Memorial Day

[trivas7]

Does anyone else resent the barrage of gingoism from the mainstream media that accompanies all national holidays in the USA? IMO the mainstream media is hypocritical when it is always complicit in its propaganda for love of one's own nation, yet is always upset when the press is shut down in other countries (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/23/AR2009052301527.html). Does this sort of thing go on in other countries? Somehow love of country is bowed down to in the name of freedom. Nationalism is a disease. It makes me sick.

[Lynx]

My expectations of the mainstream media are too low for me to feel resentment. The article in question and the comments it received are all par for the course.

[GracchusBabeuf]

Does anyone else resent the barrage of gingoism from the mainstream media that accompanies all national holidays in the USA?How else will they keep the masses in line?;)

[Bud Struggle]

I don't see that much of it to be honest. I think there should be an appreciation for the servicemen that fight for America--especially those that fought Nazis in WWII.

I guess it all depends on what you think of your country, of course. I realize it's done some bad things once in a while but overall America has been very, very good to me so I appreciate it and the people that fought for our American way of life.

[RGacky3]

I think there should be an appreciation for the servicemen that fight for America--especially those that fought Nazis in WWII.


Why? Who did they do it for? I feel sorry for servicemen, I don't appreciate them though, they wern't fighting for me.


I appreciate it and the people that fought for our American way of life.

What is the American way of life your talking about, and how did people fight for it?

Also what IS America? Is it the government? The people? the Culture?

Patriotism in America is very unique, in that in other countries patriotism (although still irrational and dangerous) is more about the native culture and society, in America its very political almost to a religious degree.

The way things are turned into soldeirs fighting for "our way of life" or "freedom" is, to me, proof of how the United States ruling class has mastered propeganda in a way that would make the USSR propegandists tear up.

[Robert]

Interesting how the hard left and the hard right are aligned on the issue of war: both against. Conservative Pat Buchanan, for example, was against both WWII and the invasion of Iraq and has written about it. Who was it that warned against "foreign entanglements"? George Washington, if memory serves.

Still, it's pretty hard to argue that soldiers and airmen resisting Nazism and chasing the Germans out of France and Russia weren't helping the cause of "freedom" as normal people understand the word; many of those guys were drafted, true, but many volunteered.


Also what IS America? Is it the government? The people? the Culture?

You tell us.

[Bud Struggle]

Still, it's pretty hard to argue that soldiers and airmen resisting Nazism and chasing the Germans out of France and Russia weren't helping the cause of "freedom" as normal people understand the word; many of those guys were drafted, true, but many volunteered.


Indeed Robert. There's a whole Antifa forum on Revleft where people are fighting Nazis by getting bigger and better anti-Fascist tatoos on their bodies and writing very argry posts on the Internet and sometimes even letters to the editors of newspapers in the hope a stray Fascist might read what they have to say and get his/her feelings hurt. On the other hand these soldiers fought hand to hand with Nazis, some even giving their lives.

They are worthy of our consideration and our appreciation.

[RGacky3]

Interesting how the hard left and the hard right are aligned on the issue of war: both against. Conservative Pat Buchanan, for example, was against both WWII and the invasion of Iraq and has written about it. Who was it that warned against "foreign entanglements"? George Washington, if memory serves.

Still, it's pretty hard to argue that soldiers and airmen resisting Nazism and chasing the Germans out of France and Russia weren't helping the cause of "freedom" as normal people understand the word; many of those guys were drafted, true, but many volunteered.


I'm not saying Nazism should'nt have been stopped, nor that the war against nazism did'nt advance freedom in europe. I'm just not fooling myself into thinking that advancing freedom was the motivation behind the US government getting into WWII. The US, as we can see from history, could care less about freedom, democracy, and human rights, what it cares about is the intrests of the ruling class. Which is the reason it went into WWII. Positive things CAN come out of wrong motives.



Quote:
Also what IS America? Is it the government? The people? the Culture?
You tell us.

I have no idea, I'm asking what people are refering to when they say, "I love America."

[Robert]

The US, as we can see from history, could care less about freedom, democracy, and human rights

Come on, Gack, you're a fair guy. What was the American Civil War about? How would you have gone about freeing the slaves from the entrenched southern cotton interests?

Please take a minute and re-read the Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, all 27 of them. See especially articles I, II, IV, VI, XIII, XIV, XV, XIX, XXII and XXVI. That won't take 10 minutes. Now try to imagine any one of them being protected under Nazi Germany .or the USSR. They are a good part of what "America is all about."

[RGacky3]

Come on, Gack, you're a fair guy. What was the American Civil War about? How would you have gone about freeing the slaves from the entrenched southern cotton interests?

Please take a minute and re-read the Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, all 27 of them. See especially articles I, II, IV, VI, XIII, XIV, XV, XIX, XXII and XXVI. That won't take 10 minutes. Now try to imagine any one of them being protected under Nazi Germany .or the USSR. They are a good part of what "America is all about."

Your suggesting that the North went into the civil war against the south over the issue of slavery. Do you really believe that?

The United States has attacked democracies as vigorously as it has attacked dictatorships.

How I would have gone about freeing the slaves would not have been one oppressive system overthrowing another one, it would have been a bottom up revolution by workers AND slaves from the north and the south.

You can read the Constitution until you are blue in the face, but it does'nt change history. You can also read the USSRs constitution as well.

[FreeFocus]

Fuck pigs. As far as I'm concerned, anyone celebrating the holiday is a turd as well, and a supporter of imperialism.

As for the press, I simply turn the TV off when they spout the propaganda lines. I don't watch much of it anyway, though.

[Dust Bunnies]

To those that use the Grammar School logic that the Civil War was just over slavery needs to hear more. The South was far more unhappy about the federal VS state power. They felt the states needed more power while the northern US felt the federal government needed more power. At the time slavery was still favorable in the South's side in a sense of laws. Northerners couldn't house slaves without the risk of being arrested or fined. So sure you can say slavery, but you must remember, the South started the war so they could have a decentralized system first, unlimited slavery second. If the North was so concerned about slavery they would have declared war first.

On the constitution issue, I'll base my critique using the 1936 USSR constitution. Here is a copy of the constitution http://www.departments.bucknell.edu/russian/const/1936toc.html

Chapter 10, Article 125 says, "In conformity with the interests of the working people, and in order to strengthen the socialist system, the citizens of the U.S.S.R. are guaranteed by law:

freedom of speech;
freedom of the press;
freedom of assembly, including the holding of mass meetings;
reedom of street processions and demonstrations.

These civil rights are ensured by placing at the disposal of the working people and their organizations printing presses, stocks of paper, public buildings, the streets, communications facilities and other material requisites for the exercise of these rights."

Those among other rights, the USSR did not follow through on, after all a constitution is not some magical soul binding thing that kills the person who betrays it. But, is the US constitutional issue free from these problems? I don't remember exactly where it is but I believe in the 1936 USSR constitution it is mentioned that any right can be revoked for the collective good. This echoes the Patriot Act (or the Patriot Act echoes this). The Patriot Act after all violated many of the original amendments (especially 4th). Even now, the government spies on people without warrants, a direct action against the constitution. So therefore I must ask, just because it is on paper means that the leader(s) follow it? In that case if you were in the USSR in 1936 would you echo that USSR was a land for free people?

Nationalism and love for one's country is foolish and the idea that you have freedom because a piece of paper guarantees it is also foolish. Many pieces of paper have been broken over the years (whether is a constitution or the Treaty of Versailles). There is only one sure solution for freedom to reign supreme, give the power to the worker.

"As long as there is the state there is no freedom. As long as there is freedom there is no state."- Vladimir I. Lenin

[trivas7]

I guess it all depends on what you think of your country, of course. I realize it's done some bad things once in a while but overall America has been very, very good to me so I appreciate it and the people that fought for our American way of life.
I quote Marcuse:

"Under the rule of a repressive whole," he wrote, "liberty can be made into a powerful instrument of domination. Free election of masters does not abolish the masters or the slaves. Free choice among a wide variety of goods and services does not signify freedom if these goods and services sustain social controls over a life of toil and fear...that is, if they sustain alienation."

[Bud Struggle]

alienation."

All well and good if you believe in such things.

[Dyslexia! Well I Never!]

What does the refusal to beleave that a country is oppressing you make you TomK?

Are you a true believer? A patriot? Well cry me a river while your rag on a stick burns, I'll sail back to rationality.

A country doesn't liberate you by writing laws to restrict you. Capitalist states by their very mechanics function by offering you just enough crumbs to live while stealing your bakery.

Reminding you of dead soldiers is just another emotional blackmail to make the masses paralysed from pursuit of true equality by awe of "their" acheivments and terror of external threats.

In short I generally feel I owe the war-dead shit, I wasn't the fuck who sent them off to die, or the fuck who shot them.

[RGacky3]

All well and good if you believe in such things.

Whats not to believe? Seriously patriotism is more than just ignorance, its simply refusal to acnowladge the clear and simple realisties of the real world.


Those among other rights, the USSR did not follow through on, after all a constitution is not some magical soul binding thing that kills the person who betrays it. But, is the US constitutional issue free from these problems? I don't remember exactly where it is but I believe in the 1936 USSR constitution it is mentioned that any right can be revoked for the collective good. This echoes the Patriot Act (or the Patriot Act echoes this). The Patriot Act after all violated many of the original amendments (especially 4th). Even now, the government spies on people without warrants, a direct action against the constitution. So therefore I must ask, just because it is on paper means that the leader(s) follow it? In that case if you were in the USSR in 1936 would you echo that USSR was a land for free people?

Not only that, but for decades and decades the consitution was'nt upheld for a large segment of the population, remember the sedition act? For one obvious example.


Nationalism and love for one's country is foolish and the idea that you have freedom because a piece of paper guarantees it is also foolish. Many pieces of paper have been broken over the years (whether is a constitution or the Treaty of Versailles). There is only one sure solution for freedom to reign supreme, give the power to the worker.

Exactly, you can write down as many rights as you want as long as one class has the power, they are ultimately going to do with it what they want, power is power and is'nt held back by paper (as history and common sense shows).

[Robert]

Your suggesting that the North went into the civil war against the south over the issue of slavery. Do you really believe that?Strictly speaking, no; it was over secession. But it's also willful ignorance to see the war as nothing but a clash of commercial interests as I imagine a communist would, something like this, I imagine?


Winfield Scott (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winfield_Scott), the commanding general of the U.S. Army, devised the Anaconda Plan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaconda_Plan)[75] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_War#cite_note-74) to win the war with as little bloodshed as possible. His idea was that a Union blockade (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_blockade) of the main ports would weaken the Confederate economy; then the capture of the Mississippi River would split the South. Lincoln adopted the plan, but overruled Scott's warnings against an immediate attack on Richmond. In May 1861, Lincoln enacted the Union blockade of all Southern ports, ending regular international shipments to the Confederacy. I see that blockade as incidental, a detail in war strategy, not the cause of the war. The north collectively, and many anti-slavery elements everywhere, including the south, were absolutely determined not to let slavery spread into new states.

I admire your goal of freeing everyone everywhere, but the People you would liberate include large swaths of the population, including the "working class" that would never ever have recognized Africans as citizens with equal rights under law (the post war amendments, XIII, XIV, and XV, I think, all were results of the north's victory and did more to liberate more people than any commie revolution ever has or ever will.)

Just one man's educated opinion. :)

[Robert]

Capitalist states by their very mechanics function by offering you just enough crumbs to live while stealing your bakery.

Speaking of "cry me a river.":lol:

Nice metaphor, though.

[RGacky3]

But it's also willful ignorance to see the war as nothing but a clash of commercial interests as I imagine a communist would, something like this, I imagine?


So you believe that had secession or commercial interests not been an issue the war would have happend over slavery?


but the People you would liberate include large swaths of the population, including the "working class" that would never ever have recognized Africans as citizens with equal rights under law

So what? They would'nt have the power to enslave anyone, nor would anyone have the power to enslave them, so who cares what they think, thats the beauty of Anarchism. Also historically, who enslaves people and sparks racism, the lower classes? Or the ruling class?


(the post war amendments, XIII, XIV, and XV, I think, all were results of the north's victory and did more to liberate more people than any commie revolution ever has or ever will.)

It made turned slaves that were sold into slaves that were rented, perhaps a step up sure.

[Robert]

thats the beauty of Anarchism

There's something circular afoot here, and it sounds like this: "we wouldn't have slaves if everyone were free!" I'm just sure you don't mean tht, but that's how it sounds. What is the mechanism under anarchy to make sure I don't kidnap you and sell you to some other ee-vil capitalist?


So you believe that had secession or commercial interests not been an issue the war would have happend over slavery?



We'll never know, will we? I don't think the union soldiers would have marched into Atlanta to "free the slaves," no, but there would never have been war had there not been serious philosophical, moral disagreement over slavery. My best guess as to what would have happened, had the south not fired the first shot, is that it would have been slowly, gradually strangled through emabargo and boycott, and yes, these would have been morally based, not financially based.

But, who knows?


It made turned slaves that were sold into slaves that were rented, perhaps a step up sure.

"Perhaps"? So ... you're not sure?

[RGacky3]

I'm just sure you don't mean tht, but that's how it sounds. What is the mechanism under anarchy to make sure I don't kidnap you and sell you to some other ee-vil capitalist?


Slavery does exist without institutions to back it up, what you rtalking about would be more along the lines of a crazy kidnapping someone. What would stop that is community self-governance. Without institutions to support slavery or capitalism the 2 can really not exist.


We'll never know, will we?

When was the last war that was "morally based" meaning the motivation behind the war was moral, I'd be supprised if you could find more than one or two.


"Perhaps"? So ... you're not sure?

There was actually arguments given by people in the south that Northeners were more racist than southerners. Because southerners took care of their slaves, because they owned them, northerners did not, because they only rented them (wage slavery). I'm not saying I agree with it, what I am saying is wage slavery is'nt much of a liberation.

[mikelepore]

I like to go to Memorial Day picnics and shock everybody by saying very loudly: "There should be a holiday to recognize the real heroes in every war time, the draft resisters and deserters, those who refuse induction into the army. They could have taken the cowardly way out, obeyed orders, and gone to war, but they had the courage to refuse to go." I enjoy seeing other people's reactions. They act in panic as though there were a serial murderer on the loose or as if a buidling were on fire or something.

Another enjoyable thing to do is, when the members of the American Legion or the Veterans of Foreign Wars organizations are drinking beer and bragging about their adventures in the Vietnam War, I like to tell them. "I supported the other side. Good thing there's no hard feelings anymore about us defeating you guys, huh? I'm getting myself another glass of beer -- are you ready for another one?" For some reason a lot of them get angry. Some people have no sense of humor.

[Kassad]

Until we have a day of memorial for the millions of Africans, Iraqis and Native Americans that colonialism has slaughtered; the hundreds of thousands of Japanese who died due to reckless military muscle flexing; the hundreds of thousands dying in Afghanistan and Palestine due to the United States' reckless foreign policy; the millions who died due to the first and second imperialist World Wars; along with Korea and Cuba that live in an impoverished state due to imperialist policies; along with all the countless others who are dying due to their right self-determination being ignored by imperialist states; I will not celebrate Memorial Day. Until that day comes when we honor those millions the United States and Western states have murdered and continue to kill, I won't see those sovereign people have their memories spit on while most citizens of the United States honor the deaths of those who served the imperialist war machine.

[Killfacer]

I wear a poppy for veterans day in the UK. The money goes to the british leagion who do a pretty good job with old people and people who have had their legs blown off. I'm all for marking the deaths of those who fought against fascism, just don't expect me to have any sympathy for those who die in Iraq or other wars of a similar nature.

[Bud Struggle]

I wear a poppy for veterans day in the UK. The money goes to the british leagion who do a pretty good job with old people and people who have had their legs blown off. I'm all for marking the deaths of those who fought against fascism, just don't expect me to have any sympathy for those who die in Iraq or other wars of a similar nature.

:thumbup: Excellent. Best in life is we judge a little less and love and forgive and understand a little more.

[RGacky3]

Excellent. Best in life is we judge a little less and love and forgive and understand a little more.

Fine, forgiveness is fine and understanding is fine, but still, going to war is nothing to be honored, or proud of, those who are sent to war should be pitied those who send people to war should be condemned (or forgiven if they stop, which the don't).

I'll be the first to forgive the ruling class, when they stop sending poor young men to die for rich capitalists interests, and when they give up their unjustified authority.