I believe their angle on prison abolitionists has been that it's an unrealistic goal to try to impose on BLM and associated movements. When you have the chance to have a national conversation and push for specific change, asking for prisons to be abolished delegitimizes the whole movement - not just in the eyes of normie libs, but also most regular people marching angry at racist cops.
It's actually an establishment tactic to give more airtime to the most extremist voices to say, "See? You don't want what ANTIFA wants." And then pro-establishment radlibs can pretend to be to the left of genuine progressives. "Oh, you want police reform, but believe in prisons? Conservative!" Just like their favorite anti-Bernie tactic, "Oh, you're for radical change, but want an Old White Man for President? Privileged Bernie Bro!"
My favorite line was Amber's: "We need a place to put Hillary Clinton." Prison abolition is like communism, a goal we all want. But in the medium-term we want to jail war criminals, Wall Street lackeys, right-wing militias, fascists, and billionaires who will otherwise shoot all of us if we try to take power.
...You may disagree with this line of thinking, that's cool. But Cancelling!!! anyone who professes it is just CIA-sponsored leftist infighting.
I believe their angle on prison abolitionists has been that it’s an unrealistic goal to try to impose on BLM and associated movements. When you have the chance to have a national conversation and push for specific change, asking for prisons to be abolished delegitimizes the whole movement - not just in the eyes of normie libs, but also most regular people marching angry at racist cops.
I think it's sus for a group of podcasters who argue they are, comedians, first and intellectuals second, and almost all of them white, argue that prison abolition is an unrealistic goal to impose on BLM. BLM is Black-led, and the prison abolitionists I know and read about are almost all Black. Dismissing the demands of Black Americans (who most direly know what's needed to help fix society) because to them, Brooklynite hipsters with a million-dollar podcast, because it sounds "unrealistic", it's hilarious, a real joke.
Arguing for Prison Abolition is right, it is the correct take, and it is a position we ultimately want to achieve, so trying to tamp down and criticize it into oblivion, or dismiss outright is a truly enraging thing to do. Again, ingrained in my brain is the reporting of Louisiana prisons going up to 120º celsius because the prison system refuses to put it in AC. The hundreds and thousands of prisoners that have died from flooding in prisons. Raw sewage pollution of their water supply (already sus to begin with). The covid-19 pandemic just ravishing people who shouldn't be in prison in the first place.
Maybe it's because I lean or have ML tendencies, but it is the peoples' movement's responsibility to have the correct line as developed from the needs of the people, so when people look to a "leader", the party is there, having told them what they needed cause you listened to their plight. One of the reasons the Bolsheviks obtained so much support is because they were against WWI from the beginning and Lenin's own party had to actively try and stop his writings from being published while he was in exile because they were wildly and truly "unpopular" or "dangerous" as it dealt with government and accusations for treason, but pulling out from WWI was the right thing to do.
We as leftists, need to be now, where the people will be in the near future. That's what helps us succeed as a movement. Dismissing "unpopular" ideas (again, that's according to Amber, bless her heart), because the Liberals are going tsk tsk, is wrong and shortsighted.
My favorite line was Amber’s: “We need a place to put Hillary Clinton.”...But in the medium-term we want to jail war criminals, Wall Street lackeys, right-wing militias, fascists, and billionaires who will otherwise shoot all of us if we try to take power.
Dismissing “unpopular” ideas ... because the Liberals are going tsk tsk, is wrong and shortsighted.
That's not where the criticism of prison abolition (PA) is coming from. The criticism is exactly the opposite: that Liberals are trying to kill the movement by demanding things like PA.
white, argue that prison abolition is an unrealistic goal to impose on BLM. BLM is Black-led, and the prison abolitionists I know and read about are almost all Black. Dismissing the demands of Black Americans
This is some series of rhetorical tricks you're pulling. "BLM is Black-led + some BLM support PA, therefore criticizing PA is anti-Black, especially if it's Whites criticizing it." You're fooling yourself mightily if that logic satisfies you.
If the majority-Black BLM actions can succeed without support - great, maybe the FBI will sleep this time and the Panthers can seize power XD... But the current movement that has swept the nation isn't majority Black. The reason Antifa is being demonized is because many non-Black radicals are involved. The reason there's a possibility for change within the current system is because White youths and radicals are pressuring White authorities - many protests are majority-White. They're the only ones I've seen, living in WASP New England.
PA is not a "Black demand", that's silly. It's a fringe demand that Black and non-Black majorities do not support.
And our argument is that this demand, if you try to make it the face of BLM, will actually doom other Black demands, even the most mild ones. So YOU are the one dismissing Black demands, mi amigo, how do you like them manzanas?
because it sounds “unrealistic”
It doesn't sound unrealistic, it IS unrealistic to expect PA in the US as an outcome of the present movement. We'll be lucky if we get anything.
Arguing for Prison Abolition is right, it is the correct take, and it is a position we ultimately want to achieve, so trying to tamp down and criticize it into oblivion, or dismiss outright is a truly enraging thing to do.
Arguing for PA is great - full power to you. But criticizing it is NOT sending it to oblivion - especially when the criticism is about the time and place of arguing for it, not the principle itself. CTH, despite our best efforts, is not yet the only mandatory audio program in the country. Don't exaggerate its power.
ingrained in my brain is the reporting of Louisiana prisons going up to 120º celsius ...
That's a weak argument for PA, btw. Scandinavian prisons are nice. You can make prisons nice if you care to.
One of the reasons the Bolsheviks obtained so much support is because they were against WWI from the beginning and Lenin’s own party had to actively try and stop his writings from being published while he was in exile because they were wildly and truly “unpopular” or “dangerous” as it dealt with government and accusations for treason, but pulling out from WWI was the right thing to do.
Except PA is not a wildly popular/dangerous idea, not even with the downtrodden and criminalized. "Defund the police" has a chance to be, but PA is just nowhere near that.
El paredón
Oh, "the wall." So until Uber-Stalin leads the Red Army through a space-time gate and exterminates all our political enemies, we will do nothing? It's total victory or nada? To me, this is CIA-sponsored, Pelosi-endorsed shouting down of movements by insisting they aren't radical enough.
Finally, demands should lead to greater change, not be dead ends. Community-based police oversight boards would build democracy, would build local power, would curtail the power of the police. Defunding police would weaken the state, provide funding for social services. What would PA accomplish? Liberal and reactionary backlash.
Prison abolition is like communism, a goal we all want. But in the medium-term we want to jail war criminals, Wall Street lackeys, right-wing militias, fascists, and billionaires who will otherwise shoot all of us if we try to take power.
For all the (justified) energy this community spends pushing back on propaganda like "Stalin sent 6,589 kabillion to gulags for thought crime!!", you'd think this point would be self-evident. You can't laugh about the futility of debating reactionaries or fascists in the marketplace of ideas, praise MLs for realizing that and acting upon it, then turn around and argue that all prisons everywhere, for any reason, should be abolished abolished. That's an incoherent position.
I believe their angle on prison abolitionists has been that it's an unrealistic goal to try to impose on BLM and associated movements. When you have the chance to have a national conversation and push for specific change, asking for prisons to be abolished delegitimizes the whole movement - not just in the eyes of normie libs, but also most regular people marching angry at racist cops.
It's actually an establishment tactic to give more airtime to the most extremist voices to say, "See? You don't want what ANTIFA wants." And then pro-establishment radlibs can pretend to be to the left of genuine progressives. "Oh, you want police reform, but believe in prisons? Conservative!" Just like their favorite anti-Bernie tactic, "Oh, you're for radical change, but want an Old White Man for President? Privileged Bernie Bro!"
My favorite line was Amber's: "We need a place to put Hillary Clinton." Prison abolition is like communism, a goal we all want. But in the medium-term we want to jail war criminals, Wall Street lackeys, right-wing militias, fascists, and billionaires who will otherwise shoot all of us if we try to take power.
...You may disagree with this line of thinking, that's cool. But Cancelling!!! anyone who professes it is just CIA-sponsored leftist infighting.
I think it's sus for a group of podcasters who argue they are, comedians, first and intellectuals second, and almost all of them white, argue that prison abolition is an unrealistic goal to impose on BLM. BLM is Black-led, and the prison abolitionists I know and read about are almost all Black. Dismissing the demands of Black Americans (who most direly know what's needed to help fix society) because to them, Brooklynite hipsters with a million-dollar podcast, because it sounds "unrealistic", it's hilarious, a real joke.
Arguing for Prison Abolition is right, it is the correct take, and it is a position we ultimately want to achieve, so trying to tamp down and criticize it into oblivion, or dismiss outright is a truly enraging thing to do. Again, ingrained in my brain is the reporting of Louisiana prisons going up to 120º celsius because the prison system refuses to put it in AC. The hundreds and thousands of prisoners that have died from flooding in prisons. Raw sewage pollution of their water supply (already sus to begin with). The covid-19 pandemic just ravishing people who shouldn't be in prison in the first place.
Maybe it's because I lean or have ML tendencies, but it is the peoples' movement's responsibility to have the correct line as developed from the needs of the people, so when people look to a "leader", the party is there, having told them what they needed cause you listened to their plight. One of the reasons the Bolsheviks obtained so much support is because they were against WWI from the beginning and Lenin's own party had to actively try and stop his writings from being published while he was in exile because they were wildly and truly "unpopular" or "dangerous" as it dealt with government and accusations for treason, but pulling out from WWI was the right thing to do.
We as leftists, need to be now, where the people will be in the near future. That's what helps us succeed as a movement. Dismissing "unpopular" ideas (again, that's according to Amber, bless her heart), because the Liberals are going tsk tsk, is wrong and shortsighted.
El paredón.
That's not where the criticism of prison abolition (PA) is coming from. The criticism is exactly the opposite: that Liberals are trying to kill the movement by demanding things like PA.
This is some series of rhetorical tricks you're pulling. "BLM is Black-led + some BLM support PA, therefore criticizing PA is anti-Black, especially if it's Whites criticizing it." You're fooling yourself mightily if that logic satisfies you.
If the majority-Black BLM actions can succeed without support - great, maybe the FBI will sleep this time and the Panthers can seize power XD... But the current movement that has swept the nation isn't majority Black. The reason Antifa is being demonized is because many non-Black radicals are involved. The reason there's a possibility for change within the current system is because White youths and radicals are pressuring White authorities - many protests are majority-White. They're the only ones I've seen, living in WASP New England.
PA is not a "Black demand", that's silly. It's a fringe demand that Black and non-Black majorities do not support.
And our argument is that this demand, if you try to make it the face of BLM, will actually doom other Black demands, even the most mild ones. So YOU are the one dismissing Black demands, mi amigo, how do you like them manzanas?
It doesn't sound unrealistic, it IS unrealistic to expect PA in the US as an outcome of the present movement. We'll be lucky if we get anything.
Arguing for PA is great - full power to you. But criticizing it is NOT sending it to oblivion - especially when the criticism is about the time and place of arguing for it, not the principle itself. CTH, despite our best efforts, is not yet the only mandatory audio program in the country. Don't exaggerate its power.
That's a weak argument for PA, btw. Scandinavian prisons are nice. You can make prisons nice if you care to.
Except PA is not a wildly popular/dangerous idea, not even with the downtrodden and criminalized. "Defund the police" has a chance to be, but PA is just nowhere near that.
Oh, "the wall." So until Uber-Stalin leads the Red Army through a space-time gate and exterminates all our political enemies, we will do nothing? It's total victory or nada? To me, this is CIA-sponsored, Pelosi-endorsed shouting down of movements by insisting they aren't radical enough.
Finally, demands should lead to greater change, not be dead ends. Community-based police oversight boards would build democracy, would build local power, would curtail the power of the police. Defunding police would weaken the state, provide funding for social services. What would PA accomplish? Liberal and reactionary backlash.
For all the (justified) energy this community spends pushing back on propaganda like "Stalin sent 6,589 kabillion to gulags for thought crime!!", you'd think this point would be self-evident. You can't laugh about the futility of debating reactionaries or fascists in the marketplace of ideas, praise MLs for realizing that and acting upon it, then turn around and argue that all prisons everywhere, for any reason, should be abolished abolished. That's an incoherent position.