Thread: What Happened to the Anti-War Movement?

Originally Posted by Xei

I think it's more likely that Obama just doesn't have the conviction to make large decisions. This isn't the first time he's flopped around for days when he had to make a big call.

I think it's most likely a little of both. War is big business, and to suspect that there isn't some sort of ulterior motive behind any perceived provocation for war is to be completely blind to historical precedent.

I saw in the paper that he yesterday stated the exact thing which I previously said would be ridiculous, namely that a strike against Syria was now necessary for America's defence. Did he give any kind of argument for this bizarre claim, or is it just some kind of bizarre, doublethinky, abstract statement?

The idea of America going into another conflict is only going to add to their long list of enemies.
With so many enemies already, the chance of another attack on American soil increaces.
9/11 was supposedly carried out by relatively few people. Imagine how many more people will go anti-american after this.
Many citizens of the USA already have doubts about their own politicians.
Why do you think your own government is slowly taking your civil liberties away.
It is just a vicious circle, which is robbing Americas population of a peaceful future.
I do hope your country can sort this out, without another bloodbath.

Originally Posted by Xei

I saw in the paper that he yesterday stated the exact thing which I previously said would be ridiculous, namely that a strike against Syria was now necessary for America's defence. Did he give any kind of argument for this bizarre claim, or is it just some kind of bizarre, doublethinky, abstract statement?

Much more of the latter. That emphasis has been on the "as a moral responsibility, we can't allow rogue governments to attack their own people" angle, but 'national security' has been thrown around a bit, but really with no more substance than just mentioning 'national security'. You know how that goes.

I find that kind of emotive, nonsense language very concerning... equally concerning is that nobody seems to care about it. At least when our politicians talked about Syria they were actually using cogent sentences about protecting Syrians from war crimes, and if one of them had appealed to some kind of vague, meaningless statement about national defence, they'd've been asked to clarify what on Earth they were talking about.

Pretty much Everything we have been getting is vague. All of the talking heads have been saying "there is evidence enough to believe that it was the regime that committed the attacks (trust us)", and that has been pretty much the extent of it. Hell, most of us (Americans), that I've heard from, have been applauding the UK's refusal to get involved in the conflict, because it shows that there are people over there actually using their heads. It's a shame that we, so far as yet, can't say the same thing about our own country. From day 1, all we have gotten, over here, is rhetoric. That's it. Obama is, at least, stalling to wait for some sort of congressional opinion on this (which was almost completely disregarded), so that's a plus. But, still, this event is going a long way to show us how hard our government (or certain facets of it) are willing to push for war, when we, the people, are of a different mind.

Just thought I would post this article here:

BBC News - Syria minister: US strike on Syria 'would benefit al-Qaeda'

This is a really good article on the issue:

Whatever Happened to the Antiwar Movement? by Justin Raimondo -- Antiwar.com

For a time I thought it was because of the fact a democrat was in office. That's a contributing factor but I think it's because of the same reason the anti-war movement during the Bush Regime was so lacking compared to Vietnam.

Press coverage has changed. In the Vietnam War, people saw the bodies coming home, the Bush administration put an end to the sort of war coverage that turns people off of war and focused mostly on showing off the military industry. Under Obama, coverage has dwindled to near zero. People don't see the effect of the drone war, they aren't ever reminded of it, out of sight, out of mind.

That is true too. It makes me think of this meme:

news bias.jpg

Granted criticizing Obama in Portland is like criticizing Bush in Rural Assfuck, Texas. It really pisses me off how blind people are they can't even see they're supporting a Reagonomist just because he's not Republican.

want a Lebanese person's idea?
Now, I don't think Americans are arogant people, but I blame the American media that is full of bullshit.

Ok, 9/11 was not a right thing for al quaida to do. Killing innocent Americans in inethical, and al quaida are buchers. They also assist the forces against the syrian president.
About the middle east people: They are ignorant people(mostly)! We kill each other! Shiei against sunni, Muslim against Christian. That is ignorance. It is apparent that the American goverment want us to kill each other so we would weaken! Then they would attack to take the patrol(it's more complicated, but that is the cause, gread). But we still are arogant for being fooled! Again, it's the damn media. As for Israel, their actions are unjustified, and they would have invaded Lebanon if not hisib al lah! Though, the soldiers of hesb al lah are punks and arrogant, but they want to be free.

Originally Posted by Original Poster

Granted criticizing Obama in Portland is like criticizing Bush in Rural Assfuck, Texas. It really pisses me off how blind people are they can't even see they're supporting a Reagonomist just because he's not Republican.

I really believe that people working behind the scenes said something to the effect of, "We have a major anti-war movement on our hands, and we need to do something about it because we want the wars to continue. I think the real problem these people are having is that a Republican is the president. So, let's get somebody else to do the same job Bush is doing, but as a Democrat. That will shut almost everybody up." They did it, and the plan worked.

Originally Posted by LouaiB

want a Lebanese person's idea?
Now, I don't think Americans are arogant people, but I blame the American media that is full of bullshit.

Ok, 9/11 was not a right thing for al quaida to do. Killing innocent Americans in inethical, and al quaida are buchers. They also assist the forces against the syrian president.
About the middle east people: They are ignorant people(mostly)! We kill each other! Shiei against sunni, Muslim against Christian. That is ignorance. It is apparent that the American goverment want us to kill each other so we would weaken! Then they would attack to take the patrol(it's more complicated, but that is the cause, gread). But we still are arogant for being fooled! Again, it's the damn media. As for Israel, their actions are unjustified, and they would have invaded Lebanon if not hisib al lah! Though, the soldiers of hesb al lah are punks and arrogant, but they want to be free.

Do you think the U.S. government's extreme support for Israel, which is so bizarre and biased that it is as if rich and powerful Israelis are paying politicians for it, is at the heart of the hate so many people in the Middle East have for us? If we told Israel that if they want to be crazy enough to have a small Jewish "home land" country in what is considered a Muslim holy land they are on their own, and also pulled our troops out of the rest of the Middle East, a lot of our terrorism threat would calm down? It seems that we are involved with the Middle East for the stated purpose of handling problems that result from the fact that we are involved with the Middle East. I think we need to just stop dealing with the Middle East entirely, aside from trade.

I don't think we had a major anti-war movement during the Bush regime, either. Which is why I think the main culprit is our media side-stepping the coverage. Putting a democrat in office merely further reduced an already castrated anti-war movement.

I mean all you got to do is look back at MSNBC's coverage of the war back in 2002. They got all behind the invasion of Afghanistan with everyone else. And this is supposedly the "liberal" network.

Originally Posted by Universal Mind

Do you think the U.S. government's extreme support for Israel, which is so bizarre and biased that it is as if rich and powerful Israelis are paying politicians for it, is at the heart of the hate so many people in the Middle East have for us? If we told Israel that if they want to be crazy enough to have a small Jewish "home land" country in what is considered a Muslim holy land they are on their own, and also pulled our troops out of the rest of the Middle East, a lot of our terrorism threat would calm down? It seems that we are involved with the Middle East for the stated purpose of handling problems that result from the fact that we are involved with the Middle East. I think we need to just stop dealing with the Middle East entirely, aside from trade.

True that a lot of middle Easter people hate Americans, but not all. Again, we know that American are very sufisticated people, but it is the government that's corrupted. But again, most of the middle east people(or at least a big strong portion) are arrogant, so it might not end there, but what can they do? Iran won't bomb America, especially if they leave middle east, but al quaida, they are just butchers. Definitely it'll help for Americans to retreat , but somebody's gotta do something about al quaida, they are inhumane

Also, a side note:
These arrogant middle easters hate Jewish just bcz of what Israel did. Hate all Jewish, and wish Hitler would have butchered them all. It's really sad how the middle east has grown to be

One thing that may help us combat Al Qaeda is stop filling their rosters with the radicalized survivors of our violent intervention.

I think a majority of the anti-war folks eventually accept War as this thing that doesn't care for their protests, one way or the other; there is no right or wrong other than what's in our head. Simply put, they give up. We can't fight it because as much as we'd like to think of change as this neatly tied bow, it's anything but. Maybe I don't understand natural selection.

There's definitely a lot of money spent trying to fool us into thinking we are incapable of changing the actions of our government. And this disillusionment solidified when our regime changed to the most liberal electable candidate we could find and we got to watch him up the violence he promised to reduce.

But our actions do mean something. Not just protests but phone harassment of our elected officials. It helps, I've seen it. Informing people makes a difference, and the actions of informed people also make a difference. A good example I just saw on the Colbert Report is Participant Media, a politically motivated movie studio that made films like Lincoln, The Help and Inconvenient Truth. They made the movie Contagion at a time when the Tea Party was pushing to defund the CDC and in effect influenced the people to influence congress to keep the CDC running strong.

In short, Governments are afraid of their people, so they spend a lot of resources making sure people think they're powerless. The people that tell you it can't be done are paid by the people afraid it will be done.

In short, Governments are afraid of their people, so they spend a lot of resources making sure people think they're powerless. The people that tell you it can't be done are paid by the people afraid it will be done.

Right, and how many drones do you think it would take to completely destroy your entire town? I don't think anyone is afraid of their government because they think they're powerless, people know what will happen because of the reality of it. Governments have no reason to fear their people, it fears other governments.

My town helps pay for those drones, buster. Maneuvers like that would put an end to the docile workforce that keeps the war machine going.

They only go after villains they can marginalize, like protesters, foreigners and homeless people. Eviscerating a town would wake people up, it's the last thing they want to do.

It works like the quote "First they went after the <marginalized demographic> and I did nothing because I wasn't a <marginalized demographic> etc, then when they came after me there was no one left to help."

Originally Posted by Rums03

Right, and how many drones do you think it would take to completely destroy your entire town? I don't think anyone is afraid of their government because they think they're powerless, people know what will happen because of the reality of it. Governments have no reason to fear their people, it fears other governments.

Can't say I agree with this statement.

Think of it this way, if a government isn't afraid of its own people, then why does it resort to lying? The government lies because its afraid of what americans will do with the truth. If we all knew the truth of 9-11 just the day after, not only would there not be a war but several very public politicians would be in jail.

Truth is empowering. It empowers the people to act out a popular protest.

So lying is dis-empowering. Smear the truth, call it a conspiracy and call people who stand up for the truth conspiracy theorist nuts. Who will protest now? (the failure of occupy wasn't its members, but all those who remained in apathy and did nothing when the time came)

I mean, sure, the government has horrible unspeakable weapons that can lay a city to waste in seconds. But theres no point in being a government (or ruler) if you have no one to govern (or rule). Aristocracy demands that there be servants, not dead bodies.

There's also the issue that those in the military have sworn an oath to the constitution and do not consider american citizens their enemy. The military would sooner turn on the government before ever blatantly attacking a city at home. Which is why so many war vets formed their own occupy or have joined/formed armed citizens militias (which is kinda scary to me!).

When it comes to using brute strength on its own people, the government uses the police (they say police feel they are at WAR everyday with the average citizen, not good). And reports of police brutality seem to be rising. But a police state in america can only go so far. The only real way we could ever be a police state is if our constitutional rights are thwarted. (which is happening....)

But again, there is no group of people who voice louder about our right to bear arms - then war vets. I mean, if the government goes that route, its asking for civil war.

So in the end, the government knows her people are not powerless. The american spirit is still alive, a bit bruised and nasty, but still there. We will protest, fight, and die for our rights. So if the government is tyrannical and wants to maliciously control us (which it sure as hell does) it can only resort to manipulation. Which has been going on for a long long time.

There's still so many americans that have NO IDEA that a THIRD TOWER fell.......

The government lies because its afraid of what americans will do with the truth. If we all knew the truth of 9-11 just the day after, not only would there not be a war but several very public politicians would be in jail.

With the internet we have the truth at our fingertips, yet nothing has happened or will happen. Look what Snowden brought to light about the NSA, have we done anything about it?

There's also the issue that those in the military have sworn an oath to the constitution and do not consider american citizens their enemy. The military would sooner turn on the government before ever blatantly attacking a city at home. Which is why so many war vets formed their own occupy or have joined/formed armed citizens militias (which is kinda scary to me!).

I hope that's true, but if the people were to all-out revolt you better hope the Military can think for itself without leadership having strategically place out top brass with theirs. Just out of curiosity, how many has the current admin. replaced?

So in the end, the government knows her people are not powerless. The american spirit is still alive, a bit bruised and nasty, but still there. We will protest, fight, and die for our rights. So if the government is tyrannical and wants to maliciously control us (which it sure as hell does) it can only resort to manipulation. Which has been going on for a long long time.

Well you're right about one thing, we're certainly die for them. As an aside I don't want you guys to think I'm a statist, I just believe governments won't change from within due to their size, and we as a people are foolish in believing we can change them from the outside. I mean what are we talking here, anarchy?

Right, and how many drones do you think it would take to completely destroy your entire town?

See the bigger picture?

Oh no you've shown doubts of the official 9/11 story, thus discrediting yourself and everything you've said.

Originally Posted by Original Poster

Oh no you've shown doubts of the official 9/11 story, thus discrediting yourself and everything you've said.

waaaah!