“We’ve made it one year penalty for inciting riots. We took the freedom of speech away, because that’s been through the courts, and the courts said, ‘you have freedom of speech,’ but what has happened is that when they burn the flag it agitates and irritates crowds … and you end up with riots.”
Donald Trump
So, while burning the flag is protected by the First Amendment in the US as an expression of freedom of speech, inciting riots comes with a one year penalty. And because burning a flag could incite a riot, it gets an automatic one year penalty?
How's this working out for y'all?
It definitely doesn't sound like the "land of the free". More than that, what this means is that anything that could be considered as inciting a riot would then get an automatic one year penalty.
But...
that can be anything!
At the moment, ICE is inciting riots, do they get penalised? What about when police needlessly kill a black person they are arresting? Penalty? What is the definition of incitement and what is the boundary line for what is okay, and where it crosses into incitement? What this means is that the current government can essentially dictate terms over anyone, picking and choosing who they arrest based on whatever flimsy line of incitement they choose at the time. It doesn't matter if it doesn't make it through the courts later, because in the short-term, a person or group of people will be in jail.
The jail business must be good in the US!
There are around 1.8M people in jail in the US, and this was before the anti-immigration arrests. But don't worry Americans, while you have the largest prison population in the world (even more than China who is pretty arresty and has 4x as many people), you aren't the top if considering incarceration per 100,000 inhabitants. You are only 5th. And 6th. And 9th.
Three in the top ten.
You are in some pretty good company there!
Look, I am not on the ground there so maybe all of this is "fake news" and everything is actually swell in the US at the moment. But, that this kind of thing is even in the news, with national guards mobilising in cities to reduce crime and violence, and threats of arrests of anyone who has spoken against the president, and what targeted withholding of funding from select states and cities, and of course, the government lockdown -
Another day in paradise?
Does these events touch on the daily lives of the average American, or are they peripheral events that don't really matter to most people, but are good for global news stories? Is the average American worried about their country currently, or is it that people are unaffected by all of this, and life just goes on as usual.
Business as usual.
I am looking forward to the time the Rest of the World performs a "conscious decoupling" from the US economy and chooses to increase consumption instead or relying on a single, debt riddled nation that will keep consuming to maintain power, and maximise wealth for a tiny fraction of people.
As I have said before, while the US is the world's largest consumer, accounting for over 26% of the global total of the economy, it only has about 4% of the world's population. What this means is that if the rest of the world population grew their consumption by a small amount, it would more than compensate for the loss of the entire American market. But, can the average American compensate for that loss?
No.
Because the US system is not a closed system, as it depends on inflows of goods and more importantly, a huge amount of income, from the rest of the world. Even if all production moved to the US, what would that look like if the rest of the world, which can provide everything for itself if needed, stops trading? What does the US look like as a hermit nation?
What does the rest of the world look like without US trade?
Lots of disruption for sure. But the thing is with the economy we have, is that disruption is sorely needed, because it just doesn't work. The disruption is going to come anyway, because there is an inevitability to an economy designed to eat itself to the point it starves under the weight of an enormous and growing wealth gap. At least if the rest of the world makes a move now, it undercuts the influence of the US and starts a transition to a more distributed economic model. Not only this, in the short term, there would be a huge amount of need to build factories and train people, and ultimately create new industries, like in the improvement of wellbeing.
the rest of the world, instead of being consumers of useless things, could pivot to be consumers of wellbeing goods and services, clean energy, and just better lives. The RoW could get out of the "industrial age" of business where it is all about selling goods and services, regardless of whether they are "good" or "serving" and into a period of things that are actually good and serving for humanity.
The human age.
As I see it in my idealistic world, industry should be rewarded by the improvement in wellbeing it brings to humanity, not on whether they can convince people to buy it or not. The reason is that it is far easier to convince our simple human circuitry to do what is counterproductive for our wellbeing, than what is beneficial for it, whether that be at the individual, or the social level. The richest companies and people in the world should be the ones that provide the most human value to society, the best health, the most content people, the maximisation of human beauty and joy.
It is never going to happen.
Because we seem too content believing that the shitshow that we have now, is the only way it can be.
Speak freely.
If you dare.
Taraz
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The Trump administration is slowly becoming authoritarian, albeit in a subtle way. His policies as the US president is beginning to turn the US ugly and the rest of the world would soon be affected. You might tell me Biden was kinda incompetent and I'd agree, but Trump is incompetent in a different way. He does things for the US, but they aren't the things that really matter, and even worse, because those things he does are damaging the nation. With all his policies it's clear he didn't assume power this second time with the wellbeing of US citizens in mind.
Is it subtle though? The amount of movement has been large and blatant. The wellbeing of everyone is under threat.
You don't see much of this stuff where I live. We are kind of isolated here in the Midwest. It's more in the big cities though it wouldn't shock me if they sent troops to Detroit eventually. He'd probably be afraid to do that because of the large middle eastern community in Dearborn. It's all about his ego. It has nothing to do with crime or anything else. Mayors and citizens spoke out against him and so he sends in the troops.
Even if just posturing, shouldn't this scare the majority of Americans? As we have spoken before, it is normalising troops in the cities and military to handle domestic issues.
Preaching to the choir man. I can't wrap my head around how okay people are with this. Yet the right claims that the left are living in an echo chamber. Both sides are just horrible. I saw an article the other day saying the Green party in the US is finally gaining some traction because of all this and while that may have been a bad thing in the past, I think it is good now. We need to shake things up.
I have the feeling that some are getting used to being worried about their country. They carry their outrage to social media daily, protesting in that little nutshell, but aren't really doing anything. Because those I know live far away, many for good reasons. Most of them couldn't even survive in the US. They live here for years, yet they still care more for the politics over there, and have no clue what's going on here. That is becoming obvious at the moment.
All that "worrying" is starting to feel like a well rehearsed dance, a habit more than a spontaneous reaction. Not even a contemplated or thought through reaction. But then again, I'm a bit frustrated at the moment, so I might be biased.
For sure. It is the normalisation of living in fear. If that doesn't sound authoritarian, I don't know what does.
For many it is a dance. Repetition of the basic steps they have learned, without the nuance to listen to the music and rhythm of the world.
Hopefully you are less frustrated today.
I also think that this will never happen, but essentially for reasons of numbers. There will never be a large enough number of people who believe in a development model in which those who bring greater wealth to the population are rewarded for it. And since the imposed greed of those who normally have greater visibility POISONS those who are below and yearn for a better life, the model we currently have IMPRISONS the minds and often the bodies of those who try to do things differently.
As I have said before, it can't come from the top down, for that very reason. It has to be ground up, where the consumer habits change. Unlikely.
This world could be awesome. Unfortunately, we are a ridiculous species.
I have a very big dream... even if it won't happen in your grandchildren's lifetime, I believe that humanity will one day evolve. And it will find the true path. There is always a light in the midst of darkness. For now, that light is nothing more than the light of a few matches being lit here and there... But one day, those matches will turn into a true star!
We’re going to need Nuremberg Trials 2.0 after Trumpism has run its dark course. Our Supreme Court has essentially given The Donald a get out of jail free card but Miller, Noem, Hegseth, and company have no such protection. “I was just following orders” will not protect them.
There are definitely some parallels, aren't there? what I think is interesting is that the amount of movement in this direction has been rapid. Months instead of decades. The speed of communication and the stupidity of the masses.
US has always had high inmate population and that is because we have a lot of private for profit prisons. So naturally sending people to jail is incentivized, because it makes money. The current administration is unprecedented in US, but so far it doesn't seem to have impacted average Americans very much. Some things that are now done could actually result in a major economic expansion after years of rolling recession in USA.
Pretty crazy how capitalistic incentives work, hey? All we'd need to do is incentivise different things.
Possibly. But economic expansion of who exactly? All I see happening is a further supercharging of the wealth gap.
Although freedom of speech is a fundamental right of every citizen and it is only in the law. But in reality, it is seen that if freedom of speech comes against the government or in favor of reality, then those people are harassed by the government. And most people cannot express freedom of speech and if they do, they have to stay in jail. Most of the opposition parties are victims of this. It is really sad that so many people are in jail in the United States.
I have a different view of freedom of speech to some, as I think we are all free to speak - there are just consequences for our speech. However, from the legal view, there should be a framework that defines acceptability, but that is no longer the case in the US.
Although people living in the world have democratic rights, some governments have made laws as they wish and have restricted or suspended people's human rights. US President Trump's imposition of prison sentences against those who commit riots is one of his actions. When my cousin, who has obtained American citizenship, recently visited Sri Lanka, he spoke of Trump's actions with regret and anger. As he mentioned, many civilians do not like Trump's rule. Strict measures are taken against riots because he thinks that his rule will be lost. In foreign policy, Trump acts on strict policies. It must be admitted that it is still difficult to leave America out of international trade. Alternative measures must be found for that.
I think it would be easier than many realise, but it would be disruptive in the short-term.
Have you noticed that "protests" are now classed as "riots"? This is a reframing of the term in order to justify military action.
The people who live in those neighborhoods are relieved to have these bad actors removed. I think you are spot on in your skepticism of your news sources. Except for libs, most people are pleased to have criminals and the antifa types rounded up.
"....Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me"
Yes, bloody shame what is happening in the UK.
What do you think is happening in the UK?
It's not what I think.
Digital ID
Freedom of Speech
Whatever you think of free speech in the US, we have an absolute right to free speech. This means that the government is prohibited from infringing on it. If the government wrote such a law, it would be struck down by courts. And bad arrests often result in the person being let go. The limits are pre-defined and set.
Europe and the UK, in contrast, have a qualified right to free speech. The governments get to decide what is reasonable free speech, which changes with their chosen interpretation, or can be simply rewritten. It seems like lately the UK has been the epicenter of testing the limits of free speech.
It is strange how the meaning of "incitement" can change based on who is in power. It makes one think if real freedom of speech is just a fantasy nowadays.
The number of prisoners and convicts has reached nearly 2 million, a staggering figure. A large portion of those imprisoned have committed violent crimes. Things are getting worse in the US in every way. It's unfair that they own such a large share of the global economy. However, the current system is so complex and resilient that creating a new order now seems utopian.
Just another clear example of the events described by The Change of World Order by Ray Dalio and The Price of Tomorrow by Jeff Booth.
There's so much to debate on this topic... So many criteria... So many realities...
I only hope that human beings react and learn to live together in harmony and build a better world that we all need so much!
Cheers.