I have blocked both hardcore Zionists - who have spent a month trying to justify fucking active genocide & blocked hardcore Muslim folks trying to justify more bloodshed of innocent lives. Fuck BOTH of those types of ppl. I look at full timelines of both sides & I'm not OK with either side trying to hoodwink ppl. I'm not OK with Zionists trying to hijack posts from people here, who are wanting ceasefire & diplomatic solutions.
I see plenty of atrocities and grief being exploited into rage but I’m not sure if I could’ve seen it w/o listening to MSM & multiple govts (the UN) but yes also the Biden Admin
In contrast, Twitter/𝕏 is aflame with partisanship driven by disinfo groups. Other social media, too
@msquebanh I really don't understand how people can't grasp the reality that both Hamas and the state of Israel (particularly under Netanyahu) are violent sadists who will stop at nothing to protect and expand their own personal power. That they can't just be on the side of people and humanity, that there has to be an Othering or that compassion for Palestinians and Israelis, and for Arabs and Jews in the diaspora, is possible. It's not only possible but the only way through. The emphasis has always got to be on preventing further suffering for everyone involved.
@fifilamoura Probably because most people don't fucking read or study any geopolitics. If they did - there would not be this mass divide across humanity now.
@msquebanh It's also partly trauma response I think, much like how some people come from abusive families and the experience expands compassion and others simply become trapped in cycles of victimization and abuse. Some people get very addicted to that dynamic and emotional noise and peace feels boring to them or even threatening because it involves being in the now and not living in the past or future. A lot of us, if not most of us, have a lot of work to do around disordered narcissism, the ability to be vulnerable and damaged empathy.
@fifilamoura Definitely, that is a big part of it too. However - having trauma responses is never an excuse to commit any type of mass murders. Much less try to use collective punishments as an excuse to murder more innocent lives. Many of us have huge traumas from longtime wars & we don't want to go kill everyone in revenge.
@msquebanh 100% Explanations/understandings aren't excuses or condoning it, it's just an attempt to deconstruct and understand the dynamics at work so we can stop repeating this bullshit both on individual and collective levels. And also so I can have patience and compassion for the people I know who are experiencing trauma. There's a lot of intergenerational trauma being triggered for many people right now, not to mention those worrying for or mourning loved ones in the region or who are afraid for themselves and their loved ones in the diaspora.
@fifilamoura I know you fully understand. I just wanted to ensure others reading, will understand too.
I know you've done a LOT of trauma recovery work & you're always trying to help others find their way to healing too.
@Mary625@fifilamoura I have blocked countless ppl since October. Many were trolls/sealions trying to troll posts from people I'm connected to. Great timesaver.
"we must also understand that experience of evil doesn't give one license to act with impunity... to act outside of moral constraints." -- Prof. Eddie Glaude Jr on MSNBC this morning.
(saw this b/c Jeff Jarvis shared it on here today)
@chargrille@msquebanh Evil is just the absence of empathy in another person's eyes. That's it, that's all evil is, being unmoved suffering or taking sadistic joy in it because it makes one feel powerful to snuff out a life. There's nothing supernatural about sociopathy, evil is indeed banal, even if it's an intense experience to look into someone's eyes and to see absolutely no empathy or recognition of one's humanity.
One is the commonly known one - dead eyes - like you've described. The other is the sparkly eyes demon - they have overly active, bright-eyes & can do eye contact. Those types - you have to watch for other body language that reveals their dishonest cores. They're more dangerous to general public because they're charismatic & don't have the dead eyes & able to fool more folks.
@msquebanh Ah, yes, the charismatic types who are very dangerous. Like it wouldn't surprise me in the least if we found out that there were bodies buried in Russel Brand's garden (just like it was entirely unsurprising he's a rapist, all the kundalini yoga bullshit was a pretty big red flag in that regard). @Tooden@chargrille
@fifilamoura@Tooden@chargrille I consider them more dangerous than overtly evil folks. These are the chameleon demons who can easily infiltrate into our communities & they're very careful about how they present themselves before starting insidious work to break apart communities & divide people. They're most dangerous when elected into positions of public offices.
@msquebanh They often delude themselves about who they are to and they're convincing liars because they believe their own grandiose lies. But clinical narcissists who are also sociopaths are attracted to any arena they can have access to attention and power, much like pedophiles are attracted to positions of trust that give them access to children. @Tooden@chargrille
@fifilamoura@Tooden@chargrille I met a couple of folks like that - when I worked in film industry a lot. It was discomforting because I could see through them but almost no one else did. They got away with a lot of workplace abuses.
@msquebanh Music scenes, including "alternative" ones, can be rife with this kind of thing too. A lot of the entertainment industry is also set up to facilitate abuse. @Tooden@chargrille
@fifilamoura
That's interesting. I think it's at least part of the truth. I think CPTSD/abuse/etc. can result in lack of empathy for others because we have lost empathy for ourselves, or had it robbed. Or are overwhelmed. So we need to relearn and keep practicing. @msquebanh
@chargrille@fifilamoura For me & my family, seeing suffering on both sides helped us grow more empathy. It helped that my parents taught us about humanity from young ages too.
@msquebanh
100%. I think it's the children whose parents don't provide any empathy who are most at a loss later in life. But even just being lucky enough to have one adult who sees you as worthy of love & care can be protective. I think there's probably also some individual variance at a spiritual or genetic level, in terms of sensitivity & capacity for empathy. Like some kids will persist in looking for love and autonomy against all odds.
@chargrille There's been some interesting work around this but basically some people are just born without much physical empathy, not that having physical empathy ensures that one is compassionate or won't commit atrocities (dehumanization exists to justify and allow ourselves to commit atrocities most of us are deeply repulsed by). We all have to learn cognitive empathy, which is understanding someone else's suffering and recognizing them as their own person and not simply projecting our own experiences onto them (as we tend to do automatically with empathy as a means to make sense of the subconscious signals we're picking up on since feelings tend to be contagious and we all have a sensory web we extend into our surroundings with varying degrees of sensitivity, vigilance and awareness of what our unconscious somatic processes are up to and what information they kick up into our conscious mind and the form that takes on as our minds make meaning out of signals and noise). @msquebanh
@fifilamoura@chargrille I remember watching the documentary, Child of Rage, when younger. I learned a lot more about this small population of folks, unfortunately born with something not wired properly from birth. It takes a lot of medical & family support for kids born with neurological issues that affect their personality & cognitive relating abilities. Our governments don't fund the services needed for these families & many do end up in jail or psych wards.
@msquebanh@fifilamoura Americans don't even know where these foreign countries are, much less the geopolitical history. Well over 50% of Americans that graduated high school can't find Israel on a map, or Ukraine for that matter.
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