It is the weak who are cruel, gentleness can be expected only from the strong. -Leo Rosen

Also “Hurt people hurt people.”

Note I am not in any way meaning to imply that one should accept or excuse cruel behavior.

But I do not want to respond to hateful people by being hateful myself. Responding from strength means taking action and responding clearly and forcefully. It is really hard to see fellow humans be so blind and so cruel and cause such unimaginable harm. Agree - they need to be stopped. I don’t know how to help this stop.

But they are still fellow humans - with their own stories and struggles. The response to someone dehumanizing others isn’t to dehumanize them back.

So the question is what actions can we take? I am not a target (born in the US, white) outside of my political beliefs - so how can I take a stand in a way that might help / have an effect?

I don’t know. I share your despair at seeing what is happening - and I encourage you to keep hold of your compassion and strength and act from there. Act boldly, forcefully, and with love.

Ok, just making sure you didn’t think he was implanting microchips, lol.

I agree that his stance on intellectual property rights is not one that benefits the common good. But it’s a belief he has held consistently and wasn’t covid specific. I disagree with it, but it does not negate the gazillion things he has done that I do agree with.

And it’s hard for me to think it’s profit motivated because he consistently gives away more money than he makes. If his motive was to make more money he would not be doing almost all of the things he’s doing.

100% agree the IP stuff sucks and is bad for the world. Disagree that his stance on that negates everything else he’s done. Nobody is perfect and he has had a more positive effect on the world than almost anyone alive - certainly more than anyone in his income bracket. Could he be better? Yes. Does that make him bad? Nope.

Finite resources. When millions of people suffer and die for lack of resources while one parson controls enough resources to support all of them = it’s just not fair. No one person is worth more than hundreds of thousands of people.

For someone lucky and successful and hardworking to be better off than others = totally cool. You can do that no problem with 100 mil.

But when you have 1000x1000 more than you will ever need and other people die for want? Not cool.

Agree. Being a billionaire is inherently immoral.

However if all billionaires supported the politicians and policies that the Gates support we would not be in this situation. Like they actually do understand the value of a strong/healthy middle class.

Note that Bill Gates plans to give away more than 99% of his wealth. It’s hard to call him unethical for keeping his money with a straight face when he’s giving away 99% of it. And working hard to do that in ways that will matter to fellow humans who are truly suffering. Like he’s not building libraries to put his name on, he’s giving away vaccines and mosquito nets.

So I’m thinking he actually isn’t keeping his excessive wealth. Like he is actually giving it away - so yeah, I don’t lump him with the others at all.

I went to the one in Portland. It was such good energy- it invigorates everyone present. It gives us energy to do other things as well.

The fact that Trump doesn’t care about Oregon doesn’t mean that “doing nothing” is a better option. Don’t discourage people from taking action. If we are gathering and talking to each other we’re more likely to find and join in other efforts.

Speaking of which - what is it that you would suggest the good people of Oregon be doing to make a difference?

Depends on the bus / area.

There is real time bus tracking now in most places so you can see when things will arrive = WAY better for dealing with traffic (note traffic is a thing for cars as well)

I’m in Portland OR and of course a bus going through a bad area is more likely to have people who are “not ok” (addicts) but the vast majority of our busses are clean and climate controlled and filled with perfectly lovely friendly people.

And risk assessment is based on what is likely. My aunt smoked her whole life and never got lung cancer so my “personal experience” is that smoking doesn’t cause cancer. You see what I’m saying?

Cars are more dangerous than busses. Period. You might not like them for any number of perfectly valid reasons, and a specific bus in a specific area might be more dangerous - but the point of the post is that personal preference and accurate risk assessment are not the same thing.

53 checking in 🙂

Lots of people aren’t online as much as you and I are. They might have bought an EV for environmental reasons 10 years ago without even noticing who owned the company.

Not everyone is online as much as we are. Lots of people are utterly unaware that ever happened.

Agree. Plus they are utterly ridiculous.

Counter point = some folks bought Tesla (the normal ones not the weird “truck” things) because they wanted a more environmentally friendly option for a car. Back before awareness that Musk is an asshole was common.

Like some of the owners might be regretful but not in a position to sell at a huge loss and buy a different EV.

Looking for an answer to this as well. I’m non violent 100% - but open to civil disobedience. If bad people are putting good people in jail I’m ok going to jail. Not to be a martyr, but if it has a chance of making a difference. Just not sure what to do.