Hm. When my dad was in the Air Force, he got a confederate flag tattoo. According to legend, he fell in with a group of southern guys who told him it would make him "one of them." Years later, he did get it covered, before getting a job where he worried it would be inappropriate. I think he had mixed feelings about it, but also he never like denounced racism either. In his old age, he def got hooked on Fox news for a while. I grew up in a place where racism doesn't get challenged, where peoples experiences dont help them to grow beyond backwardness.

I love my dad. He's not a bad person, and he is a really good person in many ways. He could be a better person, but there are def structural obstacles, like I said. He's not a virulent, hateful racist, but he is kinda backward in many many ways.

I think when I heard of Platner's tattoo, I sort of understood it the same way I understood this contradiction with my own father. I mean, Platner is younger than me, it wasn't a fatherly identification (I think), but I could imagine my dad as a younger man when he still had the tattoo. Granted, dad never ran as a US Senator, but there was sort of learned blindness around it that got transferred to Platner. Dad never really denounced or regretted his time in the military, but he also never talked about it. I got the impression he had some trauma from it.

I think your points are really good here. Like being able to denounce the IDF as an "other" while being soft on American military probably has to do with either personal experiences like mine, or structural opportunism (let's face it, they're one in the same via hegemony). I think your question about "does he regret his service" is a really revealing insight and a good approach. It gives him a chance to be real about it, to "set the record straight" on a personal level. I think I also didn't really make a distinction between his Blackwater work and his US military work. All of my friends who are veterans will denounce the US Military. My brother will tell anyone he hated his time in the military. Its not a huge ask for a leftist, or a moderate with progressive attitudes. I know so many people, and yeah veterans can just straight up become anti-imperialists. They do not have to become PMCs and work for companies that had to rebrand because of extensive war crimes. And they do not have to be okay with that years later, once they've "changed."

I wish I had discussed this with local comrades earlier. When we were talking about Platner last night, one of my comrades brought up their experience with 2020 protests, and the boogaloo boys. They said that when the Boogs hit the scene there was a lot of controversy around their participation in protests, and many of them had "tattoos" that were red flags. Still, many people defended their participation, at the time. Years later, we know they were just Nazis doing like "activist left-moderate cosplay," the evidence is overwhelming. My comrade just put it plain: people with Nazi tattoos have never been our allies, and they never will be.

I'm def reflecting on how twisted up and contradictory these conditions are. How my personal experiences were basically used against me. How I wasn't concrete about what kind of things are forgiveable, and in what context. The structural contradiction around the US military led me to be less concrete about the facts, to just let myself be confused by very straightforward facts, and how it led to being wishy washy about the senate run of a rapist fascist, which led to me actually defending him when facing principles opposition.

But this is why I engage in debate. Not because I want to win or dominate in the marketplace of ideas, but because it is a form of self education. Anyway, I appreciate you engaging with my wrongheadedness. I know from experience it doesn't always change peoples minds, but that's why it was worth letting you know that in this case, I remember our discussion and recognize just how fucked up my position ended up being: not just that I was defending him but how I ended up defending him when I never had any intention of doing so.