#beneficiaries of a genocide

[auressea]

uncolonize your mind..

https://thedialoguevictoria.ca/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/SettlersTakeAction_OnCanadaProject.pdf

@allthecanadianpolitics

[skalidris]

anyway it's really funny how scared everyone is to call the israel-palestine conflict a genocide just cos it's happening in real time, and has all the markings of being a genocide, due to it being a genocide

[txttletale]

this debate is tedious because undeniably the majority of usamericans constitute an extraordinarily privileged class who reap the bulk of the benefit of imperialism, so what is the point of fighting tooth and nail to lump in the internal colonies? its especially offensive to indigenous people to imply theyve somehow been enriched as a result of settler colonialism

indigenous and Black people have obviously not been 'enriched by settler colonialism' and the ongoing mechanisms of settler colonialism do in fact work as impoverishing forces to lock them off from many of the benefits of imperialism. but usamerican global imperialism and usamerican settler colonialism are two very different systems and structures, although of course not with zero overlap. but there are also indigenous and Black people throughout Latin America, who also were the victims of settler colonialism, genocide and slavery, as well as usamerican imperialism. i am not "lumping in" anyone, any more than analysing men as beneficiaries of misogyny is an attack on Black or gay men or a denial of their oppression.

[odinsblog]

Lmao. Twitter user georgina4781 is like, “I hope future generations judge you by the same social standards” — aka: being against white supremacy, Apartheid & imperialism that destroyed the lives of literally MILLIONS of Black and indigenous peoples. And they said that shit with their whole entire chest out! You and your pesky “modern standards” of …. *checks notes* …. not enslaving entire countries and depleting said countries of valuable material resources.

Look, Imma let everyone in on a little secret here: throwing down the, “BUT THEY DIDN’T KNOW ANY BETTER BACK THEN” excuse is 💯bullshit. But white people can be counted on to stay eating it up. Because that false framing serves a purpose.

Are we really and truly expected to believe that absolutely noooobody back then had any inkling that things like slavery, colonialism and Apartheid were evil? Nobody at all back then knew it? C’mon now. See? More “white innocence” bullshit. You think Jeff Bezos doesn’t know that people dying in Amazon warehouses is easily preventable and him not taking precautions to avoid more deaths is “bad”? People know wrong now, and they knew it back then. Still not sold? Okay, how about this: if nothing else, the Black and indigenous people being colonized knew it and expressed their views, but colonizers intentionally ignored them and did not listen to them. And I’m pretty sure we won’t need to search very hard through history books to find white people who knew it was wrong too. Just because their voices did not prevail doesn’t mean that “everyone back then” somehow did not know better. Many knew better and simply did. not. care. Kinda like Jeff Bezos right now.

When we accept the false premise that “they just didn’t know any better back then,” we are allowing a form of whitewashing history to happen — we are allowing today’s racism deniers to deftly delete the agency of colonizers, and replace their cruelty and greed, with innocence. And POOF! Just like that, the myth of white innocence is maintained, and the cruelty and greed behind all imperialism is parsed, equivocated and whitewashed away into something less heinous and more palatable.

And the thing white people seem to call “bringing up the shitty parts of history” is literally what everyone else, under ordinary circumstances, refers to as the truth, but apparently everyone is supposed to stay quiet so that colonizers and their beneficiaries can continue whitewashing history and continue pretending that it wasn’t really that bad, or advise everyone to just “get over it” because was “a long time ago,” or eventually argue that it never happened at all.

I’ll let you in on another secret: white people who want to downplay & deny racism love to throw racism into this far away safe space called, “the past”. I’m reminded of an old saying that goes something like, “your grandfather may have chopped down the tree, but we are still suffering from no shade today because of his actions.” An incredibly bad paraphrase on my part, but the point is, Uju Anya is a survivor of war and genocide caused by recent colonialism, and the person who was instrumental in that - in chopping down the proverbial shadetree - just died. Uju Anya is still experiencing the loss of diaspora caused by Queen Elizabeth’s kingdom, and telling her how to process her very real and very current grief is so presumptuous that I would need to live a million years as a white person to even begin to comprehend how presumptuous that is.

White fragility is a hell of a thing. But demanding that the still-living and still-impacted descendants of imperialism just shut up so that European whites don’t have to be reminded of their queen’s active role in colonialism … that’s strait up bullshit.

Apparently American conservatives aren’t the only ones upset with honestly talking about theories critical of racist systems.

Sending out much love to Uju Anya, who is now having Jeff fucking Bezos, one of the richest white men in history, and others harass her and lecture her about “kindness” and “respectability politics”.

[onesettleronebullet]

'inner colony of the USA' idk I think it's a bit un-nuanced to act like black americans don't by and large serve to benefit from US global imperialism in the current era and that this benefit can't create a conflict of interest wrt racial/class solidarity

What do they benefit from? In the most bloodthirsty era of us imperialism, the Cold War, black organisations such as the Black Panthers never shied away from solidarity with their fellow colonised. To believe that somehow the modern black community has less reason to oppose imperialism now than then is immaterialist nonsense.

To act as though the black people who are put into mini Bantustans that we call ghettos and projects, who placed through the prison complex are made into slaves and sweatshop workers, who are treated with such savagery that they can be shot by the states enforcers without any real repercussion are somehow beneficiaries in imperialism is laughable.

In that vein, there are certain segments of the Latine populations who also seek to benefit from their own nations' exploitation by the US, the settler class, and the bourgeoisie. The consistent switching between conservative, fascist parties, and socialist ones is evidence enough of that; the continued genocide of indigenous peoples on their land is evidence of that and the exploitation of black people in their own communities is evidence of that.

Should I condemn all of Latin America as settler colonial states that deserve no solidarity from africa or asia? No! That's reactionary rubbish, but this rhetoric that you're spewing is equally that of the dustbin.

[howieabel]

“People of color in the internal colonies of the US cannot defend themselves against police brutality or expropriate the means of survival to free themselves from economic servitude. They must wait for enough people of color who have attained more economic privilege (the “house slaves” of Malcolm X’s analysis) and conscientious white people to gather together and hold hands and sing songs. Then, they believe, change will surely come. People in Latin America must suffer patiently, like true martyrs, while white activists in the US “bear witness” and write to Congress. People in Iraq must not fight back. Only if they remain civilians will their deaths be counted and mourned by white peace activists who will, one of these days, muster a protest large enough to stop the war. Indigenous people need to wait just a little longer (say, another 500 years) under the shadow of genocide, slowly dying off on marginal lands, until-well, they’re not a priority right now, so perhaps they need to organize a demonstration or two to win the attention and sympathy of the powerful. Or maybe they could go on strike, engage in Gandhian noncooperation? But wait-a majority of them are already unemployed, noncooperating, fully excluded from the functioning of the system. Nonviolence declares that the American Indians could have fought off Columbus, George Washington, and all the other genocidal butchers with sit-ins; that Crazy Horse, by using violent resistance, became part of the cycle of violence, and was “as bad as” Custer. Nonviolence declares that Africans could have stopped the slave trade with hunger strikes and petitions, and that those who mutinied were as bad as their captors; that mutiny, a form of violence, led to more violence, and, thus, resistance led to more enslavement. Nonviolence refuses to recognize that it can only work for privileged people, who have a status protected by violence, as the perpetrators and beneficiaries of a violent hierarchy.” ― Peter Gelderloos, How Nonviolence Protects the State

[germiyahu]

There really is no meaningful distinction between Right Wing antisemitism and Left Wing antisemitism. At least not when it comes to their effects.

Right Wing antisemitism claims Jews are subhuman, or even non-human. Both a powerful elite and a class of pathetic vermin. Weak and strong. Dangerous yet easy targets to vent off a little societal steam. The perfect scapegoats.

Left Wing antisemitism claims Jews are a privileged class not in need of protection, not deserving of consideration. The beneficiaries of white/class privilege and also constantly attempting to cosplay marginalization for special treatment or attention or sympathy.

Both see Jews as a powerful force perverting society, while also feeling contempt for individual Jewish people, Jewish culture, Judaism, etc. as useless, lazy, whiny, entitled, and moronic. Are Left Wing antisemitism and Right Wing antisemitism really all that different in their core beliefs?

Right Wing antisemitism is often more openly violent, sure. It's often more of a direct call to action to harm Jews. It's often more outwardly and proudly genocidal in scope and intent. But Left Wing antisemitism can feel more insidious I imagine, as it looks at Right Wing antisemitism and especially in these times, increasingly says "So? What do you have to say about all the dead children in Gaza?"

Right Wing antisemites want to victimize Jews and Left Wing antisemites insist Jews cannot be victims. Do you not see how this is a deadly combination? And do you not see, how maybe after decades of thinking they could trust them, Jews are more upset about Left Wing goyim being antisemitic?

And that's not even touching on the Leftist antisemites who are being openly violently antisemitic in a Right Wing way but still insist on calling themselves Leftists. I'm taling about who I think is the greater percentage. The Leftists who see verifiable undeniable rising antisemitism and simply don't care because the Jews had it coming or the Jews need to do x, y, z before they deserve your pity or your help or your anything... this is a huge problem.

[girlactionfigure]

My mom bought me these boots from Zara in Denver a few weeks back. She could feel me sinking into a pit of rage, grief, and hopelessness. So, she came to meet me in Denver and upon landing, took me to walk the mall “just to get out and move through it.” My mother, a miracle, born to a father who was the sole Holocaust survivor in his family, knows a thing or two about battling anger and grief at a world fixated on annihilating Jews and our spirits.

 I've been intimately familiar with the horrors of October 7th since it happened. Like countless Jews, I've meticulously followed every gruesome detail of Hamas' well-planned and well-funded genocide attempt. Every despicable act of torture, rape, and murder – etched into my bones. On top of that, I follow daily the relentless onslaught of people and communities celebrating, erasing, and justifying the slaughter, while denying our right to defend ourselves. Watching old friends ‘like’ and share posts constantly which dehumanize Jews and lie about Israel, putting our lives further at risk. Contending with all of this over the past few months has been unbearable. Like many Jews, I'm haunted both awake and asleep. 

I've been debilitated, struggling to cope with all of it. How do we carry on in a country where so many wish us dead? How do we thrive in a place that dismisses our pain and disregards our countless contributions to society? How do I contemplate having children in a place where their lives aren't valued? How can I coexist with so many people who, at best, couldn't care less about the brutal murders of over 1200, the kidnapping and daily ongoing torture of hundreds more for over 119 days, while the world cheers for the rest of us to be annihilated? How do I sleep at night when all I can think about are the looming threats to Israel and the Jewish people, the treatment of our hostages, and the insidious web of hatred that constantly engulfs our existence? 

When my mom handed me these boots, I thought they might be fitting for Israel, but I didn't really dwell on it. I knew the journey would be grueling. And while I thought I already knew the gruesome details, walking through the aftermath is a different level of knowing. These boots tread through miles of hell – the remnants of homes ruthlessly attacked by a kind of evil I couldn't fathom existed. An evil that deliberately targeted communities of Israelis dedicated to peace, only to be met with beheadings, rape, burning alive, and slaughter.

 These boots tread through miles of desolation – the aftermath of thousands of terrorists and hundreds of so-called "civilians" perpetrating unspeakable acts against over a thousand innocent, peace-loving people. These vile rapists and murderers were the beneficiaries for years of those they heartlessly slaughtered. They were acquainted with so many of these good people, the very people they mercilessly killed. Several of these compassionate Israelis had welcomed these terrorists into their homes for years, offered them work opportunities, and tirelessly tried to help them lead a better life. 

These boots ventured through charred remains, blood-soaked grounds, and homes, bomb shelters, and once-beloved personal spaces and belongings torn apart, covered in bullet holes, reduced to pieces and char – all obliterated by hours of relentless assaults by terrorists armed with thousands of machine guns, fire bombs, and RPGs. Weapons funded, in part, by American and European taxpayers, whose leaders for years knowingly funneled billions into a terror operation whose sole objective is eradicating Israel and every Jew from the map before extending their genocidal ambitions westward. 

After coming back from our third trip to the massacre sites in the south, 

@JordynTilchen

insisted on me wiping these boots down before stepping into our rental, but the weight of what they carried was too immense. I couldn't erase the traces of blood and death that clung to them. Instead, I brought them home with me wrapped in several bags. These boots hold more than just grime; they carry the echoes of unspeakable atrocities and the silent cries of hundreds and hundreds of innocent lives ruthlessly tortured and taken.

 I've decided to give them a burial here, to acknowledge the horrors they tread through, the shattered communities and homes they traversed, and to honor the remains of the once-beautiful lives torn from existence that cling to them. As I do this, I promise to honor not only those brutally murdered and taken hostage, but also those who are risking everything to defend the rest of us. I promise to continue to do my best to not be consumed by what feels like a tsunami of hopelessness, but to pick myself back up and channel this endless grief and anger into meaningful action and resilience.

Eden Cohen ✡︎ עדן כהן

@edencohentweets

[jyndor]

oh my god

a show written by white us americans for us american kids, while often spot on with its anti-imperialism, is not actually the end all be all for how occupied and marginalized peoples can respond to their oppression and genocide. weirdo.

full disclosure I have my problems with the portrayals of jet and hama for this exact reason that i have previously written about here. because ultimately the gaang represent "good" resistance - mostly defensive/nonviolent. jet represents "bad" resistance, namely violent property damage that would have caused civilian casualties if sokka hadn't warned them. and hama, who thanking this op didn't bring up, is supposed to show how trauma can make a person do terrible things but really it just feels like a racist, misogynistic way to both sides colonialism and imperialism.

now unless I'm misremembering the story (I am not) that episode took place in the earth kingdom. why were those innocent fire nation civilians so close to the valley that jet was trying to protect? why was he worried about them encroaching on that valley enough to destroy the dam?

because they were settlers. the fire nation was trying to defeat and occupy the entire world, of course their settlers weren't just innocent civilians, they played a role like all settlers do in all conflicts. and jet and his freedom fighters were all displaced by the fire nation. they were refugees.

in the end, the gaang may have their problems with jet's tactics but they still mourn him and understand that he is RESISTING oppression, and not that he is the same as his oppressor.

katara is UNIQUELY empathetic and decent at times. during the painted lady, she makes it clear that she wants the liberation of ALL - including her oppressors who are also victimized by fire nation imperialism (and capitalism lbr). she sees the class dynamics in the fire nation, sees how they harm the villagers of jang hui. how the military industrial complex poisons fire nation citizens - literally. the problem is that they are happy to take her help when they think she is one of them, but when she reveals herself to be a waterbender, they turn away from her in their racist, xenophobic disgust.

the truth is that katara's form of universal liberatory politics is just one form of resistance against oppression. sometimes atla veers into making it seem like the only acceptable form of resistance, which is quite convenient for the white us americans who wrote the show.

one of atla's main ideas is that imperialism harms everyone, including the beneficiaries of imperialism. it was also written in the early to mid 2000s during the so-called war on terrorism, and with a us american audience in mind. so no I am not surprised that jet isn't seen in a totally positive light, nor am I surprised that the fire nation is occasionally presented in a "not all fire nation" way. it still posits that those innocent civilians are racist/colonizers and frankly complicit in many ways for what the fire nation is doing abroad.

this is why jet isn't a villain, he's just a complicated character. why he is made a martyr. why katara mourns him even if she's angry with him.

as for whether or not katara would condemn hamas... I'm not sure it matters. movements regularly have infighting and disagreements on tactics. even so, atla is a TV show. palestine is a real place with real people who have tried all kinds of forms of resistance. nothing is ever good enough for supporters of the settler colonial project of israel because the point is never, ever to live together in peace. two state solution? where do you see that in atla? if ANYTHING the show calls for pluralism and freedom of movement for all. for an end to nation states and nationalism, as well as preservation of all cultures. liberation for all.

I can't speak to the mess of the comics or lok because I don't care about those but if we're just talking about atla... come on. it's free palestine.

also nice false equivalency between the free palestine movement as a whole and hamas, which is just one part of the movement. racist dipshit genocide apologist.

[ohsalome]

How Russia is using the fossil fuel propaganda playbook to win the war

Climate war and Russia

Climate change is one of the biggest threats to humanity and life on Earth, but the fossil fuel industry has managed to block or delay the much-needed political action for decades. Michael Mann, one of the world’s leading climate scientists, has done a lot to untangle and categorize the various propaganda tactics used by the fossil fuel lobby. He refers to this joint propaganda effort as “climate war.”

Russia – a petrostate and the main beneficiary of carbon-based economy – is one of the main fossil fuel propaganda architects. Unsurprisingly, Russia now uses the same propaganda template to weaken global support for Ukraine and win the war.

And no, I’m not talking about all the wild state TV talk shows where people actively call for genocide against Ukraine, cheer for nuclear war, and portray Putin as their supreme leader. I’m talking about much subtler and smarter tactics and channels aimed at the rest of the world with one goal in mind: to help Russia win the war in Ukraine.

So let’s look closer at this similarity and learn how to spot Russia’s propaganda machine using the concepts from Michael Mann’s The New Climate War book.

Inactivism

Fossil fuel lobbyists realize they don’t need to convince people they are right. No, they just need to do enough to prevent people from fighting for green reforms. That’s why the main goal of fossil fuel propaganda now is to spread “inactivism” – the lack of meaningful action about climate change.

Russia’s propaganda regarding Ukraine also boils down to one goal: to stop or delay international support for Ukraine, especially military support. Russia doesn’t need to “win” the informational war – it doesn’t need to convince everybody that the invasion of Ukraine is a righteous thing. All it needs is just some “inactivism” from the rest of the world.

If other countries stop or just slow down their support of Ukraine, Russia will eventually win the war by brute force and larger ammunition stockpiles.

Denialism

Climate change denialism is the idea that climate crisis isn’t happening or that the change isn’t caused by human activity. Denialism isn’t used as widely now, but it had been the main fossil fuel propaganda tactic prior to the 2010s.

Today, Russia keeps denying everything. It denied it was planning to invade Ukraine, it denied it was waging a war while it was invading Ukraine. Russia also denies it has committed war crimes and atrocities in Bucha, Izium, Mariupol, and elsewhere in Ukraine.

Denialism is dull and easily refutable, but it works well for already sympathizing audiences and conspiracy theorists. That’s why there are people who think the Buch massacre was staged by Ukraine.

Whataboutism

Don Draper of the Mad Men TV series once said, “If you don’t like what’s being said, change the conversation.” And that’s exactly what the fossil fuel lobby (Russia included) has been doing.

When scientists and activists called for a massive reduction of global carbon output, the fossil fuel industry invented the “personal carbon footprint” nonsense that blamed the consumer choices of ordinary people for the climate crisis. This tactic isn’t aimed at winning an argument – it is designed to create enough noise and confusion to block any meaningful public discussion and thus political action.

Russia is doing the same thing with Ukraine. When it gets blamed for illegally invading Ukraine in the first place, Russia and its trolls bring up all the wars waged by the US or spin the “Ukraine is Nazi” nonsense. They don’t need people to think Russia is right – they just need them to think everybody else is not right either.

By drowning the discussion in endless “but what about” arguments, Russia tries to prevent the public from focusing on important things. That is, Russia illegally invaded a sovereign state for the sake of territorial conquest, and it needs to get out of Ukraine for the war to stop.

Doomism

In climate change advocacy, “doomism” is the idea that humanity can no longer hope to solve the issue of climate change, so it needs to adapt to the new reality. While “doomism” is rooted in a very real sentiment – the feeling that humanity is failing to decarbonize its economy at the needed pace – it benefits the fossil fuel interests in the end.

Why? Well, if it’s too late to save ourselves, why bother demanding change? Why put in all your energy to try to fix the unfixable? The fossil fuel industry has long realized that fatalism leads to passivity and disengagement. Hence, they can keep doing business as usual.

The most dangerous thing about doomism is that it poisons well-meaning people by turning them into “inactivists.” Just like when American writer Jonathan Franzen wrote an opinion piece claiming that “The climate apocalypse is coming. To prepare for it, we need to admit that we can’t prevent it.” This article was later dubbed “the most brilliantly unintentional fossil fuel industry propaganda” because, while being a cry of a concerned person, it actually harmed the cause of climate activism.

So who are the doomists of the Russo-Ukrainian war? The people who, prior to February 24, said there was no point in arming Ukraine because if Russia decided to invade, Ukraine wouldn’t stand any chance anyway. These “experts” then said: “Okay, Ukraine defended well, but there’s no way it can actually retake the occupied lands from Russia.” Now, these voices are saying Ukraine won’t win the war against Russia no matter how many weapons it receives from its allies.

Most of these arguments lead to one conclusion: it’s impossible for Ukraine to win, so we shouldn’t waste our time and money supporting it – let’s just strike some kind of deal with Russia. Of course, none of these voices address the fact that such a deal would reward Russia’s invasion and wouldn’t bring lasting peace to Eastern Europe.

Needless to say, this mindset directly benefits Russia as it promotes inaction in the face of an obviously criminal invasion of a sovereign country. Buckle up, the voices of doomism will get louder as the war grinds on.

Division

Sowing division among your opponents is an old-school political move, but it still works.

Instead of jointly demanding systemic change (the fastest possible decarbonization of our economy), people are dragged into endless culture wars, like shaming people for traveling by plane. The fossil fuel industry is pouring a lot of resources to spread conflicting narratives and make people fight among each other instead of uniting against their common enemy.

Russia also uses this tactic against Ukraine by promoting multiple narratives at once. Depending on the audience, Russia brands itself as the ultimate global fighter against Western colonialism, as the bastion of traditional family and Christianity, and as the enemy of global elites. That way, it is trying to disrupt the unity of Ukraine’s allies and prevent joint global action.

As Timothy Snyder said: “If you don't like gay people, they tell you the Ukrainians are all gay. If you don't like Nazis, they tell you they're all Nazis. If you do like Nazis, they tell you that they're all Jews.”

The non-solution solution

Finally, one of the newer propaganda tactics is the promotion of “non-solution solutions.”

According to Michael Mann, “The inactivists have sought to hijack actual climate progress by promoting “solutions” (natural gas, carbon capture, geoengineering) that aren’t solutions at all.”

There is a clear scientific consensus on what should be done to solve the climate crisis: abandon fossil fuels and turn to renewables ASAP. Instead, the fossil fuel lobby pushes numerous questionable alternative ideas for solving the crisis, thus slowing down the implementation of real solutions and meaningful political action.

Russia, too, is trying to hijack meaningful international anti-war effort by promoting scenarios that won’t actually solve anything. Right now, the only real way to actually save innocent lives in Ukraine and end the war is to arm Ukraine sufficiently so it can push the Russians out of its internationally recognized territory. Everything else is just a distraction at this point.

Negotiations are pointless when Russia is still aiming to exterminate the Ukrainian nation and destroy its statehood. Limiting military help to Ukraine “to not escalate the conflict” will only increase the chances of Russia’s military success. Focusing on humanitarian help will not help save human lives and liberate Ukrainians trapped under Russian occupation.

Russia will try to use different channels and “useful idiots” to promote various non-solution solutions, as all of them ultimately benefit Russia.

Let’s focus on meaningful action: for the world and for Ukraine

Fossil fuel propaganda is so similar to Russian propaganda for a reason: Russia is one of the main architects of fossil fuel disinformation. Right now, both interest groups are using these various methods to cement the status quo and prevent our fight for justice. Let’s make sure they fail.

People around the world deserve a future. Life on Earth deserves to be protected. Ukrainians deserve to live in peace. Ukraine deserves justice.

source: Ukraine Explainers on Patreon

[transingthebourgeoisie]

Come to Tuktoyaktuk and see our 7/11 where we have bananas for only a few bucks. I'll wait.

That's in Canada, for one, if you wanted to go for the Easy Own you could've said, basically anywhere in Alaska, or food deserts generally. Of course I've already discussed those, so I won't repeat myself; to be specific to this ask, indigeneity does not immunize you from, participating in society. The computer/phone you typed this anon on utilizes Tantalum refined from Coltan extracted from the third world by Canadian mineral firms, in its capacitors, which, if you're unfamiliar with electronics, is a very critical component. Of course you can buy such a computer almost anywhere, - indeed, you basically have to, nobody makes 'slavery free' computers, and I would caution against believing any claims people make to that effect, - but you are buying it in Canada, at the price of the beneficiaries of Imperialism, with the ease of access of the beneficiaries of Imperialism, you, as a citizen of the first world, have the first and greatest serving, compared to the third world. You are, after all, - whether or not it was imposed by genocidal force and assimilation demands, - a Canadian citizen. Of course, as an indigenous person, this still comes after the white people, but that's not what we're talking about, is it?

Colonization and Imperialism are, as you will be apparently surprised to find out, different processes that produce different effects on a given, and between them, produce a unique relationship. This relationship is not one of absolution.

As I've said to, several people now, I'm native american, half of my family lives up on a desolate mountainside without access to utilities, electricity, non-exorbitantly-priced groceries, and work in general. There isn't even a road to my grandmother's house; the path you have to take is so steep that any incorrectly balanced vehicle will tumble over and off the side of a several meter drop.

I assure you, I know what I'm talking about.

[auressea]

https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/campaigns/national-day-truth-reconciliation.html

Mental health supports available

Former residential school students can call 1-866-925-4419 for emotional crisis referral services and information on other health supports from the Government of Canada.

Indigenous peoples across Canada can also go to The Hope for Wellness Help Line 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for counselling and crisis intervention.

Call the toll-free Help Line at 1-855-242-3310 or connect to the online chat (Please use Google Chrome).

Truth and Reconciliation Week

This bilingual educational program is open to all schools across Canada. All sessions will be held virtually, allowing classroom participation from across the country and the involvement of Indigenous and non-Indigenous students. From September 25-30, 2023, registration is required.

@allthecanadianpolitics

[nimakokaaz]

my least favourite thing about getting chased off twitter by a mob of

• angry white women

• whoever they could con into believing being trans somehow makes them not white settlers

is that it has directly impacted my finances, my social life, and my ability to take care of my family in a direct and existential way, and has proved literally everything i said about white settler trans women being very much active participants and beneficiaries of genocidal colonialism.

i wasn't suicide baiting them, but having had two weeks of social isolation and intensifying poverty to think about their unbelievably cynical use of white womanhood and white women's tears to pretend a native dude was oppressing them, i really REALLY hope they fucking kill themselves.

there is no LGBTQ community. there is no trans community. there can't be, when trans colonisers are empowered to and benefit from the pretense that criticism of white womanhood is transphobia.

edit: if this makes you think i'm transmisogynist just wait til you hear what i say about cis white womanhood. actually, you don't have to wait. it's exactly the same fucking thing, cos white cis women LOVE hollering 'misogyny' when the people they're colonising raise their voices. we're so angry! we're so hateful! we're so SAVAGE!!!

[slicedblackolives]

btw this person admitted to me in the DMs (they initiated) that the only reason their great grandma got a college education was because they were Mormon settlers in Utah and the LDS (who committed genocide against native Americans in Utah with collusion from the US government) subsidised female education with the money they got from said settler genocide. Their family also were farmers and I…. Wonder how the fuck they got the land? It was not stolen from indigenous people surely? And then they’re whining about what they should do. Thee most direct beneficiary of American settler colonialism and genocide crying about having to work in a restaurant. How dare the blood money not stay in the family!!!!

[sandumilfshou]

if anyone is interested in new zealand politics, recently a coalition of three right-wing parties got elected into power and the prime minister who got the majority of votes during the election is not living up to his election campaign promises and capitulating to extreme policies and decisions the other 2 party leaders are pushing forward. some examples are:

repealing the smokefree generation initiatives, which were the first of their kind in the world and wouldve lowered the rate of smoking related deaths, which is one of the top killers of our population

slashing funding by up to 50% for the free lunches in schools programme which feeds 220,000 kids (approx 1/4 of the population of children) every day because of a 4% surplus of lunches being considered "wastage"

putting forward motions to completely negate and rewrite new zealand's founding document, te tiriti o waitangi, which guarantees the indigenous māori people sovereignty over themselves, their land, and taonga (treasures) as the coalition sees this as "special treatment"

slashing or entirely defunding walking, cycling, and public transport initiatives, while cutting out the electric vehicle discounts, increasing the cost of petrol, forcing EV owners to pay on road costs (which is currently only for diesel vehicle owners) and increasing the annual registration fee for all cars by $50NZD over the next two years

repealing or rewriting gun restriction and ownership legislation that was tightened up after the christchurch mosque shooting in 2019 that killed over 50 people

putting sanctions on people who are on a monetary benefit due to disability and/or unemployment and/or poverty while also lessening how much money beneficiaries receive each week

bringing back private charter schools who do not have to follow the national curriculum, are funded by the taxpayer, and can essentially teach anything they want including extremist religious beliefs, with fuck all government oversight

obviously theyre giving tax breaks and cuts to the top earners and landlords

its gotten so bad that even our major news outlets on tv and print arent even trying to be unbiased when it comes to reporting on the absolute dumb and evil things this government is trying to put through "under urgency", bypassing the select committee stage entirely

its so fucked. this is essentially the new zealand equivalent of trump being elected. the prime minister has also stated multiple times that isr*el is not committing genocide and he does not believe aotearoa new zealand has to own up to any of our responsibilities in the prevention of genocide act.

anyway i have no idea what the point of this is other than getting this news out there and to say please support aotearoa new zealand's indigenous māori population, who our colonist prime minister is now trying to erase again

[onesettleronebullet]

Okay so let's start here shall we.

The idea that Black Americans get 0 benefits from imperialism is never something I wanted to put across because generally, entire people groups don't tend to solely suffer outside of genocide. And crudely strawmanning my position as being me thinking one has an "imperialist" aura is priming the audience to believe that those putting forth this argument are simplistic and manichaean which is untrue.

What I am putting forth is that the benefits from imperialism such as "The Banana" are so insignificant that those trickle-down benefits should not really be brought up in any serious discussion on the subject. It's in the same vein that yeah "the British brought roads and industry into their colonies" but those benefits have materialist reasons for their existence and aren't because of the British Empires altruistic need to give it's colonised citizens better lives but rather are a result of forms of wealth extraction.

Of course, "The Banana" can not exploit the autochthonous people's of the USA, but rather, its presence in those communities says nothing about the actual health of those communities at large. In South Africa, we have lots of Bananas too which are exported from the Front Line Nations such as Mozambique, which SA exploits through White Monopoly Capital based corporations, and yet no one would dare say that Black South Africans and Coloureds as a whole benefit from White South African settlerism despite the fact that they do by that metric. Furthermore, the majority of the people having this argument are Latines, who, through the metric of having access to "The Banana" also benefit from imperialism in some sense.

These parts are interesting because it's very much a reframing of the whole conversation, especially without context which those reading this will not have.

Within the context of the original conversation, beneficiary and perpetrator were indeed used as synonyms. When the main arguments were "black Americans go into the global south to gentrify the land" and "black American soldiers rape Korean women" and one of the root statements that caused this whole issue was "I think all Americans, including minorities should burn" (for being imperialist) then you can not then turn around and say beneficiary and perpetrator are not one and the same. I'd also add the original context made a distinction between Black Americans and Native Americans, with the latter not benefitting from imperialism in the same way the former does. If benefit is simply about having access to "The Banana" then why would the Native American not benefit where the Black American does?

In a different context, perhaps but not this one.

The whole response is a little disappointing in two ways:

a) this could have been the original conversation the whole time, and this post shows they had the capability of this conversation without the need to specifically target black people in order to shut them up about anti-black racism from other imperialised peoples.

b) the whole critique is based on being overly banal with definitions without taking in not only the original context which was simple anti-black incendiary rhetoric as well as the broader context of subjects of imperialism being told that they should be grateful for America because they reap the benefits of America's existence. This latter bit will absolutely be taken out of context or hyperfocused on but who cares, the average tumblr Marxist has a very ineffective pedagogy and needs to get a better framework outside of being smug and dunking the libs.