the_dunk_tank
It's the dunk tank.
This is where you come to post big-brained hot takes by chuds, libs, or even fellow leftists, and tear them to itty-bitty pieces with precision dunkstrikes.
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All the people who post on reddit are pretty much just evil demons. They're aware of how things work. How could they not be when they're constantly saying "Pfft. All these MARXIST tankie McTankersons talking about value and workers and whatever. It's like, hey man, stop harshing the vibe!" They read the random paragraphs and instantly their brain sections it off so they can cope in real time. We all do it with information we don't want to internalize. Like horrifying news, whatever else. You read it, process it, "know it", but it's pushed off somewhere in your mind beyond real comprehension because it directly opposes your chosen beliefs.
Anyway, so that's one type of person basically beyond help. The posters who are open neolibs.
Heavily generalizing, I think there's two groups. The reddit demons and the "truly ignorants." And I don't mean ignorant of western, American, exploitation of China, etc. Everyone knows about that. Maybe they'll deny it, but, yeah. I mean those who know about it but sort of accept it because this is the life and world they born in to and they were told all along the way that the people of China, etc. must suffer in order for this world to keep existing. Or the implication was made clear anyway. Every single American knows it in their heart. So in that way, that they all know the truth, every single American is complicit in ongoing exploitation. And benefits from it. However, the part that I argue makes them truly ignorant is they were never told, of course, and never bothered to look much into it that... it doesn't have to be this way. It hasn't been this way for all that long historically. And this total outsourcing of labor has only become so ubiquitous since ~1970s.
Anyway, my only point here was yes you're right. They do ignore it. I don't know how many of them are doing Mr. Burns fingers while thinking about exploiting people to enrich capitalists, but it also doesn't matter. If you even lightly pay attention to "politics" even the sludge Americans call politics, there's no way to be a moral person and walk away with anything other than an anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist and really, boiled down, broadly anti-USA as a nation outlook. All the excuses of "brainwashing" and such ring hollow to me when these "people" see children and other obvious innocents murdered by the thousands, even millions on the bigger timeline, and still support their own Nazi state. I was born and raised in the USA and I came to see it for exactly what it is. Someone else just as "online" and exposed to reality has no fucking excuse in my book.
As said in Masses, Elites, and Rebels
I'm sorry but I think both of you and the author massively overestimate the amount of critical thinking the average westerner is doing in regards to geopolitics.
Imperialism is not so cut-and-dry and easy to comprehend as something like slavery and it's reprecussions, which to this day is something people still fail to comprehend.
I don't think the argument would be that the opinions that people form, or want to form, always come from a conscious understanding of imperialism. The author would likely say that Westerners want to believe, and do believe, the rest of the world is bad, dangerous, unfree, undemocratic, totalitarian, etc. to make them better about their own lives - even if, or because they are, facing difficulties themselves.
The article mentions China and the supposed genocide of Uyghurs in Xinjiang as an example. The phrase may as well be gibberish to Westerners. They don't know, nor want to know, anything about the topic.
You are right, they aren't doing any critical thinking. They are simply repeating nonsensical lines and absurdities, and they don't want to think about it.
They don't understand imperialism on a conscious level. But they want to believe that even if they can't pay their bills, and their own life in the West has its hardships, and their state could be doing more, that at least other places are worse. And they want to feel superior to the rest of the world, so they believe any atrocity propaganda they stumble across to fuel their coping mechanism. But it doesn't require an understanding of imperialism on their part. If they think about it at all, I'd guess they would attribute the superiority of the West to white supremacy, "democratic values", etc.
Good analysis, thank you.