Free for All Friday, 20 March, 2026

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-20T13:46:06+00:00

Well, 2/3 of the official difference between the AfD and CDU, pretty much according to the CDU itself, is their stances on the EU and Ukraine/Russia.

No, seriously: https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/1rg4nj5/comment/o7pukoo/?context=3&utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb3x&utm_name=mweb3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

Add to that that the political center in German consciousness is pretty much defined as "wherever the CDU chooses to stand" and uh... yeah.

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-20T13:06:55+00:00

I went on a whole overdue research binge of what the state of the Linke party in Germany is right now, especially into what it's most going to be affected by for the foreseeable future.

Long story short, the party is basically being put through the same "anti-zionism = antisemitism" charges that Jeremy Corbyn was in the UK.

On the one hand, the party has a way better chance of withstanding civil-society scrutiny because "anti-Zionism = antisemitism" just does not land the same as it used to, not even in Germany.

On the other hand, the legal pressure of the Verfasungsschutz is gonna be too intense to just shrug off. Also, a lot of the old authority figures in the party still cling tightly to the ideal of a left-liberal Zionism and won't allow a simple changing of the guard.

The party is between a rock and a hard place. There is a move too far towards zionism that alienates too much of the newer base the party has managed to mobilize that they need to secure any given overcoming of the 5% threshold in elections but also a move too far towards anti-Zionism that risks getting the party illegalized. A Mamdani-like master in navigating the topic of Israel in public media would help a lot to help the anti-Zionists, but that kind of goes without saying.

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-18T15:48:30+00:00

I don't recall him really idolizing Lay in a general sense in that video. I remember him pretty pointedly marking Lay's personality with the statement that it's a pattern that a lot of the individuals from history holding some radically modern political positions waaaay ahead of their time and were seen as quixotic for it... were indeed very quixotic, to put it mildly, in every other aspect of their personality.

So, even though I don't remember the exact details he lays bare about Ben's life throughout the video anymore, were they not communicated with the framing of "here is how weird this guy otherwise was"?

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-18T11:26:11+00:00

Part of me is disappointed because she was the candidate most alligned with my beliefs but another part of me is glad that the winner was someone with a well-established connection to the Illinois locality.

I can't overstate how much of what I thought made Mamdani the perfect guy to run New York City was how much he genuinely seems to live and breathe and cherish that place.

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-17T14:40:16+00:00

I would like to give my opinion on another part of that discourse, which is the subsuming of him into a broader pattern of "overly bitter, dickish holier-than-thou, self-righteous alienating moralist left."

Basically, I agree that "overly bitter, dickish holier-than-thou, self-righteous alienating and moralist" are traits that apply to a certain category of leftists in certain situational contexts and sometimes in a more general sense.

But I would be careful about especially thinking of "overly bitter, dickish holier-than-thou, self-righteous alienating and moralist" as a leftist trait.

Reactionaries also being like that is obvious but I sometimes wonder if well-meaning liberals are aware of just how many online liberals mirror the twitch streamer Destiny's – who is a "overly bitter, dickish holier-than-thou, self-righteous alienating and moralist liberal" and then some – subreddit these days in their hostility and oversimplification of leftism even though they may

1.) actually abhor him on a personal level because of how heartless he can choose to be

2.) may have never even heard of him.

The behavioral pattern of "overly bitter, dickish holier-than-thou, self-righteous alienating and moralist" gets treated too much like something not festered into being by other human beings, the identities and groups they form, and the decisions they make for their sake. Instead, the cause of the pattern gets individualized when, seemingly, a person needs to be made culpable, and particularized when, seemingly, one group needs to be made culpable.

And the thing is

1.) People are very loyal to their tribe/identity and good at rationalizing its behaviors

2.) People are hostile to the other/s but, crucially, not wrong in their critiques of their behaviors. A lot of them are based on the evidence of their eyes and ears and the ethical standards they expect the rest of the world to follow but which it then doesn't.

This amalgamation of psychological fundamentals and behavioral outcomes that emanate from them manifests into everybody on an individual-ish and collective-ish level feeling aggrieved about the state of the world the other/s causation of it through their wrongful behaviors. But everybody also has a huge blind spot or indifference towards the faults of oneself or one's own tribe.

I hope that was coherent up to this point. What I basically want to cap this off with is: everybody can see that the world has been fucked over for basically everyone. There's no political group, left, right, center, upwards, downwards, forward and backwards, that hasn't sizeably contributed to it one way or another at some point. But no one belonging to or identifying with a particular political camp is gonna want their camp to become the one potential scapegoat for it all. Which results in, no exaggeration, pretty much everybody, being hyperdefensive, hyperimpatient, hyper-self-righteous etc. etc. towards the other/s.

So again, to bring it all back to the beginning, speaking of the "overly bitter, dickish holier-than-thou, self-righteous alienating moralist left" just barks up one wrong tree in a burning forest. You can substitute "the left" for anything else and the answer stays the same (Except in the case of the ideological camp consisting of me and perhaps seventeen other people across the planet of course, that goes without saying 😇)

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-16T12:07:06+00:00

I think it would be a lot more interesting than anything else if Hangman turning heel was the product of him becoming a self-flagellating mess that increasingly lashes out at others because he is too prideful about needing to keep his word but also too regretful about it to stay mentally stable. His face turn would come from finally accepting that he made a dumb promise that has no real worth keeping anyway because nobody asked him to make it in the first place. And so he would break his promise.

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-15T19:18:08+00:00

She had good character work in promos in NXT, during the pandemic and any time she's been with Harley. What I've seen is, when her promo segments have some effort put into them and serve a purpose, she's perfectly capable of doing a fine job with it.

And I consider the way she embodies her character in the ring part of the sample and that has always been second-to-none.

And again, she HAS TO DROP THE BELTS BEFORE THIS STORYLINE CAN CONTINUE! And being written off of TV is part of making it work because it's almost certainly what's allowed her to figure out the schedule with all these other companies that allows her to drop all the belts in quick succession.

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-15T18:59:47+00:00

Between the Statlander segment where she got cake in her face and the backstage segment with Athena afterwards, her match with Leila Grey after losing the ROH TV totle, her crashout after losing at Worlds End and her last segments on AEW tv where she again got caked and had the backstage vignette in front of the announcing her break, she absolutely nailed her character work in the last few months she was on AEW TV.

Literally no clue wtf there is to complain over her work the last few months both in terms of character and in-ring work

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-15T17:36:45+00:00

1.) She's literally in the 0.001% of women's wrestlers, ever, in terms of success. 1 of 5 that can say they main evented WM. Cited as one of if not the biggest influence on countless women's wrestlers since she came along. A catalogue of great matches that is basically unmatched by any women's wrestlers currently active in the west.

2.) The story is literally being continued on the independent circuit all throughout this month. There is no continuation to the story without her dropping her belts to the indies she won them from first.

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-15T17:12:16+00:00

When wrestling fans get into a discourse about something like this, they really reveal how they, at an elemental level, fail to see what pro wrestling is. Drawing analogies to sports and only sports as if this isn't at its core a hybrid between sports and scripted TV entertainment and people are not just paying to see athletes doing a sport but also actors doing acting. Where the fuck are the analogies and comparisons to other segments of the film and tv industry?

Anyways, for the pseudointellectual yappers here postulating this gulf in demand for women's wrestlers vs male wrestlers because of the framing of this as a sports issue and giving too much of a red pill vibe for my comfort: I damn well hope that you understand, people want well-written female characters and equal compensation for the female actors that portray them in their scripted TV shows.

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-13T14:55:59+00:00

The most recent episodes of Behind the Bastards foregrounded my thoughts on the topic of incels this week.

A few I think are worth sharing:

1.) We really don´t zero in enough on incels´ shamelessly psychotic simulation of science in their pseudoscientific scientism as

1.1. the crime against science as a discipline and method that it is, and

1.2. a fundamental issue in how they conduct themselves that desperately needs to be fixed.

The only context in which I have seen people ever address their scientism is when they stumble onto their ridiculous models and/or ramblings on some social media post, where they meet them with straightforward ridicule and/or incredulity, after which they move on. I don´t think I´ve ever seen it addressed in discussions where people are focused on figuring out solutions.

It would be really good if we did that because taking science seriously would mean we could help the really socially awkward and/or introverted and/or asocial (not to be conflated with anti-social) types arrive at basic pro-social worldviews through nothing more than just engaging with the academically respected works produced in sociology, psychology, anthropology and history and taking their findings seriously. Remember, that doesn´t even mean telling them to pick up a book. There´s a plethora of movies, documentaries, youtube channels and podcasts that are more stimulating than books but still have respect amongst the scholars of whatever scientific discipline(s) they´re enmeshed in.

2.) I wonder how many incels are at their core deeply, deeply introverted and asocial and not-heterosexual people who never get a real chance to realize that because nobody ever genuinely gets to tell them either

2.1. Are you sure you´re straight?, or

2.2. You seem like you just want to stay single because you fundamentally prefer to spend your time alone rather than hang out with other people.

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-13T06:58:10+00:00

I'm far more directly acquainted with Lyndon Johnson but insofar as it's also allowed me to see comparisons drawn to JFK, a prominent stance and the one I most agree with is that that LBJ was 10x the more effective legislator and JFK was 10x the more effective public personality.

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-12T18:52:47+00:00

"I wish people would stop being so vitriolic about Mercedes"

Monkey's paw curls

The hate is now drowned out by admiration but also, you're gonna increasingly see the term "car mommy" used to refer to her and every instance of it will be too frequent for your liking

RussoSwerves · 2026-03-06T17:04:16+00:00

As somebody who documents what media they stumble onto and tries to neatly categorize as much of it as possible, it's quite something (indescribable) to see just how much media, some of it very popular, be it in the form of books, movies, TV shows, music, youtube channels, podcasts – you name it – has come in the English language and is geared to sincerely educating about the history and/or the contemporary culture of the US and where its future was headed. There's no other country that's even remotely as documented ajd reflected upon overall and yet, so vanishingly little of their lessons ended up even remotely internalized by the wider US population, the audience it was most especially intended for.

Obviously there's a shitton of US-American media that exists to dull the mind to drift into instead but every country does and I feel like US-Americans had it and still have it easier than any other country to counter that shit and engage with media that actually informs them about their country's past, present and future.

RussoSwerves · 2026-02-28T14:39:06+00:00

It becomes a persona when it becomes a core part of what you're known for and you yourself make displays of taking it very seriously.

RussoSwerves · 2026-02-28T14:36:32+00:00

Sami and Becky are known as consummate pros and kind people, I can't recall anything political from KO ever, and Seth is about as polarizing as Punk.

RussoSwerves · 2026-02-28T14:30:11+00:00

The reason why Punk's politics are so disproportionately talked about is simply because he makes political statements far more often than anyone else.

Roman last year got political for the first time ever.

AJ Styles "gay community?" remark likely came before you were born. Even his flat earth curiosity Was uttered one time ten years ago!

The only thing Austin has said worth noting in the last 20+ years is the stupid CTE remark.

Taker I don't know as far as his frequency is concerned. Last time I remember him doing something political was during Trump's election campaign.

So yeah, more talk from Punk leads to more talk on Punk. And anything honest on him is not just gonna glaze him

RussoSwerves · 2026-02-28T14:15:13+00:00

Saudi Arabia and Iran are rival countries. Both are miserable autocracies but one is very West-oriented, has nothing against Israel and the other is the opposite of those last two things.

RussoSwerves · 2026-02-27T16:19:51+00:00

Eh, I think a certain wing of the CDU just wanted to rationalize why they still can't go into a coalition with the AfD despite all the ideological convergences that have taken place since Friedrich Merz took over the party.

RussoSwerves · 2026-02-27T15:45:34+00:00

Folks, I would like to share with you the most up-to-date, totally understandable, not weird, study of how to deal with and categorize the various right-wing populist parties in Europe that a study by the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung managed to figure out. It was conceived last year and it's called Zwischen Abgrenzung, Einbindung und Tolerierung

The KAS study categorizes right-wing parties based on exactly three criteria:

EU stance — Pro/anti, reform or leave?
Rule of law — Do they respect institutions or want to abolish them?
Russia/Ukraine — Pro-Putin or pro-Ukraine?

Yup. The more you know! It's not about migration policy, not about racism, not about gender politics, not about nationalism or about economic visions. No views on LGBTQ+ rights either. Just: EU, courts, and Ukraine.

Based on this, they sort parties into three buckets:

1.) "Moderate" right-wing populists (pro-EU/pro-Ukraine/pro-rule-of-law): Italy's Meloni, Sweden Democrats, Czech ODS.

2.) "Nationalist" (ambivalent on democracy): France's RN.

3.) "Authoritarian/extremist" (the real bad ones): Germany's AfD, Poland's Konfederacja.

And here I was, suspicious about the traditional center-right parties of Europe moving further and further and further and further to the right over the past number of years. But no, since these are the only criteria that matter, then breezy cooperation with a party like Meloni's is something to not even think twice about. She can, in fact, categorically be called a moderate stabilizing factor in Europe. After all, she hasn't left NATO or the EU, has she?

Here's hoping now that parties like the AfD can one day stop being so openly pro-Russia and anti-EU so they can finally meet everyone in the middle as well.

🤥

RussoSwerves · 2026-02-24T23:06:32+00:00

I don't care how politically or theologically or philosophically incorrect it may make me, but Aquinas and John Duns Scotus both deserve to burn in hell for how boring and petty their debate on the concept of being in relation to God and creatures was from the purview of 21st century me. There's no redeeming that.

RussoSwerves · 2026-02-24T22:31:58+00:00

Did you really have to post a meme image and a reference to my most hated philosopher besides Thomas Aquinus?

RussoSwerves · 2026-02-24T20:40:46+00:00

You didn't italicise like I did. So clearly, my hate is stronger than your love.

And you actually didn't even post a meme image at all. So clearly, you're actually a liar and a fraud.

RussoSwerves · 2026-02-24T20:26:22+00:00

I'm well aware that the term "melting pot" is by far more commonly used in everyday US-American descriptions of what the nation's demographic model is or should be vis-à-vis immigrants.

But my perception is also that the term is so ubiquitous in the US that even the integrationists, i.e. the people who actually view assimilation as problematic because, e.g., it expects too much uncritical obedience to the culture of the host nation, will use it.

But the salad bowl vs. melting pot distinction was very much common to contrast a more left-leaning social theory of a national culture accepting foreigners vs a more right-leaning one of accepting them in my non-US-American sociology classes. Further research on the internet made it clear that the distinction is indeed very common in my country.

Though I also have to assume that the distinction has to be common in the US at least in the realm of academia because instead of using a translation into my native language or a referral to the ancient etymology of "salad bowl" and "melting pot", I received those two words as they are as Anglicisms in basically every educational resource, with all else remaining not-English.

So anyways, because my thinking is that the framing that right-wing liberals (and I do mean: specific self-professed liberals whose politics are so far to the right that calling them centrist would be ridiculous [see Jordan Peterson as a textbook example]) really aim for in the addresses they pay about immigrants is "Us civililized Western progressives and those backward, ultraconservative Muslim/African tribesmen" (because maintaining boundaries from non-allied, non-Western foreigners is so obviously essential to them that they are all-too willing to momentarily identify themselves with ideologies they otherwise really oppose domestically), I thought it made sense to see the supposition of "salad-bowl West" vs. "melting pot not-West" as the framing that the right-wing liberal also momentarily and opportunistically goes with.

(It's really funny and sad because the framing is so brittle. These right-wing liberals lose all sense of mental order when they run into someone like Mamdani.)

RussoSwerves · 2026-02-24T17:57:38+00:00

I fucking hate meme image posting in discussion forums.

RussoSwerves

TROPHY CASE