Political Activism?

[kay]

I guess that in a twitter-saturated, internet-warrior society with a short attention span
a) everyone thinks their voice needs to be heard regardless of how little thought they've put into it
b) there is a focus on individual glory instead of collective cohesiveness
c) trends last such a short time that little sticks

When things don't take much more effort to do than a simple "click like" or a quick tube ride down to the middle of town, I guess people also automatically assign less importance to the task. If something literally took you a week to plan to get to, you'd care more too.

Contrary, anti-establishment anarchist have always existed. Trend followers have always existed. It's just that they've never existed in such stupendous numbers before. Simply because it used to be so much more effort to do anything.

[ultraspatial]

I guess that in a twitter-saturated, internet-warrior society with a short attention span
a) everyone thinks their voice needs to be heard regardless of how little thought they've put into it
b) there is a focus on individual glory instead of collective cohesiveness
c) trends last such a short time that little sticks

Contrary, anti-establishment anarchist have always existed. Trend followers have always existed. It's just that they've never existed in such stupendous numbers before.

or converged as much

[Muncey]

I guess that in a twitter-saturated, internet-warrior society with a short attention span
a) everyone thinks their voice needs to be heard regardless of how little thought they've put into it
b) there is a focus on individual glory instead of collective cohesiveness
c) trends last such a short time that little sticks

Pretty spot on. I don't think much has changed though, apart from how easy it is to 'join in'. I'm sure in 1960s there was a small majority of hardcore protestors and the vast majority were just people turning up once in a while just to feel like they're apart of something or follow the crowd. Only difference is that large majority of people only willing to do the bare minimum now only need to share a video or retweet something.. its just easier to do fuck all and pretend you're apart of something nowadays.

But I don't think the mindset of people is greatly different.

[kay]

Yeah I don't think mindsets have changed either. Just the loudmouths are getting more channels to be louder through, and drowning out everyone else.

[yoowan]

Wub you seem to forget the 1 million people who marched against the iraq war in 03

[Pedro Sánchez]

Wub you seem to forget the 1 million people who marched against the iraq war in 03

More than that stood in line for cheaper TV's in ASDA today.

[test_recordings]

It's pretty easy to contact a politician yet most people never bother. I do and get results. Activist groups like 38 Degrees are good ways of actually achieving something

[yoowan]

Wub you seem to forget the 1 million people who marched against the iraq war in 03

More than that stood in line for cheaper TV's in ASDA today.

But they didn't

[yoowan]

It's pretty easy to contact a politician yet most people never bother. I do and get results. Activist groups like 38 Degrees are good ways of actually achieving something

38 degrees is wicked

[test_recordings]

Do you actually contact your politician, or just sign up for things? My politician's sick, sends me personal letters and stuff even though he must get a few saying the same thing. Shows he's paying attention though, he knows somethings afoot when the UK public actually start getting politically involved. Fucking genuinely groundbreaking imo

[Burlish]

Good Thread,

It will happen again, more peaceful/violent than ever depending on where you are

I think the dollar needs to collapse and TPTB need to slip up one more time,

a la sandy hook and 9/11

Without trying to paint myself as too much of a conspiracy theorist...we really do need to see some form of Activisim, though i'm uncertain as to weather 'political' activism is going to do anything new / solve the current problems for any decent length of time.

If marching with a placard is your way of getting something, your clearly more of a sheep than they expected...people need to be removed/dissapeared if were ever going to see real change in 'society'...it's a sad/cruel fact but lot's of people are gonna have to die.

I'd prefer to see some sort of creative activism however so that's the direction i'm going ;_)

[nowaysj]

I have so much to say on this but am not educated well enough to articulate my point coherently so i'm just going to wait for (certain) other people to say what I want to be said and hit them up with a re-quote, an and maybe even a bigup.

Is this not a perfect example of just the kind of attitude I was getting at?

No.

[nowaysj]

Back to my GCSE level comparisons -

Then, you were largely anonymous and could protest with only the fear of a beating from a bobby's truncheon.
Now you have police with cameras, facial recognition technology, watch lists, mace, tasers, the terrorism act, etc.

10x bigup.

[nowaysj]

You people have pulled the foreskin back and are sucking directly on the head with your thoughts. I'm in too much pain to put words together right now. But I have a high degree of confidence that the status quo will not continue. Probably not because of activism, but because the sq is not sustainable and will destroy itself, HOPEFULLY without killing most of us or our children. God willing.

[Laszlo]

(Reply from two up)
Safe.
My point being, for those who don't get it, is that perhaps in the 60s, with the higher sense of job security and relative anonymity, there were much greater instances of 'the casual demonstrator' turning up and being counted. The worst that was likely to happen was physical pain and a few hours in a cell. If you believed in something strongly enough then a broken nose and a brief loss of freedom was a small price to pay.
Now (and maybe it's only the perception of what could happen, but that's neither here nor there to my point) you could be beaten, illegally kettled for hours on end, have a toxin sprayed in your face which makes you think you are about to die, electrocuted (which can make you lose control of your bladder/bowels), generally have your dignity stripped from you and (perception wise i'll stress) much worse. It's not really any wonder we don't see the same sort of numbers on the streets any more. If one was to weigh up the pros and cons.. "well I really hate that the bankers get away with fucking things up for the rest of us but still get massive bonuses, but then I don't like static shocks off my people carrier let alone being tasered and shitting myself. I think I might stay at home".
Something BIG has to happen in order to get things moving again, I just can't see it happening.

[Genevieve]

Who's to say that political activism is limited to active demonstration?

Isn't this political activism?

Isn't Bitcoin a fuck-you to government's monopoly on legal tender and monetary policy? Wasn't the Silkroad a protest against the governmnet's drug laws?

Really, the idea that we're circumventing governmnent's own monopoly on legal tender DIGITALLY is way more revolutionary than smoking dope and holding up signs and singing songs about peace.

I know you guys aren't exactly thrilled about it. But just think of the RAW IDEA here, at its basis; Today, people can 3D PRINT FUCKING GUNS. Traditionally, it was the state, the establishment, that regulated guns. In just a few years time, we could alll arm ourselves to the teeth in secret with the state being none the wiser. You don't think that kind of scares the people in charge?

We definitely live in some revolutionary times. And having it take place in a (black) market, where each participant can make an informed decision for themselves. Which may be more effective than just hordes of angry people who know they're angry at someone, but not sure exactly who or why. Except that things aren't good.

[Nihilism]

The problem with a lot of those activists is that they're not dedicated to the cause. Most of them are just doing it because it's cool and it's giving them a big ego boost. Nowadays it's cool to do something for the society, although they don't really doing something then only showing the world that they're there protesting for something they have no knowledge of. And what's up with that whole marxist movement? It is as if that is the only ideology that is allowed if you want to be 'respected' as an activist. I do not really believe in such a system like that of Karl Marx. Just look at the communists and it's says enough that such a system is not feasible in this world.

Btw, i don't see me as an activist. I'm more of a social anarchist that doesn't believe in a political system like such system of today.

[nowaysj]

Who's to say that political activism is limited to active demonstration?

Isn't this political activism?

Isn't Bitcoin a fuck-you to government's monopoly on legal tender and monetary policy? Wasn't the Silkroad a protest against the governmnet's drug laws?

Really, the idea that we're circumventing governmnent's own monopoly on legal tender DIGITALLY is way more revolutionary than smoking dope and holding up signs and singing songs about peace.

I know you guys aren't exactly thrilled about it. But just think of the RAW IDEA here, at its basis; Today, people can 3D PRINT FUCKING GUNS. Traditionally, it was the state, the establishment, that regulated guns. In just a few years time, we could alll arm ourselves to the teeth in secret with the state being none the wiser. You don't think that kind of scares the people in charge?

We definitely live in some revolutionary times. And having it take place in a (black) market, where each participant can make an informed decision for themselves. Which may be more effective than just hordes of angry people who know they're angry at someone, but not sure exactly who or why. Except that things aren't good.

Still need ammo homie, and can't print that. But I'm with you.

[kay]

The problem with a lot of those activists is that they're not dedicated to the cause. Most of them are just doing it because it's cool and it's giving them a big ego boost. Nowadays it's cool to do something for the society, although they don't really doing something then only showing the world that they're there protesting for something they have no knowledge of. And what's up with that whole marxist movement? It is as if that is the only ideology that is allowed if you want to be 'respected' as an activist. I do not really believe in such a system like that of Karl Marx. Just look at the communists and it's says enough that such a system is not feasible in this world.

Btw, i don't see me as an activist. I'm more of a social anarchist that doesn't believe in a political system like such system of today.

Communism as practiced bears little resemblance to communism as originally proposed though.

[Genevieve]

Btw, i don't see me as an activist. I'm more of a social anarchist that doesn't believe in a political system like such system of today.

???

Communism as practiced bears little resemblance to communism as originally proposed though.

Yeah. I think what's more accurate is that Marx's theory of how to establish communism has been disproved by the USSR. It wasn't a communist, but it proved that state state socialism won't lead to communism.