Comradely Rants

I'm going to be very short on this one.

Brian Berletic said it best or earliest, referring to Thailand, but I've said it in private to myself about my own country before he said it on youtube, so I'm going to paraphrase him:

"When you have no own national language, no investment into your own culture, no media, no digital walls to keep foreign influence out, you have no ability to tell your own story or protect your own interests."

The right-wing, is destroying our media, because their basic thinking goes like this, although this is true for all current Dutch political parties: "We have US media to take care of us. What we have should just repeat whatever the US says."

The only group I can say that's neutral on this are the Marxists thrown out of the Socialist Party as the Socialist Party here I will describe as yet another pro-US Feminist Party who threw out the tankies for not being woke.

So I keep saying it:

The EU need an own language that's not English, French is okay, and even Russian is if the EU fails and Russia takes over. Otherwise we keep being stuck doing things what a country in another continent wants without any consideration of anyone living here.

We need tech companies and apps just like China has if we want to strengthen our nations.

So far, the only country doing so really is Russia. It's a bit sad, because the other country that really wanted to do so is France, but they lack the power of Germany and Germany isn't doing anything to further EU integration to my knowledge.

I put my hopes on this Bubble Tea society failing miserably economically. Maybe, maybe we will enter a more reasonable movement that understands the direction the world is going in.

But I fear we're going headstrong into Anglo-fascism first instead.

It's the same as the US.

Hong Kong: All they want is democracy. Donbas: It's a Russian invasion!

You know these people in Luhansk and Donetsk Republic are willing to die to get out of Ukraine.

It's the reason why Russia doesn't want Ukraine to join NATO. Half the country potentially wants to join Russia. Are we going to fight a world war over a majority of people in a region wanting to leave the nation, even more than the Hong Kong population did.

With the Hong Kong situation, it's yet again, 'Britain gave them democracy. Chinese promised to retain the democracy. They lied.'. That's a three times no there. Hong Kong was vassal state without any form of democracy, so it was a dictatorship through and through under a democracy. How does that happen eh? Furthermore, mainland China promised to improve it's democracy, which they did, with the promise from the British side that China had sovereignty over Hong Kong national security and defense issues.

People are constantly now making stuff up what the US is doing and what Russia and China are doing in order to excuse their anti free trade, and anti-democratic and anti-freedom actions.

If it's a Russian invasion, then of course you can oppress and genocide the people in the Donbass region. If Hong Kong demonstrators "just want freedom", then of course a little bit of terrorism is allowed.

Going back to the Hong Kong situation. Like Donetsk and Luhansk, a majority of people wanted to at least remove their oligarchically elected leader from office. And yes, I get it, such elections aren't very democratic. But during the entire protest, calls for democracy was put on the backburner.

What they really wanted and what the whole was about, was to build a wall between them and Shenzhen, with Shenzhen quickly becoming the richer city. It's kind of like East and West- Berlin, except that it's West Berlin that would be the poor one in the middle of the country and they didn't build the wall to keep their citizens from fleeing, but to keep the East Berliners out from treating the West-Berliners like equals and not like gods to the dirt poor peasants they were.

If they had gotten independence, the situation would immediately turn into a civil war again as just like Ukraine, a significant part of the city rather wants to be part of China, seeing how Shenzhen is richer and they have to deal with that daily as they live at the mainland border, rather than the metropolic island.

That's why the demonstrators felt the need to lie and support the prevention of extradition of an axe murderer murdering a young woman in cold blood for cheating on him, in order to demonstrate for what they really wanted, retain the illusion of their status as the richest, most powerful city in China, to which they've frankly lost by 2020 to Shenzhen in PPP per capita.

So despite a majority being in favor of the protests in Hong Kong, I disagree with all of them for having a pipe dream that can only be upheld by being more and more violence as they keep losing power, thus throwing into an economic abyss. The mainland rightfully believes that this is not a smart decision and considers the protesters to be like children led to the chompers. The organiszers already felt the need to lie in order to hold the demonstrations and while the city used to be a safe haven for people fleeing from mainland China, mainland Chinese between 2014 and 2019 entered Hong Kong as "just another rich Chinese city" (since 2020 it's spoiled brat city) and looking at the attitudes during those demonstrations, where pro-US Hong Kongers were constantly beating up every pro-China person they saw, it got pretty clear on who is oppressing whom and why.

Back to the Donbas situation, it is straight forward. Russia is richer, the protesters are sons and daughters of Russians who moved into Ukraine during the Soviet period. Ukraine, already poor is further going backwards economically. They border Russia. They want out and they'll get richer if they do.

This will keep happening and so it's no wonder that a "if we think you attack one of our members, you attack all of us" NATO isn't very welcome to Russia and pro-Russians wanting to separate themselves from near-NATO nations, in which any secession, of which some of the the Hong Kong 2019 demonstrators were opting for, is always seen as a direct Russian invasion.

P.S. Dutch state media made extremely suggestive language that Russia blocked gas going to Germany (via Nordstream 2) and that this is evil, while just a few weeks ago they agreed with the US to shut down Nordstream 2.

What planet am I living on?

Good god! It's why I started these rants today. I actually have wanted to do them a long time ago, but only today did I find an outlet.

The centre-right, or perhaps I should say the right-wing magazine of the Netherlands, Elsevier Weekblad, continuous to amaze me.

This week I read about an opinion piece on the ECB. It was also a call to step out of the euro. The guy blames the ECB policies on southern Europe and said that the US and English central banks were doing better. Then he warns that continuing the policy could cause a quarrel with examples given throughout the article.

Like, no dude, YOU are the example of causing quarrel. YOU are putting up blame! That's one. Two, when you are saying that "quantitative easing", where do you think that English term comes from? Do you really think that's coming from Spain or Italy?

NO!! The ECB's policy is MIRRORING THE US! And that's not a consequence of it's policy, IT IS THE POLICY!

The EU is full of US puppets and they're not doing anything other than looking at what the US is doing for almost everything they do.

They read the Wall Street Journal, Politico and The Financial Times for guidance. None of these are EU and so none of them are acting on EU behalf of any EU nation.

In fact, the article writer is one of them as his main complaint is that the ECB is not mirroring the US enough. The ECB's only difference with the US FED is a slightly lower interest rate. When the US FED is at 0.25%, the ECB is at 0 or -0.25%. To prevent runaway price inflation, you need to mirror or go above your price inflation rate, which right now is something like 5-10% in the EU? In the US it's 7-15%. And as the US is not raising their rates fast enough, so won't the ECB.

Mirroring the US further is going to crash the euro and stepping out of it means you're going to go down even quicker. They're going to do both.

And I'll bet that when the Netherlands is going to step out of the euro, they won't reintroduce the guilder, but call their currency the dollar as well, because they'll think it will sell well. Ha. Morons.

I think my subsequent rants are going to much shorter.

Nuclear energy is expensive. Wind is cheaper. World Solar power growth is around 25% a year. It takes 5-20 years to build a nuclear power plant.

Let's say it takes 15 years to build all the nuclear power plants you need to offset Russian gas. Massive project.

With 25% growth a year you get a doubling of solar power in the world every 3 years. World solar power is around 25% of world nuclear power at this moment. So in around 6 years it should equalize it and then in another 9 years if like a miracle the nuclear output doubled in those 15 years, an amazing feature for it's run course, it would still be dwarfed by solar.

And while wind is growing at a slower rate, it's also going to surpass nuclear with ease.

This not even going to be a challenge.

What is a challenge however is natural gas. As unlike nuclear, natural gas is cheap.

But no, "Russian gas is evil" and therefor shall not be bought. We will only buy expensive frozen shale gas from the US.

This will cripple our economy, but let's sanction the Russians and while we're collapsing, blame everyone but ourselves for worshipping the US.

Because really, that's our current politics right now.

I'm Dutch myself and I'm seeing my country has fallen into a what I would call a bubble tea society since around 2010, like most nations in Europe and some nations in Asia.

I derived this term from someone describing my country as a cheese cover, as his opinion was that the companies he worked for were doing little business with large international corporations, mainly the US.

But I look at it differently and would say, the US is the only thing we look at, we put ourselves and the other four eyes as secondary, our allies as non-existent and Russia and China as "ridiculously evil". And no, those quotes do not signify my disagreement. It signifies me quoting someone describing China without a hint of sarcasm.

That's why I prefer the term Bubble Tea Society, as I argue the Hong Kong protests flag waving and US anthem singing is incredibly anachronistic for a nation into economic downfall, while it sits inside, not next to, but inside the current world's greatest economic superpower.

With more anachronistic (I would have expected pro-China groups to pop up, like pro-Russian seperatists in the Donbass) groups from Thailand, Myanmar and Taiwan, they form the Milk Tea alliance, although really it should be called the Bubble Tea alliance due to Bubble Tea craze happening at the same time as the Hong Kong protests of 2019.

But I guess Bubble Tea alliance lends itself too easily for their opponents to call them out for living in a cultural US bubble, while China isn't just Asia's growing sole superpower, but economically surpassed even the US in power purchasing terms and is getting stronger still.

To describe a bubble tea alliance, I would say that it's not just that our politicians are puppets, but the entire society is completely revolved around it. The people pretend to take pride that they're supposedly worldly and international, but in reality they openly despise their own culture and language, they worship the US in everything and make every excuse they can and spit in the face of everyone else.

Just to give an example

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELD2AwFN9Nc

This comedic "America first, the Netherlands second". at first glance looks like it's mocking the US and the Dutch country itself. But really, it's a giant "Please please please be good to us, we beg you" love letter to the US when the US started showing it's first obvious signs that it is spiraling out of economic and political control and is on it's way to a full collapse. Even though the Netherlands is more dependent on China on imports and exports, there's never going to be a video with a narrator saying how much the Netherlands depends on them. Or Russia, or Germany, or France for that matter even though these countries are much closer to the Netherlands than the US.

It's sycophant.

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Als Nederlander zie ik dat mijn land sinds ongeveer 2010 aan het vervallen is naar wat ik alleen kan beschrijven als een bubbelthee maatschappij, zoals de meeste landen in Europa en sommige in Azië ook zijn.

Ik ontleen deze term aan iemand die Nederland omschreef als 'kaasstolp Nederland'. Zijn mening was dat bedrijven waarvoor hij werkte weinig zaken deden met grote internationale bedrijven, vooral de VS en dus een land is dat wel heel erg inwaarts kijkt.

Maar ik kijk er anders tegenaan en zou zeggen, de VS is het enige waar we naar kijken, we zetten onszelf en de andere Anglo-landen als secundair, onze bondgenoten als niet bestaand en Rusland en China als "belachelijk kwaadaardig". En nee, dit citaat komt niet uit het feit dat de twee woorden wil laten overdrijven, ik citeer iemand's beschrijving van China zonder blikken of blozen of enige aanwijzing van sarcasme.

Daarom geef ik de voorkeur aan de term bubbelthee-maatschappij, want ik betoog dat de VS vlaggenzwaaiende en Amerikaans volkslied zingende Hong Kongse demonstranten, zeer conversatief of zelfs anachronistisch voor een natie kiest die bezig is economisch in te storten, terwijl ze zelf binnen de grootste economishe supermacht bevindt. Jaja, niet ernaast. Er in!

Met nog meer anachronistische leden (ik had echt verwacht dat er pro-China groepen zouden opduiken, zoals pro-Russische separatisten in de Donbas) uit Thailand, Myanmar en Taiwan vormen ze het melkthee-verbond, hoewel die eigenlijk het bubbelthee-verbond zou moeten heten, omdat de bubbelthee rage rondom diezelfde periode ontstond als de Hong Kong protesten van 2019.

Maar ik vermoed dat het bubbelthee-verbond zich te gemakkelijk uitleent aan kritiek van hun tegenstanders als een bananenrepublieksverbond, waarin de bananen de Hong Kongse demonstranten zelf zijn. Geel van buiten, blank van binnen. En dat terwijl China niet alleen de grootste en nog steeds groeiende supermacht in Azië is, maar economisch zelfs de VS in koopkracht overtreft en verder zal overtreffen.

Om de bubbelthee-maatschappij verder te omschrijven, wil ik zeggen dat het een maatschappij is die niet alleen onze politici vazallen zijn van de Anglo-cultuur, maar dat de hele samenleving er helemaal om draait. Inwoners van het land blinken trots uit hoe werelds en internationaal ze zijn, aanbidden ze slechts één cultuur die niet de hunne is, negeren ze de rest en verachten ze openlijk hun eigen cultuur en taal.

Om maar een voorbeeld te geven

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELD2AwFN9Nc

Deze komische "America eerst, Nederland tweedst". lijkt op het eerste gezicht de spot te drijven met de VS en met het Nederland zelf. Maar in werkelijkheid is het een smeekbrief. Een "Oh lieve lieve VS, we zijn je zóóóó dankbaar. We maken ons zorgen, maar beloven je, we zullen altijd goed voor je zijn. Kus, Nederland.". Het is naast een smeekbrief dus ook een liefdesbrief. En dat terwijl de VS zijn eerste tekens begon te vertonen dat het economisch en politiek uit de hand aan het lopen is en op weg is naar een volledig verval, wat normaal gesproken zou moeten betekenen dat men moet erkennen van verval, dat dit machtsvacuüm gaat betekenen en dat Nederland hierop moet voorbereiden. Maar in plaats daarvan zetten de Nederlanders zich, net als Hong Kongers, de hakken in het zand.

Ook al is Nederland voor in- en uitvoer afhankelijker van China dan de VS, toch zal er nooit een video komen met een televisiestem die vertelt in hoeverre Nederland wel niet afhankelijk van China is op een zeer gewillig zelf-kastijdende kruiperige snobbistische wijze. En of het nou Rusland, Duitsland, of Frankrijk is, ook al liggen de laatste twee landen praktisch vlakbij Nederland, deze liefdesbrief zal alleen de VS betreffen.

Nederland is verworden tot een vernederland met trotse kruipers.

Please for the love of god shut the fuck up

If theres one thing I really dislike, its when people try to force their own opinion on others. Liberals do that all the time, for example when they come across someone who questions the supposed "Uighur genocide".

But its not just liberals, a lot of leftists and communists online show the same behaviour. Except they hold the opposite view on certain questions. But when faced with someone who holds the "wrong" opinion, they are just as fierce in trying to force their views on others. Edit, I should add that I also used to do this a lot.

In my opinion, this kind of behaviour wont get us anywhere. Nobody will change their opinion because someone online said that they were wrong, and threw a dozen sources at them. Instead they will probably get angry, and strengthen their belief out of spite.

I think what we should do instead is try to accept that everyone is entitled to their opinion, even if we disagree. This leads to much more fruitful discussions, where we can get to know the opinions of others without anyone getting upset. And even if we disagree on some issues, there are surely others where we agree, and can work together to make something positive.

Rant over.

@AgreeableLandscape's post about the book 1984 by George Orwell just spurred my thoughts and I felt like sharing. Nothing more, just my take on it over the years:

The narratives about the telescreens struck me the most, seeing how they were used to express a pervasive, unavoidable presence of snitches and thought policing present in every waking moment in the fictional, strawmanned communist society.

Western capitalist nations these days are total surveillance states, everything you do from either an internet connection or being out in public under the collective eye of uncountable and often unseen cameras is recorded somewhere, on some remote server, with fuck knows how much metadata to accompany it, kept for some unknowable amount of time, if not forever, with no accountability or control over any of it granted to the citizens being surveilled.

Your every bank and card transaction (with accompanying video if made in-person) and records of debt/credit are stored digitally with multiple backups around the country impervious to activist destruction or weather events, but accessible to anyone in the government or corrupted police forces at any time. You're opted in, with or without consent or knowledge, to a corrupt and unaccountable credit reporting system that tracks all your financial activity throughout your life (frequently without accuracy) and determines how easy of a time you'll have in this modern hell wherein money is held higher than any deity and is needed for literally every aspect of simply living.

Your smartphone, equipped with multiple cameras and a microphone, operated by hardware and firmware made by privatised capitalist entities (frequently Qualcomm), is equally accessible to state-level agencies; LineageOS or whatever will mostly keep Google from harvesting an ocean of your personal data, but it doesn't help you when the cellular radio firmware (baseband) is so often a closed "binary blob" of unknowable code that interacts with the network at a level below and independent of the authority of the OS software, even when the device is off. These combined with the newer "smart TVs" are the literal, actual telescreens which watch and listen to everything we do in service of capitalist and neoliberal masters.

Every moment of interaction with any police is recorded in sound and video (unless they had plans to murder you in advance, in which case the surveillance is turned off). Your ISP holds all records of your interactions with every website you visit, say something naughty enough about a shithead neoliberal politician on a privatised social platform, or talk enough bad about the system of capitalism itself, and all your details are gleefully turned over to the pork at their request and you get a knock at your door. A lesser form of this snitching is seen when "owners" of intellectual """"property"""" rat out users in bittorrent swarms sharing movies etc., casting the widest net possible to increase chances of a life-ruining lawsuit sticking to some of them, and they do it thousands of times per day with full compliance from the ISPs due to laws written by and for the oligarchy to protect capital interests.

Modern journalism and news are perverted, falsified, and shaped in equal parts by both a violent, highly individualist and reactionary society who have been conditioned to respond only to negative stories, and by force of being controlled from by a small number of multinational megacorporations handing down doctrines of biased pro-capitalism horseshit to keep the narrative on the side of the oligarchy.

I could keep going but I have other shit to do. What I'm trying to say with all this is even though 1984 was apparently written to show what some strawmanned "communist" dystopia would be like, in reality and bittersweet irony it ended up envisioning capitalism to the fucking letter.

I picked up this book because it's a "people's history" as Parenti rightfully calls it and I wanted to read something that isn't theory but still somewhat related to MLism.

Also, I had to study the play Julius Caesar by Shakespeare in school. The play portrayed the characters are noble Roman men. Apparently, Julius Caesar was becoming a favourite of the masses and was therefore getting too ambitious. So, a posse of other Romans hatch out a plot to assassinate him to preserve the democracy. Sounds familiar? I forgot what happens after. I barely passed that class.

But, from reading Parenti's book, turns out that every Roman nobleman sucked big time. They were feudal-bourgeoisie who extracted massive rents from poor people. They lent money with high interest rates. They cheated people out of public land. They lived lavish lives while the masses were forced to live in asymal conditions. They traded their women as political pawns. All of them owned slaves.

Julius Caesar (also a slaveowner) was assassinated not because he was becoming too "ambitious", but because he won a civil war against the ruling class and wanted to enact equitable changes like land reforms, debt forgiveness etc.

As you can see, the reality is quite different from the rosy tragedy depicted in the play, in which the common people are portrayed as a fickle crowd that are swayed by any display of oratorship. Although just a play, IMO it's fair to expect it to do reality some justice, but we know why it is the way it is. But this weird fixation with depicting upper-class wretched men as "noble" is not limited only to Shakespeare but is also exhibited by historians, but old and recent, as shown by Parenti in the way he quotes them.

Parenti is a treasure. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.