. or a mysterious 'fall' from a 6th story window. And a 'self inflicted' gunshot wound to the back of the head.
ValleyFur
I can appreciate his work in linguistics without adopting his world view, which I can’t help but think is influenced by his work in formal semantics. In other words a misplaced faith in simplified absolutism. That there is a universal truth not subject to nuance and human experience.
BrdCdn
Fuck that's bang on as his world view is essentially the west is bad, therefore anti western good.
AdnanFox
It literally is. Right now in Palestine.
CloakedFigure
*points at the world*
“Hey guys, history is repeating itself again.”
Arkvoodle
Hitler killed very few Jews, if any, by his own hand. He filled a nation with hatred and zeal and got them to do it for him. He was not just a monster, but one who knew how to bring out the monster in others.
pirateninjaunicornattacksquad
So america does not have an educational system. Got it.
cactuskid1956
More like lame parents. Coddling too much spoiled kids
Krossis
GaiusWydra
America has a heavily edited and propagandized education system. I grew up in a “liberal” town and there were many things we weren’t taught, about slavery, Manifest Destiny and all the genocide that America has perpetrated. If you want to learn more about it look up the textbooks that were approved and given to schools by the Daughters of the Confederacy. It’s pretty eye opening, if you’re willing to see the truth.
johnnyxd270
Cranking out nationalists. "We've done nothing wrong ever, and don't you say we did, or else."
IUsedToHaveUsernameOnce
So... Glorified daycare?
Greypuppy
Grew up in Michigan, was taught a lot about slavery, was taught there were fights with Native Americans but it was kinda made to look like it was 50/50 on who was the aggressor, was taught we were always the good guys after that point in time. Didn't know we had camps for Japanese people till Kenji by Fort Minor.
I went to middle and high school right after 9/11 so I wonder if that affected how much "America strong and good and wins everything" was pushed.
pirateninjaunicornattacksquad
Nah, you already had that attitude before hand. It did increase the severity of said attitude though.
draxxthemsklounst
I grew up in a very conservative town in the south and we were taught all of this. They were not shy about teaching us the slave trade and how we treated the Indians.
GaiusWydra
My school talked about the Trail of Tears, the kidnapping of indigenous children and forced “reeducation,” and other atrocities, but didn’t REALLY talk about it. It was glossed over, and the prolonged effects on indigenous communities was never mentioned. We certainly never heard about the Philadelphia MOVE bombing, or COINTELPRO, or similar things that had prolonged effects on BIPOC communities.
TheWonderfulWorldOfDickButt
Legit question. He killed 6 million jews, but I also heard he killed like another 6 million other people on top of that. So the death count is like 12 million right? Can someone cite me a source?
zenoshogun
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocaust_victims Plenty of sources listed here for a start.
NKato
An ironic statement given that he made excuses for the Russians invading Ukraine.
Moranasaurusrex
Knowledge is knowing Isreal didn't learn anything.
morphis
They learned not to count on any others to protect them because nobody did the last time.
NiftyGoblin
Oh like how China keeps Uyghurs in concentration camps, murders them for organ 'donations' and slave labor, or sells the women into prostitution or forced marriages? Like that? Lets not forget that.... cus it really seems like people are forgetting that.
AbdulMasaiev
Knowing Chumpsky he probably doesn't forget it, he straight up denies it happens
Indigon
Seriously. People understand that Nazi's are bad. But they seem to have forgotten why.
draxxthemsklounst
Especially on U.S. college campuses that are calling for the genocide of Jews.
Sonicschilidogs
Da, Comrade, instill the anti-intellectual ideas into the westerners heads so that Mother Russia can have it's puppet state once more
purpledd
As well the shootings/hit and run of Palestinians/Arab students. Both the Antisemitism and Anti-Arab sentiments are horrifying.
StarSumiaki
I thought the 6 million figure included other demographics they considered "undesirable" as well, such as LGBT, Roma, disabled folks, etc.
sesamestreetfighter
Everyone included is 11 million, 6 million was just Jews
pointsfailatmakingsomethingup
I read somewhere that the 11 million number is a low ball, and that the non jewish victimes of the holocaust could be well over 10+ million themselves.
sesamestreetfighter
I have also read this but I don't have any sources on hand for better estimates.
stuart1965
Did Noam know about the approximately 11 million non-jewish people also killed in the gas chambers?
stuart1965
honestly - who would down vote that comment and why!
neithermenoryou
Everyone because it's wrong? Only roughly 2.7m people were killed in the gas chambers itself, the rest were murdered by various other means to get to the approximately 11m victims total that weren't soldiers. The Germans were efficient but they aren't THAT efficient.
stuart1965
The argument on who gets to have the Holocaust-focus all to themselves and discount the identical suffering of millions of other people seems in very bad taste.
neithermenoryou
But you said something completely nonsensical. You specifically said "killed in the gas chambers" not "killed during the holocaust". Those two are entirely separate concepts considering one is only a specific subset of the larger group. Also, for some people the holocaust specifically only encompasses the jewish people, as they lost roughly 80% of their total population, far exceeding the losses of any other group of people. Though that definition is slowly falling out of favor.
Quenya3675
The Germans also murdered 20 million Russians but for some reason Jews are the only victims mentioned.
Redser
Naom lost his way with his views on Russia and Ukraine sadly though. No time for him anymore. E. G. https://uacrisis.org/en/kremlin-shady-horse-noam-chomsky
GwenGifTerror
I get what you're saying, but considering that Ukraine is dependent on continued support from the US, I see some of his points. Not saying I agree with the way he made them or everything he said. Zelensky's recent statements about the implications of the loss of US aid seems to me to be related to the foundational criticism Chomsky had about the US govt's role in the initial attack by the Russians.
BrdCdn
He lost his way long before that. He was a Pol Pot stan and generally an insufferable tankie.
Sonicschilidogs
Because his support of Pol Pot was super great.........
OpenMouthHotKiss
We already had The Beer Hall Putsch and he's pretty much promised The Night of the Long Knives if reelected. He's "joked around" at the idea of a dictatorship. How does anyone support the un-American piece of shit
dingybasement350
Because our country was already right wing and he knew all the buttons to push and slogans to chant. People like his bigotry.
rcgom
3 types support him. the 1% benefited financially, bigots got license to be bigoted, & the extremely gullible believe him.
NoGunsNoCats
I saw a Channel 4 news report a few weeks ago where they asked an Israeli couple if they thought Palestinian civilians should be spared in the Israeli response to the Hamas attack. They said no one should be spared, C4 asked if Palestinian children should be spared, the Israeli husband said they were all dogs.
All I took from this exchange is that there is a general view amongst Israelis that Palestinians aren't people.
TheWombatStrikesAgain
Two people aren't exactly a good basis from which to extrapolate the opinions of an entire nation, but yeah, there is a lot of hate. And if you asked Palestinians whether Israelis/jews count as people, you'd get very similar answers. After all, there's a reason Netanyahu and the Hamas rose to power in their respective countries.
NoGunsNoCats
Yeah probably the context doesn't show through, you really got the impression that the reporters were so shocked by Israeli sentiment from those around them that they asked the question about children to raise awareness of that.
rcgom
lets hope that it isn't a universal attitude among them.
NoGunsNoCats
So the same Channel 4 report also looked at how the Israelis are moving settlements into the West Bank. On face value this doesn't sound such a bad thing until you see how they are doing it. It was shocking to see what they do to displace poor people with very few rights.
fractalsphere
Conservative 'education' is denying that it even happened. Kind of like the native Americans 'moved out' to make room for the colonists.
TheWombatStrikesAgain
Sometimes they do it in a more sneaky way like "Yeah, that happened, but it wasn't that bad, and the people had nothing to do with you, and also the good guys won and will always win (and by 'good guys' I mean people like us), and it's over now, so don't worry about that."
draxxthemsklounst
I gotta say, I don’t even know the people that did this cuz they’re all dead now. And I’ve never met them! America is a completely different place than it was in 1776 vs 1964 vs now.
Greypuppy
The colonists came over, the natives taught them how to grow corn, then they had the first Thanksgiving together as friends and everyone was happy. The shit they told us when we were little.
draxxthemsklounst
I grew up in a very conservative town in the south and they were not shy about teaching us about the slave trade and how we treated the Indians.
Beleg7
My understanding is that the German populace was never convinced that extermination was necessary. They were convinced to look the other way. They were convinced to trust that the Nazi government was doing the right thing and not worry about what exactly that was because Germany was great again and the Jews were gone.
FiftyShadesOfMascarpone
Not even that. Most of the populace were simply scared shitless after Hitler's coup. Only 37% voted for the NSDAP in Reichstag elections and for Hitler in the presidential election, which he lost to von Hindenburg who got 53% of the vote. Meaning the nazis never had majority support. But after their power grab they transformed the country so quickly and radically that it was suicide to speak out against the government. Those who did got a Gestapo visit late in the evening & were never seen again
FiftyShadesOfMascarpone
All totalitarian systems are enforced by a minority who keep the majority in line through fear. You don't need the support of the people if most of the police and military forces are on your side, and at least the former are only too happy to support a fascist regime. Of course many citizens eventually develop Stockholm syndrome and get swept up in the propaganda. The curse of a cooperative species. But distrust of authority is also a very common human trait.
PanNonOpticon
There is no such thing as Stockholm syndrome
FiftyShadesOfMascarpone
That's not true. It's not a mental disorder listed in diagnostic manuals. Neither are codependency, most phobias, and a great many other psychological phenomena that have been described in detail in the scientific literature. They're very real but not diagnosed and treated by psychiatrists and clinical psychologists (as opposed to therapists and counselors).
PanNonOpticon
Anybody believing against better judgment that stockholm syndrome is real should look up the namesake case. TL;DR police bungled up, endangered the hostages several times, the psychologist was used as a face saving measure for the government. There are scientific studies about this that use term: "urban myth." There is no such thing as stockholm syndrome.
DavidBrooker
Ironically, Noam Chomsky was famously skeptical of the genocide in Cambodia.
GenericUsername71
Fucking Noam
chbarts
He outright said survivors were lying.
MD762708
And petitioned newspapers not to print their letters. He's a cunt.
CleverGroom
Right. I usually agree with Chomsky, but sometimes he's just as wrong as any of the world's worst, most educated cockwalruses. Bibi, Orbán, Kissinger, DeSantis, Thatcher, just to name a few--all of them studied at MIT, Harvard, Oxford, and/or Yale and have/had advanced degrees. At this point I don't even feel certain that education helps at all. Personally, the more I've learned, the less I've hoped.
alrightalrightalrightpartyatthemoontower
Same! People are complicated and no one should be on a pedestal.
GwenGifTerror
He took accountability and admitted he was about that on multiple occasions. He is by no means a perfect person. He just as anyone else in this world gets it wrong sometimes.
AbdulMasaiev
Care to cite one of those occasions? Because to my knowledge the extent of those admissions is "ok, in retrospect, MAAAAAAAYBE there were SOME atrocities, but the important thing here we should not lose out focus from is America bad"
Goldensands
I mean if america had more focus on how america = bad that would definitely be a good thing.
TrustMeImADog
Western democracy can be both utterly unfit for purpose, horrendously unjust, full of morally ambiguous or downright evil policy decisions... And simultaneously immeasurably better than any of its primary opposing systems of government. Beware those whose opposition to the former leads them to the camp of the latter.
KittenInside
Among other "interesting" points of view.
cantdo3456
The great horseshoe of politics
Corin
I'm as far left as Chomsky, easily, but I'm not a genocide denying pedophile. A lot of us hate that fucker.
gsynth
Not just that one. I'm a leftist but Chomsky is a terrible person to look up to.
ByronGetronfree
It would probably have required him to agree with the US government on an issue.
chbarts
Yep. His knowledge of geopolitics starts and ends with "AMERICA DO BAD THING"
brumbasse
All said, you can build a pretty solid career on that, but when it turns into brainworms it's super super bad
DavidBrooker
That was essentially it. He said we were only getting information filtered through the US propaganda machine. But the only other source of information was that being filtered through the Chinese (or Chinese financed and supported) propaganda machine, which he took in uncritically.
chbarts
Yep. The PRC even invaded Communist Vietnam after Vietnam invaded Cambodia to stop the horrors.
AbdulMasaiev
The funny thing is, "after" here means in "when the Vietnamese army was still in Cambodia cleaning the nonsense up, and all that was left in Vietnam were some territorial defense militias". A month of just fighting that and the PRC was like "oh hell no fuck this" and retreated, losing the war.
chbarts
But the PRC is $100% a threat to the USA, yep yep yep! /s
TerriblePokemon
And thinks that Ukraine should just surrender to Russia
AbdulMasaiev
And thinks the Serbian genocide of Albanians in Kosovo wasn't a big deal and should not have been stopped by force.
wr8070m98
I haven't really been following things. Has he actually said that Ukraine should surrender, or that they should negotiate peace, possibly giving up some of the more Russia-leaning parts of Ukraine? I'm sincerely asking
Beefkins
Here's an interesting read by Ukrainian academic economists in an open letter to Chomsky. They cite sources for Chomsky's statements, though some links may be behind a paywall: https://news.berkeley.edu/2022/05/19/open-letter-to-noam-chomsky-and-other-like-minded-intellectuals-on-the-russia-ukraine-war
He really does seem to have some spectacularly shitty takes on the subject.
wr8070m98
I read this - very nicely put! I think their complaints against what Chomsky apparently said are quite valid. Thanks!
braechnov
He said it is an act or provocation to bring certain military force within striking range of the home soil of a super power, and that one should expect ground invasions as a response in order to guarantee security. USA did exactly this by invading Cuba (Bay of Pigs), so he isn't really parroting Russian talking points so much as just pointing out what actually happens - USA included.
braechnov
Someone will no doubt reply "yeah but the USA pulled out of Cuba and didn't just keep trying to occupy them" to which you can just reply "you do know where Guantanamo Bay is, right?"
PutItInNeutral
Except that Putin invaded Ukraine long before any of that happened. No one was supplying Ukraine with vast amounts of weaponry before Crimea and Eastern Ukraine were invaded in 2014.
braechnov
It was Ukraine's attempt to join NATO and thereby provide a shared border with Russia which prompted the invasion. It's like if Mexico somehow joined the USSR - the USA would be quite unlikely to just go "oh ok np"
Raygereio
This talking point frustrates me because always completely ignors the reason why countries like Ukraine want to join NATO. If Russian wasn't a belligerent asshole that constantly threatens and attemps to conquer & massacre its neighbouring peoples, said peoples wouldn't have reached out to Western powers.
All Russia's whining about NATO's expansion eastward, is a problem entirely of their own creation. They could have stopped it at any point by simple being the better option.
Raygereio
And pointing to the US and going "They did it to!" is toddler level logic one is supposed to have grown out of somewhere past kindergarten.
Yes, US-imperialism is bad. And Russian-imperialism is also bad. They're both bad. If one's bad, you don't have to go "guess the other one is fine".
braechnov
Is there a reasonable measure of "belligerent asshole who doesn't conquer and massacre" that you could propose please?
ipushbuttons
He goes well beyond that, he unabashedly parrots Russian propaganda. He excuses the entire invasion and says Russia had no choice but to invade due to evil American imperialism. Go watch his interviews, it literally sounds like he is reading straight from a checklist of pro-Russia talking points produced by Russian state television.
GwenGifTerror
My understanding is he called Russia's invasion a "a crime of aggression" and puts a lot of the blame on the US government.
BrdCdn
He's a cunt and a genocide denyer. He view America as the great evil in the world and as such anyone who is anti western must be the good guy. Puddles have more depth than his understanding of geopolitics and he shouldn't be taken seriously on those topics.
asimovcascade
Or linguistics for that matter
Eli93
Super weird stance. Yeah the US is an imperialist hegemonic nightmare, but if Russia had the chance, they wouldn't be any better...
AbdulMasaiev
Chompsky isn't anti-imperialist. He says he is, but he's completely brainlocked into thinking America is the only country that can do imperialism, which means his anti-imperialism is just a straight anti-Americanism.
Ebo352
There is some merit to that if you think the US is some hegemonic, unipolar power. But, the US isn't that, so, yes, he has lived long enough to become the bad guy.
TerriblePokemon
What a chode
drinkthederpentine
Chode Chompski
NotAPervert
Noad Chodesky
bomdroppinfoo
@GwenGifTerror any thoughts on this?
GwenGifTerror
I don't think it's appropriate to say he "parrots Russian propaganda." I see some of the points he makes but can see how it's reasonable to disagree with the way he made them. Considering Zelensky's recent statements about the need for continued US aide, I can't help but see the foundational aspects of Chomsky putting the blame on the US government and the potential outcome of that conflict.
GerbilHereReportingLiveFromRichardGeresAss
Doesn't sound like a great thinker in this case.
AbdulMasaiev
Chumpsky is a mixed bag. In linguistics, he's brilliant. In abstract political theory, he's quite good. But in political specifics he's 100% living that tankie life and his analysis of things is just "America bad and America enemies good"
chbarts
He's so goddamned convinced America is always wrong he cannot evaluate the world honestly.
Meltemi
Fairly, he was an absolute brilliant linguist through the latter half of the 20th century, for all that his ideas of universal grammar have later been panned as not only a "romantic simplification of neuroscience," but worse, being unfalsifiable. Unfortunately, this isn't linguistics. https://www.smbc-comics.com/?id=2556
IronCore
Beef tensors! As usual SMBC is spot on and humorous.
TerriblePokemon
Being an expert in one subject does not make you universally great at everything. No way would I let a neurosurgeon plan my wedding.
LehmanParty
See also: skilled professionals thinking markets/real estate is a single weekend course
GerbilHereReportingLiveFromRichardGeresAss
Yep, I used his work for my Bachelor's degree in linguistics. Kinda sad seeing him out of his element.
BrdCdn
He fancies himself a geopolitical expert and is essentially a brain-dead tankie.
AbdulMasaiev
Ok but how many years do you have to be in an element for it to be your element? Because Chompsky has been a famous tankie basically all his life and he's preeeeeeeeeeeetty old by now.
spitfires2000
Say what you want about the Germans, not a day goes by without having some sort of WWII/Nazi documentary on TV there. They don't hide it.
theraininspainfallsmainlyontheplain
We have a plethora of those in US too. But bc we love warfare.
RandyRandalman
My grandmother fled to the US to escape them, and wasn't Jewish. Their actions effected more than that particular group and it's kind of sad that this fact gets glossed over.
FiftyShadesOfMascarpone
I just wish those documentaries had also mentioned the less well-known Holocaust victim groups back in my day. All the demographics who continued to be persecuted after the war (and not just in Germany). LGBTQ+ individuals, mentally ill or otherwise neurodivergent people, people w. addiction disorders, welfare-reliant and/or homeless people etc. I still don't see them mentioned because public broadcasting mainly caters to the elderly, but at least the school curriculum is more honest these days.
FiftyShadesOfMascarpone
(In higher education, that is. I suppose Germans with a GED-equivalent education don't need to know these finer details. Otherwise we'd also have to teach them about the 90,000 gay men who were sentenced for the crime of having consensual gay sex after the war and committed suicide in some cases. Meaning we'd have to admit that the Holocaust didn't end in 1945 and instead continued for decades.)
chbarts
Now if only we could inculcate the same respect for history in the Japanese and Polish.
LukaszMac
Excuse me what?
chbarts
The Japanese far right denies Japanese war crimes. The Polish government really downplays their role in the Holocaust.
LukaszMac
And what role was it exactly?
chbarts
Eager collaboration, at least: https://archive.ph/Csumv
pastramionrye
Agree.
Strategicgnomer
Yeah, and I wish it were more effective but, there are still towns of incredibly racist shitbags and the Nazi successor party is gaining power again.
MarkySpaceMagnet
I guess that they realize that people try to forget the bad things.
PrfctDrk
GOOD! Never forget it or else you'll end up repeating it
Huor
It’s why I revere modern Germany, and that’s speaking as a Jew. I wish my own country (Canada) would follow your example. /gallery/fv2QibT
MrKnowItAll1903
Zionist Israeli Government is now convincing the entire population that it must obliterate Palistine and is right to do so.
[deleted]
[deleted]
PostTraumaticSouthDisorder
I mean, its just like men and women. There doesn't need to be a reason, but any bit justification helps. Lots of history there too.
Muunk
"are we the baddies?"
Northstar219
I remember studying it in high-school and hearing about how many Germans refused to believe the concentration camps were real. I guess it was an issue for a while after the war that people kept denying it(maybe still is?). Makes me wonder what those peoples decendents think about it. I know that right wing fascism is still an issue there
CloakedFigure
I respect that. To make the future generations face such a dark truth that wasn’t even 100 years ago is truly the right thing to do. Shame you don’t see more nations doing it *cough America cough*
CloakedFigure
Gonna go out on a limb here and assume any downvotes are coming from privileged white people who lack empathy.
Wynterwitch
Yup, the USA and Canada could both use more and more frequent airing of documentaries around the treatment of PoC in North America. Especially Asian immigrants. There's a bit (although not ever enough) about the treatment of indigenous people and about the slave trade, but it seems like there's even less about forced labour of Chinese immigrants building the railroads and Japanese internment camps. All these things need so much more focus.
Wynterwitch
I want to make it clear, I'm not in any way putting any of these issues above the others. They all need to be primary focuses in school AND outside of it in public programming, documentaries, the news, social media, etc. We need more for all generations especially older gens who weren't educated at all about the horrific things our nations did (and in many ways are still doing) and who unfortunately still hold the majority of the political power due aging populations and old politicians.
Drunktrunkmonkey
Don't forget the Japanese... not under the impression they do much to talk about their war crimes
Ploty
It's no a match with the numberous American docus on Discovery and Nat Geo, not to forget American movies. I get the impression Americans are obsessed by it
henryvk
Yeah, that may be so but we have tons of fascists, crypto-fascists and reactionaries here. In the Eastern German states, the fascist party is on track to become the strongest political force.
KarlRoyGabriel
Ownership of production and those that make is an epistemological illusion. It’s an allegory for the time it takes to craft and share a story. Or a thing. Cool stuff is cool I guess, and people gotta eat, and working on behalf of time and money is just the cruelest paradigm to be slave to. So sorry kiddos. So sorry.
JohnnyLawlessEsq
AND Germany embarking on its biggest rearmament program in almost a hundred years! This always goes well.
TheWombatStrikesAgain
That's actually not a major concern. The Bundeswehr has been starved for decades, is struggling to find enough recruits to even fill all the current jobs, and tons of material is inoperable. Even the 100 billions will only push it marginally towards being a borderline acceptable defensive fighting force. And due to recent budget constraints, all material donated to Ukraine will also come directly out of that budget. It's nowhere near being a threat to anyone.
Acc87
We also just had left wings students at the Freien Universität in Berlin-Dahlem holding a Pro-Palestine protest, and shunning fellow students from their study halls because they are Jewish, or they call it now, "Pro-Zionist".
ShaunDreclin
If they're using being "pro-Palestine" to mask their antisemitism, I highly doubt they're actually left wing (or even actually pro-Palestine)
Acc87
They are the typical nouveau-"left". People from highly privileged backgrounds studying something in the social studies field, "fighting oppression" and especially whats called inter-sectionalism, but in the end basically just trying to one-up each other in their morale score. And go from hating "capitalism/the right" (=anyone disagreeing) straight to Zionist world orders and Rotschild conspiracy. Got nothing to do with true left values.
aviselafin211
Many anti-Semites are careful to couch their bigotry in terms like Zionism. These same nouveau fascists often apply conditions and standards to Israel that aren't applied to any other western liberal democracies.
Fn0rd
We had a right wing march in my former hometown… about 300 or so, they were all yelling „illegal immigrants out“ just to be able to say they are not against immigrants per se. The next week there was a counter protest, roughly 7000 people yelling „OUR TOWN IS COLORFUL AND STAYS THAT WAY!“ loved it there.
IThrowLemons
The United States shouldn't bomb civilians either so I'm not entirely sure whether "double standards" is a valid point here or not.
aviselafin211
Fair observation, but I wasn't thinking of only the Americans. CAF operations in Syria, Libya, and Afghanistan inevitably led to civilian casualties despite very strenuous mitigation measures. NATO and WW2 Allied forces prosecuted air campaign in German occupied Europe again causing civilian casualties. Despite some misgivings then and now, no serious alternatives were ever contemplated to achieve victory. Current war in Ukraine, Donbas, and Crimea leads to daily events like in Gaza. Silence.
RootMeanSqr
Ok then, you know what to do, right?
cuddlydingo
Accept ALL students into art school.
henryvk
Wait for the Red Army to end it all?
TheWombatStrikesAgain
They're not exactly anti-fascist these days.
henryvk
And it’s not just the East. It just emerged that the Bavarian deputy minister president shared an anti-semitic pamphlet when he was young and his support in the polls *improved* as a result.
5tradivariuS
It's fukken sickening, at least Poland did some correct decisions removing the conservatives from power, let's hope it sticks
Guttfunk
*sigh* same thing going on in Sweden, and we don't have the history to speak for itself
iWantedAcoolNameButTheyOnlyHadThisOne
That the afd and csu are bad news is obvious, I agree. But they are part of a bigger European trend towards the right. And given this trend, we are still doing fairly ok in Germany, if you compare it to surrounding countries. Some have fascist governments (Italy, Poland until last month), others are close to it (France). Look at our "Ampel" in comparison to that.
spitfires2000
Don't forget about Wilders. He hasn't formed a government yet, but still...
MyDragonHeartedSpirit
So, when all the Western and European governments become fascist, who fights the Fascists?
Infinias
There are ongoing actions to make the AFD illegal as a Nazi party. Hopefully these trials go through until the next election in Germany next year.