Call me a liberal, but I can’t keep derailing threads about this and fully address it in a post on its own. I am worried all the progress we have made is down the toilet and the right’s now the one advancing and winning year by year.
I get it, we’ve been in the minority opinion before like with gay rights. As doom and gloom as it looks, there is no denying that things have gotten better. And even during the aughts backlash times of the “anti-PC tirade”, being progressive still felt avant-garde and more sophisticated than being a chud. Some of that energy eventually manifested into Obama (as much of a fraud he was, even when I was a kid it was still awesome seeing him win.)
Now I feel like it’s the inverse. Not only are we losing these cultural battles, but I feel fogey being a non-CHUD. CHUDs are highly praised everywhere and thanks to the internet, CHUDs have been able to make their own Hollywood alternative and their own cultural institutions to build real soft power.
I would love to know of any possible signs of hope this little golden age of chuddery will be short-lived and we’re making some small wins. I would also love to know how the rest of y’all keep on trucking.
Sometimes the Nazis invade and push all the way to Leningrad, and you spend two years desperately fighting to keep the city from being overwhelmed.
Sometimes the Zionists decide your village needs to go and they come in the night with dynamite and machine guns, catching you unaware.
Sometimes federal troops ride in before you can haul the guns into the hills and your family and comrades are surrounded in a little shack by a river.
Sometimes your biggest partner and guarantor collapses in a crisis and you have to make desperate choices as your implacable enemy redoubles the effort to strangle you to death.
Sometimes you've lost your headquarters and have to retreat, far far from where you started, and begin again.
The struggle is not guaranteed victory. It will not always feel like we're winning. Sometimes you're ill-equipped and staring down a titan. But you're not struggling alone, the adversary has weaknesses and the struggle does not begin and end with us.
At least that's what I tell myself.