You are aware that proof doesnt get more solid than repeated, collectively witnessed, action, right? A direct testament from Putin would be less significant than the current record of military intervention.

If the current trajectory of russian aggression has not yet convinced you, if Georgia’s annexation has not yet convinced you, if Transnistria has not convinced you, if Donetsk, Luhansk, and Kherson have not convinced you (despite pro-russian separatists in the region serving as erstwhile justification for annexation) then I do not know what to tell you.

Crimea and eastern Ukraine would like to have a word with you as of 4 years ago.

The article you link quotes Putin claiming that he has never opposed Ukraine joining NATO. That is not only demonstrably false but also just a misuse of the article that muddies the water.

Putin has absolutely opposed Ukraine joining NATO (on the basis that he has always planned on annexing Ukraine in whole or in part) and has used his power to materially prohibit their membership. Ukraine’s nuclear disarmament was part of this plan.

I hear you, and I can take your criticism that my statement about black male voters was miscalibrated. I looked it up and they were like 76% in favor of Harris, which is leagues better than white men or women. So, point taken.

I still think that the economic essentialist approach has a better shot at moving the needle, but maybe this is just where we disagree.

It is definitely hard to thread the needle of being aware of american history and also having enough optimism left over to be motivated to affect change, I will grant you that. Your pessimism is well warranted.

Respectfully, I will point out that your view is, in a way, kind of paradoxical. You are right to say that white people in this country cannot be trusted to improve the lives of non-whites however, this phenomenon is not unique to the white community - it is mostly just amplified by their disproportionate power in society. That in mind, consider what this implies in relief: the myriad constituencies of the oppressed minorities in this countries will be able to, in a coordinated way, set aside their own priorities to mutually advance the causes of other non-hegemonic groups in a way that is separable from the economic conversation while overcoming white hegemony WITHOUT white participation.

Looking at the way the latino community voted in 2024, and black men’s feelings about gay and trans people, and the complete implosion of solidarity among women as a voting block…this doesnt seem like a winning strategy, nor is it clear that this coalition can ever surmount the white hegemony. The only group that ever seems to participate in politics in this way reliably are black women, and god bless them for it.

On the other hand, rewind the clock to 2016 and 2020 and you see that movements around economic issues like universal healthcare have a ton of steam given the support for Sanders and AOC, among others. I want to be clear, fuck the dems, but these are illustrative examples.

All I am saying is that the most annoying white people you know have been saying for years that they are deeply reactionary to racially specific policies while also communicating clearly that they are also fucking morons. TRICK THEM. Advance policies that are nominally race/gender/sex/etc. neutral but would disproportionately work to fix racial/gendered/sexual/etc. disparities…like universal healthcare, like rent controls, like public works projects (trains, housing, etc.). You are bound to get a few of them onboard and motivate fewer of them to oppose you. The combined effect might be enough. God knows the current strategy is doing the opposite of working.

I am totally with you. I fully agree with everything you have said here. To your point about brown people and LGBTQ+ people deserving the same standard of living as white people, I fully agree, and I fully agree without caveat.

The question I have for you is: given the current political landscape, and in recognition of the history of the struggle for social justice, can you and I agree that this struggle exists alongside a struggle for economic justice that can be advocated for in its own terms?

I do not want to throw anyone under the bus - and I explicitly reject the prevailing narrative that it was trans issues that cost the dems election (as if the dems represent anything other than their own interests or needed help losing). My main concern here is that, without a bulletproof political coalition, you need to make progress where you can.

It is my contention that right now the forces of dominance and oppression are effectively mobilizing the ignorant and the poor against each other along lines of social construction and we could form a broader coalition unified around economic and labor issues. And I say this in full admission that this will not solve our social justice problems. It will not solve racism, sexism, anti-LGBTQ+, xenophobia, or other bigotries and systemic injustices of those kinds. However, it is possible that by securing things like universal healthcare, universal childcare, minimum wage increases, rent controls, etc. that the lives of everyone gets better. And if everyone’s life gets better, it is easier to mobilize against systemic injustice and harder to blame the ‘other’ for why your life sucks.

I hear you but unless you already have a bullet proof political movement (the left does not), then you need to find it in your heart to look at the deplorables and find commonalities and build on them. This is the real benefit of class solidarity and economic essentialism. Our identitarian differences can be used against a movement to divide it, but we are all workers under capitalism. We all have bills. We all need to put food on the table. And yeah, securing labor rights, housing, and healthcare will not solve racism, sexism, and other bigotries BUT it will be much easier to advocate for social justice issues if people arent just fighting for survival.

The people you are angry with deserve your ire, but they are as much a product of their environments and circumstances as everyone else. Barring the rapture, they arent going anywhere so our political solutions need to include these people. There simply is not enough political power in everyone else to overturn their political relevance.

If your heart is set on finding reasons to hate everyone else, you are always going to find them but successful political movements are built on solidarity and compassion.

Have you seen people’s algorithmic bubbles? The corporations that control these algorithms do not want to increase access to accurate and helpful information. Blaming millions of people instead of the systems that keep them oppressed is morally questionable, strategically ineffective, and psychologically isolating.

How…do you have internet? Van life seems so appealing but also so scary.

I do not want to be seen as defending fascists or being obscurantist but I regularly encounter normal people who literally never learned how to identify a fascist. To them, it vaguely means authoritarian and imperialistic and deploying it in conversations within an american context seems unnecessarily inflammatory. The average person has neither the time nor the inclination be as plugged into politics as we are. Words actually do mean things…just different things to different people.

I suppose it really depends on what freedoms you consider important and how much you weigh things. It is true, in china, you cant be openly critical of the regime. FWIW, that is increasingly true in the US.

However, in china, you are free to not be killed by violence. You are free to get affordable healthcare. You are free to get affordable high quality food. You are free to get affordable housing (outside of Beijing and a few other financial centers). You are free to get an affordable high quality education. I dunno. There are tradeoffs. The US is increasingly offering less and less by way of substantive freedoms and is becoming more and more authoritarian.

Also, have you actually been to china? How much of what you know about china is based in outdated information from 30 years ago or might just be straight up propaganda? I have been in the last 10 years and it blew my mind and changed a lot about how viewed the country.