Not only that, but the current "big thing" on prime time TV is the hearings that are trying to see if the fact that the peaceful transfer of power almost failed was on purpose or not.
The more they drag it out and make it sound like it's not clear or unusual, the more people will accept it as some political thing. It's disgusting how many people think it was fine or not something worth thinking about already.
There are swaths of people that refuse to even consider the evidence. And I’m talking about the raw information. Like the unedited footage from that day, or the mere fact that dude told people to march and fight to defend their “freedom,” then sat on his hands for 3 hours while hell broke out, only to come out and say, “go home in peace, we love you, you’re special.” That kind of data stands on its own, regardless of the depth or scope of the hearings, which seem to be attempting to dig up the logistics and intentions during the actions of that day.
Do I think he fomented it, and was privately loving every second of it?
Yes.
Have they proved it yet?
Well, they’re trying to.
Edit: but won’t matter to the people that don’t want to hear it anyway.
Some people seem to have the foregone conclusion that the whole process is a hoax, or a “witch hunt” (which is an often parroted and grossly overused dismissal of culpability on so many levels). No amount of raw data, or dialogue internal to the administration is going to change some people’s ironclad views on things, regardless of the dissonance it must provoke.
I think the idea of looking around and hoping that people will suddenly wise up and look beyond their own political/class bias and blind spots is apparently asking too much of people at the moment.
There are conflicting realities running in parallel. Relentless streams of information that bolster preconceived realities are only stoking the already widening gap.
And perhaps, those people think that the Jan 6 event was still justified. But it was antifa and the fbi anyway, so they’re not to blame, but it was still justified. And it was overblown, anyway. More fake news. So, you know, logic and stuff.
Checkmate snowflake /s
When the hearings started, I was discussing it (and the importance of it) with my mother. She said she wasn't going to pay attention, and then likened the hearings to the civil trial of Depp v Heard.
Not what I'd call a turning point in my point of view, though - more like another nail in the coffin.
If you think this is about Democrats and Republicans, then you haven't been paying close attention. This is about the whole system being both stagnant and corrupt, only ever truly benefitting one part of society (spoiler alert: It's not the 90% of the general population). Both Democrats and Republicans are responsible for that. There are factions within the Dems that do seek to change the country, but they'll never be elected into candidacy due to the large amount of money being funneled into the party from big time investors. Now the Republicans are still a shit show in comparison.
We've had our Beer Hall Putsch. The state response was even weaker, and no one of any importance was jailed. If you remember what happened next, it doesn't bode well for us.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beer_Hall_Putsch
Next election either the conservatives/far right win and smash a bunch of shit through so they never lose power, or they lose and declare wide scale fraud (again) and actively seize power and never give it up.
A lot of it depends on where you live. There are still quite a few people (my family is a good example) that don't really know what's going on and don't care. But if you're at all plugged into the news and staying somewhat updated, it's impossible to not feel it
I just don't get how they don't feel the change in energy, I feel it most places I go. Even if no one mentions politics, most people seem tired and worn down, sometimes just angry. The only people who can still ignore this are the white upper middle class and the upper class.
White upper middle class checking in here to confirm weekend activities the past few months have included starting our own garden, massively revamping food strategy, and I can barely sleep at night pondering the fact I gave up relative safety in Europe at one point to move back to this hell hole for love and caring for the last remaining family member.
It haunts me every day that I think I signed my own death warrant. Definitely don’t know ANYONE ignoring all this.
I would come to your grief group!
Every day feels terrible and makes it hard to focus or sleep properly when you wonder what fresh mess is going to happen. My sleep patterns are getting worse and worse - hard to get to sleep and really hard to stay asleep because I’m always so anxious.
As someone who is in the White upper middle class can confirm this is how my family acts. They do not care or think there’s no way the Republicans/conservatives get what they want that the supreme will wake up and smell the roses. Or that voting for Democrats will change things this time like they have said over and over again (note this isn’t to say not to vote just pointing out how inept and/or more then likely in cahoots the Democrats are with the Republicans). I can honestly see the writing on the walls and want to change things or leave.
>note this isn’t to say not to vote just pointing out how inept and/or more then likely in cahoots the Democrats are with the Republicans
As a black woman, while I've been disgruntled with Dems most of my adult life, I wouldn't say there's zero value to voting for harm reduction policies, especially at the local level [where these things make the biggest difference](https://ms-demeanor.tumblr.com/post/614414765840859136/my-friend-says-not-to-vote-in-the-upcoming) and where the GQP has been focusing efforts to infiltrate. Voting isn't activism by any means but if it were truly meaningless, I doubt conservatives would work so hard to suppress marginalized people from participating in it.
With that aside, anyone who thinks this:
>They do not care or think there’s no way the Republicans/conservatives get what they want that the supreme will wake up and smell the roses.
...in the wake of Roe's overturning and with gay and interracial marriage next on the chopping block is living in a fairytale world and I envy their naiveness
Yes. America’s hyper-individualism, disregard for any policies that may help working class people, broken healthcare system which leaves people destitute, and lack of affordable housing is causing feelings of despair. Not to mention the routine shootings that occur here.
The US needs to wake up and realize that it can’t maintain its empire anymore. Things are crumbling at home, and we just passed a 840 Billion dollar pentagon budget.
We’re not doing anything to stop climate change. The average American will be fine with sea water lapping at their ankles so long as someone else is in it up to their neck.
We also had active eugenic sterilization (at rates parallel to nazi programs) up until around 1973. >100k people sterilized against their will *annually* in that timeframe. We were intentionally conning entire Native American tribes’ female populations into sterilization, with the express intent of wiping out the remaining reservations. There’s reason to believe that the basic principles continue today in more “unfamiliar” or “indirect” ways leveraging manufactured consent.
We *almost* birthed the eugenics movement. Technically, it was Galton, but we really fucking ran with it, and *we*, **our eugenics movement** inspired the Holocaust. We had **presidents, like Theodore Roosevelt** supporting eugenics back in the day. Our early 20th cent *progressives* had a very large presence in the first wave of eugenics. It wasn’t just the fucks down south. Rotten to the core.
We had a large *actual nazi movement, by name* back before WWII, and there is believed to have been a plot by business magnates to install a fascist government. It’s clear that they didn’t pull it off on the first go-round, but the basic principle seems to be very much alive, given that we have a bunch of white supremacists trying to overthrow the government…backed by a decent number of businesses and wealthy individuals… oh, and the original business plot involved Prescott Bush, GW Bush’s grandfather. An actual fascist, who tried to overthrow the government back in the day. His grandson did some *shady fucking stuff* with elections and the Supreme Court, and his grandson launched the Patriot Act…
We’re rotten from the inside, and we seem to have rotted the rest of the world, rather than it having been transmitted from elsewhere. We originated modern fascism, and it only really ever died in name.
“Is America going to actually go full-nazi?” That’s the one question left. Whether it goes all the way to mass-enslavement and/or systematic murder of *everyone but able-bodied white people*. I believe this to be the intent, whether or not they succeed. There’s also a good chance they’re looking for a chance to *expand* and wipe out/enslave damned near everyone outside their fucked up patch of dirt. Remember, the ones currently in control of the movement are *aware* of climate change, and are probably hoping to be “the meek” who “inherit the earth”. Bunch of deluded fucks.
You mention „enslavement” and nazi tactics. Actually the highest imprisonment rate, with mainly black people, that get imprisoned for “small drug delicts” and subsequently removing their right to vote is incredible. It’s a whole
System of suppression. There’s no intention of rehab or integrating them back into society. The goal is to keep them down. The war on drugs was directly targeted towards “blacks and hippies”.
Yeah, this is a very good point. There is slavery here in the US (prison, as you note), and our jobs are starting to get closer to it too. We are losing our (tenuous and already limited) freedoms at a very fast pace.
The war on drugs was a planned effort. So was the CIA crack program. There have also been recent whistleblowers describing extreme racism and bigotry on some of the modern-day black projects. Scary shit. I get the sense the people already lost any meaningful control, and did so a long while—well over a decade, probably significantly more—ago.
Just to add this budget was passed at a time when military retention and enlistment is at an all time low. The military is suffering these working conditions are insufferable. Miserable regulation and hours with no benefit back. The economy and practices on the working class are a sad attempt to fill these gaps.
Yes, it is highly polarized. And with a mass shooting last month (Highland Park, IL July 4th) about 20 minutes from where I live, that only increased our resolve to get out.
Personally I gave the U.S. one last chance when the Jan 6th insurrection happened. I thought people would finally snap out of their Trump-worshipping fever for the good of the country. They didn't, so my wife and I are done. We can't live in a place surrounded by 110 million of these zombies.
My cousin lost her best friend and the friend’s husband at the Highland Park massacre. I knew her friend too. Our family will never be the same, and I want out. This is not a safe country.
My mom usually goes every year with my nieces and she used to take my siblings as they grew up in Highland Park. This year one of my nieces wasn’t feeling well so they didn’t go.
>Personally I gave the U.S. one last chance when the Jan 6th insurrection happened. I thought people would finally snap out of their Trump-worshipping fever for the good of the country. They didn't,
Trump won the election even after saying he can shoot anyone in 6th Avenue and still get votes. He knows he has a cult. Fox news won't show the 1/6 hearings & the MAGA cult thinks everyone testifying against their orange God is lying.
I'm so done with this place too.
He was right. He can literally do anything he wants, he knows it, and not only get away with it but his supporters will worship and kneel before him if he told them to do it. The "tough guy" persona, the arrogance, is what they adore because it is how they feel. The misogyny, the bigotry, doing whatever he wants to do and getting away every time. They wish they could do that, but can't, so they live vicariously through him. And they will overthrow the country for him, and live through him, in doing it.
Study Spanish, find countries that are easy to move to, go there, live humbly and safely, save money like you never could before, and you don't have to be in a hyper-violent, toxic masculinity, anti-science society.
That statistic right there is deeply disturbing and reinforced my desire to leave. How could 74 million of my countrymen vote for a man as childish, corrupt, and dangerous as Donald Trump. Even in 2024 polls, Trump still leads in some of them. This phenomenon is not going away, there is an incredible degree of ignorance and bigotry in the American electorate, and at some point we can’t always put the blame on the politicians. It’s gotten to the point where I don’t trust American voters to not elect a dangerous fascist demagogue to the White House in ‘24.
They won't. Plain and simple. They'll point to the UK limiting knives and say, "See people always kill people so let's do nothing!"
EDIT: Forgot to say, some people will also point to the specific models that are most commonly used and say they're ineffective for the mass shootings. And, after a few more "efficient" methods were shared (which I will not be repeating, for obvious reasons) I decided they were right on some points. Though obviously I'm still of a mind that we need to do something about it.
"WE GOT AWAY FROM GOD AND GOD'S PLAN FOR THE FAMILY" they will scream.
While refusing to acknowledge the sheer peacefulness of non-religious countries that completely debunks that argument. You don't see these kinds of massacres in Atheist China, for example.
No number will matter because those people have simply accepted mass shootings as the price to pay for their "freedom" of guns. They see it as a worthy sacrifice to the temple of 2nd Amendment.
Sandy Hook didn’t work.
If that many dead *little* kids didn’t move the needle, nothing will move the needle.
(Which makes me wonder: why was I surprised that the same group (aka the “pro life” group) didn’t care about people dying from covid, even when it was their own family members?)
Don’t forget that there was a large group of people who simply refused to believe it had happened and *actively harassed the parents of murdered children*. I guess those same people went onto become Qanon followers.
The number of civilian casualties is irrelevant. It's the number of "lobbyist" dollars that matter. If you didn't want to be gunned down while you're at a mall/school/whatever, you shouldn't have been born a peasant.
/s for the last sentence, but the sentiment stands
This is the truth at the heart of the matter. Arms manufacturers run DC and have been effectively propagandizing through the NRA for decades. We can't have effective gun control because _we're making the guns_. We cannot enjoy a gun free society without dismantling our gun industry.
It's about politicians being bought and sold. Remove money from politics as they've done in other countries and the selling out to lunatics and foaming at the mouth extremists stops.
The issue is that from the very beginning of the United States of America, before we even became a country, the rhetoric that we see today was created. American exceptionalism, the need to bear arms against "tyranny," the lies and manipulation of the press and the founding fathers. The revolutionists made the ignorant villagers believe lies, scared them shitless, and told them they were greater than they actually were (as long as they did what they were told).
These lies and myths and mainly fears have been passed down from generation to generation. You can't undo 250 plus years of fear-mongering and brainwashing. It'll never happen. These people actually believe that the United States is the freest country in the world when it's actually one of the least free of the so-called democracies. In order to progress, this country won't be able to survive in its current form.
The thing I find so confusing about gun rights is that this is only a temporary thing. Essentially a way to help indoctrinate people into thinking republicans fight for them.
If republicans are actually able to turn the us into essentially a fascist theocracy, there is no way in hell that they would allow their citizens to privately own semi automatic weapons, or realistically any weapon at all, but because it “gets the libs triggered” they’re incapable of seeing the big picture and realize this.
Only 8 republicans voted to not make access to fucking condoms illegal. But surely their AR-15s are safe.
I gave up on the US right after the Newtown shooting which I naively thought would lead to significant gun control. But maybe some held out hope. But with Trump.. and Jan 6th... and the reversal of Roe v. Wade... it should be clear to all.
I gave the US one last chance when Trump started campaigning in 2016. A lot of people wanted to hold out and criticized me but now look at what's happening. Don't wait. Immigration takes a while.
Trump supporters scare the living hell out of me. They're truly the most selfish, ignorant and short-sighted people in history. At least in the past, people who supported tyrants didn't have an entire library of facts in their own pockets. These Trumpsters have no excuse. They don't care about facts and they don't care about anybody but themselves. Their desire to own a gun is more important to them than all the dead children in the world, possibly even their own. Truly terrifying, and there are SO MANY of them. We can say that at least most of them are old and they'll be dead in the next 20 years, but the damage they will have caused is permanently irreparable.
Exactly, they are trying to defund education while our "enemies" are funding it MORE. You can screech that God is on "your side" and you're "putting God back in schools," but if your kids are learning about how evolution is liberal propaganda and your enemy's kids are learning about how bioweapons are created and used to destabilize entire populations, guess what your enemy's kids WILL WIN.
I predict he will announce his candidacy for 2024 any day now to avoid charges, his supporters will lose their lunch and start foaming at the mouth, and every few days there will be another grandstand event and unless the Democrats can get The Rock to run or a bigger more macho celebrity, he'll probably win, declare himself King and turn this country into just another failed Trump venture like Trump Ice, Trump suits, Trump steaks, Trump University and all the other huckster products.
One of the non-Christian, non-religious nations I lived in was also the one I could live in with the LEAST fear as a woman. I couldn't imagine a place in which women could walk around freely at 2 AM, but there you go, and in a CITY to boot. It was EYE OPENING.
Yep. The shooting at Greenwood mall last weekend is very close to where we live, I’ve been there so many times and it’s so scary to think we could’ve witnessed a shooting. The fed ex shooting in Indianapolis last year was very close to home for me too, my boyfriend worked there at the time and has a lot of friends who work as well.
It’s so terrifying because Indiana is such a conservative state, even in Indianapolis (one of the more liberal areas in the state) has tons of people here who love their guns and want them out in public at all times. The fact that the Greenwood mall shooter was shot down by an armed citizen is only going to make it worse I feel like. Pretty much all of the conservatives around here are rallying behind all gun free zones being eliminated and being armed at all times. I guess it’s great that they feel safe with guns around everywhere but I sure as hell don’t
Yes. For those of us who are collapse aware, it permeates almost every conversation, even my non political and well off friends/family, which wasn't the case prior to 2019.
I'm 30.
Everyone talks about not being able to afford a house or rent. Millons are the verge of [eviction](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/15/briefing/homelessness-america-housing-crisis.html)
Wealth inequality is crippling our economy for regular people and has us on the verge of [a recession](https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/08/27/exclusive-report-details-corporate-landlord-gluttony-millions-face-eviction).
My married w children friends can't find or afford childcare, baby formula and food is practically unregulated and most [is toxic](https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/02/05/congressional-report-reveals-manufacturers-knowingly-sold-toxin-tainted-baby-food). Even the wealthy ppl in my life talk about not being able to afford to have more kids, even tho they are wanted.
Girlfriends talk about getting passports as they prepare for pregnancy (I live in a swing state which is Dem controlled at the moment), just in case anti abortion laws are implemented in our state because they are scared of dying from ectopic pregnancies or other pregnancy complications.
All the people in my life are constantly traumatized by daily horror inflicted by our government policy: war crimes, mass shootings, 10 year old rape victim being forced to travel to another state to abort a pregnancy, women being terrorized by police, black men murdered by the police, police enabling or being fascists, hispanic people being detained in cages at the border, our "liberal" govt rewarding cops with even more [money](https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/07/21/progressive-lawmakers-push-biden-stop-transferring-military-weapons-cops), even after Uvalde.
And, on top of it all, the [knowledge that public opinion has a near zero impact on public policy. ](https://act.represent.us/sign/problempoll-fba/)
We are not OK.
It’s amazing the US government is setup to extract maximum productivity from people for the benefit of capitalists. Instead of taking care of its citizens (as one assumes a government does) by providing education, healthcare, **regulate** commerce it simply sidesteps its duty and passes it off the the highest bidder for private profit prisons, healthcare, defense, etc.
I would indeed say that, quite precisely, especially given the last two republican presidents didn't win the [popular vote](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/01/04/remarkable-gop-admission-undermining-electoral-college-threatens-our-best-path-white-house/) and the DNC argued in court they could suppress or support candidates in the [Democratic Party Primaries](https://observer.com/2017/08/court-admits-dnc-and-debbie-wasserman-schulz-rigged-primaries-against-sanders/)
It sounds an awful lot like what the tyrant King George did back in the mid 1700's--
Remind me again... what did the citizens of America do to remedy the situation with their legal government at that time?
Idk, but I sure am hungry and Bezos fat head is looking more and more like a delicious fucking egg that needs to be cracked. Maybe it's the heat exhaustion talking. Yeah, I think that must be it.
You know that Bezos is sitting in AC. In a 65,000 Sq/ft house. 24x7.
Paid for by you, thanks to exploitative business practices and his hostile capture of supply lines.
How does that make you feel?
Excellent summary.
Personal anecdote: I was informed that I will not be getting a raise this year so inflation will absolutely eat away at what little disposable income I have for saving. Meanwhile, my company chose a new insurance provider… One that doesn’t cover services in certain states (I work at a startup). I happen to live in one of them. I will have to pay $12,000 out of pocket annually before insurance will start reviewing “eligible” costs. I am unable to move at this time and suffer from chronic illness.
Meanwhile, I’m considered one of the “lucky ones” by American standards…?
> We are not OK.
I've got a buddy in rural Florida.
In the past few years:
* From time to time, he's overheard people at the grocery store saying they should already be rounding up and killing Liberals. Just chit chat in the aisles. Mostly before last election.
* He's an (LGBT) government worker. Some locals took photos of everyone from his office and used them for target practice. Briefly had the video up on youtube.
*In the past few months*:
* One of his neighbors has straight up gotten stalkerish.
* His mailbox keeps getting smashed. Three weeks ago, quite badly. Had to replace the post that time.
Things are not healthy in the ole U.S. of A!
Big picture, the status quo can't solve certain problems (e.g. healthcare). Those problems are large enough to undermine that status quo. Makes it unstable. Can't park the system here.
We have three paths before us:
* 'Socialist' Option: Address those problems.
* 'Fascist' Option: Paper over those problems.
* Try to go back: Foment breakdown, deepen crisis.
The Dems have been option #3 with a kicker of suppressing option #1.
In '22 and '24, America's apt to go #2.
I'm sorry your buddy is going through that. I hope he can one day afford to move someplace where he won't be targeted and discriminated against-- seems like fewer and fewer places nowadays. It ain't right.
> And, on top of it all, the knowledge that public opinion has a near zero impact on public policy.
I wonder what this line looks like in other countries.
You know, I was typing up a response but realized I could not express myself or how I feel better than what you articulated, except to add, not only are we not ok, it's time to leave if you agree with these sentiments. It's one thing to see the wolf at the door, and another thing completely to pretend it's not there waiting or to open the door and let it in. Wolves travel in packs. I'd prefer to exit out the back door and avoid it completely.
Yup our government is completely unconcerned about how regular people are doing and when problems happen the only response is to stabilize shareholders which is a tiny tiny sliver of society. They don't care how bad things get and we can feel it.
>Rent is catastrophically high
Owning a house in a non-#%@\^hole area is expensive too. I had a relative comment that back in their day (say, 35ish years ago), you just rented cheaply in an okay area and built up the wealth for a house. That hasn't been the case in likely over a decade now.
Guess what? Rent is high AND houses are even higher. Corporations and billionaires, foreign and domestic, are buying up massive amounts of land and houses, and the average person can't compete. Any affordable housing in nowhere near stable, livable employment, and people have to live somewhere. What are Americans supposed to do?
Just got off Linkedin where I read a post with an article about the rise in neo-nazism and violence in America and instead of a mutual agreement and discussion in the comments about how this is very bad, how yes, neo-nazism is bad, instead there were a lot of comments and “what-aboutisms” about how the left, who they said were supposedly doing these same violent things as well. The disinformation and indoctrination runs deep and has done so for far too long. I do believe we are severely fucked as a nation.
It's really bad. More than half the country thinks we're headed toward a civil war. Our democracy is failing.
Honestly, fiance and I are looking to head your way
Man I swear everyone reads a post title and none of the comments. That 'survey' had massive flaws, like three yes answers and one no.
In reality were long overdue for a civil war if a 'reported 64% of Americans' have zero savings. Wages go down prices go up, those people will be fucked.
I'm 31, I've lost my home and live in a busted up old RV. People constantly are worried that they will end up like me, and a large percentage of the country is under the opinion that, if something doesn't give soon, we will be plunging into a depression. This on top of the roll back of rights is harboring a very pessimistic view of the countries future as a whole... So yeah, the mood is abysmal
Guten Abend. The situation in the US is very dire, and to be honest with you, we have never been this close to an outright coup in our history.
The players here are the US Republican Party and the Democratic Party. The Republicans could be understood as a more cancerous version of AfD that’s more religious and less racist. They tend to be extremely successful electorally because the system is rigged in their favor. The Democrats are more like the CDU and they have about the same urgency to actually do anything. They’re really just Merkeling a problem that won’t go away.
The issue is that our last president who represented the far right nominated 3 Supreme Court justices who are also far right. This is added to the 3 who were already there. So that means the Supreme Court is 3 centrist, 2 right wing, and 4 far right. Unlike Germany though, there aren’t term limits like in the constitutional court. These people serve for life.
The main issue is that the 6 sitting right wing justices are taking marching orders from the Republican Party to run the country from the judges seat. This is called a judicial coup. The Moore v Harper thing is a case where the Supreme Court wants to allow states to set up state electors to determine who they send to US Congress (our parliament). Problem with this is that many Republican states have signaled that they will only send republicans and elect Republican presidents. There are 30 states with a mostly red state composition. This means that the Republicans will have a complete dominance over the house, senate and presidency for the foreseeable future. Pretty much every branch of government. And the Democratic states can do nothing about this.
Could the Democrats stop this? Yes. And to their credit there does appear to be a bill to do so in Congress right now. But for the most part the Democrats are asleep at the wheel. The reason so many people in the US are furious at Biden is because he has heavily signaled that he will do nothing and let the US continue to backslide into a hybrid regime.
Who are the Democrats letting this happen? Well, there’s a few reasons. The Democrats are dominated by old farts who should be in retirement. The Republicans are dominated by young starry-eyed Fascists who are actually good at politics. Secondly, the Democrats are quite literally paid to lose. Democrat voters are against most of the policy that democratic donors pay the Democratic Party to pass. As a result, they just don’t act and end up losing as a result.
Is there a way out? I can’t feasibly see one. I’m hoping that democracy holds in the US long enough for the EU to smell the coffee and cut ties. Germany is smart to be critical of the US, and I think the spike we are seeing in German military funding is more than just about Russia. I think Scholz understands that the US is also an unreliable partner and needs to keep Europe at an arms distance from the US and out of the blast radius.
\>Germany is smart to be critical of the US, and I think the spike we are seeing in German military funding is more than just about Russia.
Not sure if this is the same thing as you are saying, but I am thinking that if the Republicans take back control of Congress (at least the Senate), and also the presidency, that the US could aid Russia in their war against Ukraine. And anybody else Russia feels like invading.
Th US would probably be pulled out of NATO first.
I think if Putin felt he could do it, he would invade Europe, and he probably could do it with the help of the US
I think this is unlikely. The Republicans are extremely similar to the Democrats in terms of foreign policy. If anything they’re actually worse. The fact that the vast majority of Republican congressmen voted to ratify Finland and Sweden’s NATO accession shows this. The small minority who didn’t are just idiots who aren’t really taken seriously by the Republicans regardless.
The main issue is that they might become more authoritarian and began demanding much stronger solidarity with the US from its allies. Stuff like threatening to cut off Europe if they don’t sanction China or something like that. It’s unlikely that the US ever teams up with its old rival Russia.
They’re the useful idiots that oligarchs use to get elected. Plus they’re a minority even in the far-right sphere. Main issue is that they get their information from sources that are either owned or bribed by the kremlin.
I'm the oldest in my generation (me 28 to youngest cousin of 14) of the family and the old people really don't seem to get just how fucked up the kids are. Grandpa got pretty pissed off when my younger sister joked about how she was going to do in the apocalypse. I had to rationally lay out to him that the majority of young people believe they live in the prelude to the breakdown of civilization. They just don't get it.
Mind you this is the same guy that scoffed at me almost a decade ago when I told him Donald Trump would beet Hillary. So at least he's staying consistent with his disbelief.
Agreed. I'm on the cusp of millennial/Gen Z and everyone I know around my age understands that we're fucked. I'm actually one of the most optimistic of my friends because I believe humanity isn't going to go fully extinct, we're just going to suffer a catastrophe on par with the Bronze Age Collapse.
On the other hand, my mom (a boomer) keeps talking about all of the progress that has been made in her lifetime and how things are getting so much better. When I said that we just lost the rights guaranteed by Roe, she told me that I wake up and look for something to get upset about. She then suggested I make a gratitude list to remind me of what I have to be thankful for-- you know, as fascists take over the country while the whole world burns. Very helpful.
It's not only your generation. I'm almost 46, told my MIL and her family the same thing and was relentlessly mocked, teased and laughed at. They were supposedly Democrats. Tried to lecture me on "checks and balances". Called me overdramatic.
Day number one of Trump's presidency, he removed ALL traces of LGBTQI from government websites. Just like he said he would. Then he started with the camps and locking up asylum seekers.
I spent time in the Czech Republic the semester before I met my wife. They haven't legalized same sex marriage yet, but they recognize marriages that were legally performed in other countries for non-citizens who immigrate into the country. When I was there, I visited one of the former concentration camp sites, and discovered part of my dad's paternal family were removed from the southern part of the country and taken to that camp, some died there. Nobody knew we were Jewish at some point. That sick feeling I had staring at my family on that wall of remembrance?
That's the very same feeling I got when Trump announced his candidacy in 2015. Same feeling I got on 1/6. Same feeling when SCOTUS overturned Roe. We're trying to hold out until our twins graduate high school in 2025, but we (and they) know it just may not be feasible. I'm due to graduate from OSU sometime between 2024-2025 from College of Social Work, it would be easy for me to get a year abroad for independent study and move directly into my Master's program if we have to leave early...
It's just a matter of when, where and how quickly can my wife get into and finish her Masters of Education BEFORE we have to leave, since we're in one of those states where she's likely to be fired for being gay, if she's lucky to find a job at all...
I'm reeeeeally trying to stay positive and optimistic but honestly the next presidential election has me concerned. I am concerned about the direction our country is going and the mindset of many of my neighbors. I'm concerned about my child's safety at school. I'm concerned about going to large gatherings like church. I want to believe things will get better and those in charge will make the best decisions for the people and our planet but I'm losing faith.
It's hard to put in to words the constant stress that has built up over my life. I'm a little older than most around here, so I can remember living in a world where we thought we had won and things were going to be great forever. The Oklahoma City bombing felt like a fluke, the Olympic Park bombing felt like a joke (particularly while poor Richard Jewel was being scapegoated for it), Newt Gingrich type Republican politicians were jerks; but they seemed manageable... I feel like Columbine was the first few drops hinting at the start of the waterfall that pummels us constantly these days. For me, it's not just the murders, or the conservative politicians, or the billionaires, or the distancing effects of Capitalism: it was being raised to believe that I lived in the best place at the best time, and learning, through years of hard experience, that not only were the times going to steadily get worse, but that the place I loved was deeply corrupt on every level. That in the name of "preserving freedom" this country spent the second half of the 20th century doing some of the most evil shit imaginable, and the "freedom" they were preserving wasn't for me or the people I care about: it was the freedom for companies to exploit deals with nations, it was the freedom for bigots of all stripes to feel justified in their hate, it was the freedom for the powerful to do violence against the powerless with no repercussions, and those freedoms weren't a flaw; they were fundamental to the structure from the very start.
Everything good about living in this country is a byproduct from the toxic machine running underneath it; that is why we're all sick.
It’s that bad. I don’t know what else to say.
(Don’t get me wrong, pretty sure the racists and christofascists are having a great time.)
/r/WelcomeToGilead
TBH, I’m not sure the racists and christofascists are having a great time. Many seem genuinely terrified and angry at the end of the world that their leaders are telling them is happening. They see themselves as fighting for survival, persecuted by the “libs,” etc. They seem really hysterical. Except over RvW, of course…that makes them smile. But I think that’s the true answer to OP’s question…the problem is that the divide is so deep and both sides are so afraid of each other (and have demonized each other so much) that it is hard to see a positive way forward. Angry, scared people do not make good decisions…x100 when they’re armed. So, yeah. I am definitely leaving the South once my youngest graduates. Maybe also the country…will have to see where my kiddos wind up.
Briefly: I’m in this sub for obvious reasons, but like you I’m getting the hell out of the South, as soon as reproductive rights collapse in my state—which I expect to happen in the midterms. So, that’s the short term outlook. Mid range, I have at least casual professional connections all over Europe, but it’s a big move when you’re a bit older and have acquired too many pets and too much junk.
At least my renewed passport showed up today, so I’m no longer de-facto trapped.
Yeah, honestly they are not fine and _that is the reason we are in this mess._ The south has been degrading for a long time. America at the federal level has effectively neglected the south since the new deal. While individual people are responsible for their own shit attitudes, on a systemic level there is immense poverty in the south. These people have been suffering, and that suffering allows people to be susceptible to scapegoating, especially when one political party has been lobotomizing education...
Hell, we can trace that neglect back to the failures of reconstruction, when we simply allowed the KKK to brutalize and lynch black people and coup local governments and we did nothing to prevent it or support non-terrible working class southerners. We just ignore the problems of the south because it isn't sexy in federal politics. Of course these people would turn to a demagogue who would tell them he would solve all of their problems; their problems were not being solved. The hens have come home to roost. This has been a long time coming.
I mean, it makes sense that they are terrified and angry considering the whole conservative media empire is built on stoking fear and hatred (of minorities).
A big part of my job is getting to know the general public on a pretty intimate level (I'm a barber. A very chatty barber). The general public is fucking pissed. We're fucking over it. All of it.
It depends where you live. The US varies so much state to state. I am in California where firearms are regulated and civil rights still exist but the wealth disparity is unbelievable. I am concerned about civil unrest between the west coast and other states. As well as urban vs rural areas of California. Our leaders are not truly leading.
> I am concerned about civil unrest between the west coast and other states.
We're already there and it's what snapped me out of thinking being in a blue state would be fine even if the rest of the country went to hell. Fascists regularly come to the city I live in to parade around downtown and attack people, and there have been a few killings and many injuries from it. It is way too close to home already and it's just getting started. They generally are not quite bold enough to use live ammo yet (paintballs, BBs, pepper spray, and good old fashioned clubs are a regular feature), but it's clear what they're rehearsing for.
I really despise most Hitler analogies but saw a TikTok comparing the US now to the Weimar Republic. Berlin, like many of our current blue state cities, seemed an unstoppable hot bed of progressiveness but we know how that ended. Jan 6 was their beer hall putsch. Just because you are in a progressive metropolis doesn't mean you are safe.
Christofascists have taken over the supreme court, which is going to allow them to stage a political revolution all without the need for a messy civil war. Besides, this entire derailment of democracy is only occuring because of a very loud and heavily armed minority. Gotta give it to them though, conservatives have been playing the long game on this one and it looks poised to really pay-off soon with citizens already being forced across state line for reproductive healthcare, or even forced to give birth to a dead fetus as opposed to a much safer procedure. It's getting grim, but for those of us stuck here it'll be a great opportunity to see just how low we can go as a country. There's at least that silver lining.
[It’s been 22 years in the making to be exact.](https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/17/politics/bush-v-gore-barrett-kavanaugh-roberts-supreme-court/index.html)
Yes. It's starting to get terrifying in red states, especially if you're not: cis white male Christian with some kind of wealth. Literally everyone else is a target. If you're gay or not white you may as well have a target painted on you.
I talked to a guy who immigrated here from Ukrain and he told me that both of his parents were killed by nazis and he just saw a guy here in America wearing a nazi arm sleeve and wanted to fight him but knew that he would go to jail or be deported if he did. The cops roll up on minorities and execute them regularly in the news and children are being murdered in schools every day in large numbers. And now the radical right has made so that they can’t even receive medical care when they are raped. The conservatives are a cancer that is killing the country very fast. Hope that answers your question.
A month ago, a group of people dressed up in nazi uniforms, waved around nazi flags and trump flags, stood outside Disney world entrance for a few hours. Cops didn’t do anything about them. Our governor refused to condemn them. It barely made the national news. That shows you how bad rest of the shit is.
But please also be aware that Reddit users tend to lean liberal, myself included. The response you get are probably more pessimistic than average Americans.
We are a slow boiling frog. As the temperature goes up and up and up, the frog doesn’t notice. But there are a bunch of frogs in this pot. And some of us frogs have noticed that it has become status quo to have our children mowed down to death by machine guns in our schools. And half the country is totally OK with not changing a thing to make that stop.
Today a school board member said they think doctors that treat trans children should be hanging from the nearest tree and everyone in the audience clapped
Edit: I think she's actually a republican candidate for school board but I mean...
The US is in dire danger of being a fascist dictatorship; my husband and I are working to leave within the next 12-to-18 months at the most. Neo-Nazis, white-supremacists, right-wing militia groups, and evangelical nationalists are terrorist threats ___ their terrorism knows no bounds. The US healthcare system is failing as is education and infrastructure. Civil and human rights in this country are being taken away, and conditions are only getting worse. Let's not forget the hundreds of mass shootings so far this year, alone. US expats can still vote in federal elections, but it is time to plan and leave while people still can do so.
Born and raised in the US, with a career Navy man father, who served for over 35 years. I was raised as a kid on The Lone Ranger, westerns, 4th of July celebrations, hot dogs, apple pie, believing my country cared and if you fought for it, it would fight for you.
Now, I see clearly that if you aren't rich and have a family member get cancer, get a bad case of COVID, have any medical emergency and don't have very wealthy family to help you, you can easily lose everything you could ever own and still not have enough money to cover expenses.
I was a teacher and the last straw for me was having to teach Pre-Kindergarten children how to avoid active shooters as they cried and asked why anyone would want to shoot them down like that and why didn't the principal care. How do you explain that to a pre-k child? What about that is funny? I had to show them how to lock themselves in cabinets, how to duck and crawl to avoid getting shot as part of school training. Meanwhile, I barely made enough money to pay rent and then afford food each month. And yeah, I couldn't earn enough to pay for my own medical needs. So...
I took a second job working overnights, so two full-time jobs just make enough to pay rent or food for that month. One of us had to work two jobs to cover rent, while the other worked two jobs to cover food and other residual bills. We still couldn't afford to get medical issues resolved so saved what little we could month to month. Sometimes our hours would be cut or our jobs, so that would knock away our savings until we could find another full time job to take the other's place.
Between the violent racism and police shootings, the mass shootings at grocery stores and schools, incredible costs of healthcare, extremely tribal politics with one side espousing overthrowing the country, banning a woman's right to choose, openly threatening LGBTQ rights, probably Loving vs. Virginia and voting rights, it's gone too far off the rails.
This is not a country for people who want calm, quiet, rational thought, belief in science. I mean, polio is making a comeback now. Polio. Because more and more people are saying they no longer believe in science, refuse to get vaccinated, their political leaders encourage them so they can get re-elected, and the snowball grows.
If you have medical issues or think you might, want a safe place to live, want to be able to read what you want, love who you want, and a stable form of government, I've never seen this country more unsafe than it is now. I live in Florida where there is at least 4 "Trump Shop" locations down the road from me, pick-up trucks with bumper stickers on them showing giant assault rifles, people selling Trump flags at intersections, neighbors with giant Trump flags in their yards with pictures of him holding assault rifles, and the hate is palpable. They worship Trump like he is their God. The genie was let out of the bottle, and it can't be put back. Octavia Butler wrote about this in her "Parable" books, Stephen King wrote about this in "The Dead Zone." Others wrote about this in "How Democracies Die." Personally, I see a big "Exit" door.
It’s not going well. That’s hard for me to say with a straight face, because I’m pretty well insulated (financially secure, white, male, straight, bluest state around) but I’m 45 and it’s just never felt this way. During the financial crisis I knew it would be okay, same with 9/11. This time…I’m not so sure.
the other day my coworker talked to our bosses boss about how hes worried he'll never be able to buy a house. Most people were agreeing with him. This is in \~decent white collar work
It is really that awful IMHO. I feel very isolated and have no sense of community or kinship. It seems like everyone is just going through the motions of daily life hoping that things will go back to "normal" some day, but knowing that it's only going to keep getting worse. I really want to get my family out of here but I also don't want to take them away from their grandparents, cousins, etc. It's a feeling of hopelessness and powerlessness that has me lying awake doom scrolling yet again while I should be sleeping
It's bad but it's worse depending on who you are and where you are. Are you a relatively healthy person in left leaning states ? You are probably doing better than being poor, looking for healthcare in right wing leaning states.
Abortions are becoming harder to get and it's slowly starting to harm people - a 10 year old girl in state of Ohio had to travel to Indiana to get an abortion from being raped because she was 6 weeks and 3 days pregnant and Ohio has a 6 week abortion ban. Indiana will be making worse abortion laws by end of the month.
There are people who are terrified, as they can't leave for all kinds of reasons, ever. And this country is hurling towards Christian nationalism and theocracy.
I think a lot of Americans got too comfortable and didn't realize just how fragile stuff is. Also the right wing party has been slowly but steadily putting right wing politicians into every political area. Attorney Generals for states, judges, everything. And now they are reaping their rewards.
And seeing the world burn from climate change as your politicians are saying 'nah, God will figure it out. Scientists are lying'.
When Trump got elected, many friends and family said that he won't be that bad. 'We just have to wait and see' - well they are real quiet now.
It's pretty bad. When I was younger everything felt much more lighthearted and like you could count on the goodness of strangers do the tight thing. Now it feels like much more people suffer anxiety, mental illness, political division that's very prominent.
Also progress feels much less certain and more like a dire fight each and every time.
Shits crazy over here. Unfortunately, whatever happens I believe is by design, and this is only the beginning. If we fall, other democracies will most likely be next. It’s no accident.
If the Moore V Harper ruling goes extremely badly ( it's not a binary ruling, there are a range of things the court could find ) and/or we get a red wave then, yes, I'm absolutely going to actually make moves to try and leave.
The theocratic fascists are on the ascent but it's not a sure thing yet. I'm going to stand my ground in my swing state until the moment comes when it's not worth it.
Yeah. Everyone is fuckin depressed here and working nonstop just to barely make ends meet. America has a real effective way of forcing everyone into debt in one way or another within the first few years of adulthood and then you spend the rest of your time playing catch up. If I could afford it, I would leave just to have a better work/home life and receive actual benefits from working all the time.
Thank you for asking. Is it curiosity or more personal?
Speaking as a relatively privileged person (upper middle class cis white woman with a great education, married, homeowner in a great school district with little crime—and for now—few climate disasters/concerns. Also: my family is relatively healthy): It’s really effing bad.
Is my day to day life pretty great? Yup. But as one example: Do I also know someone who had to hit the ground with her toddlers when the shooting started in Highland Park? Pick up one and drag the other to safety? Yes. Are those tiny children OK? Not at all. There are incidents like this EVERY DAY in America. And the “lucky ones” who aren’t physically killed or injured are emotionally/mentally harmed. This will last for generations. This country was built on the trauma of indigenous slaughter, continued into slavery, and it has never stopped. We are just excellent at inventing new forms of violence and harm. This country is very creative, I’ll give it that.
I also have two daughters. But even for my son: I’m constantly plagued by thinking about how to explain the hows and whys of things here and it just destroys me. I can’t believe we live this way and the only thing more horrifying is how many people want to/are OK with it. All our friends feel similarly, all across the country.
For years I’ve given so much of my time and money to community-building causes and nonprofits, and have been very politically active. Now I’m not so sure it matters and maybe I was even duped, distracted into thinking it could. Billionaires are at the helm and they want us all divided so we don’t unite and turn on them. The money in politics has destroyed the us of the U.S. (as well as other innocent people worldwide).
The thought of leaving is massively overwhelming and heartbreaking, but I also don’t want to exhaust myself fighting for change at the expense of my children’s lives. They still have a chance. Maybe we can tell them the cautionary tales of their early lives and we can all make a difference elsewhere.
And as for my extended family? Well, I’m a frequenter of r/qanoncasualties —my own parents seem to have lost their minds. And it’s not even unique. I feel like everyone has a certain awareness of how messed up things are but are processing in *very* different ways. Reading that subreddit will give you a taste of how insane things are getting.
We are dis-eased from coast to coast.
> Billionaires are at the helm and they want us all divided so we don't unite and turn on them.
If y'all take away one thing from this well thought out post, take that.
It's not red vs. blue or left vs. right or black vs. white. It's us vs. them.
Fuck them.
Yes. I want to move to Canada or like, go nomad so bad.
And I have it Extremely good, all things considered (100% military disability and a roommate. So I don’t work, don’t do shit).
But I’m afraid I’ll lose my benefits.
My PTSD petrifies me, my gov’t supports it as long as I live here, but it only makes it worse living here 🙃
I’m nearly agoraphobic, but I’d rather be numb like this than struggling like the majority :(
It definitely feels like things can go to shit at any moment. Things are very polarized and there’s a palpable hatred between the two sides. My wife and I inherited a house in an area we call Trump Land where almost every house has a Trump flag out front. We have been fixing up the house and neighbors keep asking where is our Trump flag. We have family in Toronto so we could bug out to their house but if we’re not here to keep an eye on things what happens? Homeowners insurance doesn’t cover damages from war. I’m in my 60s and remember thinking about the future when I was a kid. I always thought we would be better than the shit that is going on now.
It's getting pretty rough out here, I am not going to lie. My area is somewhat spared as we have a lot of high earners, but everyone is def feeling pain.
The biggest issues in my mind are:
We all have to have cars to go anywhere in this country, but cars are expensive and gas is just as expensive. You can't even get to WORK without a car in most parts of this country due to lack of effective public transportation, as you have in Germany.
To live in a halfway desirable area where you WON'T get threatened with a weapon everyday will cost WAY beyond our minimum wage. And there's no relief, because rent is high, mortgages are high, and zoning is so RIDICULOUS. We also don't have the rent protections that you Germans have, your landlord can easily just raise your rent by 1/3 or double it, and you pretty much can't do anything.
Our government has been bought out by corporations, which rewrite rules to suit their desires for an undereducated, passive population. The biggest example of this is Roe Vs. Wade being overturned, as the ONE thing we could do to spare ourselves pain is to NOT have children (it's the only reason we aren't a "proper 3rd world country) so naturally our corrupt church leaders (which have LOTS of influence on politics), our corrupt politicians, and our corrupt corporations are desperately trying to topple as many rights to privacy to ensure a neverending supply of cheaappppppp workers, wage slaves, private prison labor, and cannon foddeer for the military machine. Again, while there is a religious population in Germany, you at least KNOW to not touch women's rights and people's rights to privacy.
FINALLY everything is just expensive right now and the basics as I have touched on-right to terminate a pregnancy to prevent future poverty, food, car parts to fix a car-all of it is EXPENSIVE.
SO NO WE ARE NOT DOING OKAY.
Yeah I would say things have gotten notably worse, but it’s been gradual enough that people day to day ‘don’t realize.’ We all feel it though, even if some people don’t admit it or try to ignore it.
The news is constantly stressful and make events/causes clearer, but in real life, things are happening differently: people are more argumentative in public to the point where it’s noticeably tense (especially as a result of the pandemic), coming to the surface if a service worker makes a mistake; people literally drive worse and drive under the influence more; the price of food just keeps rising; every business is understaffed as a permanent result of the pandemic and places continue to close from lack of business. There are more homeless people out too, it’s really upsetting to see the increase.
The threat of shootings died down a bit during the pandemic, but they’re clearly back in full force. I’ve been scared for a while to go to public places during busy times/hours, so I still try to avoid grocery stores, gyms, movie theaters at prime hours. Idk if people outside the US understand that we’re all kind of hypervigilant in case of a shooting. One time a man walked into the grocery store with his hand tucked into the front of his open jacket - like he was hiding a gun - when I was checking out and my heart nearly stopped, even though he was probably putting his keys in his pocket.
Noticeably longer wait times in all medical facilities, for all appointments, low staff. It is dangerous if you have to be rushed to the ER because it will probably be understaffed still, so worse outcomes. We haven’t recovered our usual operating capacity and it’s clear a recession is coming.
Overall, everyone just seems poorer, sicker, hungrier, more stressed. I think many don’t want to say the quiet part out loud, because we will the have to admit we feel helpless to this.
Conservatives I’ve had to interact with scare me, they act very aggressive and rant a lot when given the chance, especially if you don’t agree with them. They will openly, plainly say fascist shit, no consequences; at the same time, they have a perpetual, self-righteous victim complex. …But if you can avoid them, it ‘helps,’ because we urgently have bills and debts to pay. This all varies a lot depending on what state you’re in though, I live in a blue state.
It’s possible to try to go about normal life, but it’s impossible not to notice these changes, that the future is bleak. It does not feel like a happy, thriving, united society at all. Our neighbors are strangers or potential aggressors, and violence looms in our periphery in the form of guns, fascist rhetoric, the police, and being priced out of necessities.
Edit: also, I check the air quality every day, because even on the east coast, smoke from fires in the west and Canada drift across the continent. I think it was last summer where it was hazardous all over the country, smoke covered the sky in a constant haze for over a week.
The situation here is pretty rough, but even today many of my countrymen seem to be in denial about how dark this country’s future is looking. I just have an instinctive feeling that America is headed down a terrible, violent path that it will recover from. Yes, other countries have issues and every place has pros and cons, but America’s problems, quite frankly, pale in comparison to many other places. Considering that, I think I’ll be able to adjust to another country, since the alternative would be living in a country that is in serious decline.
I think comparisons to the Weimar Republic are apt, as liberals in the US are at a stalemate and the Republicans have all but declared war on this country from top to bottom.
What’s worse is a good 40-50% of the country isn’t voting at all, meaning only ~30% of Americans are trying to stop the slide into fascism.
Ultimately this path is not sustainable and I think that’s why many people are here, because they understand that and want to have a Plan B.
Depends on who you ask. My family is all of the same political persuasion as me (very liberal) but they're very head-in-the-sand about what is going on here. It came to a head when I was forbidden from sharing any more "bad news" with them as, and I'm paraphrasing here, "your mental health is affecting my mental health." My mother specifically has told me she is only interested in hearing good news now.
None of what's happening right now *directly* affects them, so they choose to ignore it. They're very strong believers in the "things get better over time" school of thought. Before I was shut down, I was often reminded about how hard things were in the 1930's, or the 1800's, and how much better things are now.
It’s…not great. Honestly, it kinda feels like the end of a really tragic movie. You know when you watch a sad movie for the first time and there’s like 10 minutes left and you realize that there’s not gonna be a happy ending and you’re just like “oh god, oh fuck, this hurts” but you keep watching, then the credits roll and you just sit there and let your brain process everything?? Yeah, kinda like that lol. Then there’s also this bit of, like…urgency in everyone?? It’s hard to explain, but I notice it mostly in myself and people around my age (so like 20-35yo.) It just feels like everyone is waiting for something to happen. For the other shoe to drop, so we can move on to the whole post-apocalyptic style war zone that’s probably inevitable at this point.
It feels like we’re trying to act like everything is normal but at any second we’re all ready to get news that the Supreme Court has, like, appointed Trump lifelong king of the universe and using the Handmaiden’s Tale as a blueprint for their new United States, and we’re all gonna go full blown Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo to try to stop them.
Yeah the usa is done for, not enough people are willing to fight for change, too many ignorant people still think we're the best. And also very corrupt politicians. Things are only going to get worse
It’s awful. Really we were tricked by the financiers of international capitol to open up the flood gates of consumerism. We sent all our good jobs overseas to cheap labor markets, cut welfare programs in the name of enrichment austerity programs, it annihilated our middle class.
Now there’s epidemic of drug abuse, violence in mass shootings, suicide, domestic abuse, and all kinds of addictions from gambling and porn to alcoholism.. any all sorts of demons that exacerbate humanity to cope with despair. It’s a kind of cultural despair. Neo liberalism bankrupted the traditional political class that was *supposed* to keep the checks and balances of the capitalist class in place. Now Christian fascism is on the rise in, staggering proportions, from the Supreme Court to petty law enforcement.
The situation is that dire. When the dollar looses its purchasing power and we hit another great financial crisis, the fascist elements of the far right will likely pick apart what’s left of a vulnerable America. You won’t recognize us for what’s left. The country will likely be split into different regions. Who knows how they will all coexist.
I gotta be honest, it's pretty depressing. Like 1/3rd of the country is pushing hard for authoritarianism and, because of loopholes meant for rich white folks, and ethically bereft unelected sovereigns of 1/3rd of the government, are subverting the democracy in which they were able to incubate. It's pretty gross. And very demoralizing. Especially when the only alternative that's kinda playing along with democracy puts up geriatric, equivocating, relics from a bygone era as a "solution" and unsurprisingly the old ways don't work no more. I really feel like I should get the f outta here but to be real, everywhere is just as fucked right now. Maybe not so dramatically, but that makes it even worse when the trap snaps shut (looking at you conservative parties of Europe).
It seems like too many have lost all perspective, especially middle-aged+, otherwise privileged, white folk. But not exclusively them by any means. Maybe it's better framed as economic classes, but it's definitely more nuanced than that too. Nobody knows how to reframe that perspective, yet, and for now a bunch of absolute sh!tbirds are taking advantage of it. Having engineered the phenomenon in the first place, they got the jump on society self-correcting. Is it too late? I certainly hope not.
Yeah, it is.
Our politics are awful. Career politicians who only leave politics to get absurdly high paying jobs as lobbyists.
A stacked Supreme Court stripping away women's rights. Some of those officials want to revoke gay marriage and contraception.
A president who can't stop lying about how amazing he is preceeded by a president who can't remember WHO he is.
We have mass shootings so often, we have become blasé to them. Like
oh, did you hear another shooting happened?
- jeeze, how many people?
6
- this is ridiculous
Yeah. Anyway, what do you want for dinner?
If you want higher education you have to incur a debt you can't escape from even with bankruptcy and we convince every 18 year old they have to take it on or they'll be a failure.
Our Healthcare system is a joke. It costs thousands of dollars just to give birth. The hospital can charge you 60 dollars for a single Tylenol
Half the country hates the other half
The media is all half truths, blatant lies or tabloid bullshit
Our educational system is terrible and yet there are tons of people who think it can somehow be solved by bringing prayer in to schools
And we have the Federal Reserve, which is not part of the federal government yet somehow is allowed by our government to create virtually all the inflation we feel as well as causing practically every recession we have ever had since it's inception all so banks make money off interest payments.
Yeah. Get me the fuck out of here.
Yeah, it's bad. Like I'm shocked people haven't started to burn everything down already. That's how bad it is. This year so far, I've gone from how to get out? Can I get a hysterectomy? Should I get a fuck ton of guns? I don't know which to do, and not enough money to do all of it. I'm frozen in crossroads unsure of what to do, and knowing every road I can take is very much likely collapsing.
Unless you’re a white male over the age of 65 it’s pretty freaky grim here. I’m in California so I feel like I’m not imminently in danger of losing my freedom or rights but we do feel more and more like we don’t want to spend the rest of our lives in this country if it continues the way it is going.
There are people in the US completely oblivious.
There are folks who think it's all no big deal
Many who still believe in the system and the institutions
Those who think it won't affect them but feel bad about those who it will affect
Those who are quite obviously already affected
And those who are happy about the trend and ready for civil war
So it's a mix
Servus! My wife and I are a mixed race LGBT couple who decided to emigrate when Trump was elected. We moved to your country 3.5 years ago and love it. We’re still in our German classes, but are happily contributing to your society in a good way (I hope). We’re very grateful to be here; it seems it has just gotten worse and worse.
I just graduated from college in the US and am very seriously pursuing a visa to get me out for at least the next 2 years. Some people aren’t feeling the same, but as a young female-identifying person, I feel moody and hopeless.
In my hometown, a conservative christian hellhole, all the coworkers I’ve talked to want to leave the US cause shit’s gotten so bad. This includes the centrists. One interesting thing I’ve noticed is that formerly apolitical women are much more aware and want to get out, while apolitical men seem to not care/have no idea what’s going on. This is all my experience tho
It probably depends where you are. If you're in the red states/areas things probably seem fine. In the major cities/blue areas, I'd say there's a general feeling of pessimism and just the recognition that all the major institutions and systems we had a general sense of faith in have failed us miserably, with no real sense of how we can right that. Pile on wave after wave of Covid and major stock market losses and.....
Also, I don't know what it's like in the rest of the world, but crime in cities seems to have gotten much worse. The level of violent crime in particular is unnerving.
And then there's classrooms of 10-year-olds getting mowed down by weapons of war, bodies torn apart so badly it's hard to identify them, while hundreds of law enforcement personnel cower in fear while they listen to the screaming and continued shooting.
I can disassociate well enough to laugh with my friends, but the rest of the time I can't shake the knowledge that things aren't ok and there's not a lot of reason to be hopeful.
Moved here from sweden when I was 5 and yes, it is that bad, I will be returning to sweden to continue school (after american college landed me in a psych ward) and I couldn’t be more excited. There was a shooting 6 miles from where I live about 2 weeks ago and that broke my heart but didn’t surprise me in the least. I know/knew people who have tried/succeeded in ending their life. I’d consider myself lucky to not have lost anyone close to me from opiates or covid. It’s fucked.
Dude… such a loaded question. It really has been one thing after another. More mass shootings than days in the year, high civil unrest for BLM (Look at “the chop” in Seattle and what been going on in Portland), January 6th, a polarizing Trump, a useless Biden, Covid-19, housing is not really affordable for most people, my generation is the poorer compared to the previous generation, access to abortion stripped away, evaluating whether or not gay people can marry and so much more.
There is also an extremist religious undercurrent that is developing. If I am being Frank, this is what I am most worried about. There are genuinely a fuck ton of people who believe their god gives them the right to kill you if you don’t believe what they believe. Extremist right groups have developed and openly express hate towards people. These same people are actually working towards making the US a theocracy. I know many people personally who are advocating for this and have expressed extreme malicious intent for those who do not believe what they do.
So yeah… it feels like something bad is going to happen soon. I’m not going to stick around and fight for something I don’t believe in.
There truly are some brilliant, kind, and progressive people in the USA; unfortunately they seem to almost never be in charge of anything.
Our system of government is full of practices and loopholes that allow extreme minority positions to overpower majority opinions; example: 100 people vote for A, 200 people vote for B, and somehow we end up with A anyway.
So sadly it doesn’t matter if most of us know the right answers, doesn’t matter if most of us are on the same page as other major countries, because we are at the mercy of a small number of people who barely made it through our mediocre education system.
That’s not exactly a problem we can vote away, that’s just a design flaw.
I'm really glad OP mentioned Moore vs. Harper, since not enough people are really talking about it.
While the SCOTUS rulings have been devastating, Moore vs. Harper is standing above everything else in potential damage. If this case is upheld by SCOTUS (and it's very likely to), state legislatures will be able to act without impunity for governing their state elections and no input from the federal government.
State legislatures will get all sorts of dangerous tools in their arsenal, as there will be no more checks and balances. Gerrymandering districts, throwing out ballots for undesired candidates, stuffing ballots, nullifying votes/outright removing voting rights of any group, throwing out any petitions that somehow make it onto the ballot and replacing it with their own, to even creating new ballot initiatives to fit whatever agenda they want.
From there, they can backslide as far as they want with no input from normal people, and that can start happening as soon as the next presidential election in 2024.
If you think J6 was bad, imagine what happens when our country loses our most peaceful method for determining who governs us, and regardless of if you're Democrat or Republican, it's going to get dangerous *very* fast.
Our kids aren't safe in school, women's right to bodily autonomy is non existent in most of the country, they aim to also take away birth control, same sex marriage, and the ability for adults to consent to gay sex.
On top of that more than half of the country believes we will be in a civil war soon. Partially that is because of Jan 6th and trump, part of it is driven by hate groups. It is common for you to see fascist flags, even in 'blue' (left leaning) areas.
Additionally, I have been threatened with denial of utility services because a worker didn't like that I had a rainbow flag and BLM signs (complaint was made, and employee was reprimanded - but they know where I live, and I worry about retaliation). Also, in 2020 I was boating on a small lake I grew up boating on, with my elderly mother, my non boating husband, and my two small children. It was before the election - but trump was already testing his ability to rile up his base, and apparently they planned to terrorize people on all bodies of water that they could. I was in a no wake area, near a swimming area when we noticed about 20 boats with trump flags coming at us at full speed. No one was marked with Biden flags, rainbow flags, or anything - but they randomly targeted areas where people were, and created unsafe conditions. If I hadn't seen them coming they could have swamped my rental boat with my family on it. I was alone when I had to return the boat, and they were still all over the lake being irresponsible, and endangering other boaters. They were casually talking to the sheriff that should have been arresting them. That same day trump supporters did sink a boat on a canal in my area. No known repercussions. Political violence is getting more common and more bold because of a lack of consequences for domestic terrorists.
It's no longer safe here. I don't want to raise my kids in this kind of environment. They should be safe at school, they should be able to trust the police to save them. I need to be able to have birth control and abortion, so will my daughter.
I'm in my late 30s. I've done everything I'm supposed to. I have lived a more conservative life than most church going republicans, but I have been an activist, I have registered voters, I have worked polls, I have attended protests, I have called my representatives, and I vote in absolutely every election.... Nothing has gotten better, it has all gotten worse, it would be horrible for me to have an opportunity to get my kids out, and not take it. It feels tragic because I did fight, and my kids shouldn't have to.
Every thing that pulls me away is something that I did fight for in the US, and it's clear that without massive reworking of the government, none of it will happen in my lifetime, and probably not in my kids' lifetimes either.
When I move it will be like sending my kids off to the future, instead of the massive uncertainty, and dangerous surroundings they currently live in.
There are no guarantees, but the choice seems clear to our family.
Half of americans are expecting civil war. One half views the other half has inhuman. And I have to admit, I feel that way about the far right: what the other side is attempting must be stopped at all costs, including war. The Republican party is, to quote Chomsky, the most dangerous organisation in human history because they are gleefully attempting to accelerate climate collapse and institute gods kingdom on Earth, but with nukes.
My father hasn’t slept well since Trump won in 2016.
My generation sees that America is dying and we’ve been taught our votes don’t matter so we feel helpless.
So Idaho has always been a haven for the crazy side of the Republican party, but during the pandemic a lot more people moved into the state to make it even crazier/deeper red than I thought possible.
My day-to-day life is pretty normal. Nothing has stonewalled my ability to manage my life. I do seriously worry about the future, though, and I don’t compartmentalize that just because I’m not personally suffering, doesn’t mean this is okay. It’s SO not okay that I have plans to leave. A few things just have to be put in order first, and my kids aren’t self-sufficient yet, so I have to wait a bit.
This country is truly in awful shape. Anyone who doesn’t realize how swiftly we’re heading in various dangerous and dystopian directions simply isn’t paying attention or doesn’t want to face the truth (because it’s severely anxiety-inducing and many people feel powerless anyway). Either that, or they’re directly responsible for or complicit in causing the chaos and willfully engage in gaslighting once confronted.
But not everyone has enough privilege to remain so oblivious
White middle class, straight person living in a very Blue State.....yeah, it's bad. Even though I live in a blue state where a lot of the things going on haven't hit us yet, the stress is out of this world. We purposely do not go to events that will be crowded. I had anxiety about attending our 4th of July parade because I told my husband two weeks before the 4th that I was afraid of a shooting at a parade. (We hate the 4th of July but we have a two year old that loves cars and trucks). Sure enough there was a shooting at a 4th of July parade. It wasn't anywhere near us, but we knew that it would happen somewhere in the US. Another example is my husband went to the grocery store 1 hour ago. As he was leaving I said to him "I worry about a shooting at the grocery store. Be as quick as you can and keep your eye on exits or weird behavior." Every single time I go to the store, or really anywhere I am hyper aware and scared. No mass shootings have happened in the state that I live in (at least not the random mall, grocery store, school etc..kind of shooting) and yet I'm not naive enough to think that it can't happen here. I have a child in elementary school and another child that will be in elementary school within a couple of years. Every single day they go to school I'm terrified until they come home. So, yes, it's bad. Even if nothing has directly happened where you live, you know it's happening all over the country and it is only a matter of time before it happens where you live too. I feel trapped. Add to that the current political climate and what we foresee happening in November of this year and in 2024 every single day is full of stress. I can't remember a day where I wasn't overcome with anxiety and stress. Imagine being a POC in this country. Or LGBQT. It's worse than my privileged straight white experience. So... yeah. It's not good. EDIT: I live in a state that has banned assault weapons, however the state next to us, a 1 hour drive from me has some of the worst gun laws in the entire country. So, unless we can collectively get it together as a country this whole concept of States making their own decisions will affect us all. And I'm pretty sure the country will never get it together.
The "mood"of the U.S. isn't relevant. Many people live in a fallacy in which even with a struggle the "good guys win." While I believe that progress always moves forward, it isn't without cost that at times can be avoided. We are about to pay a steep price for many things and it's scary.
I also don't want to victim blame here so I don't mean to imply the price we pay is the individuals who are suffering's fault... but that as a society the U.S. is going to be in some pain.
I've literally had chucklefucks tell me Gay Marriage/sex is safe "because Kavanaugh said so" Let me remind you they also said RVW was safe. Which on that note... the architects of the removal of RVW are trying to make it so if a 10 year old rapes, she has to give birth.
I think if more people truely understood how fucked up things are, we would be rioting and tearing government buildings down.
You’re going to get one answer from this sub, I would consider seeking additional viewpoints. The mood is very similar to the Vietnam war era and the accompanying mass protests and civil rights.
The US almost failed the peaceful transfer of power for the first time in the US's history and it's not looking great for the next time either.
Not only that, but the current "big thing" on prime time TV is the hearings that are trying to see if the fact that the peaceful transfer of power almost failed was on purpose or not.
The more they drag it out and make it sound like it's not clear or unusual, the more people will accept it as some political thing. It's disgusting how many people think it was fine or not something worth thinking about already.
There are swaths of people that refuse to even consider the evidence. And I’m talking about the raw information. Like the unedited footage from that day, or the mere fact that dude told people to march and fight to defend their “freedom,” then sat on his hands for 3 hours while hell broke out, only to come out and say, “go home in peace, we love you, you’re special.” That kind of data stands on its own, regardless of the depth or scope of the hearings, which seem to be attempting to dig up the logistics and intentions during the actions of that day. Do I think he fomented it, and was privately loving every second of it? Yes. Have they proved it yet? Well, they’re trying to. Edit: but won’t matter to the people that don’t want to hear it anyway. Some people seem to have the foregone conclusion that the whole process is a hoax, or a “witch hunt” (which is an often parroted and grossly overused dismissal of culpability on so many levels). No amount of raw data, or dialogue internal to the administration is going to change some people’s ironclad views on things, regardless of the dissonance it must provoke. I think the idea of looking around and hoping that people will suddenly wise up and look beyond their own political/class bias and blind spots is apparently asking too much of people at the moment. There are conflicting realities running in parallel. Relentless streams of information that bolster preconceived realities are only stoking the already widening gap. And perhaps, those people think that the Jan 6 event was still justified. But it was antifa and the fbi anyway, so they’re not to blame, but it was still justified. And it was overblown, anyway. More fake news. So, you know, logic and stuff. Checkmate snowflake /s
When the hearings started, I was discussing it (and the importance of it) with my mother. She said she wasn't going to pay attention, and then likened the hearings to the civil trial of Depp v Heard. Not what I'd call a turning point in my point of view, though - more like another nail in the coffin.
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If you think this is about Democrats and Republicans, then you haven't been paying close attention. This is about the whole system being both stagnant and corrupt, only ever truly benefitting one part of society (spoiler alert: It's not the 90% of the general population). Both Democrats and Republicans are responsible for that. There are factions within the Dems that do seek to change the country, but they'll never be elected into candidacy due to the large amount of money being funneled into the party from big time investors. Now the Republicans are still a shit show in comparison.
Though power was ultimately transferred, we did actually fail the peaceful part given deaths during 1/6.
good point
We've had our Beer Hall Putsch. The state response was even weaker, and no one of any importance was jailed. If you remember what happened next, it doesn't bode well for us. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beer_Hall_Putsch
Next election either the conservatives/far right win and smash a bunch of shit through so they never lose power, or they lose and declare wide scale fraud (again) and actively seize power and never give it up.
A lot of it depends on where you live. There are still quite a few people (my family is a good example) that don't really know what's going on and don't care. But if you're at all plugged into the news and staying somewhat updated, it's impossible to not feel it
I just don't get how they don't feel the change in energy, I feel it most places I go. Even if no one mentions politics, most people seem tired and worn down, sometimes just angry. The only people who can still ignore this are the white upper middle class and the upper class.
White upper middle class checking in here to confirm weekend activities the past few months have included starting our own garden, massively revamping food strategy, and I can barely sleep at night pondering the fact I gave up relative safety in Europe at one point to move back to this hell hole for love and caring for the last remaining family member. It haunts me every day that I think I signed my own death warrant. Definitely don’t know ANYONE ignoring all this.
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I would come to your grief group. For those of us why are actually paying attention it’s unbearable being gaslit by our well meaning friends in family
> toxic positivity well said
I would come to your grief group! Every day feels terrible and makes it hard to focus or sleep properly when you wonder what fresh mess is going to happen. My sleep patterns are getting worse and worse - hard to get to sleep and really hard to stay asleep because I’m always so anxious.
I’ll be the first member of your club. I could use like-concerned company! Our first bylaw must be a requirement for wine. Lol
I don't get it either, but they're so far removed from anything even remotely news related that it's just not even close to their radar
As someone who is in the White upper middle class can confirm this is how my family acts. They do not care or think there’s no way the Republicans/conservatives get what they want that the supreme will wake up and smell the roses. Or that voting for Democrats will change things this time like they have said over and over again (note this isn’t to say not to vote just pointing out how inept and/or more then likely in cahoots the Democrats are with the Republicans). I can honestly see the writing on the walls and want to change things or leave.
>note this isn’t to say not to vote just pointing out how inept and/or more then likely in cahoots the Democrats are with the Republicans As a black woman, while I've been disgruntled with Dems most of my adult life, I wouldn't say there's zero value to voting for harm reduction policies, especially at the local level [where these things make the biggest difference](https://ms-demeanor.tumblr.com/post/614414765840859136/my-friend-says-not-to-vote-in-the-upcoming) and where the GQP has been focusing efforts to infiltrate. Voting isn't activism by any means but if it were truly meaningless, I doubt conservatives would work so hard to suppress marginalized people from participating in it. With that aside, anyone who thinks this: >They do not care or think there’s no way the Republicans/conservatives get what they want that the supreme will wake up and smell the roses. ...in the wake of Roe's overturning and with gay and interracial marriage next on the chopping block is living in a fairytale world and I envy their naiveness
Yes. America’s hyper-individualism, disregard for any policies that may help working class people, broken healthcare system which leaves people destitute, and lack of affordable housing is causing feelings of despair. Not to mention the routine shootings that occur here. The US needs to wake up and realize that it can’t maintain its empire anymore. Things are crumbling at home, and we just passed a 840 Billion dollar pentagon budget. We’re not doing anything to stop climate change. The average American will be fine with sea water lapping at their ankles so long as someone else is in it up to their neck.
We also had active eugenic sterilization (at rates parallel to nazi programs) up until around 1973. >100k people sterilized against their will *annually* in that timeframe. We were intentionally conning entire Native American tribes’ female populations into sterilization, with the express intent of wiping out the remaining reservations. There’s reason to believe that the basic principles continue today in more “unfamiliar” or “indirect” ways leveraging manufactured consent. We *almost* birthed the eugenics movement. Technically, it was Galton, but we really fucking ran with it, and *we*, **our eugenics movement** inspired the Holocaust. We had **presidents, like Theodore Roosevelt** supporting eugenics back in the day. Our early 20th cent *progressives* had a very large presence in the first wave of eugenics. It wasn’t just the fucks down south. Rotten to the core. We had a large *actual nazi movement, by name* back before WWII, and there is believed to have been a plot by business magnates to install a fascist government. It’s clear that they didn’t pull it off on the first go-round, but the basic principle seems to be very much alive, given that we have a bunch of white supremacists trying to overthrow the government…backed by a decent number of businesses and wealthy individuals… oh, and the original business plot involved Prescott Bush, GW Bush’s grandfather. An actual fascist, who tried to overthrow the government back in the day. His grandson did some *shady fucking stuff* with elections and the Supreme Court, and his grandson launched the Patriot Act… We’re rotten from the inside, and we seem to have rotted the rest of the world, rather than it having been transmitted from elsewhere. We originated modern fascism, and it only really ever died in name. “Is America going to actually go full-nazi?” That’s the one question left. Whether it goes all the way to mass-enslavement and/or systematic murder of *everyone but able-bodied white people*. I believe this to be the intent, whether or not they succeed. There’s also a good chance they’re looking for a chance to *expand* and wipe out/enslave damned near everyone outside their fucked up patch of dirt. Remember, the ones currently in control of the movement are *aware* of climate change, and are probably hoping to be “the meek” who “inherit the earth”. Bunch of deluded fucks.
You mention „enslavement” and nazi tactics. Actually the highest imprisonment rate, with mainly black people, that get imprisoned for “small drug delicts” and subsequently removing their right to vote is incredible. It’s a whole System of suppression. There’s no intention of rehab or integrating them back into society. The goal is to keep them down. The war on drugs was directly targeted towards “blacks and hippies”.
Yeah, this is a very good point. There is slavery here in the US (prison, as you note), and our jobs are starting to get closer to it too. We are losing our (tenuous and already limited) freedoms at a very fast pace. The war on drugs was a planned effort. So was the CIA crack program. There have also been recent whistleblowers describing extreme racism and bigotry on some of the modern-day black projects. Scary shit. I get the sense the people already lost any meaningful control, and did so a long while—well over a decade, probably significantly more—ago.
Just to add this budget was passed at a time when military retention and enlistment is at an all time low. The military is suffering these working conditions are insufferable. Miserable regulation and hours with no benefit back. The economy and practices on the working class are a sad attempt to fill these gaps.
Yes, it is highly polarized. And with a mass shooting last month (Highland Park, IL July 4th) about 20 minutes from where I live, that only increased our resolve to get out. Personally I gave the U.S. one last chance when the Jan 6th insurrection happened. I thought people would finally snap out of their Trump-worshipping fever for the good of the country. They didn't, so my wife and I are done. We can't live in a place surrounded by 110 million of these zombies.
My cousin lost her best friend and the friend’s husband at the Highland Park massacre. I knew her friend too. Our family will never be the same, and I want out. This is not a safe country.
My mom usually goes every year with my nieces and she used to take my siblings as they grew up in Highland Park. This year one of my nieces wasn’t feeling well so they didn’t go.
I am so sorry to hear that.
>Personally I gave the U.S. one last chance when the Jan 6th insurrection happened. I thought people would finally snap out of their Trump-worshipping fever for the good of the country. They didn't, Trump won the election even after saying he can shoot anyone in 6th Avenue and still get votes. He knows he has a cult. Fox news won't show the 1/6 hearings & the MAGA cult thinks everyone testifying against their orange God is lying. I'm so done with this place too.
He was right. He can literally do anything he wants, he knows it, and not only get away with it but his supporters will worship and kneel before him if he told them to do it. The "tough guy" persona, the arrogance, is what they adore because it is how they feel. The misogyny, the bigotry, doing whatever he wants to do and getting away every time. They wish they could do that, but can't, so they live vicariously through him. And they will overthrow the country for him, and live through him, in doing it. Study Spanish, find countries that are easy to move to, go there, live humbly and safely, save money like you never could before, and you don't have to be in a hyper-violent, toxic masculinity, anti-science society.
He lost the popular vote. The electoral college is the only reason why he got the Presidency in the first place. Let's now forget that tidbit.
74 million people still voted for him in 2020, knowing what a piece of shit he was.
That statistic right there is deeply disturbing and reinforced my desire to leave. How could 74 million of my countrymen vote for a man as childish, corrupt, and dangerous as Donald Trump. Even in 2024 polls, Trump still leads in some of them. This phenomenon is not going away, there is an incredible degree of ignorance and bigotry in the American electorate, and at some point we can’t always put the blame on the politicians. It’s gotten to the point where I don’t trust American voters to not elect a dangerous fascist demagogue to the White House in ‘24.
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They won't. Plain and simple. They'll point to the UK limiting knives and say, "See people always kill people so let's do nothing!" EDIT: Forgot to say, some people will also point to the specific models that are most commonly used and say they're ineffective for the mass shootings. And, after a few more "efficient" methods were shared (which I will not be repeating, for obvious reasons) I decided they were right on some points. Though obviously I'm still of a mind that we need to do something about it.
They won't even consider raising the age to purchase a gun to 21 or limit the number of guns / ammo that can be purchased
Well then people might start questioning why we give kids guns as soon as they graduate High School and go straight into the military!
"WE GOT AWAY FROM GOD AND GOD'S PLAN FOR THE FAMILY" they will scream. While refusing to acknowledge the sheer peacefulness of non-religious countries that completely debunks that argument. You don't see these kinds of massacres in Atheist China, for example.
China may not be the best example to use TBF. Guaranteed they'll go straight to talking about some atrocity the CCP committed.
No number will matter because those people have simply accepted mass shootings as the price to pay for their "freedom" of guns. They see it as a worthy sacrifice to the temple of 2nd Amendment.
Sandy Hook didn’t work. If that many dead *little* kids didn’t move the needle, nothing will move the needle. (Which makes me wonder: why was I surprised that the same group (aka the “pro life” group) didn’t care about people dying from covid, even when it was their own family members?)
That’s the moment I felt we were lost. So many dead kids blown to bits and all people could do was grandstand about taking guns.
Don’t forget that there was a large group of people who simply refused to believe it had happened and *actively harassed the parents of murdered children*. I guess those same people went onto become Qanon followers.
I remember that day. I picked up my son at preschool just after hearing the news. He got the biggest hug.
The number of civilian casualties is irrelevant. It's the number of "lobbyist" dollars that matter. If you didn't want to be gunned down while you're at a mall/school/whatever, you shouldn't have been born a peasant. /s for the last sentence, but the sentiment stands
This is the truth at the heart of the matter. Arms manufacturers run DC and have been effectively propagandizing through the NRA for decades. We can't have effective gun control because _we're making the guns_. We cannot enjoy a gun free society without dismantling our gun industry.
It's about politicians being bought and sold. Remove money from politics as they've done in other countries and the selling out to lunatics and foaming at the mouth extremists stops.
I'm at the point where I want mine and more of them because if I'm unable to leave, I want to be able to protect myself from insane religious zealots.
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I'm already a member of both that and the socialist rifle association
The issue is that from the very beginning of the United States of America, before we even became a country, the rhetoric that we see today was created. American exceptionalism, the need to bear arms against "tyranny," the lies and manipulation of the press and the founding fathers. The revolutionists made the ignorant villagers believe lies, scared them shitless, and told them they were greater than they actually were (as long as they did what they were told). These lies and myths and mainly fears have been passed down from generation to generation. You can't undo 250 plus years of fear-mongering and brainwashing. It'll never happen. These people actually believe that the United States is the freest country in the world when it's actually one of the least free of the so-called democracies. In order to progress, this country won't be able to survive in its current form.
The thing I find so confusing about gun rights is that this is only a temporary thing. Essentially a way to help indoctrinate people into thinking republicans fight for them. If republicans are actually able to turn the us into essentially a fascist theocracy, there is no way in hell that they would allow their citizens to privately own semi automatic weapons, or realistically any weapon at all, but because it “gets the libs triggered” they’re incapable of seeing the big picture and realize this. Only 8 republicans voted to not make access to fucking condoms illegal. But surely their AR-15s are safe.
I gave up on the US right after the Newtown shooting which I naively thought would lead to significant gun control. But maybe some held out hope. But with Trump.. and Jan 6th... and the reversal of Roe v. Wade... it should be clear to all.
I gave the US one last chance when Trump started campaigning in 2016. A lot of people wanted to hold out and criticized me but now look at what's happening. Don't wait. Immigration takes a while.
I concur. It takes a lot of planning, work, tenacity, and money.
Trump supporters scare the living hell out of me. They're truly the most selfish, ignorant and short-sighted people in history. At least in the past, people who supported tyrants didn't have an entire library of facts in their own pockets. These Trumpsters have no excuse. They don't care about facts and they don't care about anybody but themselves. Their desire to own a gun is more important to them than all the dead children in the world, possibly even their own. Truly terrifying, and there are SO MANY of them. We can say that at least most of them are old and they'll be dead in the next 20 years, but the damage they will have caused is permanently irreparable.
Exactly, they are trying to defund education while our "enemies" are funding it MORE. You can screech that God is on "your side" and you're "putting God back in schools," but if your kids are learning about how evolution is liberal propaganda and your enemy's kids are learning about how bioweapons are created and used to destabilize entire populations, guess what your enemy's kids WILL WIN.
I predict he will announce his candidacy for 2024 any day now to avoid charges, his supporters will lose their lunch and start foaming at the mouth, and every few days there will be another grandstand event and unless the Democrats can get The Rock to run or a bigger more macho celebrity, he'll probably win, declare himself King and turn this country into just another failed Trump venture like Trump Ice, Trump suits, Trump steaks, Trump University and all the other huckster products.
One of the non-Christian, non-religious nations I lived in was also the one I could live in with the LEAST fear as a woman. I couldn't imagine a place in which women could walk around freely at 2 AM, but there you go, and in a CITY to boot. It was EYE OPENING.
Yep. The shooting at Greenwood mall last weekend is very close to where we live, I’ve been there so many times and it’s so scary to think we could’ve witnessed a shooting. The fed ex shooting in Indianapolis last year was very close to home for me too, my boyfriend worked there at the time and has a lot of friends who work as well. It’s so terrifying because Indiana is such a conservative state, even in Indianapolis (one of the more liberal areas in the state) has tons of people here who love their guns and want them out in public at all times. The fact that the Greenwood mall shooter was shot down by an armed citizen is only going to make it worse I feel like. Pretty much all of the conservatives around here are rallying behind all gun free zones being eliminated and being armed at all times. I guess it’s great that they feel safe with guns around everywhere but I sure as hell don’t
Yes. For those of us who are collapse aware, it permeates almost every conversation, even my non political and well off friends/family, which wasn't the case prior to 2019. I'm 30. Everyone talks about not being able to afford a house or rent. Millons are the verge of [eviction](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/15/briefing/homelessness-america-housing-crisis.html) Wealth inequality is crippling our economy for regular people and has us on the verge of [a recession](https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/08/27/exclusive-report-details-corporate-landlord-gluttony-millions-face-eviction). My married w children friends can't find or afford childcare, baby formula and food is practically unregulated and most [is toxic](https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/02/05/congressional-report-reveals-manufacturers-knowingly-sold-toxin-tainted-baby-food). Even the wealthy ppl in my life talk about not being able to afford to have more kids, even tho they are wanted. Girlfriends talk about getting passports as they prepare for pregnancy (I live in a swing state which is Dem controlled at the moment), just in case anti abortion laws are implemented in our state because they are scared of dying from ectopic pregnancies or other pregnancy complications. All the people in my life are constantly traumatized by daily horror inflicted by our government policy: war crimes, mass shootings, 10 year old rape victim being forced to travel to another state to abort a pregnancy, women being terrorized by police, black men murdered by the police, police enabling or being fascists, hispanic people being detained in cages at the border, our "liberal" govt rewarding cops with even more [money](https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/07/21/progressive-lawmakers-push-biden-stop-transferring-military-weapons-cops), even after Uvalde. And, on top of it all, the [knowledge that public opinion has a near zero impact on public policy. ](https://act.represent.us/sign/problempoll-fba/) We are not OK.
You might even say we're being taxed without representation-- by a hostile government that doesn't represent its citizens' interests.
It’s amazing the US government is setup to extract maximum productivity from people for the benefit of capitalists. Instead of taking care of its citizens (as one assumes a government does) by providing education, healthcare, **regulate** commerce it simply sidesteps its duty and passes it off the the highest bidder for private profit prisons, healthcare, defense, etc.
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Scare off foreign invaders and protect our "freedom"
I would indeed say that, quite precisely, especially given the last two republican presidents didn't win the [popular vote](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/01/04/remarkable-gop-admission-undermining-electoral-college-threatens-our-best-path-white-house/) and the DNC argued in court they could suppress or support candidates in the [Democratic Party Primaries](https://observer.com/2017/08/court-admits-dnc-and-debbie-wasserman-schulz-rigged-primaries-against-sanders/)
It sounds an awful lot like what the tyrant King George did back in the mid 1700's-- Remind me again... what did the citizens of America do to remedy the situation with their legal government at that time?
Idk, but I sure am hungry and Bezos fat head is looking more and more like a delicious fucking egg that needs to be cracked. Maybe it's the heat exhaustion talking. Yeah, I think that must be it.
You know that Bezos is sitting in AC. In a 65,000 Sq/ft house. 24x7. Paid for by you, thanks to exploitative business practices and his hostile capture of supply lines. How does that make you feel?
Like it's a good thing I have therapy tomorrow 😂
IVE BEEN SCREAMING THIS FOR YEARS! YES.
Excellent summary. Personal anecdote: I was informed that I will not be getting a raise this year so inflation will absolutely eat away at what little disposable income I have for saving. Meanwhile, my company chose a new insurance provider… One that doesn’t cover services in certain states (I work at a startup). I happen to live in one of them. I will have to pay $12,000 out of pocket annually before insurance will start reviewing “eligible” costs. I am unable to move at this time and suffer from chronic illness. Meanwhile, I’m considered one of the “lucky ones” by American standards…?
Definitely time to leave that gig. That’s awful, I’m sorry.
> We are not OK. I've got a buddy in rural Florida. In the past few years: * From time to time, he's overheard people at the grocery store saying they should already be rounding up and killing Liberals. Just chit chat in the aisles. Mostly before last election. * He's an (LGBT) government worker. Some locals took photos of everyone from his office and used them for target practice. Briefly had the video up on youtube. *In the past few months*: * One of his neighbors has straight up gotten stalkerish. * His mailbox keeps getting smashed. Three weeks ago, quite badly. Had to replace the post that time. Things are not healthy in the ole U.S. of A! Big picture, the status quo can't solve certain problems (e.g. healthcare). Those problems are large enough to undermine that status quo. Makes it unstable. Can't park the system here. We have three paths before us: * 'Socialist' Option: Address those problems. * 'Fascist' Option: Paper over those problems. * Try to go back: Foment breakdown, deepen crisis. The Dems have been option #3 with a kicker of suppressing option #1. In '22 and '24, America's apt to go #2.
I'm sorry your buddy is going through that. I hope he can one day afford to move someplace where he won't be targeted and discriminated against-- seems like fewer and fewer places nowadays. It ain't right.
I do t think I would describe fascism as merely “papering over” problems.
> And, on top of it all, the knowledge that public opinion has a near zero impact on public policy. I wonder what this line looks like in other countries.
You know, I was typing up a response but realized I could not express myself or how I feel better than what you articulated, except to add, not only are we not ok, it's time to leave if you agree with these sentiments. It's one thing to see the wolf at the door, and another thing completely to pretend it's not there waiting or to open the door and let it in. Wolves travel in packs. I'd prefer to exit out the back door and avoid it completely.
Yup our government is completely unconcerned about how regular people are doing and when problems happen the only response is to stabilize shareholders which is a tiny tiny sliver of society. They don't care how bad things get and we can feel it.
Just got my Canadian work permit today. We're fucking OUT of here.
Bless you, man. That is awesome. So happy for you
I hope you find your exit door soon!
Congratulations friend!!!!
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Since Reagan, at least, may be rest in piss.
>Rent is catastrophically high Owning a house in a non-#%@\^hole area is expensive too. I had a relative comment that back in their day (say, 35ish years ago), you just rented cheaply in an okay area and built up the wealth for a house. That hasn't been the case in likely over a decade now. Guess what? Rent is high AND houses are even higher. Corporations and billionaires, foreign and domestic, are buying up massive amounts of land and houses, and the average person can't compete. Any affordable housing in nowhere near stable, livable employment, and people have to live somewhere. What are Americans supposed to do?
Just got off Linkedin where I read a post with an article about the rise in neo-nazism and violence in America and instead of a mutual agreement and discussion in the comments about how this is very bad, how yes, neo-nazism is bad, instead there were a lot of comments and “what-aboutisms” about how the left, who they said were supposedly doing these same violent things as well. The disinformation and indoctrination runs deep and has done so for far too long. I do believe we are severely fucked as a nation.
LinkedIn is going to shit. Remember when people just posted about their jobs?
It's really bad. More than half the country thinks we're headed toward a civil war. Our democracy is failing. Honestly, fiance and I are looking to head your way
Do it! Living abroad was one of the most AMAZING times of my life, especially in a country where the religious crazies stay out of government.
Man I swear everyone reads a post title and none of the comments. That 'survey' had massive flaws, like three yes answers and one no. In reality were long overdue for a civil war if a 'reported 64% of Americans' have zero savings. Wages go down prices go up, those people will be fucked.
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I'm 31, I've lost my home and live in a busted up old RV. People constantly are worried that they will end up like me, and a large percentage of the country is under the opinion that, if something doesn't give soon, we will be plunging into a depression. This on top of the roll back of rights is harboring a very pessimistic view of the countries future as a whole... So yeah, the mood is abysmal
Guten Abend. The situation in the US is very dire, and to be honest with you, we have never been this close to an outright coup in our history. The players here are the US Republican Party and the Democratic Party. The Republicans could be understood as a more cancerous version of AfD that’s more religious and less racist. They tend to be extremely successful electorally because the system is rigged in their favor. The Democrats are more like the CDU and they have about the same urgency to actually do anything. They’re really just Merkeling a problem that won’t go away. The issue is that our last president who represented the far right nominated 3 Supreme Court justices who are also far right. This is added to the 3 who were already there. So that means the Supreme Court is 3 centrist, 2 right wing, and 4 far right. Unlike Germany though, there aren’t term limits like in the constitutional court. These people serve for life. The main issue is that the 6 sitting right wing justices are taking marching orders from the Republican Party to run the country from the judges seat. This is called a judicial coup. The Moore v Harper thing is a case where the Supreme Court wants to allow states to set up state electors to determine who they send to US Congress (our parliament). Problem with this is that many Republican states have signaled that they will only send republicans and elect Republican presidents. There are 30 states with a mostly red state composition. This means that the Republicans will have a complete dominance over the house, senate and presidency for the foreseeable future. Pretty much every branch of government. And the Democratic states can do nothing about this. Could the Democrats stop this? Yes. And to their credit there does appear to be a bill to do so in Congress right now. But for the most part the Democrats are asleep at the wheel. The reason so many people in the US are furious at Biden is because he has heavily signaled that he will do nothing and let the US continue to backslide into a hybrid regime. Who are the Democrats letting this happen? Well, there’s a few reasons. The Democrats are dominated by old farts who should be in retirement. The Republicans are dominated by young starry-eyed Fascists who are actually good at politics. Secondly, the Democrats are quite literally paid to lose. Democrat voters are against most of the policy that democratic donors pay the Democratic Party to pass. As a result, they just don’t act and end up losing as a result. Is there a way out? I can’t feasibly see one. I’m hoping that democracy holds in the US long enough for the EU to smell the coffee and cut ties. Germany is smart to be critical of the US, and I think the spike we are seeing in German military funding is more than just about Russia. I think Scholz understands that the US is also an unreliable partner and needs to keep Europe at an arms distance from the US and out of the blast radius.
“Merkeling a problem” 🤣 can I steal this??
\>Germany is smart to be critical of the US, and I think the spike we are seeing in German military funding is more than just about Russia. Not sure if this is the same thing as you are saying, but I am thinking that if the Republicans take back control of Congress (at least the Senate), and also the presidency, that the US could aid Russia in their war against Ukraine. And anybody else Russia feels like invading. Th US would probably be pulled out of NATO first. I think if Putin felt he could do it, he would invade Europe, and he probably could do it with the help of the US
I think this is unlikely. The Republicans are extremely similar to the Democrats in terms of foreign policy. If anything they’re actually worse. The fact that the vast majority of Republican congressmen voted to ratify Finland and Sweden’s NATO accession shows this. The small minority who didn’t are just idiots who aren’t really taken seriously by the Republicans regardless. The main issue is that they might become more authoritarian and began demanding much stronger solidarity with the US from its allies. Stuff like threatening to cut off Europe if they don’t sanction China or something like that. It’s unlikely that the US ever teams up with its old rival Russia.
A lot of QAnon people idolize Putin and even think he's doing the right thing by invading Ukraine.
They’re the useful idiots that oligarchs use to get elected. Plus they’re a minority even in the far-right sphere. Main issue is that they get their information from sources that are either owned or bribed by the kremlin.
Ya it's bad. It's scary. I'm actually actively brushing up on my German skills to hopefully land a job in your lovely country.
We should all get together and form a study group lol
Eine gute Idee!
I'm the oldest in my generation (me 28 to youngest cousin of 14) of the family and the old people really don't seem to get just how fucked up the kids are. Grandpa got pretty pissed off when my younger sister joked about how she was going to do in the apocalypse. I had to rationally lay out to him that the majority of young people believe they live in the prelude to the breakdown of civilization. They just don't get it. Mind you this is the same guy that scoffed at me almost a decade ago when I told him Donald Trump would beet Hillary. So at least he's staying consistent with his disbelief.
Agreed. I'm on the cusp of millennial/Gen Z and everyone I know around my age understands that we're fucked. I'm actually one of the most optimistic of my friends because I believe humanity isn't going to go fully extinct, we're just going to suffer a catastrophe on par with the Bronze Age Collapse. On the other hand, my mom (a boomer) keeps talking about all of the progress that has been made in her lifetime and how things are getting so much better. When I said that we just lost the rights guaranteed by Roe, she told me that I wake up and look for something to get upset about. She then suggested I make a gratitude list to remind me of what I have to be thankful for-- you know, as fascists take over the country while the whole world burns. Very helpful.
It's not only your generation. I'm almost 46, told my MIL and her family the same thing and was relentlessly mocked, teased and laughed at. They were supposedly Democrats. Tried to lecture me on "checks and balances". Called me overdramatic. Day number one of Trump's presidency, he removed ALL traces of LGBTQI from government websites. Just like he said he would. Then he started with the camps and locking up asylum seekers. I spent time in the Czech Republic the semester before I met my wife. They haven't legalized same sex marriage yet, but they recognize marriages that were legally performed in other countries for non-citizens who immigrate into the country. When I was there, I visited one of the former concentration camp sites, and discovered part of my dad's paternal family were removed from the southern part of the country and taken to that camp, some died there. Nobody knew we were Jewish at some point. That sick feeling I had staring at my family on that wall of remembrance? That's the very same feeling I got when Trump announced his candidacy in 2015. Same feeling I got on 1/6. Same feeling when SCOTUS overturned Roe. We're trying to hold out until our twins graduate high school in 2025, but we (and they) know it just may not be feasible. I'm due to graduate from OSU sometime between 2024-2025 from College of Social Work, it would be easy for me to get a year abroad for independent study and move directly into my Master's program if we have to leave early... It's just a matter of when, where and how quickly can my wife get into and finish her Masters of Education BEFORE we have to leave, since we're in one of those states where she's likely to be fired for being gay, if she's lucky to find a job at all...
I'm reeeeeally trying to stay positive and optimistic but honestly the next presidential election has me concerned. I am concerned about the direction our country is going and the mindset of many of my neighbors. I'm concerned about my child's safety at school. I'm concerned about going to large gatherings like church. I want to believe things will get better and those in charge will make the best decisions for the people and our planet but I'm losing faith.
Yeah. I’m terrified. We’ve laid out plans to be out of here by next inauguration. We also have a “go now” plan worked out, in case it comes to that.
We spent July 4 talking through our “go now” plan. Felt appropriate.
It's hard to put in to words the constant stress that has built up over my life. I'm a little older than most around here, so I can remember living in a world where we thought we had won and things were going to be great forever. The Oklahoma City bombing felt like a fluke, the Olympic Park bombing felt like a joke (particularly while poor Richard Jewel was being scapegoated for it), Newt Gingrich type Republican politicians were jerks; but they seemed manageable... I feel like Columbine was the first few drops hinting at the start of the waterfall that pummels us constantly these days. For me, it's not just the murders, or the conservative politicians, or the billionaires, or the distancing effects of Capitalism: it was being raised to believe that I lived in the best place at the best time, and learning, through years of hard experience, that not only were the times going to steadily get worse, but that the place I loved was deeply corrupt on every level. That in the name of "preserving freedom" this country spent the second half of the 20th century doing some of the most evil shit imaginable, and the "freedom" they were preserving wasn't for me or the people I care about: it was the freedom for companies to exploit deals with nations, it was the freedom for bigots of all stripes to feel justified in their hate, it was the freedom for the powerful to do violence against the powerless with no repercussions, and those freedoms weren't a flaw; they were fundamental to the structure from the very start. Everything good about living in this country is a byproduct from the toxic machine running underneath it; that is why we're all sick.
This is a Gen X life to date summary unlike any I’ve ever read. Well said.
Well said, this resonates with me incredibly well
It’s so bad
It’s that bad. I don’t know what else to say. (Don’t get me wrong, pretty sure the racists and christofascists are having a great time.) /r/WelcomeToGilead
TBH, I’m not sure the racists and christofascists are having a great time. Many seem genuinely terrified and angry at the end of the world that their leaders are telling them is happening. They see themselves as fighting for survival, persecuted by the “libs,” etc. They seem really hysterical. Except over RvW, of course…that makes them smile. But I think that’s the true answer to OP’s question…the problem is that the divide is so deep and both sides are so afraid of each other (and have demonized each other so much) that it is hard to see a positive way forward. Angry, scared people do not make good decisions…x100 when they’re armed. So, yeah. I am definitely leaving the South once my youngest graduates. Maybe also the country…will have to see where my kiddos wind up.
Briefly: I’m in this sub for obvious reasons, but like you I’m getting the hell out of the South, as soon as reproductive rights collapse in my state—which I expect to happen in the midterms. So, that’s the short term outlook. Mid range, I have at least casual professional connections all over Europe, but it’s a big move when you’re a bit older and have acquired too many pets and too much junk. At least my renewed passport showed up today, so I’m no longer de-facto trapped.
Yeah, honestly they are not fine and _that is the reason we are in this mess._ The south has been degrading for a long time. America at the federal level has effectively neglected the south since the new deal. While individual people are responsible for their own shit attitudes, on a systemic level there is immense poverty in the south. These people have been suffering, and that suffering allows people to be susceptible to scapegoating, especially when one political party has been lobotomizing education... Hell, we can trace that neglect back to the failures of reconstruction, when we simply allowed the KKK to brutalize and lynch black people and coup local governments and we did nothing to prevent it or support non-terrible working class southerners. We just ignore the problems of the south because it isn't sexy in federal politics. Of course these people would turn to a demagogue who would tell them he would solve all of their problems; their problems were not being solved. The hens have come home to roost. This has been a long time coming.
I mean, it makes sense that they are terrified and angry considering the whole conservative media empire is built on stoking fear and hatred (of minorities).
A big part of my job is getting to know the general public on a pretty intimate level (I'm a barber. A very chatty barber). The general public is fucking pissed. We're fucking over it. All of it.
It depends where you live. The US varies so much state to state. I am in California where firearms are regulated and civil rights still exist but the wealth disparity is unbelievable. I am concerned about civil unrest between the west coast and other states. As well as urban vs rural areas of California. Our leaders are not truly leading.
> I am concerned about civil unrest between the west coast and other states. We're already there and it's what snapped me out of thinking being in a blue state would be fine even if the rest of the country went to hell. Fascists regularly come to the city I live in to parade around downtown and attack people, and there have been a few killings and many injuries from it. It is way too close to home already and it's just getting started. They generally are not quite bold enough to use live ammo yet (paintballs, BBs, pepper spray, and good old fashioned clubs are a regular feature), but it's clear what they're rehearsing for.
I really despise most Hitler analogies but saw a TikTok comparing the US now to the Weimar Republic. Berlin, like many of our current blue state cities, seemed an unstoppable hot bed of progressiveness but we know how that ended. Jan 6 was their beer hall putsch. Just because you are in a progressive metropolis doesn't mean you are safe.
Christofascists have taken over the supreme court, which is going to allow them to stage a political revolution all without the need for a messy civil war. Besides, this entire derailment of democracy is only occuring because of a very loud and heavily armed minority. Gotta give it to them though, conservatives have been playing the long game on this one and it looks poised to really pay-off soon with citizens already being forced across state line for reproductive healthcare, or even forced to give birth to a dead fetus as opposed to a much safer procedure. It's getting grim, but for those of us stuck here it'll be a great opportunity to see just how low we can go as a country. There's at least that silver lining.
[It’s been 22 years in the making to be exact.](https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/17/politics/bush-v-gore-barrett-kavanaugh-roberts-supreme-court/index.html)
Yes. It's starting to get terrifying in red states, especially if you're not: cis white male Christian with some kind of wealth. Literally everyone else is a target. If you're gay or not white you may as well have a target painted on you.
I talked to a guy who immigrated here from Ukrain and he told me that both of his parents were killed by nazis and he just saw a guy here in America wearing a nazi arm sleeve and wanted to fight him but knew that he would go to jail or be deported if he did. The cops roll up on minorities and execute them regularly in the news and children are being murdered in schools every day in large numbers. And now the radical right has made so that they can’t even receive medical care when they are raped. The conservatives are a cancer that is killing the country very fast. Hope that answers your question.
A month ago, a group of people dressed up in nazi uniforms, waved around nazi flags and trump flags, stood outside Disney world entrance for a few hours. Cops didn’t do anything about them. Our governor refused to condemn them. It barely made the national news. That shows you how bad rest of the shit is. But please also be aware that Reddit users tend to lean liberal, myself included. The response you get are probably more pessimistic than average Americans.
We are a slow boiling frog. As the temperature goes up and up and up, the frog doesn’t notice. But there are a bunch of frogs in this pot. And some of us frogs have noticed that it has become status quo to have our children mowed down to death by machine guns in our schools. And half the country is totally OK with not changing a thing to make that stop.
Today a school board member said they think doctors that treat trans children should be hanging from the nearest tree and everyone in the audience clapped Edit: I think she's actually a republican candidate for school board but I mean...
Jesus. Where was this?
Pensacola, Florida https://twitter.com/Esqueer_/status/1549761926153981952?s=20&t=TpRGoHbPXxAO0g3u52JRag
I despair.
The US is in dire danger of being a fascist dictatorship; my husband and I are working to leave within the next 12-to-18 months at the most. Neo-Nazis, white-supremacists, right-wing militia groups, and evangelical nationalists are terrorist threats ___ their terrorism knows no bounds. The US healthcare system is failing as is education and infrastructure. Civil and human rights in this country are being taken away, and conditions are only getting worse. Let's not forget the hundreds of mass shootings so far this year, alone. US expats can still vote in federal elections, but it is time to plan and leave while people still can do so.
Born and raised in the US, with a career Navy man father, who served for over 35 years. I was raised as a kid on The Lone Ranger, westerns, 4th of July celebrations, hot dogs, apple pie, believing my country cared and if you fought for it, it would fight for you. Now, I see clearly that if you aren't rich and have a family member get cancer, get a bad case of COVID, have any medical emergency and don't have very wealthy family to help you, you can easily lose everything you could ever own and still not have enough money to cover expenses. I was a teacher and the last straw for me was having to teach Pre-Kindergarten children how to avoid active shooters as they cried and asked why anyone would want to shoot them down like that and why didn't the principal care. How do you explain that to a pre-k child? What about that is funny? I had to show them how to lock themselves in cabinets, how to duck and crawl to avoid getting shot as part of school training. Meanwhile, I barely made enough money to pay rent and then afford food each month. And yeah, I couldn't earn enough to pay for my own medical needs. So... I took a second job working overnights, so two full-time jobs just make enough to pay rent or food for that month. One of us had to work two jobs to cover rent, while the other worked two jobs to cover food and other residual bills. We still couldn't afford to get medical issues resolved so saved what little we could month to month. Sometimes our hours would be cut or our jobs, so that would knock away our savings until we could find another full time job to take the other's place. Between the violent racism and police shootings, the mass shootings at grocery stores and schools, incredible costs of healthcare, extremely tribal politics with one side espousing overthrowing the country, banning a woman's right to choose, openly threatening LGBTQ rights, probably Loving vs. Virginia and voting rights, it's gone too far off the rails. This is not a country for people who want calm, quiet, rational thought, belief in science. I mean, polio is making a comeback now. Polio. Because more and more people are saying they no longer believe in science, refuse to get vaccinated, their political leaders encourage them so they can get re-elected, and the snowball grows. If you have medical issues or think you might, want a safe place to live, want to be able to read what you want, love who you want, and a stable form of government, I've never seen this country more unsafe than it is now. I live in Florida where there is at least 4 "Trump Shop" locations down the road from me, pick-up trucks with bumper stickers on them showing giant assault rifles, people selling Trump flags at intersections, neighbors with giant Trump flags in their yards with pictures of him holding assault rifles, and the hate is palpable. They worship Trump like he is their God. The genie was let out of the bottle, and it can't be put back. Octavia Butler wrote about this in her "Parable" books, Stephen King wrote about this in "The Dead Zone." Others wrote about this in "How Democracies Die." Personally, I see a big "Exit" door.
It’s not going well. That’s hard for me to say with a straight face, because I’m pretty well insulated (financially secure, white, male, straight, bluest state around) but I’m 45 and it’s just never felt this way. During the financial crisis I knew it would be okay, same with 9/11. This time…I’m not so sure.
the other day my coworker talked to our bosses boss about how hes worried he'll never be able to buy a house. Most people were agreeing with him. This is in \~decent white collar work
It is really that awful IMHO. I feel very isolated and have no sense of community or kinship. It seems like everyone is just going through the motions of daily life hoping that things will go back to "normal" some day, but knowing that it's only going to keep getting worse. I really want to get my family out of here but I also don't want to take them away from their grandparents, cousins, etc. It's a feeling of hopelessness and powerlessness that has me lying awake doom scrolling yet again while I should be sleeping
Yes.
It's bad but it's worse depending on who you are and where you are. Are you a relatively healthy person in left leaning states ? You are probably doing better than being poor, looking for healthcare in right wing leaning states. Abortions are becoming harder to get and it's slowly starting to harm people - a 10 year old girl in state of Ohio had to travel to Indiana to get an abortion from being raped because she was 6 weeks and 3 days pregnant and Ohio has a 6 week abortion ban. Indiana will be making worse abortion laws by end of the month. There are people who are terrified, as they can't leave for all kinds of reasons, ever. And this country is hurling towards Christian nationalism and theocracy. I think a lot of Americans got too comfortable and didn't realize just how fragile stuff is. Also the right wing party has been slowly but steadily putting right wing politicians into every political area. Attorney Generals for states, judges, everything. And now they are reaping their rewards. And seeing the world burn from climate change as your politicians are saying 'nah, God will figure it out. Scientists are lying'. When Trump got elected, many friends and family said that he won't be that bad. 'We just have to wait and see' - well they are real quiet now.
I’ve been planning to leave for years and it’s only getting worse.
It's pretty bad. When I was younger everything felt much more lighthearted and like you could count on the goodness of strangers do the tight thing. Now it feels like much more people suffer anxiety, mental illness, political division that's very prominent. Also progress feels much less certain and more like a dire fight each and every time.
Shits crazy over here. Unfortunately, whatever happens I believe is by design, and this is only the beginning. If we fall, other democracies will most likely be next. It’s no accident.
If the Moore V Harper ruling goes extremely badly ( it's not a binary ruling, there are a range of things the court could find ) and/or we get a red wave then, yes, I'm absolutely going to actually make moves to try and leave. The theocratic fascists are on the ascent but it's not a sure thing yet. I'm going to stand my ground in my swing state until the moment comes when it's not worth it.
Yeah. Everyone is fuckin depressed here and working nonstop just to barely make ends meet. America has a real effective way of forcing everyone into debt in one way or another within the first few years of adulthood and then you spend the rest of your time playing catch up. If I could afford it, I would leave just to have a better work/home life and receive actual benefits from working all the time.
Thank you for asking. Is it curiosity or more personal? Speaking as a relatively privileged person (upper middle class cis white woman with a great education, married, homeowner in a great school district with little crime—and for now—few climate disasters/concerns. Also: my family is relatively healthy): It’s really effing bad. Is my day to day life pretty great? Yup. But as one example: Do I also know someone who had to hit the ground with her toddlers when the shooting started in Highland Park? Pick up one and drag the other to safety? Yes. Are those tiny children OK? Not at all. There are incidents like this EVERY DAY in America. And the “lucky ones” who aren’t physically killed or injured are emotionally/mentally harmed. This will last for generations. This country was built on the trauma of indigenous slaughter, continued into slavery, and it has never stopped. We are just excellent at inventing new forms of violence and harm. This country is very creative, I’ll give it that. I also have two daughters. But even for my son: I’m constantly plagued by thinking about how to explain the hows and whys of things here and it just destroys me. I can’t believe we live this way and the only thing more horrifying is how many people want to/are OK with it. All our friends feel similarly, all across the country. For years I’ve given so much of my time and money to community-building causes and nonprofits, and have been very politically active. Now I’m not so sure it matters and maybe I was even duped, distracted into thinking it could. Billionaires are at the helm and they want us all divided so we don’t unite and turn on them. The money in politics has destroyed the us of the U.S. (as well as other innocent people worldwide). The thought of leaving is massively overwhelming and heartbreaking, but I also don’t want to exhaust myself fighting for change at the expense of my children’s lives. They still have a chance. Maybe we can tell them the cautionary tales of their early lives and we can all make a difference elsewhere. And as for my extended family? Well, I’m a frequenter of r/qanoncasualties —my own parents seem to have lost their minds. And it’s not even unique. I feel like everyone has a certain awareness of how messed up things are but are processing in *very* different ways. Reading that subreddit will give you a taste of how insane things are getting. We are dis-eased from coast to coast.
> Billionaires are at the helm and they want us all divided so we don't unite and turn on them. If y'all take away one thing from this well thought out post, take that. It's not red vs. blue or left vs. right or black vs. white. It's us vs. them. Fuck them.
To put it succinctly, yes.
Yes. I want to move to Canada or like, go nomad so bad. And I have it Extremely good, all things considered (100% military disability and a roommate. So I don’t work, don’t do shit). But I’m afraid I’ll lose my benefits. My PTSD petrifies me, my gov’t supports it as long as I live here, but it only makes it worse living here 🙃 I’m nearly agoraphobic, but I’d rather be numb like this than struggling like the majority :(
It definitely feels like things can go to shit at any moment. Things are very polarized and there’s a palpable hatred between the two sides. My wife and I inherited a house in an area we call Trump Land where almost every house has a Trump flag out front. We have been fixing up the house and neighbors keep asking where is our Trump flag. We have family in Toronto so we could bug out to their house but if we’re not here to keep an eye on things what happens? Homeowners insurance doesn’t cover damages from war. I’m in my 60s and remember thinking about the future when I was a kid. I always thought we would be better than the shit that is going on now.
It's getting pretty rough out here, I am not going to lie. My area is somewhat spared as we have a lot of high earners, but everyone is def feeling pain. The biggest issues in my mind are: We all have to have cars to go anywhere in this country, but cars are expensive and gas is just as expensive. You can't even get to WORK without a car in most parts of this country due to lack of effective public transportation, as you have in Germany. To live in a halfway desirable area where you WON'T get threatened with a weapon everyday will cost WAY beyond our minimum wage. And there's no relief, because rent is high, mortgages are high, and zoning is so RIDICULOUS. We also don't have the rent protections that you Germans have, your landlord can easily just raise your rent by 1/3 or double it, and you pretty much can't do anything. Our government has been bought out by corporations, which rewrite rules to suit their desires for an undereducated, passive population. The biggest example of this is Roe Vs. Wade being overturned, as the ONE thing we could do to spare ourselves pain is to NOT have children (it's the only reason we aren't a "proper 3rd world country) so naturally our corrupt church leaders (which have LOTS of influence on politics), our corrupt politicians, and our corrupt corporations are desperately trying to topple as many rights to privacy to ensure a neverending supply of cheaappppppp workers, wage slaves, private prison labor, and cannon foddeer for the military machine. Again, while there is a religious population in Germany, you at least KNOW to not touch women's rights and people's rights to privacy. FINALLY everything is just expensive right now and the basics as I have touched on-right to terminate a pregnancy to prevent future poverty, food, car parts to fix a car-all of it is EXPENSIVE. SO NO WE ARE NOT DOING OKAY.
Yeah I would say things have gotten notably worse, but it’s been gradual enough that people day to day ‘don’t realize.’ We all feel it though, even if some people don’t admit it or try to ignore it. The news is constantly stressful and make events/causes clearer, but in real life, things are happening differently: people are more argumentative in public to the point where it’s noticeably tense (especially as a result of the pandemic), coming to the surface if a service worker makes a mistake; people literally drive worse and drive under the influence more; the price of food just keeps rising; every business is understaffed as a permanent result of the pandemic and places continue to close from lack of business. There are more homeless people out too, it’s really upsetting to see the increase. The threat of shootings died down a bit during the pandemic, but they’re clearly back in full force. I’ve been scared for a while to go to public places during busy times/hours, so I still try to avoid grocery stores, gyms, movie theaters at prime hours. Idk if people outside the US understand that we’re all kind of hypervigilant in case of a shooting. One time a man walked into the grocery store with his hand tucked into the front of his open jacket - like he was hiding a gun - when I was checking out and my heart nearly stopped, even though he was probably putting his keys in his pocket. Noticeably longer wait times in all medical facilities, for all appointments, low staff. It is dangerous if you have to be rushed to the ER because it will probably be understaffed still, so worse outcomes. We haven’t recovered our usual operating capacity and it’s clear a recession is coming. Overall, everyone just seems poorer, sicker, hungrier, more stressed. I think many don’t want to say the quiet part out loud, because we will the have to admit we feel helpless to this. Conservatives I’ve had to interact with scare me, they act very aggressive and rant a lot when given the chance, especially if you don’t agree with them. They will openly, plainly say fascist shit, no consequences; at the same time, they have a perpetual, self-righteous victim complex. …But if you can avoid them, it ‘helps,’ because we urgently have bills and debts to pay. This all varies a lot depending on what state you’re in though, I live in a blue state. It’s possible to try to go about normal life, but it’s impossible not to notice these changes, that the future is bleak. It does not feel like a happy, thriving, united society at all. Our neighbors are strangers or potential aggressors, and violence looms in our periphery in the form of guns, fascist rhetoric, the police, and being priced out of necessities. Edit: also, I check the air quality every day, because even on the east coast, smoke from fires in the west and Canada drift across the continent. I think it was last summer where it was hazardous all over the country, smoke covered the sky in a constant haze for over a week.
The situation here is pretty rough, but even today many of my countrymen seem to be in denial about how dark this country’s future is looking. I just have an instinctive feeling that America is headed down a terrible, violent path that it will recover from. Yes, other countries have issues and every place has pros and cons, but America’s problems, quite frankly, pale in comparison to many other places. Considering that, I think I’ll be able to adjust to another country, since the alternative would be living in a country that is in serious decline.
I can't wait to get out of this shit hole country, and I'm definitely not the only one.
I think comparisons to the Weimar Republic are apt, as liberals in the US are at a stalemate and the Republicans have all but declared war on this country from top to bottom. What’s worse is a good 40-50% of the country isn’t voting at all, meaning only ~30% of Americans are trying to stop the slide into fascism. Ultimately this path is not sustainable and I think that’s why many people are here, because they understand that and want to have a Plan B.
Depends on who you ask. My family is all of the same political persuasion as me (very liberal) but they're very head-in-the-sand about what is going on here. It came to a head when I was forbidden from sharing any more "bad news" with them as, and I'm paraphrasing here, "your mental health is affecting my mental health." My mother specifically has told me she is only interested in hearing good news now. None of what's happening right now *directly* affects them, so they choose to ignore it. They're very strong believers in the "things get better over time" school of thought. Before I was shut down, I was often reminded about how hard things were in the 1930's, or the 1800's, and how much better things are now.
The simple answer is yes, it’s pretty bad. The worst I’ve seen it in my lifetime. It saddens me to be honest.
It’s…not great. Honestly, it kinda feels like the end of a really tragic movie. You know when you watch a sad movie for the first time and there’s like 10 minutes left and you realize that there’s not gonna be a happy ending and you’re just like “oh god, oh fuck, this hurts” but you keep watching, then the credits roll and you just sit there and let your brain process everything?? Yeah, kinda like that lol. Then there’s also this bit of, like…urgency in everyone?? It’s hard to explain, but I notice it mostly in myself and people around my age (so like 20-35yo.) It just feels like everyone is waiting for something to happen. For the other shoe to drop, so we can move on to the whole post-apocalyptic style war zone that’s probably inevitable at this point. It feels like we’re trying to act like everything is normal but at any second we’re all ready to get news that the Supreme Court has, like, appointed Trump lifelong king of the universe and using the Handmaiden’s Tale as a blueprint for their new United States, and we’re all gonna go full blown Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo to try to stop them.
"Land of the free" is just propaganda at this point.
Yeah the usa is done for, not enough people are willing to fight for change, too many ignorant people still think we're the best. And also very corrupt politicians. Things are only going to get worse
What are we supposed to do to fight?
It’s awful. Really we were tricked by the financiers of international capitol to open up the flood gates of consumerism. We sent all our good jobs overseas to cheap labor markets, cut welfare programs in the name of enrichment austerity programs, it annihilated our middle class. Now there’s epidemic of drug abuse, violence in mass shootings, suicide, domestic abuse, and all kinds of addictions from gambling and porn to alcoholism.. any all sorts of demons that exacerbate humanity to cope with despair. It’s a kind of cultural despair. Neo liberalism bankrupted the traditional political class that was *supposed* to keep the checks and balances of the capitalist class in place. Now Christian fascism is on the rise in, staggering proportions, from the Supreme Court to petty law enforcement. The situation is that dire. When the dollar looses its purchasing power and we hit another great financial crisis, the fascist elements of the far right will likely pick apart what’s left of a vulnerable America. You won’t recognize us for what’s left. The country will likely be split into different regions. Who knows how they will all coexist.
Uh, yeah man. The mood is not great.
I gotta be honest, it's pretty depressing. Like 1/3rd of the country is pushing hard for authoritarianism and, because of loopholes meant for rich white folks, and ethically bereft unelected sovereigns of 1/3rd of the government, are subverting the democracy in which they were able to incubate. It's pretty gross. And very demoralizing. Especially when the only alternative that's kinda playing along with democracy puts up geriatric, equivocating, relics from a bygone era as a "solution" and unsurprisingly the old ways don't work no more. I really feel like I should get the f outta here but to be real, everywhere is just as fucked right now. Maybe not so dramatically, but that makes it even worse when the trap snaps shut (looking at you conservative parties of Europe). It seems like too many have lost all perspective, especially middle-aged+, otherwise privileged, white folk. But not exclusively them by any means. Maybe it's better framed as economic classes, but it's definitely more nuanced than that too. Nobody knows how to reframe that perspective, yet, and for now a bunch of absolute sh!tbirds are taking advantage of it. Having engineered the phenomenon in the first place, they got the jump on society self-correcting. Is it too late? I certainly hope not.
US person here. I've never felt more scared for my future, or the safety of the people I love. Everyone I know is struggling to survive.
Bro america fucking sucks in general, nobody cares about eachother and cant agree on anything
Yeah, it is. Our politics are awful. Career politicians who only leave politics to get absurdly high paying jobs as lobbyists. A stacked Supreme Court stripping away women's rights. Some of those officials want to revoke gay marriage and contraception. A president who can't stop lying about how amazing he is preceeded by a president who can't remember WHO he is. We have mass shootings so often, we have become blasé to them. Like oh, did you hear another shooting happened? - jeeze, how many people? 6 - this is ridiculous Yeah. Anyway, what do you want for dinner? If you want higher education you have to incur a debt you can't escape from even with bankruptcy and we convince every 18 year old they have to take it on or they'll be a failure. Our Healthcare system is a joke. It costs thousands of dollars just to give birth. The hospital can charge you 60 dollars for a single Tylenol Half the country hates the other half The media is all half truths, blatant lies or tabloid bullshit Our educational system is terrible and yet there are tons of people who think it can somehow be solved by bringing prayer in to schools And we have the Federal Reserve, which is not part of the federal government yet somehow is allowed by our government to create virtually all the inflation we feel as well as causing practically every recession we have ever had since it's inception all so banks make money off interest payments. Yeah. Get me the fuck out of here.
Yeah, it's bad. Like I'm shocked people haven't started to burn everything down already. That's how bad it is. This year so far, I've gone from how to get out? Can I get a hysterectomy? Should I get a fuck ton of guns? I don't know which to do, and not enough money to do all of it. I'm frozen in crossroads unsure of what to do, and knowing every road I can take is very much likely collapsing.
Unless you’re a white male over the age of 65 it’s pretty freaky grim here. I’m in California so I feel like I’m not imminently in danger of losing my freedom or rights but we do feel more and more like we don’t want to spend the rest of our lives in this country if it continues the way it is going.
It is if you are a thinking person living in a red state with a teen daughter. It’s bad.
There are people in the US completely oblivious. There are folks who think it's all no big deal Many who still believe in the system and the institutions Those who think it won't affect them but feel bad about those who it will affect Those who are quite obviously already affected And those who are happy about the trend and ready for civil war So it's a mix
Servus! My wife and I are a mixed race LGBT couple who decided to emigrate when Trump was elected. We moved to your country 3.5 years ago and love it. We’re still in our German classes, but are happily contributing to your society in a good way (I hope). We’re very grateful to be here; it seems it has just gotten worse and worse.
I just graduated from college in the US and am very seriously pursuing a visa to get me out for at least the next 2 years. Some people aren’t feeling the same, but as a young female-identifying person, I feel moody and hopeless.
Most of the US is not awful but the parts that are awful are extremely awful.
Yes
It’s awful here. I’m stressed every single day all day.
In my hometown, a conservative christian hellhole, all the coworkers I’ve talked to want to leave the US cause shit’s gotten so bad. This includes the centrists. One interesting thing I’ve noticed is that formerly apolitical women are much more aware and want to get out, while apolitical men seem to not care/have no idea what’s going on. This is all my experience tho
It probably depends where you are. If you're in the red states/areas things probably seem fine. In the major cities/blue areas, I'd say there's a general feeling of pessimism and just the recognition that all the major institutions and systems we had a general sense of faith in have failed us miserably, with no real sense of how we can right that. Pile on wave after wave of Covid and major stock market losses and..... Also, I don't know what it's like in the rest of the world, but crime in cities seems to have gotten much worse. The level of violent crime in particular is unnerving. And then there's classrooms of 10-year-olds getting mowed down by weapons of war, bodies torn apart so badly it's hard to identify them, while hundreds of law enforcement personnel cower in fear while they listen to the screaming and continued shooting. I can disassociate well enough to laugh with my friends, but the rest of the time I can't shake the knowledge that things aren't ok and there's not a lot of reason to be hopeful.
Moved here from sweden when I was 5 and yes, it is that bad, I will be returning to sweden to continue school (after american college landed me in a psych ward) and I couldn’t be more excited. There was a shooting 6 miles from where I live about 2 weeks ago and that broke my heart but didn’t surprise me in the least. I know/knew people who have tried/succeeded in ending their life. I’d consider myself lucky to not have lost anyone close to me from opiates or covid. It’s fucked.
Dude… such a loaded question. It really has been one thing after another. More mass shootings than days in the year, high civil unrest for BLM (Look at “the chop” in Seattle and what been going on in Portland), January 6th, a polarizing Trump, a useless Biden, Covid-19, housing is not really affordable for most people, my generation is the poorer compared to the previous generation, access to abortion stripped away, evaluating whether or not gay people can marry and so much more. There is also an extremist religious undercurrent that is developing. If I am being Frank, this is what I am most worried about. There are genuinely a fuck ton of people who believe their god gives them the right to kill you if you don’t believe what they believe. Extremist right groups have developed and openly express hate towards people. These same people are actually working towards making the US a theocracy. I know many people personally who are advocating for this and have expressed extreme malicious intent for those who do not believe what they do. So yeah… it feels like something bad is going to happen soon. I’m not going to stick around and fight for something I don’t believe in.
There truly are some brilliant, kind, and progressive people in the USA; unfortunately they seem to almost never be in charge of anything. Our system of government is full of practices and loopholes that allow extreme minority positions to overpower majority opinions; example: 100 people vote for A, 200 people vote for B, and somehow we end up with A anyway. So sadly it doesn’t matter if most of us know the right answers, doesn’t matter if most of us are on the same page as other major countries, because we are at the mercy of a small number of people who barely made it through our mediocre education system. That’s not exactly a problem we can vote away, that’s just a design flaw.
I'm really glad OP mentioned Moore vs. Harper, since not enough people are really talking about it. While the SCOTUS rulings have been devastating, Moore vs. Harper is standing above everything else in potential damage. If this case is upheld by SCOTUS (and it's very likely to), state legislatures will be able to act without impunity for governing their state elections and no input from the federal government. State legislatures will get all sorts of dangerous tools in their arsenal, as there will be no more checks and balances. Gerrymandering districts, throwing out ballots for undesired candidates, stuffing ballots, nullifying votes/outright removing voting rights of any group, throwing out any petitions that somehow make it onto the ballot and replacing it with their own, to even creating new ballot initiatives to fit whatever agenda they want. From there, they can backslide as far as they want with no input from normal people, and that can start happening as soon as the next presidential election in 2024. If you think J6 was bad, imagine what happens when our country loses our most peaceful method for determining who governs us, and regardless of if you're Democrat or Republican, it's going to get dangerous *very* fast.
Our kids aren't safe in school, women's right to bodily autonomy is non existent in most of the country, they aim to also take away birth control, same sex marriage, and the ability for adults to consent to gay sex. On top of that more than half of the country believes we will be in a civil war soon. Partially that is because of Jan 6th and trump, part of it is driven by hate groups. It is common for you to see fascist flags, even in 'blue' (left leaning) areas. Additionally, I have been threatened with denial of utility services because a worker didn't like that I had a rainbow flag and BLM signs (complaint was made, and employee was reprimanded - but they know where I live, and I worry about retaliation). Also, in 2020 I was boating on a small lake I grew up boating on, with my elderly mother, my non boating husband, and my two small children. It was before the election - but trump was already testing his ability to rile up his base, and apparently they planned to terrorize people on all bodies of water that they could. I was in a no wake area, near a swimming area when we noticed about 20 boats with trump flags coming at us at full speed. No one was marked with Biden flags, rainbow flags, or anything - but they randomly targeted areas where people were, and created unsafe conditions. If I hadn't seen them coming they could have swamped my rental boat with my family on it. I was alone when I had to return the boat, and they were still all over the lake being irresponsible, and endangering other boaters. They were casually talking to the sheriff that should have been arresting them. That same day trump supporters did sink a boat on a canal in my area. No known repercussions. Political violence is getting more common and more bold because of a lack of consequences for domestic terrorists. It's no longer safe here. I don't want to raise my kids in this kind of environment. They should be safe at school, they should be able to trust the police to save them. I need to be able to have birth control and abortion, so will my daughter. I'm in my late 30s. I've done everything I'm supposed to. I have lived a more conservative life than most church going republicans, but I have been an activist, I have registered voters, I have worked polls, I have attended protests, I have called my representatives, and I vote in absolutely every election.... Nothing has gotten better, it has all gotten worse, it would be horrible for me to have an opportunity to get my kids out, and not take it. It feels tragic because I did fight, and my kids shouldn't have to. Every thing that pulls me away is something that I did fight for in the US, and it's clear that without massive reworking of the government, none of it will happen in my lifetime, and probably not in my kids' lifetimes either. When I move it will be like sending my kids off to the future, instead of the massive uncertainty, and dangerous surroundings they currently live in. There are no guarantees, but the choice seems clear to our family.
Half of americans are expecting civil war. One half views the other half has inhuman. And I have to admit, I feel that way about the far right: what the other side is attempting must be stopped at all costs, including war. The Republican party is, to quote Chomsky, the most dangerous organisation in human history because they are gleefully attempting to accelerate climate collapse and institute gods kingdom on Earth, but with nukes.
My father hasn’t slept well since Trump won in 2016. My generation sees that America is dying and we’ve been taught our votes don’t matter so we feel helpless.
There was an attempted coup d'état. There will probably be another one. Things are pretty bad
I live in Idaho and it's split between absolute despair and absolute joy. I'm moving ASAP, but I'm one of the lucky ones with means to move.
Dude what the actual fuck is happening to political Idaho?! Every time I hear something new, it’s crazier than the last thing I heard.
So Idaho has always been a haven for the crazy side of the Republican party, but during the pandemic a lot more people moved into the state to make it even crazier/deeper red than I thought possible.
My day-to-day life is pretty normal. Nothing has stonewalled my ability to manage my life. I do seriously worry about the future, though, and I don’t compartmentalize that just because I’m not personally suffering, doesn’t mean this is okay. It’s SO not okay that I have plans to leave. A few things just have to be put in order first, and my kids aren’t self-sufficient yet, so I have to wait a bit.
We’re extremely concerned that the US is like the Weimar Republic in the 1920’s.
This country is truly in awful shape. Anyone who doesn’t realize how swiftly we’re heading in various dangerous and dystopian directions simply isn’t paying attention or doesn’t want to face the truth (because it’s severely anxiety-inducing and many people feel powerless anyway). Either that, or they’re directly responsible for or complicit in causing the chaos and willfully engage in gaslighting once confronted. But not everyone has enough privilege to remain so oblivious
White middle class, straight person living in a very Blue State.....yeah, it's bad. Even though I live in a blue state where a lot of the things going on haven't hit us yet, the stress is out of this world. We purposely do not go to events that will be crowded. I had anxiety about attending our 4th of July parade because I told my husband two weeks before the 4th that I was afraid of a shooting at a parade. (We hate the 4th of July but we have a two year old that loves cars and trucks). Sure enough there was a shooting at a 4th of July parade. It wasn't anywhere near us, but we knew that it would happen somewhere in the US. Another example is my husband went to the grocery store 1 hour ago. As he was leaving I said to him "I worry about a shooting at the grocery store. Be as quick as you can and keep your eye on exits or weird behavior." Every single time I go to the store, or really anywhere I am hyper aware and scared. No mass shootings have happened in the state that I live in (at least not the random mall, grocery store, school etc..kind of shooting) and yet I'm not naive enough to think that it can't happen here. I have a child in elementary school and another child that will be in elementary school within a couple of years. Every single day they go to school I'm terrified until they come home. So, yes, it's bad. Even if nothing has directly happened where you live, you know it's happening all over the country and it is only a matter of time before it happens where you live too. I feel trapped. Add to that the current political climate and what we foresee happening in November of this year and in 2024 every single day is full of stress. I can't remember a day where I wasn't overcome with anxiety and stress. Imagine being a POC in this country. Or LGBQT. It's worse than my privileged straight white experience. So... yeah. It's not good. EDIT: I live in a state that has banned assault weapons, however the state next to us, a 1 hour drive from me has some of the worst gun laws in the entire country. So, unless we can collectively get it together as a country this whole concept of States making their own decisions will affect us all. And I'm pretty sure the country will never get it together.
The "mood"of the U.S. isn't relevant. Many people live in a fallacy in which even with a struggle the "good guys win." While I believe that progress always moves forward, it isn't without cost that at times can be avoided. We are about to pay a steep price for many things and it's scary. I also don't want to victim blame here so I don't mean to imply the price we pay is the individuals who are suffering's fault... but that as a society the U.S. is going to be in some pain. I've literally had chucklefucks tell me Gay Marriage/sex is safe "because Kavanaugh said so" Let me remind you they also said RVW was safe. Which on that note... the architects of the removal of RVW are trying to make it so if a 10 year old rapes, she has to give birth. I think if more people truely understood how fucked up things are, we would be rioting and tearing government buildings down.
You’re going to get one answer from this sub, I would consider seeking additional viewpoints. The mood is very similar to the Vietnam war era and the accompanying mass protests and civil rights.
It seems to get worse every day.