Is genocide in America's future?

[Cyrano]

That's an ugly question. And here's an ugly answer. IF the Republican/Fascist Party controls the House, the Senate and the Presidency, I believe there is nothing, absolutely nothing, to stop them from ridding themselves of their perceived "enemies."

I'm using the word "ridding" as a polite euphemism for genocide. After all, they've told us who they are. Let's believe them. They despise all of the "THEMS" and you know who the "THEMS" are. Blacks, Muslims, Jews, browns, Asians, LGBTQs, Democrats, and anyone else who isn't a white "Christian" who believes in their particular version of a "Christianity of Hate."

Anyone who doesn't believe that today's Republican Party is capable of genocide is a fool. Few believed it during WWII, until the the death camps were liberated and the Holocaust was revealed.

Too many of today's Republicans are America's worst nightmare. Some of them are all right with Jim Crow, some are even okay with slavery, and too many of them would be just fine with "ridding" the world of the "THEMS." Do I really have to name them here? You know who they are. And you know the immense power of their propaganda machine.

Is genocide in America's future? It's a possibility that only we can stop. But first we must realize that America's fascists are at war with us. And it's past time that we recognized that and fought back accordingly.

[ChicagoRonin]

1. Hate to be a fellow downer

But genocide is definitely in America's past.

And I'm not just talking about Native Americans. The Draft Riots in New York during the Civil War. There's of course the destruction of Black Wall Street in Tulsa Oklahoma (perpetrated by the KKK with local government assistance). The violence, trumped up charges and execution of immigrant activists during and after the pro-labor Haymarket Riot in Chicago.

I think the Japanese Americans really lucked out during the internment. Shame on FDR for signing the order, but one of the saving graces is he wasn't a racist demagogue of a Hitler-level order. There were plenty of Americans who would have loved to have lined up every man, woman and child to be shot.

I'm not saying it will happen. But I think it could.

[ITAL]

20. I don't think those incidents are really genocide

(Native Americans aside anyway)

Pogroms yes, genocide no. Also throw in things like the anti Catholic riots in Philly in 1844 for more examples of a violent incident against a minority group.

[ChicagoRonin]

27. Yes, not the best comparisons

Sorry, having to type in-between stuff.

But I do think as a nation we've had the seeds of something nasty brewing all throughout, and it could have gone further at any point.

I mean, some of my African American friends insist that the actions taken against them over time constitute a kind of slow-moving genocide. Is it? Not sure myself, but certainly makes me uncomfortable to ponder what some people are capable of if sufficiently riled up against another group.

[Sympthsical]

2. I was supposed to be in FEMA camps by 2006.

I remember, as a young gay man, when the Federal Marriage Amendment stuff was going down, I was consistently told, "They're building camps in Wyoming for us. They're coming!" I don't know if Republicans are 17 years behind or . . .

This kind of stuff is unhelpful. We have real problems, real divisions, and real work to be done.

This "Why everything is practically Hitler and the Holocaust!" rhetoric is just not useful. Plus it's just annoying. The people who are forever invoking the 1930s (which has gone on since I've been a politically aware adult) always exude that, "I have barely managed freshman college history, so I know all about things!" energy. Which is less useful.

Sometimes I think people need anxiety. Addicted to it. Want everything to be the Worst Time In History to justify it.

We have problems. They're solvable if we work hard enough and usefully enough.

But if screaming in the streets is cathartic, I guess? I don't see what it solves, how it helps, or what its use is.

Is it like a religious revival thing, but for ideology?

Maybe.

[Chainfire]

9. So why are you convinced that it couldn't happen here?

Is there some "quality" that Americans possess that Germans did not? I don't believe that we are heading for pogroms, but neither do I believe that it couldn't happen. You are correct that this is not the 1930s and that history does not repeat, however, it surely can rhyme. As a gay man, you should know that there are a lot of Americans that would "rid themselves" of you, if they could do it with impunity. If Democracy, as we have know it, crashes down as the results of a right-wing "takeover" then all bets are off. If you don't think that the right wing is capable of "taking over" take a long hard look at Florida. Republicans in Florida are like maggots on a corpse, they won't stop until the carcass is clean.

[Sympthsical]

13. One never says never

However, when employing rhetoric of this kind, I'm going to need some evidence that such a thing is imminently likely.

I do not see evidence that it is likely, nor has any attempt been made to do so outside of rhetoric.

I do pay attention. What I do not do is emotionally invest in narrative nor let rhetoric and media prey upon my limbic system to get me all riled up and an anxiety-ridden, fearful mess. I see Florida. It's a thing. What I found funny this week is something people have been slamming Florida for as "Totally fascism!" was then celebrated when California did it. Like, not a single person made a single comment going, "Wait. Isn't that the same exact thing?" Maybe a lot of perception is being colored by where one is situated politically.

So maybe it's not objectively true that things are going the Hitler route. Maybe - just maybe - the narrative that it is has been deployed in order to keep people in an emotional, politically-useful state.

I cannot predict what will be true in 50 years, but I do know our current times are not "Just like the 1930s!" so I'm going to react to this sort of thing accordingly. Which is usually an eye roll.

As I said, there is work to do, bad policies, ideas, and politics to swat down.

But genocide, no. And it devalues actual genocides that have occurred to throw around the word so cheaply for a bit of rhetorical theater to get the blood pumping.

[treestar]

30. The desperation in Weimar

Germany - the extreme inflation, where they took barrels of marks for a loaf of bread - those are the kind of conditions needed.

People want a tyrant who says he will take care of it all when they are in that situation.

People here always go why aren't we in the streets?

We are still comfortable. We are not in desperate situations. Not massively. That's what it takes to get people to want someone who promises quick solutions.

It could happen, but at this time the conditions aren't there.

[Chainfire]

32. I agree, but one big man-made or natural disaster could change everything.

I mean, like if a big asteroid hits, all that will survive would be cockroaches and MAGA knuckle draggers, but, forgive me, I repeat myself.

[Mr.Bill]

33. I generally agree with you,

but there are somewhat isolated groups of people, some of them large groups that can get fanatically involved about an issue and bring about change that harms many people. The example I am getting at is that group that are absolutely convinced that hundreds of millions of babies have been murdered in abortion clinics. We have seen what they have done, even if it did take them 50 years. That it took that long is only testament to how determined they were.

[Chainfire]

35. I understand what you are saying, but lets just spin one scenario that is in the realm of

of possibility, as a thought exercise:

China has been saber rattling and their N. Korean ally has been threatening. Assume, for the sake of argument, that China and the US get into either a full military standoff or a shooting war in the Pacific. I am no economist, but I suspect that the sudden halt of Chinese imports would snowball into an economic collapse like we haven't seen since '29. How good do you feel about the present House of Representatives dealing successfully with a problem on that scale?

I don't think that that is going to happen because I believe that the Chinese are just chest thumping and bluffing...today. We are also involved in a war in Europe that cold go South on us because when involved in a war against a crazy man, anything could happen. We are one crazy Russian commander, with Tac Nukes in his arsenal, away from disaster

Those are the kinds of man-made disasters that could lead to internal struggles that we aren't prepared to defend against. They could become our own little Reichstag fire.

[Mr.Bill]

36. The thing is, the financial disaster

would be even bigger for the Chinese. That's why there is something good to be said for countries to be interdependent on each other. The last thing China wants is to lose us as a customer. It's also why they invest money here.

Now Russia is different. Thay have alread somewhat lost us as a customer. They do still have money invested here, though. At least some of their wealthier people do.

[Chainfire]

37. The point is not the problems it would cause in China, but the problems it would

cause here. Let all of the knuckle draggers with stockpiled guns and ammo get a might hungry, and watch them lash out. They haven't been arming to shoot squirrels..

Of course if you are saying that you don't expect China to make trouble in the Pacific because they are concerned about how that would damage their economy, I can't argue with that because I just don't know. Who knows, if their economy keeps sliding downhill, they may end up like the Japanese before the shooting war with us started in '41, thinking "It is now or never, let's roll the dice." China may also come to the conclusion that the Japanese did, that we are too soft to compete with them politically, intellectually or militarily.

I really don't tend to worry about those kinds of things. I am in the last few years, at most, of my life, and there is little that I can do that would affect the outcome anyway. One thing is certain; the power structure of our civilizations has been constantly on the move since recorded history. There is no reason to believe that that won't continue. It seems as if, as time passes, those who have been holding world power have seen the length of their tenure shrinking. The Egyptians ruled for 3,000 years, The Romans, 1000, The British Empire lasted 400 years, maybe our time is about to expire at 100 years. Perhaps it is inevitable that the most populous part of the world receives the baton from us. Happy thoughts, hey?

[Mr.Bill]

34. What stands out as a difference between us and 30s Germany

is we are a much more diverse society. That's why they are focused on a war on that diversity. Less diversity makes it easier to convince people that they are either "with us or against us".

[Cyrano]

10. So you really believe "It Can't Happen Here."

Intelligent people learn from the past. Comparing what's going on here today to 1930's Germany is not rhetoric. And we ignore it at our own peril.

[Sympthsical]

14. People have to know the past in order to learn from it

And evidence that people running around the internet do have a working knowledge of history is usually pretty thin.

History ain't talking points. If people are coming at me with this rhetoric, I want proof they at least studied for the test.

[Cyrano]

15. Interesting word salad

[Sympthsical]

21. Yeah, but mine was more brief

So I kinda win on style points.

[Chainfire]

28. Personally, I have read the history of the first half of the last century extensively.

I have a good working knowledge of how things developed after the end of the first half of The World War. (First World War) There are some parallels to today's times, but my crystal balls can't tell me what is in store for the future. I am keeping my options open and my powder dry, for I do not intend to go into the box car quietly.

[TheRealNorth]

3. They will use their political power to persecute their enemies....

And our choice will be to submit, leave, or fight back. If we choose to fight, then they will go genocidal.

That is how I see it playing out.

[sarisataka]

4. If it was a possibility

Would you be posting it on the internet from a device that can be traced to you?

[Cyrano]

11. What's your point? Die in silence???

[sarisataka]

16. If I believed I was a member of a group

That would soon be targeted for elimination I would make sure it was very difficult to trace my words to me

[Cyrano]

17. Too late. Being on DU with a star makes you a "THEM."

[sarisataka]

22. Yes it does

If such a dystopia ever come to be...

[TheRealNorth]

12. Maybe because some of us have already decided....

That submission is not an option for us. I guess only if your plan would be to submit would you care about them tracing your internet posts.

[sarisataka]

18. There is a difference between

Deciding not to submit and volunteering to be first against the wall...

[czarjak]

5. As soon as they can figure out how to get away with it, there will be blood.

Unfortunately, just because is good enough for some.

[Cosmocat]

23. They keep pushing the social boundaries

A few examples.

This shit of shipping migrants to other parts of the country to "own" libs is an incredible act of dehumanization. This is not something that a governor could have even thought to do as little as a decade ago, and they did it with no repercussions.

They have REALLY amped up their dehumanization of transgenders. They almost assuredly will be the test case in pushing the envelope.

This lunatic state representative, recorded on the record in session saying he supporting hanging by trees a few weeks ago, again, next to no repercussions.

A good portion of R elected officials have long been in engaged in this crazed contest with one another to say the most inflammatory thing possible to get right wing attention and love. That will continue to keep upping the ante.

[HardPort]

6. Genocide is as American as apple pie.

[ananda]

7. It's certainly going in that direction now.

...

[NowISeetheLight]

8. Reminds Me

This movie clip. This is their ultimate goal. Christianistan. White, heterosexual, Christian.

[BlueCheeseAgain]

19. Obviously one can never be sure about the future.

But this kind of rhetoric, in my view, is over-the-top and hyperbolic. In fact, if I were on the right, and wanted to point out how the left wants to kill everyone on the right, I'd probably point to this post as evidence. After all, if you really, truly believe the other side is planning on wiping you out, then haven't you given yourself license to kill all of them first?

[Kid Berwyn]

24. "When do we get to use the guns?"

A man at a local event by Turning Points USA asked, just hours after the Boise Towne Square shooting, asked Charlie Kirk when he would get to start killing political opponents.



‘When do we get to use the guns?’ The police should be able to take that guy’s guns.

BY BRYAN CLARK
The Idaho Statesman, OCTOBER 28, 2021

Excerpt…

The main speaker was Charlie Kirk, the co-founder of Turning Points. Kirk’s hucksterism is obvious. He is a traveling salesman at heart.

Snip…

According to the nonprofit organization’s tax filings, Kirk was paid about $330,000 last year. Turning Points reported earning about $10.3 million from fundraising events, more than a quarter of its total revenue for 2020.

Snip…

The man, claiming the state had fallen into tyranny, asked Kirk: “When do we get to use the guns?” — to applause and cheers from many in the audience.

Then, to remove any doubt that this aspiring Brownshirt wasn’t being metaphorical or facetious but was, in fact, asking when to start murdering political opponents, he continued: “That’s not a joke. I’m not saying it like that. I mean, literally, where is the line? How many elections are they going to steal before we kill these people?”

Kirk did not respond with a simple message like: “Terrorism is wrong. You shouldn’t do it.” Instead, he cast political violence as a tactical blunder. It would play into the hand of the same hidden media-deepstate-Democrat forces trying to institute tyranny by installing Joe Biden as president, he claimed.

Continues…

https://www.idahostatesman.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/article255354321.html

Clarance Thomas and SCROTUS have done all they could on behalf of the nation’s machine gun manufacturers for a reason, a very bad and evil reason.

[Efilroft Sul]

25. I was in a 200+ post Facebook talk with an uber Catholic about Knowles' eradication speech at CPAC.

And by "talk," I mean "battle," and by "uber Catholic," I mean a real defender of the faith cut from the same cloth as Bill Donahue, president of the Catholic League.

Anyway, this guy says the good ol' leftist media, such as Rolling Stone, twisted Knowles' words about eradicating transgenderism. I replied that one cannot eradicate the -ism without eliminating those associated with it, so, yes, Knowles' speech had the same energy as a Nazi in 1933 saying he wanted to eradicate Judaism.

But this wasn't just an argument over headline writing or the left "deliberately misrepresenting" Knowles' intent. This defender of the faith went on to describe gays, lesbians, and transgenders as "moral pollution," and he did not dispute nor repudiate Knowles for saying that we "can't genocide transgender people because they are not a legitimate category of being." Look, we're getting into some real purify the race shit here, especially if you consider transgenders as non-persons with zero rights (because how can you commit genocide if they're not real people?), and if "moral pollution" is this century's "vermin."

Keep in mind this guy said that the left is overreacting about eradication and Republicans being fascist, but he's the one who sounds like a Nazi. And he seems to be fine about that.

[Initech]

26. I have no doubt that if Desantis or Trump got back into power...

That mass murder definitely wouldn't be out of the question. The Q nuts and their obsession with military tribunals and public executions is fucking weird and very deeply disturbing.

What they're doing now with this insane war on drag queens and trans health care is sick, and it's definitely a preview of where we could be headed.

[dembotoz]

29. sadly i know some folks who would throw the switch without any hesitation

organized death camps maybe not so much

unsolved poorly investigated murders? sure why not.
maybe some folks just disappear

[LexVegas]

31. No. nt