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Post by BettyNewbie on Nov 13, 2019 21:22:03 GMT -5
What we're seeing is the culmination of a larger resurgence of fascism that's been going on over the last 20 years. Communism's sudden, hard collapse in the early 90s left much of Eastern Europe and West Asia in shambles. Borders were redrawn, and entire political and economic systems were demolished overnight without much of a plan to replace them with anything. Communism's safety nets got torn apart by capitalist vultures, and many countries' standards of living plummeted. With few available alternatives, people increasingly turned to hyper-nationalism, racism, and xenophobia to fill the void. This was the world that produced Putin and a resurgence of fascism/neo-Nazism in the rest of Eastern Europe. At the same time, you saw the destabilization of the Middle East as a result of Western imperialism, which fueled a new breed of Islamist fascism, from Al-Qaeda to ISIS. Age-old ethnoreligious conflicts were inflamed, and minorities (Christians, Jews, Shia Muslims, Kurds, etc) became more vulnerable than ever. This was the world that produced Erdogan and his desire to rebuild the Ottoman Empire. And, that's not even getting into the economic downfall, distrust in the government, and simmering racism in the US that paved the way for Orange Hitler.
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Post by Tim on Nov 14, 2019 0:16:21 GMT -5
The last time this happened, Fascism had to be destroyed at a terrible cost.
Will that happen again?
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Post by BettyNewbie on Nov 14, 2019 10:11:05 GMT -5
I'm no fan of interventionism, but what recently happened with the US pulling out of Syria has echoes of pre-WWII isolationism: Right as I speak, the Kurds are facing genocide, as are the Christians of Northern Syria. Erdogan wants to rebuild the glory of the Ottoman Empire, and he will purge any pesky minorities who stand in his way, just like his Young Turk predecessors did. How is he not nearly as dangerous as Hitler was?
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Post by Tim on Nov 14, 2019 12:01:57 GMT -5
Yeah, because isolationism worked so well for the U.S. the last time. The age of isolationism ended on December 7th, 1941.
And yet the world will do nothing. They did nothing when Slobodan Milošević turned the former Yugoslavia into a bloodbath in the 1990's, after all.
We need leaders like Winston Churchill to deal with thugs like Erdogan. Sadly, we have none.
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Post by BettyNewbie on Nov 15, 2019 0:59:43 GMT -5
Fuck the Senate. Of course, he's a Tr*mp bootlicker. Hope we get rid of all these slimeballs in 2020. Also, very funny how the same Teabaggers/Bible-Thumpers who were dogpiling on Ilhan Omar a few weeks ago are nowhere to be found. I guess genocide denial only matters when it comes from a black Muslim woman.
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Post by Tim on Nov 15, 2019 12:20:32 GMT -5
It's like those nuts that say the Holocaust never happened. Or the Killing Fields never happened.
The U.S. needs to call Turkey out on this, not turn a blind eye. But they won't, at least not this Administration.
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Post by BettyNewbie on Nov 15, 2019 12:56:30 GMT -5
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Post by Tim on Nov 15, 2019 17:02:34 GMT -5
Takes one to know one.
I mean what does Turkey say happened to all those Armenians? That they just vanished into thin air!?
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Post by BettyNewbie on Nov 15, 2019 19:11:58 GMT -5
I mean what does Turkey say happened to all those Armenians? That they just vanished into thin air!? Worse. They turn around and call the Armenians the aggressors:Painting marginalized groups as wealthier/more powerful/more aggressive than they actually are is an age-old tactic for justifying genocide. Think of all the antisemitic myths about Jews being greedy moneygrubbers or murdering Christian children for rituals (aka. blood libel), for example.
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Post by Tim on Nov 16, 2019 0:30:43 GMT -5
Yeah, just like those evil Jewish gangs that beat up honest Germans in the 1930's
And Turkey has been getting away with this for decades.
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Post by Squad 51 on Nov 17, 2019 9:44:09 GMT -5
It's so sad what's going on in several countries in the world, yet the world seems to have forgotten about the conflicts. I know, Germany also plays a role but we're doing it the wrong way.
Anyway, Germany still has problems with the genocide of the Hereros at the beginning of 20th century. Many skulls are still in museums whereas their descendants want them back and that Germany accepts his responsibility of this crime.
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Post by BettyNewbie on Nov 17, 2019 19:02:40 GMT -5
I fail to see the difference... (That is the Grey Wolf salute, BTW. The Turkish Sieg Heil.) What Turkey proves is that countries like the US and UK will happily ally with fascist dictatorships for political convenience. Even before Erdogan, Turkey was never a "free democracy." Three letters were literally banned in the country up until 2013 to keep people from speaking Kurdish. They have always had a law against "denigrating Turkishness" designed to ban any criticism of the government. The country was literally founded upon genocide, racism, and enforcing ethnic purity. But, up until Erdogan showed up, Turkey posed no immediate threat to the West, so their fascism was swept under the rug, and they became allies against those Scary Pinko Commies. It's only now that the chickens have come home to roost, and the West is starting to figure out that their NATO ally is a fascist dictatorship. It literally took Turkey inflicting a new genocide on the Kurds for this to happen. Of course, Armenians, Assyrians, Greeks, and Kurds already knew this for years, but nobody ever listens to them.
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Post by Tim on Nov 18, 2019 0:30:35 GMT -5
Now the West has to sit up and take notice.
Of course, Orange Hitler will not go against his buddy.
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Post by BettyNewbie on Nov 18, 2019 1:07:18 GMT -5
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Post by Tim on Nov 18, 2019 12:55:05 GMT -5
It's like the 1930's all over again.
Appease the Fascist dictator, because that worked so well the last time
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