this post was submitted on 20 Jan 2026
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[–] Darkness343@lemmy.world 4 points 44 minutes ago

Maybe the alien invasion from outer space we were expecting since Independence day. was just the Americans using either their space force toys or the solar warden fleet to take over the world?

[–] baatliwala@lemmy.world 31 points 6 hours ago (2 children)

Yeah America is getting cooked for the next couple decades at least. Even if Trump literally dies tomorrow and his successor backs out no one is trusting them for a long time.

[–] nothrone@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago) (1 children)

People keep saying that, but is that really true? Because I just don't see society having any sort of memory.

For fuck sake, the guy is a rapist, pedophile, liar of the highest order. No one cares. Sure, some people are moving away from US services/products, but 1. Not that many people are doing it and 2. Once a non pedophile, war-monger gets back in the presidency, some little bit of marketing and everyone will go back to buying US.

I just don't think anyone gives a shit. There is like 1 principled person for every 100000 people.

[–] Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 2 points 8 minutes ago

The tide is turning.

Checks and balances have to get a whole lot stronger before anyone trusts the US long term.

[–] phutatorius@lemmy.zip 15 points 5 hours ago

That's fine. If that's what it takes to help the Americans get their predatory elites onto a tighter leash, that'll be worth it.

[–] Balldowern@lemmy.world 27 points 6 hours ago (3 children)

Foreigner here. I know you civilians don't control the government anymore & many of us see your hands are tied, but if Americans really want to stop wars, then stop enlisting in any branch of your military except the coast guard. Every other branch is primarily used for invasion. If you've already enrolled/are trapped by the military, try to become a conscientious objector.

And FFS, arm yourselves (civilians) to the teeth. The tyrannical government your Founding Fathers envisioned has arrived.

[–] anon_8675309@lemmy.world 6 points 1 hour ago

A lot of us are armed. But you know that orange turd would order the military to bomb complete cities. We would be taking on the world’s most powerful military.

But. I do agree with you. That what it’s going to take. We just need to organize.

[–] theherk@lemmy.world 1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

Each of the branches have long had many global peacetime missions, including humanitarian. They don’t offset the offensive nature of a deployed force, but it can be a good thing to have for delivering defense and aid.

The problem isn’t the enlisted. It is also not limited to the officers. The problem, at present, is primarily the civilian leadership being absolutely unprofessional, unethical, and self-centered.

[–] bearboiblake@pawb.social 2 points 23 minutes ago (1 children)

This is like saying "don't blame ICE, blame the executive branch". Soldiers follow orders. The enlisted soldiers WILL kill US citizens resisting the government if ordered to. So yeah, they are part of the problem. Same with cops.

[–] theherk@lemmy.world 2 points 15 minutes ago

My point is that it isn’t enlisted people that decide on mission. And simply not enlisting doesn’t change that. If the numbers are needed, they will be achieved via volunteer or draft.

Enlisted may or may not attack citizens depending on their views on which orders are lawful. This is nothing like saying not to blame ICE. ICE are signing up to do exactly what they’re doing and should be responsible for it. But enlisted personnel don’t enlist to attack citizens, generally. I’m not saying they are not part of the problem, but they certainly aren’t the root of it.

[–] Fredthefishlord@lemmy.blahaj.zone 6 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

Having only people who are willing to do atrocities in the military is not going to magically make it better lmfao, nor will it stop it

[–] echodot@feddit.uk 9 points 5 hours ago

Given the fact that the navy were quite happy to kill a bunch of unarmed civilians and then come back a second time when some of them didn't appear to be dead enough, doesn't give me a lot of hope that there'll be a lot of conscientious objectors in the military. My view is that if you're already looking at the military as a career option you've got a certain opinion about killing and that opinion is that it's okay to do it as long as someone else gave you the order. Absolutely no need to think about the legality of the order either.

Advocating moral responsibility for your actions is kind of a prerequisite of military service.

[–] renrenPDX@lemmy.dbzer0.com 41 points 9 hours ago (6 children)

Some of these comments are awful. Apparently, if we all aren't wrapping ourselves and children with explosives and becoming Jihadists overnight, we're not doing enough.

This is a class war. The rich have taken over all the checks and balances in our system to where they can break every rule and comfortably get away with it; all the while getting richer and us poorer. We're powerless and spread too thin geographically to do anything meaningful. Maybe we do need to get that radical, but I really hope it doesn't ever need to get to that point.

[–] bearboiblake@pawb.social 1 points 20 minutes ago

Stop with the false fucking hope, wake the fuck up, and do something. God you people will be wringing your hands acting like there is nothing you can do right until the end.

JOIN A UNION. JOIN THE IWW. ORGANIZE. GET INVOLVED IN LOCAL PROTESTS AND NETWORK NETWORK NETWORK. FORM A GROUP CHAT FOR YOUR COMMUNITY. BUY A GUN AND LEARN TO USE IT.

[–] jof@lemmy.world 1 points 30 minutes ago
[–] echodot@feddit.uk 7 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

Ok but there is quite a way between going oh I don't like what's happening on social media and blowing yourself up.

Write to your representatives and make it extremely clear that if they want to be reelected they will stand up to Trump.

Massive protests, the No Kings protest were good but then you all kind of just gave up. Nothing violent but just a stubborn refusal to go along is all that is required. Boycott companies that support Trump, don't buy the next iPhone (it's basically the same phone every year anyway), don't go to FIFA, don't go to the Olympics, go to as many town meetings as you can and raise points of order and complain. Make it even possible for the powers that be to ignore the situation.

Just imagine you're a French dock worker complaining about industrialisation.

[–] bearboiblake@pawb.social 1 points 18 minutes ago

Don't waste your time writing to representatives. Democracy is gone, bud, you need to start imagining that you are living under the nazi regime. Arm yourself and network with activists. Make contacts now while you still can.

[–] Photonic@lemmy.world 9 points 6 hours ago (4 children)

Nobody is blaming you for what Trump is doing. Nobody is asking you to become terrorists and this hyperbole is extremely unhelpful. We are blaming you for the fact that we’re not seeing protests every day that make the BLM protests seem like small gatherings. You guys are way past the point of being able to hope. Do something today. This is your country, so it’s your responsibility.

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[–] ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net 29 points 9 hours ago

Here are concrete steps we can take to combat this (the titles below expand if you click them).

Learn First Aid! ⛑️

The future us likely to be violent, and It extremely important to have the skills to be able to keep yourself and others alive if they get hurt. You can never have too many medics.

Tacticool Girlfriend provides a great introduction to building a personal first aid kit, called an IFAK, which can deal with things like bullet wounds and other serious bleeding wounds. I also want to emphasize her recommendation of only buying medical gear from reputable sources (not Amazon!), such as North American Rescue to avoid fakes that could cost you your life.

But you'll need to learn how to use that equipment, too. The best resource for that is to take a local Stop The Bleed class, which are pretty widely available in most places. They may cost a small fee, but can also sometimes be free. Alternatively, if you cannot access a local class, this video by PrepMedic will give you a solid understanding of how to use Tourniquets and Gauze for wound packing.

Injuries are less harmful if they are tended to early. Learning first aid can help conserve resources when healthcare becomes unaffordable. Having several medics in case of harm by police is an extremely powerful morale booster during a protest that may become a police riot. When you become comfortable with the basics of first aid, riot medicine is the next suggested step.

Establish or join local Mutual Aid networks

If you haven't already, get to know your neighbors. Mutual aid is a willingness to support and grow your community. This can include informal networks through friends, tenant/renter organizations, solidarity groups, and industrial unions.

These are groups using direct action to solve each other's problems. Building strong communities makes it difficult for fascism to take root. The actions of the government are going to hit every community hard, and the ones who build trust in each other and work together are most likely to survive. We've been building a list of resources in !inperson@slrpnk.net to help you on your way. Also check out this handy guide to find existing groups in your area.

This isn't only for your own community protection. Your ability to organize today will change the political landscape tomorrow. When revolution occurs, the social organizations that show the greatest resilience through the regime are the ones typically calling the shots when the dust settles. When it comes to elections, get out the vote drives are useless if most of the voters are fascists. At some point, you have to do grassroots political education if you don't want fascist candidates winning elections. Mutual aid networks are excellent forums not only for teaching each other good political ideas, but demonstrating them in practice.

Join a Union and Prepare for a General Strike! 💪

The most effective non-violent action we can take is preparing and organizing for a General Strike.

The country would be brought to its knees if suddenly deprived of profit and labor. That tactic was extremely effective in Chile in 2019, and had they not fallen for the trick of liberal reform, they would've had a successful revolution on their hands with virtually no bloodshed.

If you aren't in a union (or even if you are, it's worth dual-carding), consider joining the IWW to unionize your workplace (bonus: you'll get higher wages, better benefits, and more time off if you succeed!) to strengthen a general strike if we manage to enact one, as most unions have a strike fund that can supplement your income during a general strike to make it more financially bearable (you should also save as much money as you can reasonably do, so it can also be used to keep yourself afloat during a strike).

And for our international friends, you should join one as well, as fascism is gaining momentum globally. If your country isn't listed below, just contact the IWW directly in the link above, and they'll help you set up a new local branch.

  • 🇦🇷 Argentina: FORA
  • 🇦🇺 Australia: ASF-IWA
  • 🇧🇷 Brazil: FOB
  • 🇧🇬 Bulgaria: ARS, CITUB
  • 🇩🇪 Germany: FAU
  • 🇬🇷 Greece: ESE
  • 🇮🇹 Italy: USI
  • 🇳🇱 🇧🇪 Netherlands & Belgium: Vriji Bond
  • 🇪🇸 Spain: CNT
  • 🇸🇪 Sweden: SAC
  • 🇬🇧 United Kingdom: UVW

Adopt Security Culture and Digital Camouflage 🛡️

Sometimes benign seeming efforts can turn into unexpected personal data collecting traps. Like an obscure website for exchanging contact info with other students turning into a global ad-tech surveillance network (Facebook), or innocent seeming online personality tests being use to harvest character profiles. Even Etsy, Reddit, Tinder, and Duolingo are feeding information to US Government Agencies like ICE.

Security culture is commonly used to describe the general awareness of such potential traps and how it can affect groups or entire communities. This goes beyond mere individual privacy efforts, as without joint efforts these often fail to work.

Especially in activist circles, security culture is paramount. For opsec reasons not everyone in the group might be aware of what clandestine efforts others are involved in, but with a general security culture many potential data leaks can be avoided.

Movements are made by the volume of their participants, and the easier and less dangerous it is to participate, the more people will get involved. As more people get involved, individual involvement becomes even less dangerous, creating a virtuous cycle.

We'll start it off with some General Advice:

  • Mentally wall off personal uniquely identifying info from your online presence, actively build a habit of opsec so that withholding information is your default mental state
  • Be careful about who you meet online
  • Use different, unrelated usernames, passwords & emails for every account. And try not to connect to those accounts with your real IP address (use Tor or a VPN)
  • Be mindful that anything done online leaves a trail
  • agents provocateurs may seek to find patsies willing to perform an ill-advised illegal activity in order to legitimize police repression. If someone is trying to pressure you, especially if you don't have a long and proven history with them, be extremely wary.

For a full guide on what encrypted communications platforms to use, and how to stay off the radar, read the Digital Camouflage section within the Monthly Meta post here (you'll need to scroll down. I'd add it here, but it won't fit in this comment).

[–] ReallyActuallyFrankenstein@lemmynsfw.com 59 points 13 hours ago (11 children)

The really striking thing about the contingent of non-Americans in this thread who are blaming all Americans, even specifically those who oppose Trump, is that I can't imagine a psyop doing a better job of fracturing the American left and isolating the US.

I think Lemmy is still small enough that the people who are vomiting on the anti-Trump Americans and insisting on collective blame are probably real people, who don't know how to direct their anger (which is quite depressing). But to explain, I actually can't think of what Russia would do differently to accomplish (1) transposing anger against Trump into anger against all Americans, which helps (2) sever international support to internal American anti-Trump protesters, and thereby (3) weaken internal American resistance to Trump by making those of us here who opposed Trump feel and be even more isolated.

Solidarity across borders seems like a better approach. Seems like you would feed the tree you want to grow, and starve the invasive weed you don't, instead of just relieving oneself on both. But what do I know, I'm just a stupid American.

[–] architect@thelemmy.club 5 points 7 hours ago

Yes much better said that I can produce in my current emotional state. This is a class war and they are abusing Americans by separating us from those that care about us (our allies).

They don't need to psyop if they just stress us out enough to lash out against each other instead.

[–] Bubbaonthebeach@lemmy.ca 21 points 12 hours ago (7 children)

From a non-American's viewpoint, most Americans seem very content to only vent online about how they didn't vote for this but they don't seem to be holding their congress and senate representatives to task to get Trump out of office, now. There is a possibility of a general strike on Friday - it should be throughout the USA. In every city. Let your reps know that you are not just attending the odd protest but that citizen demand change immediately. They can impeach or Amendment 25 him out right now. No waiting for the slight possibility that there might still be an election in November. Trump isn't obeying any other laws or the constitution so he can't be expected to hold and then abide by an election many more months away. Americans do not seem, from the world's view, to be treating Trump with the urgency that is needed.

[–] FireRetardant@lemmy.world 1 points 1 hour ago

The guy literally has said you'll never have to vote again and has recently been teasing the idea of skipping the upcoming election. If american streets are still empty of angry citezens after that election is canceled, we are truly cooked.

[–] parricc@lemmy.world 5 points 6 hours ago

A widespread general strike will likely never happen because most people would be fired on the spot if they told their boss they were going on a strike. If you get fired, you don't qualify for unemployment, and most people are only a single paycheck away from being homeless. I guess people from a lot of countries do not understand this concept because they had the privilege of actual workers rights.

We've been protesting. The frustration you have from thinking we're doing nothing is the same frustration we have with the so called Representatives sitting with their thumbs up their asses. They don't care what we think. They straight up make fun of us for trying. With the exception of Greenland and Canada, the rest of the world does not understand the pure rage, frustration, and fear we're dealing with every single day. If you're somewhere like mainland Europe, you're in a far safer place than we are right now. You don't have to worry about if and when your friends and family will get randomly kidnapped by ICE. You don't have to worry about when you too will get put in a concentration camp simply for having leftist political views. If the US actually goes through with invading Greenland, what do you think that is going to mean for those inside of the US? The country would immediately tear apart. All US bonds would immediately get dumped, and there would be a worldwide economic collapse. The only silver lining would be that the American war machine would also hopefully collapse. It may be large, but it's expensive to run. The entire US would turn into something that looks like the Bosnian War. Due to the US facing an internal collapse, Canada would likely be able to resist occupation, and Greenland would be won back from any kind of conquest. While awful things would happen in mainland Europe, they would pale in comparison to whatever happened in the US. We're dealing with fascists, and there would probably be hundreds of Tiananmen Square type events. This last few months has involved coming to terms that we probably will never have a chance to live a full life because we'll be dead long before old age ever comes.

We're not a country of soldiers. We're just regular people. Despite whatever you might think, most people do not own guns or know how to use them. Do you expect people to leave their children homeless and without food over a 1 day strike? Do you understand that if a war happens, most of us will probably end up dead simply from being inside of the US? And even if there isn't a war, we may 2 years or less until we get put in a concentration camp simply for being against Trump. I fucking worry every day that my friends could get disappeared at any moment. You see stuff in the news about Minneapolis, but ICE is in every city. Over 1000 miles away, they've been going door to door near some of my closest friends. To suggest we are content is batshit. We are not okay with anything. I'm not going to apologize for the threats of an orange megalomaniac that I continually try to resist.

If you're outside of the US, you absolutely can do stuff. Stop buying things that feed the monster. Build defenses and deterrents against US aggression. And get the money out of your own politics too. Stay vigilant. You don't want to go down this road, and it's closer than you'd think. If the US goes to war, it won't win. We might all be dead, but maybe the world will reset and fascism will fall.

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