For some reason the US is able to export it's own politics and history abroad. The history of black people in the UK takes is overwritten by the history of black people in America. Our political ideology dominates theirs. What is the deal? Is it similar to the denizens of South American, Asian, and European countries being criticized and censured for "blackface" and such aspects of American racism and history as if it were their own. Why is this so prevalent? What does it all mean?
It's because the USA owns like 99% of the internet and it exports their own brand of Spectacle.
Hudson Clark
It's politically useful because it keeps demographics divided and hostile to one another rather than united and hostile to their actual oppressors and exploiters.
The international bourgeoisie are collaborating in order to meet their economic and political ends.
Cooper Sullivan
Imperialism, even amongst supposedly "leftist" circles. US participants in English language discussion use their numbers and, usually, control over the discussion platform to quash any dissent from their framework. Hence, we have plebbitors insistent that an English person calling them a pork meatball is bigotry, for example.
Nathan Nelson
I hope people now see why Holla Forums should switch to Esperanto.
Mason Cooper
Not sectarian enough, lets make our own language. I propose Yiddish with a dash of japanese. Ikh libe dikh Onii san
Luis Howard
Maybe, I don't know, in solidarity? Would you say that people in England doing a solidarity march for, say, a general strike in France are 'importing' France's politics?
Ryder Ross
Both groups would presumably be workers, which we can justify as having a common international struggle. Is there such an border-less struggle here? Or is the entire justification for BLMs existence America's racial history itself.
Jaxon Richardson
They do actually have a common struggle. Racism exists on both countries, and in both countries there has recently been a rise in racial tensions (police shootings/Brexit).
Brayden Cook
But the common struggle isn't the nebulous "racism", it's Black Lives Matter, the hashtag. What does Brexit have to do with the way blacks are policed in America? Literally nothing.
Isaac Walker
Except the idiot bigots emboldened by Brexit are mainly targeting Eastern Europeans (muh Poles), Indo-Pakistanis and Arabs (muh Muslims). The people in OPs post are just a group of bandwagon jumpers who want to copy what is happening in the US, due to aforementioned imperialism.
We're back to my original point. They're probably doing it in solidarity. Furthermore, it's a very well known hashtag which can be used to raise racial awareness without triggering the 'muh immigrants' people. Then you simply compare what's happening there (racial attacks on blacks) to what's happening in England (racial attacks on immigrants) and suddenly you have a bunch more people on your side. "You're against this thing, so why not be against this similar thing?
Xavier Davis
Remind of this pic with Kurds holding a BLM sign…
Owen Davis
Which is utterly fucking pointless, practically. People here have no influence on what happens in the U.S. Again, they just want to copy what the "cool kids" in the US are doing.
1) They're quite different. Groups of citizens attacking each other is quite different from state representatives abusing the power they're granted to perform executions. 2) I hate shitheads who try to attach their cause to another. This is a dishonest tactic and it makes me want to hit the people who persist in doing it in the face. When I say I support X, I mean I support X. I does not mean that I support X, Y and Z.
Jose Smith
I literally explained why it's not pointless in the very next sentence. The point isn't to affect policy abroad, but to show that there's a common struggle.
I still gotta ask how that is different from any socialist solidarity march. If a socialist movement in France starts a protest against a labour law (oh wait), I'm not gonna refuse to support them just because my country isn't getting that labour law. We're both still getting fucked by Capitalism, and that's why we should be showing solidarity to each other.
The exact same can be said here. Both groups are getting fucked by racism, so they act in solidarity, because they're both part of the same broader struggle.
Evan Williams
I explained that this is not true in my last post.
Aaron Morris
And I explained that this is not true in my last post. Please read more than the first paragraph, I appreciate it.
Julian Cook
Formatting, please.
Luis Hill
I read it. You are doing exactly what I decried in my previous post, attaching Y to X. No, they are quite different issues.
Jonathan Wright
You can use it raise racial awareness of American racism only. It doesn't have anything to do with Brexit or immigrants, in fact, some parts of BLM have been carefully trying to extract the specific, core issue of institutional, American anti-black racism from a general racial awareness by specifically separating out black Americans from the umbrella of "PoC" by encouraging the use of terms such as "Black and Brown Americans". It certainly raises racial awareness as if the racial context in the UK was the same was it is in America, which it isn't. What they are doing is transplanting the American context to the UK.
Leo White
So the two movements fighting racism don't have enough in common but the socialist ones do? By that same logic one would be against all kinds of internationalism.
Juan Murphy
Where did I claim this? Fuck off with putting words into my mouth. This discussion is no longer productive and is at an end.
Owen Adams
Which is why you go the extra step and directly compare the two countries issues, rather than simply transplanting the American context to the UK.
Daniel Walker
Dude, I'm not putting words in your mouth, I'm trying to make an argument. You say their problems are too different, I make the argument that their differences aren't much different from two countries protesting different labour laws, so what exactly is the difference between these two?
I know this sound like "if you support x, then you have to support y." I'm not saying that. I don't care what you support, and really I'm just playing devil's advocate here. I'm saying that if BLM and those people in England are part of the same broader struggle against racism, and the socialists in two countries are part of the same broader struggle against Capitalism, then why is the former protesting in solidarity pointless when it isn't for the latter.
Andrew Rivera
Where have I claimed they're are different? I am only responding because you are again using this question in an attempt to put words into my mouth. I will not discuss this further.
Nolan Barnes
Right. Fucking. There.
Jaxson Jones
How is such a comparison between the countries beneficial, and how much would be a non-sequitur, distracting you from the racism of one country by pretending it has the same history of slavery and segregation as the United States? How would inter-Asian racism be understood through the lens of Black Americans? Why don't Black people in America adopt the same banner of Burakumin in Japan, or the Roma in Europe? Really I'd say that Americas have trouble understanding those foreign forms of racism because they only have their cultural context to understand racism, and unlike Capitalism there actually is no global form of racism to struggle against. I think the UK confounds its own issues when taking up the slogans of Black Lives Matter, I Can't Breath, and Hands Up Don't Shoot.
Levi Roberts
It is quite obvious that am I stating that I have not claimed that BLM movements in two countries are different to socialist movements in two countries.
Logan Ward
Well… That's actually a very good point. I agree.
Pah, foiled again.
Oh, I guess I misunderstood you then. Sorry.
Asher James
Just curious… how many black posters are there on Holla Forums? I have a feeling this board is overwhelmingly white and male.
Parker Allen
Most revolutionary circles are. White, male, and well-cultured. However, there are always a few coloreds. Even in libertarian circles you'll find one or two blacks
