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Reposted by Nick

David Wearing @davidwearing.bsky.social · 3d

We will also hear a lot about Washington's "diplomatic achievement", a travesty of a framing. The US could have pulled the plug on Israel's genocide at any point over the past two years, and chose not to. The basis of a ceasefire has long been there, but Israel and its allies weren't interested.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 3d

This thread nails exactly how I was feeling reading posts about the ceasefire. The relief on the faces of dancing Palestinian children is understandable and a treasured thing, but it doesn't alter the reality of what has happened, the West's complicity, or the likely outcomes (which are bad, sorry).

David Wearing @davidwearing.bsky.social · 3d

Palestinians will feel understandable relief. The West should feel nothing but shame. Gaza has been obliterated. The territory rendered uninhabitable. Tens of thousands murdered in cold blood. The entire population subjected to starvation tactics. And now, colonial subjugation under Trump and Blair

Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 4d

This is the most wholesome end to the story I could possibly imagine. Amazing!

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 4d

What we are saying is that mud-wrestling Tommy Robinson for the right to wrap yourself in a flag which has been a symbol of oppression in fully a quarter of the world is a very strange position for a socialist, someone who used to sing about internationalism.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 4d

This is a heartbreakingly bad take by Billy. We're not trying to"build solidarity with the working class" but within it. Anti-racists, immigrants and refugees are working class, not some 'outside' force. No-one is saying the St George flag is the same as a swastika.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 4d

Portland is "a wasteland of firebombs"?

Just off the top of my head, but is it possible that Trump has been watching Fallout and because of his dementia thought it was a news bulletin?

Justin Baragona @justinbaragona.bsky.social · 4d

"Antifa-led hellfire"

www.whitehouse.gov/articles/202...

PORTLAND: Fake News Ignores Antifa Violence, Residents’ Pleas for Help

For years, an Antifa-led hellfire has turned Portland into a wasteland of firebombs, beatings, and brazen attacks on federal officers and property —

www.whitehouse.gov

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 4d

Every time this happens the media repeat the lie that this "will help pubs". Sure. Extra staff, probably door security required, operators working even longer hours than usual. But customers with no extra money to spend. If they drink at midnight watching football they won't go out the next day.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 4d

Thanks for this. Great thread.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 4d

I don't like picking just one, and different genres require different skills, but Robb Johnson is the greatest left-wing song writer alive, possibly ever, and that seems important in these times.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 4d

It hit me hard at the time, because I was a huge fan. But he's a radio 4 "British institution" these days, and hardly ruffles feathers any more. I've moved on to other music and learned a lesson.

As the Redskins sang, "Take no heroes"

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 4d

And to believe that, you have to completely misunderstand the history and class interests at work in this country.

"What do they know of England, who only England know?" Indeed.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 4d

I remember arguing with him at Tolpuddle about 20 years ago over things he'd said on stage about reclaiming the St George flag and he was so impervious to reason that it really upset me.

I think it's been a thread in his songs all along, sadly, that he's "proper English" and the racists aren't.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 4d

"Uncle Bill" as he is known to fans these days, had been a kind of hero to me since the 1980s. But it's been 20 years now since he started this "reclaim Englishness from racists" stuff and all of it seems tone deaf to me. Which is weird for a musician, right? You can take the boy out of Essex...

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

That's what we need. It's not what we have.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

Oh that's a devious way to get loads of cat pics! Anyway, here's my lovely boy Minchin helping himself to some sour cream.

A black cat eating sour cream by sticking his whole head into the pot. Many facial whiskers are therefore now white, but the cat does not care.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

What the fuck has happened to this country? Fucking Heseltine is being a better anti-fascist then the Labour prime minister. I regret that I've lived long enough to see this, it's despairing.

BBC Newsnight @bbcnewsnight.bsky.social · 5d

“You described Reform and other parties across Europe today as among the 'right wing equivalents of the fascists in the 1930s'. Why?”

“Because that’s what they are”

@vicderbyshire.bsky.social asks Lord Heseltine about remarks he made at Conservative Party Conference.

#Newsnight

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

Satire can't be a substitute for an active, and politically educated, mass campaign against whatever bad thing is being satirised. The fact that bad things happened in the 1980s wasn't the fault of Spitting Image but of the spineless schmucks that led the Labour Party, &c. and let Thatcher win.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

I don't think anyone ever claimed Al Jolson was satire.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

Well done. For some reason it always seems like the neurodiverse end up having to do a much larger share of the work just to get the neurotypical to hear that there's even an issue.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

Think Chaplin doing the great dictator. It didn't "normalise" Hitler, it contributed to the anti-fascist sentiment and helped to undercut any nazi sympathisers in the US and the rest of Europe.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

I understand it, I just think you're completely wrong. It's the mainstream media, and other politicians, taking such performance seriously which normalise the fascist tones of his speech. Satire bursts the bubble and encourages people to see that his views are not normal, not even rational.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

Christ alive, the state of politics in the USA right now is terrifying. But also fucking hilarious.

A. Good luck infiltrating a thing which doesn't exist ("leftist terror cells in Texas").

B. You're announcing secret undercover operations in a fucking social media post.

Will Oremus @willoremus.com · 5d

Obviously not the main point here, but it's interesting how this is framed as content rather than policy.

"BREAKING" is typically what journalists or influencers say when they have a big story -- not what government officials say when they launch "undercover" operations

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

Oh bless you, I hope you were able to reach a satisfactory / amicable conclusion.

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

Ever heard of satire?

a woman sits on the sidewalk in front of a sign that says " perks "

Alt: Scene from TV show "Friends" with Rachel doing a 'whoosh' gesture above her head, then shrugging, sarcastically implying the previous poster missed the whole point of what they were commenting on.

media.tenor.com

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Nick @nick.4glengate.net · 5d

What happened next? Enquiring minds and nosey parkers need to know!

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