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Guavanaut posted:That of course depends on what proportion of British Protestants consider what the Poles get up to as Christian. Also on what percentage of British irreligious are looking at at the current results of Poland's Christian background with some level of horror. If in 2020 you are horrified at the thought of someone being the wrong flavor of Christian, to the point of destroying your own economy to spite some of them, you are too dumb to live. Even the European countries that actually have large communities of both Catholics and Protestants don't really care anymore. Concerns about religious fundamentalism are more legitimate, but it seems extremely unlikely that that would be the main preoccupation of the typical Brexiteer. quote:True on the first part, not necessarily on the second. Most of the new non-EU migrants are from within the Commonwealth. Is someone who speaks English and plays cricket and lives somewhere that even shares or shared the same head of state or at the very least shares the same strange system of common law, but is Black, more or less culturally related than someone from Poland? I think the answer to that depends on how No, imposing your language and religion on a colonized subject nation top-down, or making them play cricket, doesn't magically make them the same as you, and that has very little to do with 'race' in any sort of biological or aesthetical sense. Nations and tribes in Africa and Asia (fortunately) still have their own deep-rooted customs, traditions, ways of viewing the world, demographics, family relations, value systems, etc. etc. Of course, nations with the same language and religion do tend to have at least certain elements in common, and form a global 'linguistic community' that does have some meaning in a more diffuse way. See also: Portugal, Brazil, Angola, and Mozambique. Is an English-speaking Protestant from Jamaica closer to an Englishman than a Catholic Slav from Poland? The question is pointless, since culture is impossible to quantify, but I suppose limiting yourself to the more objective characteristics, it could be argued that it's the case. I don't think the article was specifically talking about the Commonwealth, though. As I understand it, most immigration from those countries already occurred during the 50's and 60's. I should really try to dig up the article in question, might have been in physical print. Phlegmish fucked around with this message at 19:08 on Jul 13, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 19:05
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the person saying it is being with ~culturally related~.
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Orange Devil posted:Those illegal immigrants are very useful at driving down wages and/or evading taxes and labour laws. the notion illegal immigrants drive down wages is false. It is a common right-wing fascist talking point but is entirely unsupported by any empirical evidence. Also in the United States at least, most illegal immigrants do in fact pay taxes. It's actually absurdly unfair, the government has a system set up where they pay money into Social Security, money which is supposed to support you in retirement, but since they are not legal they are ineligible for benefits. So the Federal government is essentially pillaging the wages of America's poorest and most vulnerable to fund it's citizen's retirement. For lots of detail on the debate over immigrants and the effect on wages this article is excellent: There's no evidence that immigrants hurt any American workers quote:For an economist, there’s a straightforward way to study how low-skill immigration affects native workers: Find a large, sudden wave of low-skill immigrants arriving in one city only. Watch what happens to wages and employment for native workers in that city, and compare that to other cities where the immigrants didn’t go. Squalid fucked around with this message at 19:24 on Jul 13, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 19:21
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Phlegmish posted:If in 2020 you are horrified at the thought of someone being the wrong flavor of Christian, to the point of destroying your own economy to spite some of them, you are too dumb to live. Even the European countries that actually have large communities of both Catholics and Protestants don't really care anymore. The number of people who care about religion at all as a condition of culture or citizenship is pretty small, but among those are people who definitely Care About Religion like the Orange Order. People seem to care more about about language and common culture, and even if that was originally imposed I don't think it's Lord Mountbatten forcing young Indians to play cricket today. Approval of the Commonwealth (and the idea of some common culture or shared goal) is significantly higher in many Asian countries than it is among the 'White Commonwealth' (where some brexiteers imagined themselves into thinking most people would be coming from).  I agree that culture is impossible to quantify, but I'm unconvinced that there's any great European commonality that doesn't degrade into outdated ideas about 'whiteness' or even more outdated ideas about Christendom. Squalid posted:the notion illegal immigrants drive down wages is false. It is a common right-wing fascist talking point but is entirely unsupported by any empirical evidence. 1. The people who are most impacted by this are also migrants, non-migrant wage levels are either negligibly affected or increase. 2. The causes of this are work gangs, sweatshops, and lovely bosses, not migrants. Most of it could be fixed by actually enforcing labor laws. Guavanaut fucked around with this message at 20:09 on Jul 13, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 19:46
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ToxicAcne posted:Ditto for Canada as well. On the other hand, Australia doesn't really have this element as part of their mythos, probably because of the White Australia policy. Regardless of the reliability of self-description, the fact that Americans constantly repeat this with pride (I assume this is also true for non-goon Americans who don't skew to the left nearly as much) means I have no trouble believing that it really is an important part of the US's national mythos and identity, and I can see how that would have psychological effects that sometimes translate into real policy differences. That said, it probably plays much less of a role than Americans love to claim. Belgium is about as far from an ethnostate as you can get, but it is consistently one of the worst Western European countries when it comes to 'integration', and there is no significant difference between right-leaning Flanders and left-leaning Wallonia, who are also as politically different as you can get. Brussels, controlled by francophone politicians who love to constantly poo poo on those intolerant Flemings, is actually by far the worst city in Belgium in that regard, with regular disturbances and even outright rioting. If anything, having a strong, self-conscious identity that you actually can integrate into, and that you are allowed to integrate into, are both important. That is something that America gets right compared to Europe, take note of that, I won't be repeating it often. Europeans seem to be divided between 1) those who hate and despise themselves (well, themselves as the collectivity, they personally are of course enlightened individuals who have transcended tribalism) and who have to suppress their gag reflex at any mention of the word 'nation' on one hand, and of course no immigrant or anyone else is ever going to respect those people, and 2) those who are constantly bitching and saying racist poo poo about non-European minorities, making hyperbolic claims about their inability to assimilate while they would 100% continue to poo poo on those with a different color regardless on the other hand, and it's even more obvious that immigrants will be antagonistic in return. The US has done a decent job of overcoming that dialectic so far. Few people are vilified for flying the official, national flag. It is usually not seen as a political statement, let alone a fascist symbol. In this very thread, they are being nationalistic about their tradition of tolerance! I legitimately admire that. There are other reasons for the difference that undeservedly rarely get brought up, such as the fact that many countries in Latin America (by far the most common origin of immigrants to the US in the past few decades) are practically Western to begin with, or the definition of 'integration' ultimately being arbitrary (in light of recent events, are the overwhelmingly Anglo-Protestant African-Americans in the US truly 'integrated'?), or the indirect effects of respective social security systems, but I'm already thesisposting way too much.
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Jul 13, 2020 19:48
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Guavanaut posted:Outside of those I'm not sure how many places even care about the UK or thoughts of moving there. The past few years the Flemish news has been full of reports about 'transit migrants' getting intercepted here or there, invariably on their way to the UK. I assume that the same is true for France or any other place that is geographically close to the UK. Few of them seemed to have any sort of historical or linguistic connection to Brits. Unless it's a case of media narratives being wildly different between countries, it does seem that quite a lot of migrants are specifically trying to get to the UK. I don't really understand why (without meaning to offend) unless it's the aforementioned lack of ID/population register. If it's really true that the biggest post-Brexit migration wave will be coming from Commonwealth countries specifically, that's at least something of a silver lining for the whole Brexit fiasco.
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Jul 13, 2020 20:09
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Phlegmish posted:in light of recent events, are the overwhelmingly Anglo-Protestant African-Americans in the US truly 'integrated'? i did hint at this a little in my previous post but its worth considering the way in which America being a "nation of immigrants" is problematic. There are two very conspicuous groups that are rather blatantly excluded from this nation, namely African-Americans and Native Americans. Ask them how their families came to be a part of the nation and you will get a rather different response.
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Jul 13, 2020 20:11
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Phlegmish posted:That said, it probably plays much less of a role than Americans love to claim. Belgium is about as far from an ethnostate as you can get, but it is consistently one of the worst Western European countries when it comes to 'integration', and there is no significant difference between right-leaning Flanders and left-leaning Wallonia, who are also as politically different as you can get. Brussels, controlled by francophone politicians who love to constantly poo poo on those intolerant Flemings, is actually by far the worst city in Belgium in that regard, with regular disturbances and even outright rioting. Belgium isn't an ethnostate - it's two ethnostates glued together by the ghost of the Napoleonic wars.
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Jul 13, 2020 20:19
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The tradition of integration and the idea of a nation of immigrants also has its roots in America's nature as a settler colonialist state. The colonial upper class was very keen on constructing narratives that would allow them a kind of legitimacy in their claim to the land that they couldn't claim through lines of descent or long presence. Different groups came up with different answers-- outright conquest from the native inhabitants, divine right, actual lines of descent in the case of the Virginia elite and their weird obsession with Pocahontas-- but one of the winners was the idea of "Americanness" as something you could gain through coming to the country and buying into the national mythos.All of those kind of weird depictions of George Washington as a god and the replacement of the goddess America with the goddess Columbia in national iconography are a part of the same general project. Imo, the way in which some of the founding fathers very clearly treated their new national project as a sort of fun political science experiment is extremely goonish, and Thomas Jefferson would definitely get himself banned for effort posting in c-spam Quorum fucked around with this message at 20:23 on Jul 13, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 20:21
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Quorum posted:Imo, the way in which some of the founding fathers very clearly treated their new national project as a sort of fun political science experiment is extremely goonish, and Thomas Jefferson would definitely get himself banned for effort posting in c-spam
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Jul 13, 2020 20:28
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Phlegmish posted:
To be honest I'm seeing a bit of this Canada as well. I was talking with some friends a while ago and they thought that anyone who hangs a flag in front of their house is a racist. Granted these guys are really active on twitter so I'm guessing that they got it from there. Honestly for myself I'm conflicted. Nationalism causes so much ugliness, and Canada itself is a state founded on genocide, so I have a distaste for it. But you're right that being able to participate in a collective identity is important. I remember learning in undergrad that in Latin America, nationalism was often the purview of the Left, and that's backed up by Chavismo, Morales, AMLO etc. Even the Zapatistas wave the Mexican flag around in their rallies.
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Jul 13, 2020 20:33
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 That old Prussian border is showing up again.
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Jul 13, 2020 20:43
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Phlegmish posted:Unless it's a case of media narratives being wildly different between countries, it does seem that quite a lot of migrants are specifically trying to get to the UK. I don't really understand why (without meaning to offend) unless it's the aforementioned lack of ID/population register.   Edit: This link gives EU born migrants also from 2015. https://www.pewresearch.org/global/interactives/origins-destinations-of-european-union-migrants-within-the-eu/ Both France and UK are 4% while Ireland is 12%, Austria is 8% and Germany is 7%. Belgium is 8%. Sweden is only 5% so it probably has the highest non european non Russian (not included in figures above) immigrant proportion but it doesn't register in the popular imagination of an immigrant looking for the promised land of economic opportunity in the same way. Peaceful Anarchy fucked around with this message at 20:54 on Jul 13, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 20:46
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Phlegmish posted:The past few years the Flemish news has been full of reports about 'transit migrants' getting intercepted here or there, invariably on their way to the UK. I assume that the same is true for France or any other place that is geographically close to the UK. Few of them seemed to have any sort of historical or linguistic connection to Brits. e: ^^^ Yeah that makes sense. Phlegmish posted:If it's really true that the biggest post-Brexit migration wave will be coming from Commonwealth countries specifically, that's at least something of a silver lining for the whole Brexit fiasco. The wording of the immigration bill is very much along the lines of "skilled English speakers" which is obviously supposed to raise images of white Americans or Australians in racist eyes, but also has several million Nigerian engineers thinking it means them. The only non-EU, non-Commonwealth, non-anglosphere countries I can think got mentioned were Japan and the Philippines, but I don't know if Japan wants any of that and I think the Philippines was just some poorly thought out (and probably racist) answer by some minister to where agricultural workers would come from.
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Jul 13, 2020 20:51
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TinTower posted:
The blue part vaguely looks like western Europe.
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Jul 13, 2020 20:58
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I taught Danish to various immigrants for a year or so, and language was definitely a reason for many of them to try for the UK at some point before or after ending up in Denmark. The other main reason was having some sort of connections there, which also makes sense.
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Jul 13, 2020 21:06
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Guavanaut posted:The only non-EU, non-Commonwealth, non-anglosphere countries I can think got mentioned were Japan and the Philippines, but I don't know if Japan wants any of that and I think the Philippines was just some poorly thought out (and probably racist) answer by some minister to where agricultural workers would come from. The Philippines do have a long history of overseas emigration for work, to the point that some say the Philippines main export is people. Even post-Brexit, the United Kingdom probably beats the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia or Kuwait as far as wages and working conditions go, so the idea isn't as outlandish as it sounds. 
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Jul 13, 2020 21:19
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ToxicAcne posted:To be honest I'm seeing a bit of this Canada as well. I was talking with some friends a while ago and they thought that anyone who hangs a flag in front of their house is a racist. Granted these guys are really active on twitter so I'm guessing that they got it from there. My view is that nations themselves cannot be inherently bad (or good), but should rather be accepted as an objective fact in most cases. In a strict sociological and cultural sense, that man flying twenty Canadian flags is no more (or less) Canadian than your twitter friends are, in all likelihood. What is 'bad' is what some people project onto the nation, but any member of said nation has the power to challenge or even change that. I do recognize that it's difficult when the situation gets polarized. As soon as a flag gets codified as being a racist symbol, then racists will be more likely to fly it, and vice versa, and it just spirals until it becomes a self-fulfilling thing. The same thing has happened with the Flemish flag over here. You have the absurd situation that Flanders is a nation in every way that counts (and it certainly wasn't back in 1830 so paradoxically it was created by Belgium), but if you fly its flag outside of official contexts, you're likely to get dirty looks - especially if you use one of the unofficial versions which are seen as more militant. The dirty looks will usually be coming from people who know literally almost nothing about Wallonia, who refer to Brussels francophones as 'Walloons', and whose French is limited to half-remembered phrases that they learned in high school. I consciously try to go against that, and have for a long time. I've been reading these forums for years now, and I generally agree with the goonsensus on most issues, but not when it comes to things like this. Most of the regulars will probably have noticed by now. Two days ago, like every 11th of July, I flew the Flemish flag from my bedroom window. I felt no shame at such a primitive display of tribalism, but rather a vague sense of community and belonging that I get from no other piece of fabric. I am Flemish. It has shaped me in important ways, culturally, psychologically, linguistically, even if it is by no means all-defining. Those who fly our flag, which rightfully belongs to everyone who is Flemish or wishes to be, regardless of background or origin, only to promote hatred, racism, discrimination, division, even violence, are my enemies. I hate them more than I hate the people who spit on the flag, because the latter wouldn't exist without the former.
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Jul 13, 2020 21:32
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African American is sort of a sub-nationality of American. The blacks who have been in America for generations are very explicitly not carrying whatever culture they had before they were brought over the sea. There have been some people who tried to adopt African culture and religion in an attempt to reinvent whatever their cultural identity beforehand was, but they're still not African. There's all sorts of institutional oppression against African Americans that seeks to keep them separate from white americans, but that doesn't mean that they don't have a culture unique to America itself. Which I think also leads to a weird thing where post-slavery black immigrants wind up integrating into the African American identity from the institutional oppression against blacks funneling them in that direction, but I don't really know that much about that. I'm not sure how you'd gauge their relative integration. There's a sort of absurdity to how America differentiates people mainly by color and an abstract understanding of what facial characteristics denote which race, and sometimes the hue difference between white and black is entirely imperceptible, but I'm not convinced that other cultural distinctions don't become nonsensical when you take a step back from them either.
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Jul 13, 2020 21:40
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Phlegmish posted:Regardless of the reliability of self-description, the fact that Americans constantly repeat this with pride (I assume this is also true for non-goon Americans who don't skew to the left nearly as much) means I have no trouble believing that it really is an important part of the US's national mythos and identity, and I can see how that would have psychological effects that sometimes translate into real policy differences. Isn't Belgium basically two ethno-states sewn together. Also the catch to Americans getting all proud of it, is that it's not actually that unique a thing when you compare us to other New World countries. Anglo America forgets frequently how much immigrant culture is important in lots of Latin America as well. lol I hesitate to call Cyprus's number reflective of immigration so much as British olds using it as a Florida. Grape fucked around with this message at 21:46 on Jul 13, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 21:40
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ToxicAcne posted:Edit: the fact that most European countries are ethnostates probably plays a huge part into why many immigrants there can't "integrate". Most European countries aren't ethnostates at all. Most of them have sizeable minorities, some of whom have been there for centuries (e.g. Hungarians in Romania or Sorbs in Germany).
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Jul 13, 2020 21:48
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Pope Hilarius II posted:Most European countries aren't ethnostates at all. Most of them have sizeable minorities, some of whom have been there for centuries (e.g. Hungarians in Romania or Sorbs in Germany). "Ethnostate" doesn't mean literally 100% homogenous. I would also not refer to the Sorbs as "sizable" in any context.
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Jul 13, 2020 21:54
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I think there's also an extremely tangible difference between white and non-white immigrants in that kind of perception among non-European populations, even if the white immigrants/minorities aren't actually any more integrated in practice, that often kind of gets ignored when these statistics come up. To take a bit of a tangent for the reasoning, one of Korean pop culture's biggest keys for its success has been its appeal to people of non-European descent, particularly people in Southeast Asia, the Middle East and North Africa. And while there's a bunch of reasons for that, a really significant one genuinely seems to be straight up "finally there's some popular media with high production values where the people don't have white faces." I was a bit taken aback the first time I read that, but it comes up as a reason constantly for Korean culture's popularity; there's a lot of people that want to see something other than American/European media. A lot of Europeans tend to point out that Americans applying American racial politics to Europe doesn't make sense, or that it's more about ethnic divides than racism etc, but true as that is be in some cases, I think it's the racial divides that often aren't lost on non-European immigrants looking for a place to move. Half your country could be immigrants, but even if you as a native of it may see the nuances between your own people and those Europeans from over there, to someone from halfway across the world that's gonna be obscured; a higher proportion of non-European immigrants, conversely, is an extremely meaningful difference. Anyway I'm saying all of this very assertively considering this is mostly being pulled from my rear end but I do think the legacy of colonialism wrt a white/non-white divide is a much more present thing in peoples' minds around much of the world (especially Asia, and I'm assuming Africa too) than a lot of Europeans and Americans realize. There's also significantly more (not unjustified) resentment than we (or at least I) ever get taught in school.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:50
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Koramei posted:To take a bit of a tangent for the reasoning, one of Korean pop culture's biggest keys for its success has been its appeal to people of non-European descent, particularly people in Southeast Asia, the Middle East and North Africa. And while there's a bunch of reasons for that, a really significant one genuinely seems to be straight up "finally there's some popular media with high production values where the people don't have white faces." I was a bit taken aback the first time I read that, but it comes up as a reason constantly for Korean culture's popularity; there's a lot of people that want to see something other than American/European media. I take issue with the "finally!" aspect here, but otherwise I think yeah there's something to this. The "finally!" doesn't work because of mostly well... JAPAN, but also Hong Kong stuff like the 70's kung-fu craze. But the same principle is at work.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:55
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Phlegmish posted:It is usually not seen as a political statement, let alone a fascist symbol. In this very thread, they are being nationalistic about their tradition of tolerance! I legitimately admire that. Whaaaat? So, uh, what are all the protesters who seem to clad themselves in the flag at right-wing and white supremacist rallies? Why is it a thing that I only seem to see the far right do when they protest in the USA? I would argue that waving the American flag is absolutely a political statement, and a conservative, right-wing one at that. And the "tradition of tolerance", I mean, yes Americans are routinely taught about the "melting pot" theory of America in school, but in practice? America is incredibly hostile to immigrant groups, especially those from non-European backgrounds. You only need to look at how East Asians, despite having immigrated to the USA since the 19th century, are still culturally viewed as inescapably, permanently foreign, no matter how long they've been in the country.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:56
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DrSunshine posted:Whaaaat? Even if you believe it to be, it's inarguable that most people don't see it that way in the US. quote:So, uh, what are all the protesters who seem to clad themselves in the flag at right-wing and white supremacist rallies? Why is it a thing that I only seem to see the far right do when they protest in the USA? I would argue that waving the American flag is absolutely a political statement, and a conservative, right-wing one at that. Right wingers fall into dim superficial jingoism like moths fly to lights.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:03
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On the other hand alot of the Western South Asian/ East Asian media doesn't do well at home. I think it was Crazy Rich Asians that flopped in China. Even for me, growing up in a place where I wasn't a minority, I found Master of None and Kumail Nanjiani's movie kinda.. whitewashed and orientalized. Especially Master of none. Anyways here are some maps.  
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Jul 14, 2020 00:03
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Why was Burma put in the Raj and not treated like a separate colony anyway? Sri Lanka was it's own thing for instance.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:05
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DrSunshine posted:Whaaaat? Whenever I see a picture of an American street, it always seems to have a comical amount of American flags everywhere. Unless this is a highly regional thing, displaying it in social settings is clearly not something that people are ashamed of. quote:So, uh, what are all the protesters who seem to clad themselves in the flag at right-wing and white supremacist rallies? Why is it a thing that I only seem to see the far right do when they protest in the USA? I would argue that waving the American flag is absolutely a political statement, and a conservative, right-wing one at that. Maybe this process is also happening in the US since the ascension of Trump, who has actually, in a way, brought the USA into closer alignment with Europe (you guys now even have Antifa twenty years after that was a big thing here). I don't think it's a good thing. It's a classic mistake that the Western left keeps making, presumably indirectly due to Third-Worldism. You can shout all you want (and goons definitely do, constantly) about how you want to destroy your own country and it's the root of all evil in the world, the reality is that even most of the oppressed don't actually want to do that, they want to change it and make it truly theirs.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:24
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At a guess, because it was easier to administer it from an already established system under the British east India company or the raj and it was geographically near the centre of British rule in India, Calcutta.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:25
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DrSunshine posted:Whaaaat? So, uh, what are all the protesters who seem to clad themselves in the flag at right-wing and white supremacist rallies? Why is it a thing that I only seem to see the far right do when they protest in the USA? I would argue that waving the American flag is absolutely a political statement, and a conservative, right-wing one at that. Do you look at pictures of America besides those taken at nazi rallies? You may see it that way but the vast majority of people in the US do not. Phlegmish posted:Maybe this process is also happening in the US since the ascension of Trump, who has actually, in a way, brought the USA into closer alignment with Europe (you guys now even have Antifa twenty years after that was a big thing here). I don't think it's a good thing. It's a classic mistake that the Western left keeps making, presumably indirectly due to Third-Worldism. You can shout all you want (and goons definitely do, constantly) about how you want to destroy your own country and it's the root of all evil in the world, the reality is that even most of the oppressed don't actually want to do that, they want to change it and make it truly theirs. It's kind of funny because this is happening a little bit (the extent to which it is happening in the real world and not just twitter I'm not sure), but it seems to be more that thinking America is good (or is bad, but can be improved) is cringe rather than fascist.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:29
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Phlegmish posted:Whenever I see a picture of an American street, it always seems to have a comical amount of American flags everywhere. Unless this is a highly regional thing, displaying it in social settings is clearly not something that people are ashamed of. It isn't. It's a very vanilla feature of just about everywhere. Phlegmish posted:Maybe this process is also happening in the US since the ascension of Trump, who has actually, in a way, brought the USA into closer alignment with Europe (you guys now even have Antifa twenty years after that was a big thing here). I don't think it's a good thing. It's a classic mistake that the Western left keeps making, presumably indirectly due to Third-Worldism. You can shout all you want (and goons definitely do, constantly) about how you want to destroy your own country and it's the root of all evil in the world, the reality is that even most of the oppressed don't actually want to do that, they want to change it and make it truly theirs. Most hard-left wing regimes understand this ironically! Like Lenin didn't start going on about destroying Russia. Though they do tend to change flags. But not even always on that front. Cuba didn't change theirs, and many others adjusted the existing flag to include communist symbols. Like Yugoslavia. The Laotian communists came up with their own original nationalist flag as well which apparently has irredentist meaning toward Thailand! I did not know this until a few minutes ago! Gorau posted:At a guess, because it was easier to administer it from an already established system under the British east India company or the raj and it was geographically near the centre of British rule in India, Calcutta. The latter is an excellent point I didn't even think about. Makes sense. Grape fucked around with this message at 00:36 on Jul 14, 2020 |
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Jul 14, 2020 00:29
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double post
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Jul 14, 2020 00:35
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Grape posted:double post Practically every historical far-left regime leaned very heavily into nationalism to rile up the masses, some to the point of genocide. They just put an 'anti-imperialist' veneer over it so that on the surface it wouldn't deviate too far from Marxist orthodoxy. The Western left can't do that, on the contrary, just as the bad adjectives are oppressing the good adjectives in their own country, the West is exploiting the Global South and is therefore bad. There is, of course, some truth to that, but at the same time, you're contesting elections in your own country, not in the entire world.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:47
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My mom actually took an American flag to some of the anti-trump protests back in 2016. Some people believe that loyalty to the country can be separate from loyalty to the current administration. She didn't actually buy a flag for the purpose, she had just had one that I found and pulled out of a creek, which seems somehow symbolic. Fascist movements may try co-opting the flag, but they generally understand that the normal American flag isn't enough to signal what they mean to say, so they tend to bring in other flags to get the idea across like the thin blue line or the confederate poo poo. The American flag also has a history of being alluded to with a lot of more generic celebratory things as well, like Evil Knievel's outfit or Wonder Woman's costume. I think that sort of use of the flag has waned, but it still happens from time to time. A little flag wave can punctuate something nicely. 
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Jul 14, 2020 00:47
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ToxicAcne posted:On the other hand alot of the Western South Asian/ East Asian media doesn't do well at home. I think it was Crazy Rich Asians that flopped in China. Crazy Rich Asians was an American film with an East Asian cast about Singaporean Chinese so it's sorta irrelevant in terms of "Asian" films not doing well at home. And East Asian media does perfectly well at home. It's just American blockbusters and big name media whose brands are known and advertised internationally also does well.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:54
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Don't forget the association with the Union during the civil war! I think another reason why Nationalism is seen as distasteful in Canada and the States is because of its misuse during the War on Terror. I know some people who don't really respect Remembrance Day because they feel like it glorifies Canada's involment in Afghanistan.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:54
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Grape posted:Why was Burma put in the Raj and not treated like a separate colony anyway? Sri Lanka was it's own thing for instance. Basically because Randall Churchill (father of Winston) was Secretary for India, and the guy really pushing for annexation despite lack of Parliamentary approval. It was pretty widely acknowledged that annexation of Burma was a mistake, as was placing it under Indian rule, but nobody cared enough to fix it.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:54
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Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
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ToxicAcne posted:Don't forget the association with the Union during the civil war! That's a good point. I see American goons talking about how the South were rebellious traitors, how they like John Brown, etc. I'm sure they're mostly doing it to push their opponents' buttons, sometimes it's even thinly disguised classism or regional chauvinism, but in general I like it a lot. It would be cool to see more of that, even if the North itself obviously had and has serious problems. How can the Confederates be True Americans when they seceded from this great country, and they were enslaving human beings, when true Americans obviously love liberty? Things like that. It's a mistake to just leave the whole arena of pride/heritage/patrotism/history to the (far) right, since these sentiments are hard-wired into the human brain and yet there are so many different ways to interpret and steer them, including some that could serve to lessen the countless historical inequalities that exist.
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Jul 14, 2020 01:11
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Phlegmish posted:That's a good point. I see American goons talking about how the South were rebellious traitors, how they like John Brown, etc. I'm sure they're mostly doing it to push their opponents' buttons, sometimes it's even thinly disguised classism or regional chauvinism, but in general I like it a lot. It would be cool to see more of that, even if the North itself obviously had and has serious problems. How can the Confederates be True Americans when they seceded from this great country, and they were enslaving human beings, when true Americans obviously love liberty? Things like that.  CPUSA stuff from the mid 1930s. Badger of Basra fucked around with this message at 01:15 on Jul 14, 2020 |
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Jul 14, 2020 01:13
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Well, sure, why not? I don't think that's a bad strategy. I myself am not a communist at all, but anyone would have to acknowledge that communist parties in countries like France and Italy had broad popular appeal and were rightly seen as legitimate political contenders right up until the end of the Cold War, and one of the ways they accomplished that was by setting their own course and distancing themselves from Moscow when necessary.
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Jul 14, 2020 01:18
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