There isn’t a rational argument for that. I’m not defending religion or even private property, I’m simply pointing out that religion is not something you can eradicate because it is an idea that emerges spontaneously from human psychology. Even if you murdered every follower of religion it will eventually re-emerge in a new - but still familiar - form. In addition, the idea of private property is not exclusive to religion. Religion just provides a convenient framework for justifying it.

Like I said, the underlying problem is greed and lust for power. There is no easy solution.

Well my argument is more than just saying “it’s not the religion!” I’m saying that it’s more than that. Religion is an effect, not a cause. The distinction is important because it helps us know what to do about it, and trying to eradicate religion isn’t it. That’s just like the “war on drugs” or the “war on terror.” It’s a fight that you can never win and that only causes more harm.

I agree that religion has no place in government, what I’m getting at is that there isn’t anything unique about the Abrahamic religions that makes them more susceptible to being used to justify violence and oppression. In India right now Hindu nationalism forms the basis of their fascist government. In the past there have been countless belief systems of all sorts that were used as justifying dogmas for all manner of atrocities. I would argue that the Abrahamic religions have been shaped by the violence and oppression they’ve been used to justify and not the other way around, and that’s true of all justifying dogmas which causes them to share many similarities.

And I say all this to push back against the idea that repressing the Abrahamic religions - or any religion for that matter - will do anything to stop the violence. In fact, repression of specific religions and of religion in general is quite common throughout history, and as I said before, it tends to form the basis of a new justifying dogma for violence and oppression rather than stopping it.

I don’t understand how the speed of communication is relevant here, would you mind elaborating?

Your mistake is presuming that people elsewhere in the world are any different. We all have the capacity for both great good and great evil. Hell, in the US right now we are ramping up the oppression of immigrants and minorities in prelude to what could easily turn into a genocide if we do not change course.

It’s also important to recognize that the Abrahamic religions are just what are currently used as post hoc justifications for settler-colonialism and imperialism. In the past other philosophies - religious or otherwise - were used and in the future there will be new ways of justifying atrocities. The underlying driver of war and conquest is greed, and that cannot be erased. Eradicating the Abrahamic religions like you suggest will not stop the killing, but would instead likely form the basis of a new justifying dogma.

Allow me to translate.

I form my worldview on vibes alone and am incapable of thinking for myself. My perception of people is entirely filtered through memes and sensationalist media.

Alright smart guy, what’s the plan then? Please enlighten us dumb and incompetent leftists with the work of pure genius you’re clearly keeping up your sleeve about how to counter the corporate media and their billions. We’re all so excited to hear it.

You fell victim to a deliberate smear campaign designed to paint her in an uncharitable light. The neoliberal ghouls tried to use her image to greenwash their enterprise and she resisted. When she became aware of how she was being used she shifted strategies and the media dropped her like a sack of bricks and allowed the conservative smears to dominate the narrative about her. She was essentially radicalized by her experience trying to appeal to the powers that be and finding out first hand that they had no interest in correcting course. No corporate media would want her real story to become common knowledge.

That’s a centrist liberal slogan that - thankfully - is falling by the wayside.

It’s incredibly sad how easily people can fall for dishonest and disingenous propaganda. Do you have any actual beliefs or principles or do you just oppose anyone you were told to call a terrorist?

There is no such thing.

The CCP acts like just because the state owns major enterprises then the workers - through the state - own the means of production. That doesn’t hold up when the state does not adequately represent the will of the workers. Never is this contradiction more clear than when the Chinese state suppresses workers’ attempts to organize on their own terms.

China is communist in the same way that the US is democratic, which is to say that it’s a sham to keep up appearances that is suspended when convenient for the few who hold real power.

Hyperindividualism and car culture explains it all. Americans don’t trust each other (especially not their neighbors) and want to put as much distance between themselves as possible. We’re also mostly NIMBYs (Not In My Backyard) and have very strict zoning laws that prevent commercial and residential buildings from coexisting in the same area. This is great for the auto industry because it means you can’t do anything without driving, and they lobby the government to block any attempt to change things.

Our suburbs are liminal spaces that more closely resemble purgatory than actual communities, which is why everyone who grew up in them is at least slightly insane.

This is a small town. We don’t call them villages, we call them towns for some reason.

The word village implies community, and we don’t do that kinda thing in the states.

The media is compromised. People are organizing but you’re not hearing about it for the most part. No one’s talking about it on public forums for obvious reasons. You will start hearing about it when things come to a head.

Holy shit you sound like a member of the rich white family from Get Out who were body snatching black people for the “advantages.” Living out in the country I usually only see the loud and ugly kind of racism, but your kind of racism gives me the creeps.

This happens to me just because I’m a man with white skin who dresses country. I do love throwing them for a loop when it happens though.

These are extreme times, people are going to hold extreme views. Most people are going to have a problem with those who are anti-extremist to the point that they imply moral equivalence between the extreme left and the extreme right. Yes, violence is generally bad. No, not all violence is equally unjustified.

Take this quiz and see if you can tell the difference between Nazism and Zionism. I bet you can’t.

Don’t you find it interesting that I only said I was anti-capitalist and you immediately assumed a ton of things about what I believe without bothering to ask? I find it interesting, it reveals a lot about your mindset. Even though you’ve decided to be overtly hostile towards me for no reason I’ll take the time to respond, because I believe you think you’re being reasonable.

Hey tankie, I’ve had conversations with other tankies that believe no business should be making a profit and there is no such thing as a good company.

Profit is just the excess labor value that your employer withholds from you. The problem is not that businesses make money, the problem is that the people who produce the value do not get to decide what to do with it. Instead, the capital owner has the ultimate authority and is able to use it to enrich themselves at the expense of those who did the actual work, with no way to hold them accountable. It doesn’t matter if the boss is a “good person” or not because the employer-employee relationship is inherently unequal.

They think a business should provide services for free, while they sit on their ass and collect UBI. UBI is something I support, but if I create a business that aims to help people one way or another with a product or service, I’m not doing it for free.

This is a gross misrepresentation of what socialists believe. Socialists believe that workers should have control over their company. I don’t think workers should provide services for free, I think they should be paid their worth and have the freedom to decide what to do with the excess rather than having it taken from them by capital owners. In the current system it is actually the capital owners who sit on their ass and collect welfare in the form of profits.

The reason socialists also advocate for welfare such as UBI is because we believe that the excess labor value should be reinvested into the community to improve everyone’s standard of living rather than paying for the boss’ 3rd yacht and 5th vacation home.

There are other forms of societal framework and I’m sorry, but Marxist Lenonist communism isn’t it. There’s a reason communism always devolves into authoritarianism.

I’m not a marxist-leninist, I lean more towards libertarian socialism / anarchism. I do wish you would have made an attempt to find out where I stand on things before starting with the name-calling. I agree that marxist-leninists have authoritarian tendencies, but I believe that results from their belief that power should be centralized under the state to establish a “dictatorship of the proletariat,” not from their socialist economics. It is possible (I would actually argue that it’s necessary) for power to be decentralized under federated collectives that practice socialist economics. This is sometimes called anarcho-syndicalism, but I believe there’s more to it than that.

And we don’t need to go back to feudalism, which is primarily what has been throughout history, which you ignore.

The political and economic systems that existed prior to capitalism were far more complex than you’re giving them credit for. Feudalism was actually the precursor to capitalism, and was not the dominant political system for most of human history. Before land was stolen by feudal lords, most of it was managed and held in common by small communities. The process by which landlords stole land and began rent-seeking is called the enclosure of the commons.

Again, I cannot recommend enough that you do some reading on anthropology. I’m not asking you to read political theory, but if you don’t have an understanding of the many different ways that humans organized themselves in the past it limits your ability to imagine ways that we could organize ourselves in the future.