I wish to share my most sincere gratitude and love with the service member and their family. According to the article this is the second self immolation outside an Israeli embassy in the US.
Israel is committing genocide, and the US is complicit. Don’t let anyone forget that.
Can anyone Eli5 us and Israel connection.
I don’t know much about politics.
The middle east is an extremely geopolitically important region for the US because of all of the oil it has. The US therefore wants a country that it can use as basically a base of operation and client state in the region. Israel as a european settler colonials state is the client state that America wants because it largely is culturally closer to the US than the surrounding arab states. Consequently, the US defends Israel to the hilt regardless of the constant stream of atrocities that it commits.
Perhaps that was the initial impetus, but it is also 50 years out of date. Now-a-days, Israel is self-propagating even if they had zero strategic value for US interests, they are the number one donator’s to many top Republican and Democrat campaign funds. In addition they represent a useful tax-haven for all the “high-tech” industries in the US. They are allow by law to develop for the MIC both hardware and software without being restricted by the usual import/export restrictions for national defense. Israel is considered international so corporations aren’t taxed on income from Israel, and Israel will pay large subsidies to American corporations to open offices there. Of course those subsidies are just money the US Government pays to Israel anyway. It’s grotesque, and even if Israel weren’t an apartheid state, the incestuous relationship the country has built with the US ruling class should give anyone with morals pause.
There’s no way China would just let North Korea do anything like Israel is doing. The difference is that Israel has outsize political influence in the US through AIPAC and the like.
OT: what’s with all these “removed by a mod” posts I keep seeing? I thought lemmy was an anti censorship effort, was I wrong?
I did not realize this happened in the US.
News coverage of this is super sus
News coverage of this is super sus
I only learned about the first one due to this discussion we’re in right here.
Aaron Bushnell, hero and role model
I wish he had another choice. We failed him by not being organized enough to welcome him as a comrade. Instead he chose to do the only thing he could. I admire his courage, but it’s a damn shame we lost someone willing to die for Palestinians.
We’ve failed him, we’ve failed the Palestinians, we’ve failed our immigrants and refugees, we’ve failed our LGBTQ+ people and people of color, we’ve failed our poor. The story of America is a story of one failure after another.
And I say “America” even though this is world news, because he was American.
Sometimes I have this thought that feels like a realization that it was never even about “the people” or “freedom” to begin with.
He was actively involved in anarchist organizing with Serve the People in Akron, OH.
I wasn’t aware of that, but I say that’s an indictment of their organization; a small org that doesn’t ever get beyond charity work and the occasional street protest could not save him from despair. A few thousand likes on Facebook? Is that the height of the organization he could join in his area? I’m sure they’re trying their best, but we have to get organized on a much larger scale to be able to do anything that matters.
Beyond being an indictment of their org, that’s an indictment of us all. We are not organized enough. Not even close.
I’d like to know why anyone would downvote this. Do you support genocide?
Maybe people are understandably uncomfortable with self immolation? Nobody has ever liked an effective activist in their time. The civil rights protesters in USA had a <25% approval rate in the 60s.
I think this person did what he thought was right, and I will remember him for that. And peace can’t come soon enough.
We should ask the question: is it really effective? Is anybody even talking about the guy who self-immolated in Colorado for the cause of climate change? Hell, even this event is being suppressed and swept under the rug. And those media orgs who do cover it are choosing to take up a “mental illness” angle to dismiss it.
Sadly there are still a lot of vile people on Lemmy. A lot less than Reddit, but still plenty
It takes courage and convictions to do this kind of protest. There’s no need to reduce it to just a suicide. It was a courageous and highly honorable act. I’ve got nothing but respect.
Telling people that someone who burn himself is a role model is poor taste even if you respect the cause.
How so? I’m expressing my respect and gratitude in the best way I know how.
This is tiresome and pointless pearl clutching.
Aaron Bushnell is a fucking role model
I wish I had half the courage it took
I don’t get this, I’m sure right-wingers would wish you had the courage, too. Why would you idolize this instead of looking at it like a tragedy?
Eyes Left Podcast: A Guide to Getting Out of the US Military (Now) w/ the GI Rights Hotline
GI Rights Hotline: https://girightshotline.org/
Absolute legend.
This is crazy
