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  • This way of thinking is similar to a reverse great man theory. Like an evil man theory or something. That people are somehow entirely in control of the programming that gets put into their brains. That some choose to be evil, and others choose not to be. That is not the case clearly. The circumstances of ones birth are not irrelevant, and to say they are is ridiculous.

    Indoctrination is a system for getting people to think a certain way. This system controls the material conditions of targets to shape their development. Those of us who don't subscribe to those same beliefs arent somehow immune to it, and didn't break the programming due to some sort of superior cognitive ability.

    The reason some people don't fall into it is because of their material conditions. Something in their life disrupted the propagandizing system, and caused a reaction in them that slowly grew into them seeing past it. It's all based on the material conditions someone is in, and those have natural variations because no system is perfect.

    It's not a coincidence that most people who become anti-capitalists in the west are not wealthy, or have some other distinguishing feature that exposed the contradictions to them.

    So while yes some people don't end up getting brainwashed it's not really because there's anything different about how their brain works, or about them as a person. It's just the luck of the draw.

    I like to think that even if i was born rich, and exactly what society expected of me, and had a great life that I'd still be a communist, but if i look at it objectively i probably wouldnt be.

    The world is shaped by its conditions, and so are the people in it. Now can some of those conditions include certain mental differences like increased empathy, or decreased empathy caused by genetic differences? Maybe. Or that could just be shaped by your conditions too, and learned over time.

    Either way i think it's important to note that people are simply products of their environment for the most part. So it's entirely valid to say Israelis in general are genocidal freaks because that's the environment they've created there. The statistical outliers are simply caused by the systemic brainwashing within Israel itself not being perfect. Something about those peoples conditions gave them an opportunity to see through it. Perhaps even gave them the ability to do so too.

    Now that doesn't mean we should say it's out of their control. And they somehow arent concious of what theyre doing. They are. People who have been so thoroughly corrupted by genocidal and fascist ideology are like cancerous cells. Even if they are still technically human they must be excised for the safety of the whole. We can recognize though that they are simply corrupted, and that in some cases they can be saved. While still punishing them for their crimes, and having a 0 tolerance policy for that behavior.

    It's important though to recognize the root cause of things like the mass psychosis of a state like Israel. Because that is the only way we prevent it from repeating. And we can use the same methods for controlling someones conditions, and turning them into a fascist to instead turn them into a decent, and kind person. This is a large part of what China's cultural revolution did. It restructured society to make it so the very culture was more likely to produce people who could function in the new society. Failing to do this successfully, and letting old cultural artifacts, and old institutions that breed fascist thought to continue existing would be dooming yourself to repeating history.

  • "Pacifist zionism" just means you don't personally want to pull the trigger.

    And mass brainwashing ain't a thing; it's very hard to convince someone to go against their material interests:

    https://redsails.org/masses-elites-and-rebels/

    People have a decolonial perspective or even become socialists because it is in their perceived material interests to do so. If one can't make the case for this then there is no persuasion. That is what education here means.

    • And mass “brainwashing” ain’t a thing; it’s very hard to convince someone to go against their material interests

      This is something I've been trying to tackle with, and I may just not be educated enough to get away from this line of thinking.

      Are there not working class and immigrants who vote against their material interest: those that will remove their social benefits or those that will deport them for not being white? The line of thinking they tend to go through is that they aren't the ones causing the problems of their society. Like citizens of Nazi Germany believing the reason for their country going down the drain was because of those of the Jewish faith. How about US president Lyndon B Johnson saying the quiet part out loud of the poorest white man will empty his pocket if you convince him he's better than the poorest black man.

      I think your emphasis on convince may help as the fact that Engels logically came to his conclusions about the defects of capitalism and where class society will go. Have there been more capitalists that have come to the same conclusions? I think I saw a headline about a CEO that has stated socialism is the only way for society not to fall, but I don't remember who that was.

      I'm rewatching Fallout with my wife, and there was a an implication that communists are merely cultists. One of the main characters of the show out rights says that then gets told "no you" with capitalists about to cause the nuclear annihilation because it's in their material interest. This does convince the main character to go to a communist meeting, but there it is revealed where they know the main villain of the season from. During that reveal, there are people in a vault shown to be worshiping the villain in cultish behavior: participating in an orgy, drinking blood, chanting, and wiping the ashes of their enemies on their face; a flag is unraveled, with a design that is obviously trying to paint a "cult of personality". This is all deliberate from the directing shots and writing. I guess I have to ask what was the logical process in the minds of the writers.

      It is in the best interest of capitalists to paint history with a negative outlook on collectivism. It is in the best interest of the proletariat to question that retelling of history, but a lot don't and just accept the version they are given. I know this example is just anecdotal, but my brother in law is a history major, poli sci minor that joined the navy to "see the world and get an affordable college education." He took Soviet history courses from someone who has stated they are from the times of the USSR [could have been a child during the fall, I haven't asked]. He's read the diary of Che Guevarra - got dirty looks from his teacher for suggesting that as his reading. He's working class with a retail job, is "fully aware of the atrocities of his country", and yet, he's not communist. He saw my copy of Liberalism - A Counter-History, asked what it was about, could see that Liberalism is the ideology of genocide, racism, slavery, and sexism. One of the times I've talked to him about Soviet history, I prodded with questions to see how much and what he retained, and he wanted to emphasis what a "monster" Stalin was - having killed "millions" of people. One time my wife and I got into a heated political argument, and I learned he's talked about me negatively to her when she yelled "David is right, you're nothing but a Stalin worshipping tankie." I've shown him my collection of books, with one of the first being Losurdo's book on Stalin. I told him that capitalist historians have a material interest to paint specifically Stalin as an inhumane monster and he bounced back with Yezhov's execution and the erasure of him from that photograph. This was before my deeper dive into the history, but I told him that could have been a falsification as I don't know how people were able to do that in the 1930s, and showed him Furr's book on Yezhov. He showed no interest in reading anything I had, but has offered his books: one of his poli sci books that explain how the media is the 4th wing of the government, and one on how the US help shaped a shadow government in Japan after WWII. I wouldn't be surprised of the reason why he smokes weed all the time is to help him block out the horrors of this capitalist ruled world.

      My wife loves to watch a popular physician on YouTube, Dr. Mike. He recently came out with a video that was more of a retelling on how each of the "dictators" of history died. Surprisingly it does make mention of some capitalists like Christopher Columbus, but that's not the egregious part. It definitely tried to paint communism as worse than fascism. With no mention of Hitlers kill count, but went of his way to declare Stalin's as "6 million to 60 million." This physician is from Russia, and, of course, moved to the US when he was very young. He's a private practiced physician, so I can see how it is literally in his best interest to paint it this way. But, my wife, and other liberal watchers, won't question what he's rehashed as it confirms what they learned, or they just trust this popular celebrity doctor.

      Apologies this is so long and for springing this on you. The idea of brainwashing has started to feel like Liberal projection, and I haven't had an outlet on my thoughts. I'll recollect my thoughts after reading the article you posted.

      • In each of the examples you have presented it is likely in the short to medium term (at least) they feel that their capitalist society of choice provides them materially greater benefit than the alternatives.

        As westerners, or those who seek to become one, we in general benefit from the exploitation of the global south; we are on the wrong side of imperialism (from a global south perspective) and it is through this power dynamic we seek narratives that give license for our bigotries.

        What we consider the modern west - child labour laws, pension, universal health care, materity leave, sick pay, womens rights, universal education etc all came following the October revolution that created the USSR. Despite centuries of imperial wealth extracted and exploited from the global south it was only when workers in the west used the leverage of the USSR to threaten domestic revolution did they get these concessions:

        https://redsails.org/concessions/

        A faction of the capital class in the west saw the accelerated development and accepted that they would need to invest in "human capital" to catch up - the most famous example is FDR's New Deal. And started reversing these concessions with the fall of the USSR.

        This is not withstanding that >= 75% Nazis were defeated by the USSR and they helped overthrow various formal colonisers around the world.

        In other words the likes of your brother-in-law owe their lives to Stalin.

        They are not stupid. They intelligently seek narratives that gives them license to justify their bigotry. It is very difficult to convince them (though maybe not impossible) because you will need to give them an alternative where they will benefit within the short to medium time greater than what the current system offers them.

        Remember everyone could look up the same information you do, and when they do not - especially when you have even offered them a chance to educate themselves - you then have to consider there is something larger at play beyond our ability to "convince".

        Marxism is a science and our theory of political change cannot be we are "smarter" than others.

        I do not have an answer to the solution. Men and women more intelligent and charismatic than we have tried and failed in the west. Even Marx thought the first workers' state would come would come out of the nations of greatest concentration of capital of the West but it did not come to be.

        I suspect the answer will at least involve a deep statistical analysis of western populations to see who will benefit from the overthrow of USAmerican Imperialism within the short term and therefore has the greatest revolutionary potential.

        Marxism is neither workerism nor populism.

        I suspect while western communists try and fail to build mass movements based on scientific socialism the Global South will force the West's material conditions as they increase their leverage, especially given the events of the past 2 years.

        The basic call to action looks something like this:

        Stop accusing the masses of being “brainwashed.” Stop treating them as cattle, stop attempting to rouse them into action by scolding them with exposure to “unpleasant truths.”

        Accept instead that they have been avoiding those truths for a reason. You were able to break through the propaganda barrier, and so could they if they really wanted to. Many of these people see you as the fool, and in many cases not without reason.

        Understanding people as intelligent beings, craft a political strategy that convincingly makes the case for why they and their lot are very likely to benefit from joining your political project. Not in some utopian infinite timescale, but soon.

        If you cannot make this case, then forget about convincing the person in question. Focus instead on finding other people to whom such a case can be made. This will lead you directly to class analysis.

      • My wife loves to watch a popular physician on YouTube, Dr. Mike.

        Are you and your wife aware that he is a committed Zionist who regularly goes to Israel, works for pro-Israeli groups and went on so-called "birthright" trips?

        https://www.timesofisrael.com/doctor-mike-treats-birthright-participant-on-israel-bound-flight/

        Also, he financially supports the fascist Ukrainian regime:

        https://web.archive.org/web/20220327183657/https://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/ny-dr-mike-varshavski-ukraine-russia-boxing-match-20220327-veue5ahjrzcnzfnrfrkedzjnhm-story.html

  • Okay the cat part is kinda cringe but they have a point: Israel can indoctrinate as many children into being murderous pedophiles as it wants but there will always be those who escape the programming. Most of them will probably end up as liberals who think they can UwUify Zionism into something progressive but some particularly based individuals will be able to see through that bullshit and recognize the white supremacist settler-colonialism for what it is: the same fascist beast that murdered their grandparents in gas chambers.

    That being said it's entirely fair to assume any Israeli you meet is not that self-aware. Most aren't and probably will never be.

  • What’s this purple cat nonsense?

  • i mean, i agree with the cat guy in the part that being jewish is not immediately synonymous with sionism. it's not so reddit for me

  • Are they talking about the Cheshire Cat? I don’t know any other purple cats.

  • EEK! The cat really went hard with that quote.

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