Politicians make laws on the basis of “I’ll never be in that situation”. But then a son or daughter comes out as LGBTQ+ and all of a sudden laws need to change. A daughter has been raped and all of a sudden laws need to change. They don’t make laws to help us. They make laws to control us and sweep away things they don’t like.
Classic “leopards eating face”.
https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/Leopards_Eating_People’s_Faces_PartySee: Dick Cheney.
Where’s the law to sweep him away?
I’m sure there’s plenty, the trick is getting someone to enforce them.
There’s a shocking number of people who walk this Earth without a functional world model or empathy, and don’t feel things until they occur to them personally.
It’s almost akin to a sort of brain damage or disorder, I’m not qualified enough to be able to explain what occurs in the brain structurally for this to happen; only that when they’re grimacing for getting convicted after they’ve murdered 40 people (or millions, if it’s an oil exec, for example) and wondering why that’s happening, you carefully and patiently explain to them that’s only part of what they’ve inflicted upon others and society writ large.
It doesn’t create a “just” or even sane society philosophically speaking, and the legislative process has been almost completely subverted by that segment of the population as you’d pointed out, specifically to be dysfunctional.
Maybe we ought to install more mirrors in the legislative branches
A daughter has been raped and all of a sudden laws need to change.
Nah, they can afford to fly their daughters out.
And what about that politician whose VHS rental history got leaked to the whole world?
repugs just cannot be allowed to continue. period.
Under the new Florida law, any citizen or business can sue beginning in January if they feel the anti-camping ban is not being properly enforced.
This is pants on head stupid. We could probably count on actual police and DAs understanding the situation and not enforcing this law in extraordinary circumstances. We can’t count on every HOA board member doing the same. Even if a judge grants an immediate motion to dismiss, it’s still a complete waste of everyone’s time and money. That’s the best case scenario.
You know what this reminds me of? There was some cheap ass webcomic in the very early 2000s that had an Amish protagonist. I only remember a single comic where the main character is watching TV and has some pundit say that poor and homeless should be shot. Then our Amish hero sets the pundit’s house on fire rendering him homeless.
The pundit declares himself poor without his house and is promptly shot by his own followers because they made good his beliefs on shooting the poor and homeless. It was actually kinda funny.
But that being said, it amazes me just how often people forget the lessons of the past. The great depression seriously changed America’s views on poverty being an entirely individual failing for many, many decades. Even into the Nixon administration he had to remind everyone that he was a New Dealer and wasn’t going to roll back any of that shit. They had to wait until baby boomers, who did not grow up in the depression and were the ungrateful beneficiaries of the numerous programs in its wake, were the main voting block before beginning to roll that shit back.
It’s also kinda incredible just how the libertarian and conservative propaganda apparatus really nullified most criticism of this shit. While that was always case even back in the 1930s, it was never to this extent.
It’s so fucking depressing to think about how goddamn popular FDR was. Basically a fucking socialist.
Boomers really have destroyed this planet. In several ways.
Remains me of when Spawn put the Leader of the KKK in Black face and they lynched him.
Perhaps http://meninhats.com?
Nope. That comic is actually decently drawn, also the format is too short for that kind of story.
Ayn Rand was not libertarian. She herself said that many times. And as a libertarian - we don’t want her.
Anyway, tired of that idea of libertarians as conservatives small enough to kick.
Bailing out big companies is not libertarian. Considering them above the law isn’t that, too. While Ayn Rand was fine with both and kinda thought that there are better and worse people, more and less useful, and the more useful must be catered for, bending laws included. She was basically an inverted bolshevik, where for those guys all economical problems could be solved having one unchecked state-corporation with instead of many, for her all problems could be solved with many unchecked corporations.
Also calling USA before and during depression a completely free economy would be kinda insincere. It’s also not libertarian to shoot at strikers.
Is this copypasta I’m unfamiliar with
Probably. Saying Ayn Rand isn’t a libertarian is like saying Hitler wasn’t an antisemite. Both are wrong on countless levels.
God works in mysterious ways.
I say, enforce the law! You can’t be homeless here! Get out! Go to Texas! They love homeless people there! Hey you want a home because you lost a home? So you’re homeless? Get out! …super easy, super simple. President Trump only likes people who don’t loose their homes.
That’s a shame. Thoughts and prayers.
Maybe running a political party off of hate wasn’t such a good idea.
Not to ever be a Florida apologist in my entire life, but hating homeless people crosses party lines.
California dems jumped at taking away homeless camps. Not helping them, just destroying the camps. Claim victory, homeless move a few blocks over, or the next town over, without their stuff. It’s like a South Park episode.
I’m not saying that the democratic party is good on this front. I’m saying that the republican party, the ruling party of Florida is built on hate, and it’s biting them in the ass.
Yeeep. Boy howdy, White Democrats^TM like to avoid feeling uncomfortable. That’s where they draw their progressive line.
It’s wealthy suburban NIMBY Dems, not “white”.
Both are true. And sad.
It’s only a bad idea if you give a shit about the populace.
oops!
It’s not about good ideas, it’s about what works.
It’s funny when the best way to defeat hateful right is to look at right-wing ideas without emotion and prejudice.
Find what makes them work to attract people and form parties. Find the most general subset of that you can coexist with. Incorporate it. Doesn’t work? Look for remaining differences. And so on. Evolution. Survival of the fittest.
It’s isn’t ever a problem or bad idea (until it come back to happen to them)
This is why we need to ban hurricanes.
Nah, we gotta nuke the hurricanes.
It’s a win-win. We destroy the hurricanes, and we also reduce our nuclear stockpile. I can see no flaws in this proposal. Checkmate, peaceniks!
I know you’re joking, but I wanted to take this opportunity to make a side note. Nuclear test ban treaties have been effective enough for long enough that we don’t have to scavenge old shipwrecks for low background radiation steel anymore. That’s a huge success, and we shouldn’t squander it.
What if to stop the hurricanes, we put our nuclear stockpile underneath a steam engine.
You reap what you sow.
Kinda fucked for the people that didnt sow, but yeah, the ones that did shall enjoy the reaping.
The people who actually sowed this are only going to reap a few extra weeks of complaining, “the poors are making the streets so ugly, why won’t the police arrest them faster?”
Especially true for those rightwing religious nuts. Their book tells them Hosea 8:7: “For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.”
Delete this
No. These people voted to make homelessness illegal and now they’re all homeless. What are they gonna do now? Arrest everyone? Fucking do it. Let the people who voted for the scum that passed these laws face the fucking music.
ITT a whole lot of people talking shit while their local governments are doing the exact same thing. This is a map from 2015. It’s only gotten worse since then.
If what’s happening in Florida disgusts you then check your own laws first.
It’s not a political thing, it’s an urban vs. rural thing. Cities tend to have more robust services for the homeless, so naturally homeless people wind up gravitating there.
They’ll find a way to suspend the law so it doesn’t affect victims of the hurricanes and then reinstitute them again later.
No, it’s cities. Many cities have their own ordinances that clear out homeless encampments. Rural folk didn’t institute those ordinances.
Because homeless people don’t move out to the fucking country. They’re not cats looking for somewhere to quietly perish alone.
It actually is a problem in my semi rural town. There is a small city ~15 miles away with a lot more resources and there’s a handful of homeless who won’t go there, even when there’s a blizzard.
They would if they had a proportional level of homelessness. Being rural doesn’t automatically make you good people. Rural communities treated vagrancy just as badly.
We’re not disagreeing. I’m just pointing out rural towns don’t have the problem of homeless people creating tent cities because they don’t tend to have the services homeless people need to begin with.
“Banned sitting in public”??
I didn’t see that one but I wouldn’t be surprised. They keep coming up with inane stuff that only applies to those people.
“Loitering”
If you feel the urge to argue for collective punishment just shut the fuck up. Saying ‘you reap what you sow’ in this case is regressive and cruel. Fascists enacted this law undemocratically and many people, human beings that you should have empathy for, are effectively held captive by the GOP which has heavily gerrymandered Florida and engaged in voter suppression and disenfranchisement. Think critically for a second and direct your criticism at the right people.
are effectively held captive by the GOP
Lol. Maybe 8-10 years ago I could’ve bought this. But no. These people actively choose hate, and they will continue doing so even at their own detriment.
Nope. Just nope. You don’t get the “fascists did it” thing when urban camping bans are being passed all over the country in red and blue cities, counties, and states.
Homelessness isn’t a conservative wedge issue. It’s the one class both parties have deemed it okay to abuse and systemically imprison or kill. And now that we have two large examples of people being made homeless through no fault of their own, you want to disavow it and say it’s just the far right?
Fuck no. You take that shame and you sit in it and next time you make it an issue to not support council members, mayors, and state officials who support criminalizing the homeless.
I’m not saying it’s just the far right. The blues you’re referring to are still right wing authoritarians.
So they aren’t having elections anymore? Do you understand these words have meaning?
Cities, counties, and states are not monolithic entities. There is always a mix of competing interests. This means even in Seattle there are a lot of conservatives. These conservatives own a lot of capital.
Trust me bro, it is most definitely a wedge issue for conservatives. I have been to tons of city and county meetings. It is not liberals calling to imprison the homeless. Guess who wins out. Fucking capital everytime.
You ever had the chance to live in a rural area and hear what they think of homeless people?
The right has been literally demonizing the homeless for thirty or more years now.They made homelessness a fucking partisan issue. You know about the bleeding heart liberals wasting money on drunks and drug addicts. Their messaging has always been clear, not in my back yard.
The Democratic party is also no were near monolithic either. For sure there are some who blame homelessness on character defects or lack of ambition but the majority do not.
Conservatives are a loud minority voice who have capital to back them up. It is amazing how the government bends over anytime “economic” interests come to play.
This issue is really complex and owes a lot to a social contract we broke when we deinstitutionalized mental hospitals in the 50’s and 60’s.
And yet you have prominent Liberal Governors like Newsom telling cities they can’t have state funding if they don’t go after the homeless.
The conservatives aren’t doing this on their own, not in deep blue regions. You can’t just hand waive away the Democrats doing this.
This is a great example of a neoliberal being a conservative. Newsom is a neoliberal. Neoliberals are conservatives who pander to progressives to get votes. They work for the business class, not the human class.
The Dem party is dominated by neoliberals. There are a few progressives in the party as well, but they are marginalized by the neoliberals.
Please stop making up definitions for words that already have them. Liberalism has always been pro capitalist. Neo liberal specifically refers to complete deregulation of the market, abolishing the income tax, and getting rid of social welfare programs like SSI and Medicare.
Please stop making up definitions for words that already have them.
You first make the above condescending statement, then immediately follow it up by describing right-libertarianism, thus making up a definition for a word that already has that description.
Modern neoliberals are not so extreme as to advocate for the total abolishment of fundamental social safety nets as you suggest. Instead, they are much more diabolical. They pretend to support such programs just enough to attract the socially progressive vote. They frequently hold a platform of “reforming” such programs to lower their costs. Once elected, the modern neoliberal gently strangles those programs to allow them to lower corporate taxes or provide benefits to the business class in exchange for their financial support. Some examples of modern American neoliberals are Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton.
So how 'bout you stop making up definitions for words that already have them? We don’t have to debate fucking minutia and semantics at the expense of destroying our actual common enemies. Instead of being condescending to one another, why don’t we try working together for a fucking change? I can see why the French started killing each other when they ran out of elites. I am fucking bloodthirsty right now and arguing stupid shit with people on my own team is a waste of both of our resources.
No. Just no.
They share a couple goals. They are not the same thing. And if you want to describe Neo Liberalism so broadly as to mean all American politicians who aren’t Socialist then you’re just spreading misinformation at that point. Usually this is some stupid take from tankies.
Go look it up. Because Maggoty class time is over. I’ve spent enough time today on this already.
Sorry but you got a shit take on the situation. I have worked on a homeless task force for years. Guess who wants to solve the problem and who wants to send it away.
Are we all to blame for homelessness to some degree. Probably. Are the liberals the same or even close to as cruel as conservatives, fuck no.
While blaming sides may seem a weak move to you. Take it from someone who is still fighting the fight for homeless rights. You can’t compare the two and your just coming across as disingenuous.
Oh and thanks for the laugh about Newsom being a liberal governor. By any measure he is the most moderate liberal around. Hell his election slogan was fucking social liberal fiscal watchdog. He openly admits capital is just as important as human rights.
What do you think a liberal is? I didn’t claim he was progressive or anything leftist.
I’m sitting here watching city council after city council enact homeless bans after the SCOTUS ruling, no matter who they say they are. And I’m supposed to take your word that special, far enough left, Democrats don’t support this? No. I’m not going to ignore the evidence right in front of my eyes. What’s happening on homelessness in this country is disgusting.
And if I’m coming across as disingenuous, what must you be with the “No True Scotsman” fallacy towards anti-homeless Democrats?
You guys are arguing semantics. This is a conservative vs. progressive situation (which you both seem to agree on) and the Dem party is overrun with conservatives (neoliberals).
We should stop referring to Dems and “liberals” and instead refer to conservatives or progressives. The two of you agree substantially on this topic and are effectively arguing about flavors of conservative at this point.
Liberals and conservatives absolutely have different ideologies. People won’t stop voting for liberals until we correctly assign blame to them rather than pass it off as a conservative thing.
Well if the liberals consider you a moderate then perhaps that is saying something. I think we can agree he is a poor example.
You can believe whatever you want. You are clearly passionate about this topic which is good. Look at the people in communities pushing for this. It is always the business every time and the solution is to always push them out.
You need to turn your anger towards those that are causing the problem. Your arguments the liberals are either A complacent or B accomplices both have some truth to them. This isn’t the problem though.
At the end of the day the voters are the problem. We didn’t show up with signs and fire them at the next election. Maybe this is the wake up call this issue needed
Literally the post above this one in my feed.
This is exactly the problem with running on “fuck you, got mine”. Side A bans homelessness. Side A ends up homeless somehow. Side B, because they aren’t running on hate, has sympathy for the circumstances Side A (and B) have found themselves in and helps. Side A faces no consequences ever (hyperbole). Side A doubles down on banning homelessness.
I’m not trying to argue against what you’re saying but fuck does this system suck.
Empathy is for individuals. If someone came to me, maga hat, and truck covered in trump Humber stickers, and said him and his daughter had been displaced by the hurricane and needed help, I would give them a room, food and whatever else I could to help and ask for nothing in return. He has not hurt me (directly) and I have no bad blood with him personally so long as he’s not being outright racist or anything around me.
But when we’re talking about MAGA as a general group, they have hurt me, they are racist and homophobic and trnasphobic and misogynistic and I will happily revel in the Schadenfreude.
If see a nazi sitting at a table and 10 people are at the table talking to them, you have a table with 11 nazis.
There is no tolerance for intolerance.
That’s valid, and these people are not entitled to your kindness or emotional energy.
But a lot of this hatred comes from people living in their own little bubbles with the only information they get coming from hearsay or propaganda. That’s why areas with few immigrants or queer people are the most racist or homophobic. And you can really change people’s minds about things by engaging with them, being friendly with them and just giving them living proof that their propaganda is bullshit. See Darling Davis making freinds with KKK members as a great example of this.
Yes, diplomacy is obsolete /s
They tried that with the Munich Agreement
It’s not 1938 anymore. We understand a lot more about people and where boundaries should be including things like “no genocide.” A lot of Nazis could be rehabilitated if they were educated and given therapy and community not based in racism. Or at least I believe so, and I believe in nonviolent communication. I think it doesn’t benefit genuine anti-Nazi movements to prohibit rehabilitation and education. And no, it’s not rehabilitation or education to be complicit, or actively saying Nazi speech.
That shit doesn’t work with fascists.
I think it does, it works with literally everyone else and we have scientific data showing it as well as lay people who help rehab and convert white supremacists and neonazis.
The thing is, if that shit DOES work with fascists, then it creates a burden of nonviolent methods being used first. And violence is so much easier and simpler - it’s exactly why the fascists use it too. But yeah, we gotta be creative and try harder and use nonviolent solutions.
This shit is why I’m against spanking, it makes kids stupid and teaches them to commit and expect violence when there’s an issue instead of problem solving. It’s too bad you can’t conceive of a world with nonviolent solutions, since violence itself causes fascism to worsen.
Naw, I wouldn’t trust a trumper to be in my house or around me. But I’m a queer so I get more vitriol from Republicans.
I am trans and bisexual.
Then you would be inviting an enemy into your home who would delight in your death. This may not have the wonderful outcome you would hope for. The risk outweighs the reward in my opinion.
You are one of the kind-hearted people who conservatives want to exterminate. No matter how kind you are to them, they will only see your kindness as weakness. That is the conservative way.
An us vs them mentality is still bad even when you do it. There are so many examples of people changing opinions of hateful people by showing them some kindness. Yes it would be very easy to pain every MAGA as a terrible person down to their core, call them the enemy and forsake them, but things will only get worse with that attitude.
But if instead you show these people kindness, especially if they are vulnerable, some of them will change, and even if its only 1 in 10, you’re still making the word better by helping people come out of their hateful mentality.
Well then I hope you live alone and wouldn’t be endangering others with your naivety
I hope whatever causes your hostile attitude eventually goes away and allows your kindness to return.
Sometimes people need to hear a tough truth. You are putting yourself and others (if you don’t live alone I guess) in danger. These people murder people like you.
If it’s just you, then have at it. Godspeed.
I would suggest putting the phone down for a little while and going out in to the real world for a bit to re-adjust.
and sidenote, if someone said the same about muslims, pointing out how many muslims murder LGBT people and how if you let a muslim into your home you would be putting family in danger would you accept that?
But we’re not talking about MAGA as a group, we’re talking about people, without any regard for their political affiliation: Natural disasters aren’t checking people’s voter registration.
Only about 39% of active Florida voters are registered Republican (sure, some are NPA and vote Republican), but there’s at least 29% of us who are registered Democrat and voting in every local and federal election, but here we are anyway.
If people with nothing but the clothes on their backs can leave places in Central and South America to make the dangerous journey to the US to try to make a better life for their family, people like you can get the fuck out of Florida before it’s too late and you’ve got brown shirts and border crossing checkpoints.
I honestly wish this was a joke or an exaggeration, and I hate the “just move somewhere else” people… But there comes a point where you just have to do what’s best for your safety and get the fuck out while you still have freedom of movement. Maybe I’m a pussy.
Yes and those people have my unconditional sympathy. It’s not like I’m doing anything to make their lives worse or withholding aid. I’m just taking a moment to enjoy bad things happening to bad people for once and in a fisrly ironic way. It’s a minor indulgence that doesn’t hurt anyone.
maga hat
“When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.” ~Maya Angelou
You’re going to open up your house to someone who will hurt you again, like how they hurt you with their vote and public support of fascism.
So what would Maya Angelou think of Daryl Davis, the man who famously reprogrammed dozens of actual KKK members by going out of his way to befreind them?
If he had listened to that advice there would only be more hatred and racism in the world.
We don’t know the names of anyone who tried that unsuccessfully.
Even if we did, it wouldnt matter.
It kinda would because that sounds borderline suicidal.
If you feel the urge to argue for collective punishment just shut the fuck up.
I started writing up this lengthy comment about how this article isn’t even about people displaced by the storms so much as those who were already homeless before, and how only ~39% of Florida voters are registered Republican, and even then we’re talking about whole families and single mothers here, and about government corruption and voter disenfranchisement, but… You said it all, and much more succinctly. Thank you!
Thank you, I’d encourage you to continue your comment if you’re still interested. I’m certainly not the best writer and it’s always great to see more genuinely compassionate and progressive takes
I have empathy for people who have empathy themselves. Many of voters in Florida elected these morons, they’re not held hostage except to their own inability to critically think. The elected officials gerrymandered, put judges in place that don’t strike the gerrymandering down, and then the rest of us have to show empathy toward them? Yeah, no.
Sure, for those who are intelligent and didn’t vote for these assholes, I feel bad for them and wish them well.
But clearly much of Florida’s population asked for this — so to those people, you reap what you sow.
I was primarily saying to have empathy for the non-assholes who are also effected by everything the assholes do, but while we’re at it, you should reserve some empathy for morons. Enough to think about and understand why they are the way they are, but not sympathize with their bigotry and hatred. The inability to think critically is cultivated. Through underfunding schools, through emotional and physical abuse, through brainwashing from childhood in fundamentalism, through lifelong propagandization and the manufacturing of consent, among many other factors.
I agree on everything except that once a person reaches the age of reason, they can no longer blame their upbringing for their mental inadequacies, barring any real mental disability. At some point people have the ability to think for themselves — they simply choose not to because humans, like electricity, follow the path of least resistance.
At that point they are responsible for their own education, bigotry, and hatred.
Yup. I will, however, feel less empathy for the people who did vote for these policies
Thank you
Man who tf goes around enforcing these laws after a disaster. Imagine some wack ass old white guy ticketing people outside of the FEMA medical station for loitering.
I can see you haven’t interacted with many police in these areas. I wouldn’t be surprised in the least by any of that behavior. The cops only protect and serve property, not people.
Margaret Killjoy did a 2 part podcast about relief efforts in Asheville, and she mentioned that one FEMA worker she spoke to told her one of the biggest hurdles to actually getting people help was the fact that a lot of local rescue and aid efforts are first and foremost run by police and the military (and other local first responders, but in the US police generally outnumber these by a hideous ratio).
The worker mentioned that the frustrations mostly come because community and mutual aid are inherently horizontal - you tell me you need food, I have food, I share food, no strings. Police and military are taught to desire hierarchy and structure and order, they want “these people need aid first and then these people and then these” rather than “EVERYONE needs aid, and if we offer it freely people generally won’t take advantage”, which is usually the case actually. I can definitely see police going “well I know all these people just don’t have homes anymore, but if we stop enforcing this law society will break down entirely”.
Rebecca Solnit gives examples of this going back over 100 years
I never once expressed disbelief.
Nah, it’ll be some 28 year old wannabe Punisher wearing Oakleys whose weekend activities include watching football and abusing his girlfriend.
California: “First time?”
https://theintercept.com/2021/05/07/california-fires-chico-housing-real-estate/
