Lemmy has a strong tendency to criticize the US, and a lot of the critiques of certain issue with the US are valid. However, I started getting really tired of opening comment sections in innocuous and non-political posts only to see that someone somehow found a way to criticize the US in it. At first, I started thinking that maybe some Lemmy users are really unhappy and find criticizing a something stronger helped them feel better as if standing up to injustice was a passion of theirs. But, we don’t see them do that with other targets, just the US. The more I notice and think about it, I’m starting be suspicious that some of those users and comments aren’t authentic, but made to create divisiveness in the West and reject the US entirely. In other words, they may be Russian, Chinese, et al. agents working to feed a stream of propaganda in order to further cause chaos and lack of unity in the West as we have seen them do before.
Anyone else think about this?
This is what I’m thinking the game plan is:
- Criticize something obviously unjust that the US has done. Ignore that all other major powers have also committed atrocities.
- Link and liken it to other US matters & behaviors
- Paint the US entirely as evil so that nothing the US can do is just
- Attack anyone that supports anything out of the US (we are between here and #3 above)
- Create a black-and-white model of geopolitics: US vs everyone else. EU and Russia on the same team lol
- West fragments as US and EU relationship dwindle from pseudo-populist movements (e.g. MAGA)
- Pick specific countries in the EU to start alienating and repeat the cycle
- ???
- Profit in special economic zones
True, we’ve already seen that right wingers are paid off by Russia to spout about inflation and other brain rot. ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnJ6Ttaiu9M ) And a lot of people who are from the US compare their country to EU countries and find glaring holes in their society, like a lack of socialised healthcare, streamlined government services, ect and rant about it like Lemmy is twitter. Keep in mind that because Lemmy is majority English speaking the vast majority of post will be about the US, because its the defacto empire of the 21st century. For me I go out of my way to include communities from my own culture so I’m not out of the loop. The kinds of people who post politics to !Menes are the same people who take the definition of “meme” literally, and suck to talk to at every party they attend.
There’s no evidence this happens on Lemmy though. You don’t need a conspiracy to explain the fact that the site was founded by people with a certain viewpoint and it has and continues to attract more such people as it grows.
I would say that there’s cross-section of users from different instances whose community have different expectations regarding netiquette. .ml or .grad users posting about how they hate america or (insert country here) is fine in their instance, but is annoying/insulting for other instances users. (.ml and grad are just examples and not exclusive to them.) There is no evidence of governmental interference for many reasons ranging from: its not actually happening, to, no one is looking for it, to, its too hard to detect. Imho most people are influenced by the ziteguist of opinion. And a little embellishment here and there on Twitter, is enough to spread the “general knowledge” that the world is so bad and there’s nothing we can do. Even better, platforms promote this content to drive more engagement making the general opinion even worse.
Well, I’m a real European who is not a fan of the US. Not to the point where I’d prefer Russia or other dictatorship shitholes, but it’s like having to choose between getting kicked in the balls really hard and getting shot in the head (just for context, I’m not one of the people who enjoy being kicked in the balls).
Every sane person in this situation would choose getting kicked in the balls, but that doesn’t mean you’re really happy about it.
I honestly feel like Lemmy got considerably less vitriolic toward Americans after the election.
I used to think Lemmy was too insignificant for Russian influents, but I’m not sure anymore.
I’m American and the main reason I don’t aim the same criticism towards other countries is that I’m American and don’t know enough about them. Maybe some people are agitating for malign purposes, but how much does that matter to a responsible netizen? No one knows who anyone is - maybe idiot takes are made by idiots or bad actors, it doesn’t change much. Lastly, one quote stuck with me after the last election season : " the reactionary is always right about what is wrong but almost always wrong about what would be right"
Best take, honestly. It’s tribalism. People love to generalize and lean on prejudice to feel superior to a broad swath of people based on things largely out of their control. Which is exactly why the same approach also happens to work as propaganda.
American here. When you elect a man—twice—whose character and policies have led to a fractured nation, a failing education system, crumbling infrastructure, and a healthcare system that leaves millions behind, it’s no surprise that the world views us with disdain. When your citizens are struggling to afford basic necessities like rent and groceries while a handful of individuals hoard wealth that rivals entire nations, we’ve earned every ounce of criticism.
Buckle up, because the descent into this nightmare is far from over. The worst is yet to come, and it’s going to be a long, suffocating fall.
Don’t forget one of our largest cities is currently on fire because of our own man made climate change that we are (I believe) the number one cause of, but those same leaders are telling us to shrug and say “who knows why”
I find it a little frustrating that you think any of this started with, because of, or will end with cheeto.
This:
a fractured nation, a failing education system, crumbling infrastructure, and a healthcare system that leaves millions behind
has always been the case, and it is a feature, not a bug. Always has been.
And it will never change as long as you continue to focus on the things the system tells you to focus on (like team red vs team blue, or the clown at the front of the stage) rather than on the system itself (a state mechanism built on slavery and genocide from day dot, and designed and enforced by and for the rich and powerful, who are the ones actually pulling the strings) and abolishing that.
And before OP gets their underwear in a twist - all states are oppressive and should be abolished, but a country founded on and with the biggest hard on for capitalism on the planet, and who has the power to, and has been since its founding, loudly and aggressively dragging the rest of the world on a race to the bottom (if not directly with war mongering and political interfering, then with profiteering off of their enemies war mongering and politically interfering), deserves all the criticism it gets, and the fact that it’s easier for you to create a straw person to dismiss the perfectly valid and long overdue criticism, than it is to hear them and sit with the mild discomfort it causes you to hear the truth and confront reality, is a you problem, not a lemmy problem.
No
as an american, i whole-heartedly support anti-american sentiment. we fucking deserve all of it. we voted in a clown shitshow of a government and of course the world should laugh
And this isn’t even the first clown shitshow of a government we’ve voted in this century
Removed by mod
Yeah, actually that’s a really important point, plus between the insane amounts of essentially anonymous propaganda that’s been unleashed on us through Citizens United and all the state government voter suppression laws that were allowed by Shelby County we’ve really only been a quasi-democratic society at best for most of this. Americans aren’t uniquely terrible people compared to the citizens of any other country, we’ve just got some incredibly shitty rich people who ran the table on political power.
e; forgot to rest of my thought
of course. and dont forget the whole fucking over the globe by forcing our version of democracy everywhere. or that our biggest industry is generating human killing devices we spread across the planet under the guise of ‘defense’… or that our country was founded by genociding almost an entire continent of humans.
i find it beyond funny that we support israel because ‘they were there first’, but if you mention that maybe the american indians should rise up and take their country back you get very different responses. america is the land hypocrites.
I don’t think we’re the only land of hypocrisy out there (like, listen to Russia talk about how they’re the real protectors of human rights, or China say other countries are threatening their national security, or Mexico complain about cartel violence while letting their police do whatever they want, or Israel do so much shit I don’t know where to start), but, yeah, a lot of us are brainwashed as hell, and our government is completely full of shit whenever it’s scolding anyone else about human rights, international law, the climate, etc.
i find it beyond funny that we support israel because ‘they were there first’, but if you mention that maybe the american indians should rise up and take their country back you get very different responses.
Yep, and also the fact that there’s such a vocal anti-migrant movement here after almost all of our ancestors in immigrated here is completely absurd
came to write something like this. feel the exact same. we don’t need to post the election results to am I the asshole because we are not the assholes.
Nearly half the electorate didn’t vote for the reactionaries. I’d also add that this regression isn’t an exclusively American phenomenon, we’re just unfortunately at the vanguard.
it wasnte even half… 88 milllion eligible voters didnt vote at all. not voting is making a decision. people that do not vote at all are complicit
Hard disagree, Republicans wouldn’t do so much voter suppression bullshit if it didn’t have any effect. People who don’t vote are almost always being oppressed in a variety of different ways.
I waited in line for five hours to vote, and I don’t even live in a place that does voter suppression bs. I can understand why some people threw up their hands and went home. Then you’ve got the people who did vote but had their vote invalidated by bureaucratic nonsense. The deck is stacked against the people
they suppress the vote because if all eligible voters voted, they would never win another election. i stand by the fact that if you did not vote at all, you are complicit in letting democracy die at the hands of conservative extremists.
As an outsider (not american and don’t live in the US) I just want to add that I’m not “anti-american”. The problem is that you guys built a “bully” reputation while at the same time we see the hardships the regular american have to go through without healthcare, education and labour laws, and nobody really cares.
As someone who would probably qualify as one of these anti-American Americans on Lemmy I can say this: A big factor for me is the despair I feel (having genuinely believed the myths for most of my life) as I see the facade falling away. The genuine awfulness and inhumanity of not just our government, and our economy, but also of the culture, the people themselves, is just overwhelming. These forums are one of the outlets I’ve been using for my rage. I can only speak for myself. I’m not a bot, or a Russian actor, or an edgy teen. I’m a disillusioned middle aged American.
I’ve been there with the disillusionment. It felt like everything I had heard about the US was complete bs. I was really upset with the education I had received and started learning a lot about other countries that had been villainized in American culture because I had felt lied to and wondered what the truth was. I think it is valid to do so when we realize that. I also think that criticizing our government is one of most important duties of every American. It’s one of the founding principles. In fact, whenever I am in Washington DC, I make sure to go flick off the the Capitol. I even take pictures.
However, I think it’s disingenuous and unhelpful to only criticize the US, both government and people. The US has done helpful things, regardless of supposed intention. The impact of policies and behaviors are the same. Additionally, something that is only criticized ultimately has no option but to not care about its impact on other and be solely selfish. Otherwise, I can only cease existing because there’s no option to improve and be welcomed. Personally, I think a more helpful approach to concerns with the US would be to also celebrate what it does right. This allows for it to correct itself and aim to be a more just and enjoyable country. It also allows for unity and growth with Western countries at a time when it looks the world is headed for a war between major powers. Hate the US all you want, while Russia has its positive as most countries do, it is my opinion that it is magnitudes worse of a county to live in many areas of life, from government oppression to economic hardships. On the positive side, it does seem to have an interesting history, unique problem-solving approaches, strong patriotism, valuable contributions to science, and outstanding artistic capacity.
Arguably, disillusionment is the facade used to keep people in line
You mean lemmy, the platform created and maintained by staunch marxist-leninists? That lemmy strikes you as anticapitalist and antiAmerican?
Weird.
Have you seen America lately?
I’m allowed to complain. I live here.
Lemmy was founded to be where anti-American Americans would go after a lot of their subs were quarantined on Reddit.
That said, it has a major American focus because a lot of users are angry with the American system and don’t have a ton of experience with others directly. They’ve developed an echo chamber here and only got interrupted by the Reddit exodus.
I’m American. I’ll jump on the criticize America bandwagon any day!
So, no, we suck in the worst possible ways. That is really all there is to it
As a French guy, I can say that I suck way more than you. America has the American dream. France has the “we suck, we complain about it all the time, and we’re proud of it” vibe.
France also has the “take my rights, we take your head” attitude. I like that.
Everyone talks about how fun chopping up the Bourbons was and then leaves out how shitty the Reign of Terror was in the wake
Nowadays it’s the modern version: “we don’t like that, and we’ll complain very loudly about it.”
Mais oui
Welcome to a non US centric platform. Twitter, Facebook, Reddit,Digg, etc are all US centric platforms so there will be a pile-on when US criticism is mentioned.
Lemmy.world is not a US centric instance so you don’t see the pile-on. You get actual opinion on an over represented country.
Fuck the US hyper-centrism. If this place was so anti US, why are all the communities titled “News” and “Politics” exclusively for discussing seppo shit? This place is less US-centric than other platforms but is still extremely US focused. If you look for more than a second, you will find anti-russia, anti-china, anti-israel and anti-germany shit too (just to name a few). Finally, I just want to say, fuck the United States of America and everything that that hellhole represents. I am sorry that you have to live there
