[Despanan]

Originally Posted by Godslayer Jillian

I'm not sifting through posts to look for vendettas.

Kay, cool. It's just sometimes it seems that you're trying to read between the lines of my posts when you respond.

Originally Posted by Godslayer Jillian

This thread is made because of all those people that will become complacent (and you can't deny there will be millions) simply because Obama won, and if you try to throw blows into the wind, see if you hit something, rather than shudder because it's true, you really have some thinking to do.

I have absolutely no idea what you're trying to say at the end of this post (The stuff I marked in bold). All joking aside, I know it's English, but it doesn't resemble anything that I would consider a complete thought.

Anyway, I agree that there is a danger of complacency at this point, but cynicism is not the way to respond to it. Similarly, I feel sentiments like:

The rest of us know the system is rigged to make us all losers. We deserve another world, another way of distributing power and resources that values everyone's needs equally.

and

Obama has done nothing and will do nothing. The only thing that has been accomplished is making people trust the same government they hated yesterday, and real organizations and movements that wanted change now lose their legitimacy thanks to Obama's slogan.

are not only wildly inaccurate, and cynical to a ridiculous level, there is a real danger in embracing such sentiments. It's not just the fact that we downplay our own accomplishments, and those of our system, but they encourage a very unrealistic view of the world around us, and usher in their own brand of inaction: rather than complacency we have wasted effort.

Now I know you're an Anarchist, but the fact of the matter is, that in today's day and age, ultra-radical "tear it down and start again" politics of any stripe really aren't going to get anything done. Real, lasting change simply isn't going to come from your Ron Pauls, or the other random radicals that pepper our system. They're too isolated, and their ideas are simply too far out there to be embraced to a level where they are effective. If we're going to get America and the world back on track we need to work within our own established system to create that change. That's really the beauty of Obama. Not only is he someone who believes in change in and through our system, and is in the position to facilitate it; He's living proof that that kind of change is possible.

So now we have a bunch of people hopeful, eager, and ready to fix the world. I'm sure many will say "Job done" and we need to be in a position to help them to realize that it's not, But they're not going to listen to us if we come at them spewing ultra-radical agendas flanked with absurd levels of cynicism, and those who embrace that view will waste their own efforts in an attempt to achieve their ridiculous goals. It's as if you were trying to re-model a house with your friends, except one guy refuses to come inside and work on the house in favor of showing you plans of a bigger, better house he's going to build once he levels your home. You want to change the world for the better? You've got to get enough people moving in the same direction, and you're not going to do that with tin-foil hat wearing crazies.

Obama is a good first step on a long hard road, and we're going to need that spirit of optimism your guy is trying to kill, because make no mistake when things get nasty, it may be all that keeps us going.