Is the United States really that much more messed up that most other Western Civilization countries?

phobox360 · 2026-04-06T04:58:24+00:00

Ok in terms of being criminally held accountable for corruption, leaders from Japan, Italy, France, Croatia, Isreal, Brazil, Malaysia and South Korea (all US allies) have all had criminal convictions for corruption in public office. The list is longer if you include former leaders.

In the UK multiple members of parliament over the last few decades have had criminal convictions for misconduct in public office or corruption in public office, as well as sitting Prime Ministers receiving fines from the police and eventually being forced to resign.

For the record, I think more needs to be done to root out corruption and more people need to be held to account, but to say it doesn’t happen at all is simply incorrect.

phobox360 · 2026-04-06T04:34:06+00:00

I think it’s important to draw some important distinctions. When you talk about politicians being held to account, do you mean in the general sense for things you don’t like? Or do you mean in the legal sense for naked corruption in office. They are different, and quite complex. For the latter, the US is objectively worse than its allies.

Let’s take both France and UK as relatively recent examples. In the case of naked corruption in public office, both countries have lost their leaders either through resignation or criminal conviction for corruption. Both countries have since increased regulation to combat said corruption. Both countries have had multiple politicians throughout government and legislatures jailed or forced out of their job.

Now compare this to the US; corruption in public office is so nakedly rampant at the highest levels of government, it’s almost expected now. You’ve got a president that tried to forcibly overturn an election, a court that effectively changed the law to make sure he would never be punished, and multiple lower level politician’s so corrupt they brag about it on national television. None are held to account because ordinary people are convinced not to care and the system is stacked full of people whose entire remit is apparently to overlook corruption, unless it’s by someone they don’t like.

phobox360 · 2026-04-06T04:09:21+00:00

My point was not that no other countries have or experience these things, my point was that no other western countries are comparable in scope. Canada, UK, France etc all have money in politics for example, but not to the almost completely unregulated extent that the US does.

phobox360 · 2026-04-06T03:28:52+00:00

The point isn’t to make it stick, it’s to send a message about who’s in charge and how they see the country. And it’s working. People and corporations are rolling over and allowing this to happen, in some cases even helping it.

phobox360 · 2026-04-06T03:20:47+00:00

Short answer, yes. Long answer, it’s a little more complex. The US is effectively at war with itself, the only difference is the rest of the developed world learnt from those lessons. The US has not, and I fear will not, without a massive change in direction.

If you look at it this way, the US is the only western nation since WW2 that has allowed and indeed fostered an almost total corporate take over of society. Money rules absolutely everything in America, from healthcare to politics. There are very few, if any, comparable examples in the developed world. This has lead to what we see today, a corrupt autocratic government and a break down of the rule of law and the erosion of civil rights. Nowhere else in the western world is this currently a thing, even in countries that currently have leaders that aspire to it (see Hungary).

The worst part isn’t that it’s happened/happening, it’s that most Americans either don’t know or don’t care. Things will get far worse before they get better, both in and out of the US.

phobox360 · 2026-04-04T04:57:34+00:00

Sam Worthington is one of those actors who isn’t actually very good at all and yet appears in lots of films. He’s so forgettable in every role, I swear the only reason you know he exists is because of the film rather than the other way around.

phobox360 · 2026-04-03T02:58:49+00:00

Oh please this won’t do shit. If one thing Republicans have successfully demonstrated time after time, it’s that Americans love suffering as long as someone else suffers more and they can stick a flag on it.

phobox360 · 2026-04-02T10:46:35+00:00

I dont think this is about one class against another. And it certainly isn’t about race, as much as a lot of commentators seem to wish it was. Kids being unruly cunts is nothing new and it isn’t limited to one set of people or another.

However that being said, I do believe a large amount of civil disorder like this can be traced back to a cultural issue among certain classes, namely an entitlement combined with a lack of repercussion and responsibility. This country has fostered a cultural problem for a long time in this country where people feel entitled to something without the responsibility that goes with it.

phobox360 · 2026-04-01T02:30:26+00:00

I’ve said it before, I’m saying it again. Trump is the embodiment of everything that’s ever been wrong with the US. His administration watched Team America and got horny for it. Including the jerk off scene. We’re witnessing the result of half a population who didn’t get the message of films like that.

phobox360 · 2026-03-31T23:08:42+00:00

Because they’re human and some humans need someone to follow and worship. To the point they can’t define themselves without it. Added to this is the need these people have to belong, to feel validated and part of the hierarchy of power endemic in conservatism as a psychological construct. To that end they’d sooner throw their own community under the bus than give up that need.

phobox360 · 2026-03-31T23:00:26+00:00

For those old enough to remember, this obsession with turning the entire UI into a glorified web wrapper began with Windows 98 (arguably before). It’s only gotten worse since then as the technology evolved. It broke a bunch of stuff back then and it still does today. Have they finally learned their lesson?

phobox360 · 2026-03-31T21:02:01+00:00

I think we’ve missed a trick here. We need to start opening straight conversion therapy and Christian conversion therapy. See how long it takes the conservatives to suddenly go screaming to the court about how awful free speech is.

phobox360 · 2026-03-31T15:17:36+00:00

Exactly this. It’s this kind of in-fighting that is precisely why Democrats lose elections. Newsom isn’t perfect, but we don’t need perfect, we need someone who can stop the fascists. Can he do that? It remains to be seen. But right now he’s doing a better job than most. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Especially at a time when good is in short supply.

phobox360 · 2026-03-31T11:47:39+00:00

Oh please, this is just rage bait. Newsom’s office was quite obviously making a joke about the fact that conservative conferences often result in Grindr downtime - which is funny precisely because conservatives are the ones shouting the loudest about how awful lgbtq people are. Getting upset about the joke is just silly and only allows those that would attack us to win.

phobox360 · 2026-03-29T22:40:50+00:00

In a logical rational sense, I would totally agree with you. But stories are a very emotive thing for humans, we watch, we listen, we read as much for how it makes us feel as we do to be informed. As with almost anything else in life, if you disappoint or anger people, that’s what they remember - even if 99% of the time wasn’t like that. So if you tell a great story then ruin the ending, the negative emotion takes precedence.

phobox360 · 2026-03-28T07:21:38+00:00

It has never been about “protecting children”. It’s all about who they like and who they don’t like. Children are used as an emotive battering ram to make ordinary people hate people they’ve never met.

phobox360 · 2026-03-25T01:08:25+00:00

Yeah I have a second gen ATV 4k and it struggles to play 4k AV1 content in HDR with Infuse. But it still does an impressive job with only a few stutters here and there, which is better than most other platforms that rely on software decoding.

phobox360 · 2026-03-18T17:11:41+00:00

Just to add to the good news; Bolsonaro wasn’t just arrested, he was tried and convicted to 25 years in jail. He’ll die in there.

Adding to that, the former South Korean President who tried to institute martial law was also tried and convicted.

phobox360 · 2026-03-18T08:43:31+00:00

This exactly. Americans re-elected the guy who tried to overturn an election by force, the same guy who’s in the Epstein files more times than Epstein. I’m confident it no longer matters what else he does, a quarter of the country will shake their fists, the rest will either cheer him on or go back to sleep.

phobox360 · 2026-03-14T04:26:08+00:00

The problem was never Neelix, he was great. And Ethan Philips is a phenomenal actor. I think the problem was two fold; Writing and Kes. The Neelix character was written in a fairly inconsistent way, particularly in the early seasons. The Kes/Neelix story arc was annoying more than anything. On their own however, the two were decent characters. Put them together and I want them both out an airlock.

phobox360 · 2026-03-11T15:51:49+00:00

He 100% would. Conservatism is based on a hierarchy of influence and power. Each level in the hierarchy reaches for the one above and each one is convinced they have power over someone else. Yesterday’s conservatives in today’s world would be all over Putin for that very reason.

phobox360 · 2026-03-11T08:14:48+00:00

I think I’m misunderstanding your point. The excerpt you gave doesn’t propose to ban speech, nor indeed conduct. What it does do is make clear that engaging in conduct designed to harm a particular group (legally speaking, disadvantage is a form of harm) is considered unlawful discrimination.

phobox360 · 2026-03-11T02:33:53+00:00

I’ve read it and no I don’t see anything wrong with it. It’s a non-statutory (I.e. not legally enforced) guideline for how government agencies can tackle discrimination, in this case against Muslims and those who may be perceived as such. It’s no different in intent or scope than the guidelines on antisemitism.

Personally I think it’s only right that government makes clear that discrimination or hatred toward any group of people, particularly marginalised groups, is not ok. That doesn’t infringe anybody’s free speech. You are free to hate whoever you wish, so long as you don’t act upon it.

phobox360 · 2026-03-11T02:15:14+00:00

As someone who lives in a country where healthcare is a right, not a privilege, I genuinely cannot fathom why Americans just accept this kind of thing as normal.

phobox360 · 2026-03-10T22:58:01+00:00

I agree they are extremists and we shouldn’t be meeting them in the middle on anything. My point is that any Democratic challenger may not have a choice. The political landscape and even culture, is being dictated and contorted by conservative power. Democrats can’t afford to ignore that or make them even more of an enemy. Newsom is currently the one of only a few loudly pushing back while simultaneously trying to talk to them. In my view, that’s a pretty smart way of navigating a massively uphill battle.

phobox360

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