Bulletins and News Discussion from September 9th to September 15th, 2024 - Viva Sandino! - COTW: Nicaragua

Image is sourced from this article.

It takes very little effort to find an article from Western state propaganda decrying Daniel Ortega and the Sandinistas as authoritarian and rife with human rights abuses. This is the natural reaction the US has to any successful liberation movement. This fairly long report from Jason Cohen, a socialist who travelled to Nicaragua one week ago, should quell any suspicions.

He describes a country with high political consciousness among the masses, who are working to construct critical infrastructure for the country and their communities. There is a virtual education system that is free across the entire nation, which serves the dual goal of democratizing education and ensuring that those in rural areas or without much free time for university can still achieve degrees and a quality education; and these classes cover technical skills in the production of infrastructure and agriculture, but also political and ideological education in order to counter the fascist propaganda produced by imperialist nations abroad.

While Nicaragua is deeply invested in its nationality and national figures who led to their socialist revolution, such as Sandino, they are also immensely proud of their indigneous history, recognizing it as also part of their anti-colonial history which continues to the present day. Additionally, they honour the struggles of other nations on the continent, such as the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela, as well as Castro in Cuba and Allende in Chile. Countries around the world are also celebrated and admired, such as Burkina Faso; during the Reagan administration, Nicaragua and Burkina Faso were comrades in arms, and now Traore is continuing the legacy of Sankara's anti-imperialism in the present. Perhaps most relevant today is their dedication towards Palestine, involving the creation of the Parque Palestina (shown in the post image), in which the Palestinian flag flies alongside the flag of Nicaragua. In July, Leila Khaled of the PFLP gave a speech in Nicaragua, in which the solidarity of the two nations was highlighted.

The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you've wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don't worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.

The Country of the Week is Nicaragua! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.

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1.5K comments

Reading some of the comments lately has caused me to doom
so fucking hard that I legit had trouble sleeping last night and I almost felt slightly nauseuous.
I typed up a long vent/screed. CW for some things such as doomerisms, mentions of suicide, violent fantasies, and really unhinged worldbuilding. I can't tell you how much of it is sincere or how much of it is coming from my deteriorating mental state
I apologize in advance

Also since this is really long I think I need to split it into two parts
Part 1: ::: spoiler spoiler God has Fascism ever truly lost? It feels like they always get the last laugh. People here call it unsustainable but it seems like it's able to sustain itself entirely through pure ideology. It doesn't need to be efficient or build anything, it just needs to control the world's resources with an iron grip and burrow its vile ideology into the minds of everyone, and it just becomes self-perpetuating. God why do so many people love fascism so much?
Fuckfuckfuck it's starting to look like Fascism never really loses, it just suffers setbacks. The Nazis failed to conquer the Soviet Union, but that doesn't matter because the west preserved Nazi ideology whereas the Soviet Union collapsed, it was ripped apart and its legacy is being torn to shreds. The Nazis got what they wanted in the end.
The Vietnam war? Vietnam has to live in a US-led world order and has to play by their rules. Same with every country that has had a successful revolution. Cuba's still being strangled by the U.S. DPRK is isolated while occupied Korea stands entirely on U.S. backing. The Black Panthers were broken.
Spain's first astronaut? Okay I don't know much about Spain but I presume things aren't good there, despite some fascist shitbag getting owned. Once again, only a setback, but not a defeat.
And apparently the dollar is an invincible weapon that China and Russia can't do anything about. With the way things are going they're totally just going to succumb and become U.S. colonies aren't they?
And China raising the retirement age? That's a sign, the beginning of the end. This will soon lead to China's collapse and the west will pick its carcass dry again. In fact it might happen in the next 5 minutes after this post!!!!
Settler colonialists have always been successful in genociding the natives: Americans, Aussies, and soon it will be Israel too. We continue to live in the fucking aftermath of said genocides. We might not have been born in time to witness the liberation of Palestine. Instead we may have been born in time to witness yet another successful genocide being carried out, and the beginning of Israel becoming the eternal hegemon of the middle east.
Do we just passively accept that Fascism really is the strongest and most supreme ideology? That white people really are the master race? That they've been able to cow and domesticate every country and keep them under their stranglehold for centuries, and they're still doing it and nothing can stop them? That they'd burrow their ideology into the minds of every single human being in the world? Look at how it maintains itself and self-perpetuates, it just keeps going and going and going and going and going and going and going and going and going. No amount of fuckups will ever change that. Countries like China need to do everything right or they're doomed, but the west can shoot itself in the foot constantly and still win.
They're laughing. The Fascists and libs must be living in fucking heaven right now. They're experiencing nothing but constant sheer euphoria every single day because the powers that be are catering to their every whim. Same for the Zionist scum knowing that with the U.S. backing them it's impossible for them to lose, that they will eventually finish their genocide without setbacks. They know the world is biased towards them, they know that if there is a God, it is a God that favors all the Hitlers of the world. Meanwhile China doesn't do everything we want, while the U.S. does literally everything the fash want. If the good guys always win then that means Fascism, genocide, and colonialism are considered good in the eyes of this God right? Then it is a cruel God that deserves to be attacked and dethroned.
:::
- Part 2:
  
  :::
  God I'm sorry
  
  you live in the belly of the beast, but things are going to come to a fever pitch, there will likely be a terrible war, and the anti imperialist camp will likely win. The US can't defeat russia, it cant defeat iran, it cant even defeat yemen, US imperialism is crumbling, they dont and cant produce anything, all they cling to is their financial weapons, which will fail when a real war breaks out. I have no doubt there will be a war with china, and i have no doubt the US will lose.
  Edit 1:
  Settler colonialists have always been successful in genociding the natives
  Nazi germany failed.
  Edit 2:
  The Vietnam war? Vietnam has to live in a US-led world order and has to play by their rules. Same with every country that has had a successful revolution. Cuba's still being strangled by the U.S. DPRK is isolated while occupied Korea stands entirely on U.S. backing
  Each of these have been stunning victories against capitalism, and pave the path for other oppressed nations going forward
  Edit 3:
  Same for the Zionist scum knowing that with the U.S. backing them it's impossible for them to lose, that they will eventually finish their genocide without setbacks.
  The Zionist Entity is currently actually collapsing, they have the "strongest military in the world" backing them and they can't even fucking defeat a guerilla force
  How do you avoid becoming a misanthrope. To believe that human beings are inherently fascits, that fascim is the natural state of humanity. That genocide is human nature.
  Look to every brave person that has fought against the fascist scourge, you live in the fascist metropole, of course the people around you are fascists
  Edit 4:
  And China raising the retirement age? That's a sign, the beginning of the end. This will soon lead to China's collapse and the west will pick its carcass dry again. In fact it might happen in the next 5 minutes after this post!!!!
  I guess this is a joke maybe? But every project will suffer setbacks, a revolution is not a dinner party, every project must deviate from its ideals in order to weather a storm, and if the chinese govt believe thats the correct path I frankly believe them
  
  yeah sorry I've just been slowly going insane due to a shortage of good news. :doomjak:
  
  no need to be sorry comrade
  
  Hey what book is that image from? Looks interesting, and I love Losurdo so somebody he found "common ground" with is probably a good read as well.
  
  "Socialism With Chinese Characteristics" By Roland Boer https://archive.org/details/socialism-with-chinese-characteristics/page/n7/mode/2up
  I havent read it but i remember Roderic Day posting this screencap on twitter and its stuck with me.
  Edit: looks like red sails hosts a couple of shorter articles by him too which might be a good starting point https://redsails.org/@boer/
  
  Comrade, as the others said, I have never been more certain that we will win. Be strong and be well!
  
  here's a quasi-philosophical, quasi-therapeutic blob of text that may or may not help you or other people in your position
  
  Don't be sorry. We all have times of doubt and its healthy to give those doubts voice and see them all in one externalized screed like this.
  When you look at the whole picture it can seem hopeless but this is tangled mess held together with feelings that are not in line with fact. Now you just have to pick through it all and identify the various parts of your fear blob and untangle them. Its like cleaning your bed room as a kid. It looks hopeless but you just put things away one by one. Take each individual fear match it with facts of how it can be/has been overcome and stack it neatly to the side. When you are done instead of a mess of doomerism and fear all you'll be left with is a sorted pile of all the bad things happening and how they can be fixed.
  It is true that fascists never went away they just went under the radar for a bit. But they were defeated don't let anyone ever tell you otherwise. They had to hide in fear for decades. Now that they have returned in force they will be defeated again. And because our ancestors didn't do a good enough job the first time don't you think the victors will be more strict in their efforts to stamp them out this time? (fool me once...)
  Fascism is an ideology based on falsehoods and defined by the people it excludes. It cannot be the cornerstone of a stable society. Even if the fascists "win" they can't win because they need conflict with the "other" to keep cohesion. They define themselves based on the struggle against who and what they exclude. In the absence of an enemy they have no defining parameters so a new enemy is created from within their ranks. If fascism were allowed to continue without opposition it would lead to everyone being dead except one person.
  
  I appreciate the share, it gives perspective.

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