I’m not sure if updating our tools is moving goal posts- what goal are we aiming for? I understand the frustration with seeing the measuring stick change to make the reasonable seem unreasonable, but I would say that the same measuring stick is now misrepresenting where people fall.

If we are talking political spectrums, there already are plenty of tools used: the linear left right, the horseshoe, the fishhook, the quadrant visualisation, etc. I’d say the data is now leaving the paper. We need new tools to make sense of it.

Much to your point though, I think it’s valuable to ask “what are we measuring, who’s doing the measuring, and who benefits from the answer?”

We will never have the satisfying answers to our questions, but hopefully we can find better questions to ask.

I think that the left/ right spectrum is outdated, or at least the definitions we give to each.

I mean, originally the left/ right divide was about whether to keep King Louis XVI around or to have him beheaded.

The spectrum we know as a communism vs capitalism scale really was useful in the cold war when those were the two sides of a bipolar world. When we still use this as the measuring stick, things become super confusing in the 21st century. Our world is no longer a communist vs capitalist struggle. Russia and China aren’t communist like the Soviet Union. The United States isn’t the same democratic state that it was in 1960.

I don’t know what our new spectrum is, that’s going to be the research of the next great political scientist, but I do think the old tools we’ve used are no longer helpful. Some are saying “woke vs unwoke”, some are saying “populism vs. globalism”, and some are saying simply “chaos vs order”. Perhaps it’s a little bit of all, or perhaps we should throw spectrums out altogether. Either way, if we use old tools for modern problems, we will end up confused. It’s like how jazz is seen as a super complex genre- it may simply be because we still use the music theory of 18th century European composers to try and understand Miles Davis. Of course it’s going to be a wild ride.

Man Christmas dinner is gonna rock this year. Just like my mom will play dumb and look confused that I used “they” as a singular, I’m going to play dumb and look confused when she says “you”. I see no downsides.

Someone correct me, but “you” was originally plural. The correct way to address a singular person is “thou”.

Oh of course, person by person there are folks who wouldn’t hesitate to grab a machete and get to work.

Hell, there are people in leftist camps who decided to join when they heard the word “guillotine”

I mean that’s what I assumed it meant. I didn’t think we were actually going to come out murdering people.

Ah I see.

Maybe this can help.

I’m happy to clarify, what part do you find confusing?

How can we be sure you’re not the secret billionaire!? 🤔

Best eat both of us just to make sure.

Edit:

Also OP and anyone who read my post because they said they might agree with me on this meme. Gotta root out enemies of the people.

Edit edit:

If anyone actually follows the line of any revolution, this is how it always goes. The guillotine will eventually kill the ones who bring it out.

Yea that’s exactly what I’m afraid of.

I’m anxious that all the praise for the CEO shooter is revealing that “eat the rich” wasn’t a euphemism for “tax the rich” but that people actually want the streets to run red with blood and cranberry sauce.

Cook me daddy

Okay this is actually what makes humans amazing. Btw the malört and Marx is talking now.

I feel like we are sold this idea to be purely a specialist because… It’s easy to know that your tool does one thing and one thing well. It really is a mindset that benefits a capitalist that a worker is good for one thing. How many jobs have you been in that you felt never utilized your potential? That you had so many skills that weren’t being utilized?

Marx characterized humans as being creative and diverse. We are amazing Swiss army knives, but so often our companies ask us to only be a screwdriver or a bottle opener.

Sadly if you are reading this thinking “I’m only good at one thing” it’s not true and it’s not your fault. You’ve been sold an idea that you bought into, and it may have even been beneficial financially. How many people are making $350k to turn a button blue and move it left 3 pixels? Our system rewards people when they are able to be tools for a specific purpose.

Oddly enough Marx predicted that the country most likely to be communist would be the United States. He actually really liked Americans, we were farmers in the morning, artists in the evening, and philosophers at night. We had overthrown the aristocracy, so it just made sense we would be the first to overthrow the Bourgeois class.

Turns out Marx couldn’t predict everything :/

Look don’t judge them, anything goes in the airport cafe.

!cartographyanarchy@lemm.ee

Huh I always thought it was “yup, while it comes up, I could use a little fuel myself”

Man I’m looking kinda dumb.

Oh 100%. This is why I had respect for the party for not running anyone for president.

I see a lot of folks being critical of the movement due to controversial associations (the Bushes etc.), and while I don’t personally like what these people have done, I recognize passing RCV will mean making strange bedfellows. It’s kinda like when you see AOC and Ted Cruz working together on banning lawmakers from becoming lobbyists.

My comment or the political party?

Andrew Yang is a billionaire which does suck, but if a billionaire is able to help us get RCV I’ll take it, but that’s just my 2 cents.

As for me I’d love if my comments were being funded by dark astroturfing money. I got credit card debt that I need to pay. Sadly I still need to go to work.

So I think a lot of folks don’t know the context this comic was written in and how misleading the message is.

This is an attack comic on a recently created 3rd party, the Forward party, created by Andrew Yang. There are several pillars to this party’s mission, such as UBI and Campaign finance reform, but the core of the party is the ranked choice vote.

If you aren’t familiar with ranked choice vote, Here is a great video explanation , but essentially it gives voters the ability to vote for multiple candidates and removing the entire “voting 3rd party is throwing your vote away” situation. If the forward party is successful to getting this passed in every part of our government, it would fully upend the two party system.

This comic is pointing at Andrew Yangs slogan in his 2020 run for president as well as for the forward party- “not left, not right, forward”. What he is trying to do is tap into the discontent found in a majority of Americans. Most voters would like to see choices beyond Dems and the GOP and these voters are all across the political spectrum.

Someone like my father, a former Republican who is disillusioned with the party but is still heavily free market, and myself who believes more in regulation and strong institutions both agree on the issue of RCV because we are in the same boat of feeling like we aren’t actually represented in our government.

I’d say this comic is a perfect example of “if you ignore the details of a philosophy and redefine it’s rhetoric, you can make it stand for anything you want”.

TL;Dr this comic is trying to convince you that the Forward party is the exact opposite of what it really is by ignoring any nuance.

Normie here, Lemmy is pretty easy to use imo. I think the transition is happening now kinda like the Internet in the 90s or online dating in the 10’s.

Ofc I just got here and I’m using Voyager.

A theory I have is that everyone who hates reddit eventually left leaving the milk bags brains. I was mod of r/mapporncirclejerk and left when I saw my mod queue get exponentially worse. My friend told me it was because the decent people left for Lemmy.

Now I’m mod of !cartographyanarchy@lemm.ee and it’s sooooo much easier.

Yep, be the change you want to see in the world.

Also, making communities is fun! I made !cartographyanarchy@lemm.ee and it is booming thanks to several lemmings who I got to post consistently. Shout out to thepiccardmanuever.