What's the breaking point?

[alonso ramoran]

"Kids Who Die" - by Langston Hughes

This is for the kids who die,
Black and white,
For kids will die certainly.
The old and rich will live on awhile,
As always,
Eating blood and gold,
Letting kids die.

Kids will die in the swamps of Mississippi
Organizing sharecroppers
Kids will die in the streets of Chicago
Organizing workers
Kids will die in the orange groves of California
Telling others to get together
Whites and Filipinos,
Negroes and Mexicans,
All kinds of kids will die
Who don’t believe in lies, and bribes, and contentment
And a lousy peace.

Of course, the wise and the learned
Who pen editorials in the papers,
And the gentlemen with Dr. in front of their names
White and black,
Who make surveys and write books
Will live on weaving words to smother the kids who die,
And the sleazy courts,
And the bribe-reaching police,
And the blood-loving generals,
And the money-loving preachers
Will all raise their hands against the kids who die,
Beating them with laws and clubs and bayonets and bullets
To frighten the people—
For the kids who die are like iron in the blood of the people—
And the old and rich don’t want the people
To taste the iron of the kids who die,
Don’t want the people to get wise to their own power,
To believe an Angelo Herndon, or even get together

Listen, kids who die—
Maybe, now, there will be no monument for you
Except in our hearts
Maybe your bodies’ll be lost in a swamp
Or a prison grave, or the potter’s field,
Or the rivers where you’re drowned like Leibknecht

But the day will come—
You are sure yourselves that it is coming—
When the marching feet of the masses
Will raise for you a living monument of love,
And joy, and laughter,
And black hands and white hands clasped as one,
And a song that reaches the sky—
The song of the life triumphant
Through the kids who die.

---

The US needs to go. The West needs to burn. Where are the community led political organizations that feed, clothe, shelter, and provide free medical care to the people? Where is the union organizing? The guerilla units? A sick society that kills and abuses and ignores the killing and abuse of children and the elderly does not deserve to be peacefully rehabilitated; it deserves to be violently torn down to its foundation and entirely restructured with love and care for one another.

Prices are going up, children are being killed, capitalists are dancing on their corpses, the pandemic is still a thing, the police are more militarized than ever, all in the land of the free---what's the breaking point?

---

Now that I think of it, this thread probably fits better in general discussion.

[Mark A Becker]

Dear Velasco-

We have passed the broken point; how do we get to the healing point?

You said, "... it deserves to be violently torn down to its foundation and entirely restructured with love and care for one another." I'm afraid that those willing to engage in violent tearing down will not have love and care on their minds.

The lind of restructuring you're calling for will be as violent as the tearing down.

Mark

[alonso ramoran]

You said, "... it deserves to be violently torn down to its foundation and entirely restructured with love and care for one another."  I'm afraid that those willing to engage in violent tearing down will not have love and care on their minds.

The lind of restructuring you're calling for will be as violent as the tearing down. 

Mark

Angela Davis, George Jackson, Huey Newton, Malcolm X, Assata Shakur, Tupac, Bobby Seale, Bobby Hutton, etc these were/are people without an iota of love in their hearts for the people? Or were the US's Founding Fathers the only people capable of engaging in violent revolution while simultaneously holding love and care in their minds, whatever that was to them? Maybe you don't think so and they were just as hateful as any other revolutionary. Ok. How do things change? Over time and passively, while politicians and pundits repeat to us that things are getting better? The Earth is dying as the first world continues to rape and plunder the third. Nothing short of violent revolution against the capitalist class can save it. There will be a period of even more acute suffering, but it won't be forever and at least the masses will have their soul back in that fight, whereas before their entire lives revolved around capital. Change is painful. Confronting traumas (such as the apocalyptic event of colonialism) is painful, otherwise what would we be confronting?

[Mark A Becker]

Nothing short of violent revolution against the capitalist class can save it. There will be a period of even more acute suffering, but it won't be forever...

"The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" - Gil Scott Heron, 1971
Worth another listen, but 51 years on, and 84 years since Hughes' poem, the incremental changes can be tedious.  MLK borrowed the phrase "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice," and wrote and spoke of it in 1958/1964. 

The bend toward justice may be agonizingly slow, but non-violence is still the correct path forward.  That, and generations being brought up to respect each other, especially those who may not look like you.  How many generations?  As many as it takes. I have no realistic expectation that the necessary changes will occur in my lifetime, yet I can see that slow bend toward justice in the hearts of my son, and many nieces, and nephews, and even their children. 

That said, with the number of guns in America, any violent revolution will end very, very badly. We can't shoot our way out of the problems we've created. 

Velasco, my friend, most of the people in my very diverse community treat each other with respect, and I far prefer living within that diversity, than sealing myself within some ethno-cultural bubble, or lashing out at those who seek inclusion. I feel sorry for folks who must live in areas where all of their neighbors may look and think the same as they do.   

I may be hopelessly optimistic to think that we are bending that arc toward justice, but I will never resort to violence to force that change.  Yet, I will gather, and raise my voice in protest along with the millions, and millions of my bothers and sisters who have grown weary of the bullshit that tries to drive wedges to break us apart.

[dukealien]

Nothing short of violent revolution against the capitalist class can save it. There will be a period of even more acute suffering, but it won't be forever...

"The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" - Gil Scott Heron, 1971
Worth another listen, but 51 years on, and 84 years since Hughes' poem, the incremental changes can be tedious.  MLK borrowed the phrase "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice," and wrote and spoke of it in 1958/1964. 

The bend toward justice may be agonizingly slow, but non-violence is still the correct path forward.  That, and generations being brought up to respect each other, especially those who may not look like you.  How many generations?  As many as it takes. I have no realistic expectation that the necessary changes will occur in my lifetime, yet I can see that slow bend toward justice in the hearts of my son, and many nieces, and nephews, and even their children. 

That said, with the number of guns in America, any violent revolution will end very, very badly. We can't shoot our way out of the problems we've created. 

Velasco, my friend, most of the people in my very diverse community treat each other with respect, and I far prefer living within that diversity, than sealing myself within some ethno-cultural bubble, or lashing out at those who seek inclusion. I feel sorry for folks who must live in areas where all of their neighbors may look and think the same as they do.   

I may be hopelessly optimistic to think that we are bending that arc toward justice, but I will never resort to violence to force that change.  Yet, I will gather, and raise my voice in protest along with the millions, and millions of my bothers and sisters who have grown weary of the bullshit that tries to drive wedges to break us apart.

Could not have said it better, particularly the part about my neighbors.

[alonso ramoran]

The bend toward justice may be agonizingly slow, but non-violence is still the correct path forward.

A convenient truth regurgitated by the capitalist class. Why on earth would they preach to the American population through films and books and whatnot that George Jackson’s way was the way to a better world? It works much better to the advantage of the capitalist class to say it is actually morally correct to peacefully protest, to wait for change and simply vote for the right candidates while they plunder the earth and exploit the people.

You sound like someone who holds some amount of power in our society, so it would make sense that you’d be saying nonviolence is the correct way to enact change. If I'm wrong and you’re not someone with any power that was earned via the violence of your forebears, I can still understand why you’d think that nonviolence is the way. Violence only begets more violence. It’s only an endless cycle and we should simply stop being violent. I understand. I used to believe wholeheartedly that this was true in all cases no matter what.

Today though my position on violence isn’t one of being reckless and seeking it in every situation where there is opposition, but recognizing it’s utility in the fight for liberation, just as nonviolent tactics are useful. Guerrilla warfare and building free clinics are both violent and nonviolent methods for building revolution, but they’re both equally necessary. You're free to think that the violent methods discredit the nonviolent methods, but if that's the case you must be consistent. Your nonviolent ways of going with the system and trusting that it will "bend towards justice" in the long run is discredited by the violence of institutions like the military, assuming you come from a Western country.

I personally don't care if one method discredits the other because it's violent. I only pay attention to the goals of these methods. The goal of one is to serve capital, the other is to serve the people.

[Mark A Becker]

If I'm wrong and you’re not someone with any power...

I have no more power than you, my friend.

[busker]

The Earth is dying as the first world continues to rape and plunder the third. 

Actually, the world's biggest consumer of energy and materials is China, hardly a first world country. And no, most of what China produces goes back into Chinese infrastructure.
Developing countries benefit hugely from trade with the developed world. An example is Indonesia, which relies on China, and to a lesser extent, India, then to an even lesser extent, the rest of the world, for selling its coal, nickel, and palm oil to.

Nothing short of violent revolution against the capitalist class can save it. There will be a period of even more acute suffering, but it won't be forever and at least the masses will have their soul back in that fight, whereas before their entire lives revolved around capital. 

The 'masses' care about their families, and sending their kids to college. Only jobless college students, their tuition being paid by their parents, or 20 somethings having their lives being subsidised by their parents again, dream of the coming revolution.
Those who are actually poor are trying everyday to get out of that cycle. Revolution is the last thing on their minds. 

Change is painful. Confronting traumas (such as the apocalyptic event of colonialism) is painful, otherwise what would we be confronting?

Colonialism was a blessing in many countries, for a variety of reasons.
In some others, it wasn't a blessing at all, but hardly 'traumatic' except for the generation that actually suffered.


You might want the US to go, but it won't. Societies don't disappear because some people have indigestion. Instead, if the complaints get too bothersome, the complainants are swatted away like flies. Only, in western democracies, you're given a far longer rope than in the developing world or, indeed, the workers' paradise of China.
The US does need to reform, being the only developed country with such a huge, uneducated, base of religious bigots. It will take one more generation for things to get better in that regard.

---

And FFS, the earth is not dying.
Climate change will make it harder for humans to exist as they do today. It will reignite the wars of thousands of years ago, with nations battling for water resources, and land (as their own goes under the sea). It will probably be very bad for future generations. But the earth is not a living being. It can't 'die'.

[alonso ramoran]

Yeah, I know this tone. I'll engage anyway.

Actually, the world's biggest consumer of energy and materials is China, hardly a first world country. And no, most of what China produces goes back into Chinese infrastructure.

Developing countries benefit hugely from trade with the developed world. An example is Indonesia, which relies on China, and to a lesser extent, India, then to an even lesser extent, the rest of the world, for selling its coal, nickel, and palm oil to.

Cool. I'm talking about the US right now. A cultural event had taken place where around 19 children were gunned down a couple days ago.

The 'masses' care about their families, and sending their kids to college. Only jobless college students, their tuition being paid by their parents, or 20 somethings having their lives being subsidised by their parents again, dream of the coming revolution.

Those who are actually poor are trying everyday to get out of that cycle. Revolution is the last thing on their minds. 

Only jobless college students or 20 somethings as you've described them? Unconditionally and internationally? You might think of replying "Well... I'm talking about the US right now". I said that in reference to the US's issues. I'm saying that we should look to other political parties in the 3rd World such as the NPA in the Phillipines in reference to looking for a solution. And of course the masses care about their families. Still doesn't invalidate anything I've said.

Colonialism was a blessing in many countries, for a variety of reasons.

In some others, it wasn't a blessing at all, but hardly 'traumatic' except for the generation that actually suffered.

You're definitely living in the First World with me   We can enjoy any fruit at any time of the year, everything is at our fingertips with a little money. That really is a blessing, thank you for showing me that.

And FFS, the earth is not dying.


Climate change will make it harder for humans to exist as they do today. It will reignite the wars of thousands of years ago, with nations battling for water resources, and land (as their own goes under the sea). It will probably be very bad for future generations. But the earth is not a living being. It can't 'die'.

This is what was meant though. You're just being cute here

---

I have no more power than you, my friend.

Appreciate the substance, my friend.

[busker]

Cool. I'm talking about the US right now. A cultural event had taken place where around 19 children were gunned down a couple days ago.

'The first world continues to rape the third' has nothing to do with school shootings in the US. It's just leftist garbage.

Only jobless college students or 20 somethings as you've described them? Unconditionally and internationally? You might think of replying "Well... I'm talking about the US right now". I said that in reference to the US's issues. I'm saying that we should look to other political parties in the 3rd World such as the NPA in the Phillipines in reference to looking for a solution. And of course the masses care about their families. Still doesn't invalidate anything I've said.

"Revolutionary" outfits like the NPA are dime a dozen in the developing world. Financed by whichever country wants to stir up trouble in the other. In the case of all of these 'Marxist Leninist' outfits in Asia, it's China keeping its neighbours weak.
In the few cases where the Communist revolution has succeeded, it has replaced the old plutocracy by a new one, and made things generally worse. Venezuela, Cuba, Laos, Cambodia, are good examples of such disasters. In most cases, however, said revolutionaries have been hunted down and butchered like goats before Bakr-Id.
Everything you've said is garbage. Highlighted in red is an example of something that has never happened in any communist 'revolution' except in the fevered imaginations of espresso-sipping intellectuals in the west who think they're communist because they've read Maxim Gorky.

Nothing short of violent revolution against the capitalist class can save it. There will be a period of even more acute suffering, but it won't be forever and at least the masses will have their soul back in that fight, whereas before their entire lives revolved around capital.

You're definitely living in the First World with me   We can enjoy any fruit at any time of the year, everything is at our fingertips with a little money. That really is a blessing, thank you for showing me that.

Actually, capitalism has made it possible to have any type of food in most countries around the world, such as Thai in Egypt and Indian in Vietnam. And the same goes for fruit. The variety in third world countries, many of which are situated in the tropics, is actually better than the refrigerated shit you get in the west.

This is what was meant though. You're just being cute here

So 'the earth is dying' = 'humanity is dying'? 
The language of the left is truly bereft of logic.

[alonso ramoran]

Cool. I'm talking about the US right now. A cultural event had taken place where around 19 children were gunned down a couple days ago.

'The first world continues to rape the third' has nothing to do with school shootings in the US. It's just leftist garbage.

Only jobless college students or 20 somethings as you've described them? Unconditionally and internationally? You might think of replying "Well... I'm talking about the US right now". I said that in reference to the US's issues. I'm saying that we should look to other political parties in the 3rd World such as the NPA in the Phillipines in reference to looking for a solution. And of course the masses care about their families. Still doesn't invalidate anything I've said.

"Revolutionary" outfits like the NPA are dime a dozen in the developing world. Financed by whichever country wants to stir up trouble in the other. In the case of all of these 'Marxist Leninist' outfits in Asia, it's China keeping its neighbours weak.
In the few cases where the Communist revolution has succeeded, it has replaced the old plutocracy by a new one, and made things generally worse. Venezuela, Cuba, Laos, Cambodia, are good examples of such disasters. In most cases, however, said revolutionaries have been hunted down and butchered like goats before Bakr-Id.
Everything you've said is garbage. Highlighted in red is an example of something that has never happened in any communist 'revolution' except in the fevered imaginations of espresso-sipping intellectuals in the west who think they're communist because they've read Maxim Gorky.

Nothing short of violent revolution against the capitalist class can save it. There will be a period of even more acute suffering, but it won't be forever and at least the masses will have their soul back in that fight, whereas before their entire lives revolved around capital.

You're definitely living in the First World with me   We can enjoy any fruit at any time of the year, everything is at our fingertips with a little money. That really is a blessing, thank you for showing me that.

Actually, capitalism has made it possible to have any type of food in most countries around the world, such as Thai in Egypt and Indian in Vietnam. And the same goes for fruit. The variety in third world countries, many of which are situated in the tropics, is actually better than the refrigerated shit you get in the west.

This is what was meant though. You're just being cute here

So 'the earth is dying' = 'humanity is dying'? 
The language of the left is truly bereft of logic.

Ah, okay. I know where you stand now. You’re a facts and logic guy. And I think I’ve just been destroyed. Guess there’s nothing much for me to say then.

[rowens]

alexorande, what are you going to do with all this violence?

Where are you going to store it?

Do you have an outline of the violence and in what manner it should take place?


The map.

Put the map in The Sewer. So nobody will see it coming.


There was at least two mass-shootings every day in America for a week after the Texas school thing.

I'm not mocking your ideas anymore than I do anyone's.

I will continue the conversation about how best to structure the violence if you wish.

[CRNDLSM]

Fun fact about uvalde, the mother who ran in for her two kids was not only handcuffed by the officers, they said if she talked to any reporters about it they would say she violated her probation and put her in prison, she went before a judge and he said he would never say she violated her probation, she's a hero. So she gave her first interview

[Mark A Becker]

Fun fact about uvalde...

That's a very, very poor choice of words there, my friend.

[rowens]

I want to point out that the violence suggested by Velasco isn't the same violence as mass shootings.

Only that violence isn't easy to control, or to stop once started.



I also would like to talk more about Malcolm X, who I am more interested in than Martin Luther King Jr. and whoever else.

[Mark A Becker]

I will continue the conversation about how best to structure the violence if you wish.

C'mon, rowens, I really do hope that you're being sarcastic.

The very last thing America needs right now are ways to structure the violence. The chaotic methods are doing way too much damage as it is.

[rowens]

If there's going to be violence, the conversation about it will lend towards whether it will be a structure toward it or not.


I'll talk about anything anyone will talk about.

---

Most of these school shootings have nothing to do with politics or revolution.
They have to do with certain individuals suffering alone in a world that has nothing to do with whatever reality we experience. Other than that it is the same world.

---

The world, by the way, is violence. Everything you do, every thought, every feeling is violence.

The only real job of a rational, conscientious human being is to contain that violence within his own body, and then do the best to influence it elsewhere in as least a morally-ethically destructive pattern as possible.

---

See.

Even that typo was violent.

Morally-ethically constructive is what I meant.

---

No I was right the first time.

---

Someone asked me to go change the oil in their car while I was writing these last few messages.

I got mixed up.

---

I know how to change the oil in someone's car, but I can't drive.

Shows how much I know.

---

It's 5:06

---

where I am. 5:07, now.

When Velasco comes back, he's going to feel put on the spot.


I must admit, I love being put on the spot.

I have nothing better to do. I get excited.

[alonso ramoran]

alexorande, what are you going to do with all this violence?

Where are you going to store it?

Do you have an outline of the violence and in what manner it should take place?


The map.

Put the map in The Sewer. So nobody will see it coming.

I think that power needs to be built from the ground up by the people if they are serious about taking up the gun. This means creating programs where people are being fed (community gardens for example), people are being medically taken care of (The BPP's free clinics), even down to the shit we don't think about, like pest control or whatnot. General stuff that improves our material conditions. If we don't have that, then there's no reason for any collective, org, or party to be taking up the gun. They'd be fighting for nothing.

As for the type of violence that's needed, I feel like we should look to the tactics that are frequently used successfully in the Third World against Western countries, which are guerilla tactics. This can consist of only fighting when victory is guaranteed, blending back in with the masses when things don't look good, launching unpredictable raids to gather resources and keep the capitalist forces psychologically on edge. George Jackson discusses the advantages of urban guerilla warfare over rural guerilla warfare in his book "Blood In My Eye" that's worth looking into.

I will continue the conversation about how best to structure the violence if you wish.

C'mon, rowens, I really do hope that you're being sarcastic.

The very last thing America needs right now are ways to structure the violence. The chaotic methods are doing way too much damage as it is.

America already has structured violence. The US military, prisons, cops, healthcare system, public schools, etc. are all built upon structured violence. Our entire culture is built upon our lust for this structured violence that keeps the masses in poverty. We fly fighter jets over big events like the Super Bowl to celebrate the fire power we use to bully and exploit the Third World. There is nothing chaotic about this violence. If you understand the culture, you'd understand it's only natural for there to be these ruptures in our society where events such as mass shootings take place.

I agree with the face-value sentiment of your statement though. The last thing the US does need is structured violence. But, in a country where idiots only scream to vote and others shrug while children are sprayed with bullets not ONLY in their country but abroad, fuck the US. I HOPE a violence structured by the masses is the last thing it needs to collapse, otherwise we're already dead.

[Mark A Becker]

There are so many hard working, good people in America, of all shapes, sizes, and colors, who are doing tangible good on a daily basis, and there are plenty of opportunities for willing volunteers to help out.

It's better to lend a hand than raise a fist.

[alonso ramoran]

There are so many hard working, good people in America, of all shapes, sizes, and colors, who are doing tangible good on a daily basis, and there are plenty of opportunities for willing volunteers to help out.

It's better to lend a hand than raise a fist.

Mark, where are you taking this conversation? I start by stating that these hard-working good people should organize to overthrow the capitalists that leech off them and you reply by saying there are good hard-working people in the US. You haven't really even replied to anything I or rowens have said concerning the nature of violence that's needed for positive change. Just different variations of  "violence isn't the answer". It isn't the answer. It's the language that the answer must be delivered in if we want substantive change.

If you don't wanna truly engage in a conversation about where violence is applicable in the fight for a better world then I think it'd be better for your mental health if you just didn't.