Cimbazarov [none/use name]

I wouldnt say its because they are scared of someone who holds leftist values, but that they need a leftist boogeyman who is somewhat well known to rile up their base. Alot of Trumps rhetoric relies on their being this boogeyman that is bringing America to doom and only he (and the right) are the ones that can fight against it

Naturally the Chinese are leaving the West in the dust when it comes to these second-order developments, where they realized “AI’s” promise is not in outright data production (because that requires discernment that it doesn’t possess) but in data MANAGEMENT and ORGANIZING, with the data being the human input that AI verifies in math, rather than the other way around in western AI models

I find this quite interesting, and I definitely see examples in America of AI use cases centered around “data production”, but I’m not familiar with how the Chinese use it for data management or if they explicitly state that somewhere?

Agreed. I think it’s likely they are organic but their growth seems to me unnatural (and their funding), and I wonder how much of it backed by the tech oligarchs themselves

Had a discussion yesterday of whether the “grassroots” orgs against AI are actually psyops funded by tech oligarchs. So you have these tech oligarchs who talk openly about how AI is going to be so destructive or lead to the death of humanity blah blah blah, but at the same time they are the ones funding and trying to develop it which seem contradictory. Then you have the “antithesis” of these tech oligarchs and companies which is the anti-AI orgs.

In my view AI exposes a contradiction between the working class and the oligarchs, which can lead to a class consciousness and that challenges the oligarchs if workers can organize against it. So the theory we were having is these anti-AI orgs are founded or funded by the tech oligarchs to try to steer the struggle against AI away from class struggle and towards a more idealistic view of AI that really doesn’t change class relations or the development of AI. From my brief look into these orgs, they seem to be aware of class relations and the issue AI presents to a labor force if its a technology that is supposed to displace them, but in their mission they seem to be more focused on AI as an existential threat to humanity akin to climate change. To them the primary contradiction is AI as a technology, not who owns AI. The tech oligarchs feed into this hysteria as well and it makes the anti-AI orgs seem the more reasonable.

The other reason I had this theory was seeing how people in these orgs do not seem to have organizing experience yet they still are somehow able to grow.

Also my other more crackpot version of the theory is Peter Thiel is a hegelian and understands (or misunderstands?) dialectics and he’s behind all of this and is trying to force his own version of thesis - anthesis - synthesis

I know it’s been said before, but anti-authoritarianism is so damaging to building any would-be socialist movement in the US. It’s really pervasive among those who hate capitalism and are willing to organize. And as a result all these people don’t have coherent politics or are just taking some middle ground of capitalism but regulated, which is going nowhere.

How about Khomenei’s claim of 60-100k people killed by the shah? Ive also heard the 100k number being thrown around. Is it just an exaggeration?

@oliveoil@hexbear.net

Have some debatelord telling me the current Iran regime is worse than the shah, saying khomenei also tortured and killed as many people as the shah and and had purges in 1980 and 1988. Actually am not that familiar with these purges (i just knew briefly that they did that to leftists), but wondering how exaggerated they are since all we know about them come from outside iran.

Also seems like the death count of the shah is either 4k or according to khomenei 60-100k?

I am talking more broadly. Like spending time together, going to an event, even just chatting. And Im referring to every type of relationship I have/had: friends, acquaintances, partners

I do think I in the past it was due to me not being the one to initiate ever, so I cant expect anyone to do it with me. But I feel i have made a good effort now and things still seem to be the same.

I feel like in all my relationships, I am always the one that has to be the initiator, and until recently I was never comfortable with initiating. But the last couple years I have been more proactive. However, its getting to the point where Im getting really exhausted of having to always be the one to initiate and it gives me anxiety that if I dont initiate, then nothing happens and I just remain alone. It feels like a huge energy imbalance where I put so much in and get so little out of it

Have one. The thing that dissuades me from anything within STEM is the crazy work hours there. It seems like being a foreign english teacher is more in demand and a better work schedule

Had the crazy idea of becoming an english teacher in China. Im still relatively young, no kids, no partner and the west is just depressing me

Ngl, my normie friends are not ready to take anything i say about North Korea that isnt “Kim Jong Un bad” seriously

One of things I realized going back home is just how much of a bubble suburbanites are in. I mean I always knew this ever since I moved out of the suburbs, but it started to dawn on me how that warps your political conscious.

For example how am I supposed to convince a suburbanite that homeless is not just a natural outcome of laziness but a conscious choice by the capitalist system? These people see a homeless person maybe once in a year. They are just so far removed from how the capitalist system fails people. And it’s so easy to get them to be hostile towards immigrants because they are in this bubble where the status quo must be preserved forever and anything that challenges that is bad.

I realized that you can’t really reason with them because they are in this bubble and you are speaking a different language than them when you talk about reality.

I’d be interested if anyone has done any marxist analysis on suburban/urban/rural living conditions and what can be done about it, cause it just seems hopeless