Democrats Want to Make Border Crisis Worse

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Darth Wedgius
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Re: Democrats Want to Make Border Crisis Worse

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Worffan101 wrote: Thu Mar 14, 2019 11:37 pm
Darth Wedgius wrote: Thu Mar 14, 2019 10:17 pm
Worffan101 wrote: Thu Mar 14, 2019 9:44 pm
Darth Wedgius wrote: Thu Mar 14, 2019 5:31 pm
Worffan101 wrote: Thu Mar 14, 2019 5:28 pm What border crisis? Who cares if millions of people want to come to America? I say, let 'em in! Put 'em to work, give 'em jobs making something or farming something, they'll spend their salaries in America and boost our GDP. Everybody wins, except those foreign countries who experience a population drain but fuck 'em, 'MURICA!!!!!
Why do people want to come to the US so badly that they'll risk their lives to do so? Is there something magical about American dirt that makes things more successful here?
We have all the best arable land in the hemisphere, we've got a strong economy, our government is stagnant but functional, our organized crime is a nuisance rather than a mortal threat, and we have a functional social safety net.

You come to America, you can at least survive above the poverty line, even if you're hated and exploited. In Central America, you can't even get that as a poor or especially mostly-indigenous person (the colonial-era caste system is dying a slow, miserable death).
Any guesses why any of that that would be? What makes 'MURICA!!! different? Is it all because of U.S. interference in the past?
Well, it started with the Iberian monarchies intentionally starving the colonies of tech and infrastructure so they would be dependent on the metropole. Then Napoleon happened and the markets dried up and political instability ensued and Argentina and Brazil ganged up on Paraguay and wiped out 90+% of the male population. Things were sort of improving for a while despite the less favorable terrain and difficulties industrializing (US at this point was more effective as a food exporter and latin american governments were too authoritarian, generally speaking, to leverage their cash crops into industrialization, not to mention that the US had straight-up superior terrain due to having all the good parts of the Great Plains and the Rust Belt AND control of the mississippi once we kicked Johnny Reb in the fork and made the slavocrat traitor filth treat black people like human beings), then in the 20th century the USA repeatedly backed corrupt kleptocrats to secure American business interests (United Fruit was EVIL, man), then in the back half of the 20th century when Chile was poised to become an actually powerful economy and the Southern Cone in general was just becoming a really nice place to live, we backed gratuitously evil kleptocrats like Pinochet (who had dissidents raped by dogs and murdered) and the Argentine junta (who that demented idiot Reagan hosted in the White House literally months before they invaded our ally Britain--the Argentine junta leader who Reagan hosted also ran the junta's most notorious death squad personally).

So, basically it's a combination of political instability, political fragmentation in Central America, exploitation by corrupt American businesses, and active economic sabotage going back centuries.

But hey, at least Pinochet was anti-communist! Pepe MAGA, helicopter meme, hail Hitler! /s
That could be the reason for Central and South America's problems, but it also might not be. Every nation has been interfered with, including the U.S., and certainly Europe was heavily hit by two world wars and sprang back within decades after WW2. Yes, there was the Marshall Plan, but we've been sending aid south of the border for quite a while now.

Meanwhile, nations in the Anglosphere have done pretty well compared to much of the world. My suspicion is that there are cultural factors involved with the U.S.'s success.

I can't prove a cause and effect relationship, and I think you can't prove one rooting all these other nations' ills to past American (or European) interference. Perhaps it would be a good idea to preserve American culture, just in case? And I think that would necessitate keeping immigration to levels where the immigrants will assimilate.
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Re: Democrats Want to Make Border Crisis Worse

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@Draco Dracul That's EXACTLY what it's about. They know the demographics are changing, that since white families can afford birth control and proper family planning, they use it, but minorities are not, so they're breeding like rabbits. And that's come back to bite them in the ass with a larger voting base that by 2050, could favor the Democrats substantially - assuming there hasn't been any kind of earth-shattering shake-up. So this is part of their draconian efforts to tell you how to live your life, acting like the biblical god they worship in the Old Testament - I rain down my judgment that you shall not enter this land, infidel, and you shall breed whether you like it or not as the Good Book says: "Be fruitful and multiply!" So come on, get going! I don't get you've been raped, or that this woman is gonna have complications and just doesn't want a baby. It's happening. So just live with it while I stand off to the side playing with myself. Yes, I think the GOP leadership, the religious right, has a forced birth fetish. It's... sickening.
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Re: Democrats Want to Make Border Crisis Worse

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Actually living in a red state, I can tell you that that isn't it at all. There is a sect or Christians who belong to what they call the "quiver-full" movement who are all about being fruitful and multiplying, but they're taking that into their own hands, so to speak. ;) No, the resistance the majority of Christians have to abortion is that they genuinely view it as murder, and they think that if one does something, they should be prepared for whatever consequences result from it, as in pregnancy as a result of having sex. Most of the people where I'm from don't oppose birth control measures like the pill or condoms, but from what I gather those who do view it as subverting "God's will."
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Re: Democrats Want to Make Border Crisis Worse

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Darth Wedgius wrote: Fri Mar 15, 2019 3:58 pm That could be the reason for Central and South America's problems, but it also might not be. Every nation has been interfered with, including the U.S., and certainly Europe was heavily hit by two world wars and sprang back within decades after WW2. Yes, there was the Marshall Plan, but we've been sending aid south of the border for quite a while now.

Meanwhile, nations in the Anglosphere have done pretty well compared to much of the world. My suspicion is that there are cultural factors involved with the U.S.'s success.

I can't prove a cause and effect relationship, and I think you can't prove one rooting all these other nations' ills to past American (or European) interference. Perhaps it would be a good idea to preserve American culture, just in case? And I think that would necessitate keeping immigration to levels where the immigrants will assimilate.
If you genuinely believe, or even suspect, that Hispanic people are culturally inferior or whatever, then you're not just a fucking idiot with no understanding of history, but a racist idiot to boot.

America's advantage is that we were located relatively close to Europe, with easily-established trade routes (MUCH easier to do triangle trade in the North atlantic than breaking through to the south in the age of sail), a gigantic mass of arable land that we got relatively early, control of all the really important river systems, and a series of lucky breaks in our early history that hit us just hard enough to make us centralize but not hard enough to seriously damage us. 1812 in particular was the single most valuable loss a nation has ever experienced. Latin America meanwhile was generally more sparsely populated, got fewer immigrants (side note, without immigration the US would've barely gotten off the floor, we literally wouldn't have had the surplus population to be able to industrialize to the degree that we did), and suffered political instability from early on due to the more complex colonial system breaking down much more than it did here. There are also at least 6 points of divergence that I can think of (Articles of Confederation survive, Federalists try rigging more elections, 1812 goes worse, Civil War happens early, actual franco-British intervention in the Civil War, different distribution of colonies join the rebellion in the ARW, etc.) that could either break America almost or before we began, or could leave the USA crippled for generations, which we successfully avoided through luck, cool heads prevailing in dark moments, lack of British desire to bloodily slog through us, and Ben Franklin locking a bunch of old farts in a room until they came up with a workable compromise.

To say that a nation as cosmopolitan and spectacularly lucky as the USA is "culturally" superior to another is flatly ridiculous.
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Re: Democrats Want to Make Border Crisis Worse

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Steve wrote: Fri Mar 15, 2019 6:29 am Point of order: Paraguay getting wrecked by Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay was because the batshit dictator of Paraguay decided not just to war with Brazil over Uruguayan politics, but because he decided, just for the lulz, to invade Argentina on the way since it was the most direct route into Uruguay. Then, IIRC, he bluntly refused any offers of peace and kept fighting even as his country died around him, until something like 66% of Paraguay's male population was dead or missing.

His enemies weren't saints (well, Dom Pedro II was virtually one by the standards of Latin American rulers - irony of ironies, the best head of state in Latin America was probably the Emperor of Brazil), but they weren't the bad guys in that war.

As for the thread subject... I am an advocate of border security, and the behavior of Trump and the people who follow him makes me seriously consider becoming an open border advocate. They've taken a legitimate issue and turned it into "We must absolutely do this simplistic but costly thing! Anything else is proof you're a traitor!" even though their chosen method will require measures that, in of themselves, would immensely help border security.

I'm not against the Wall because I want to flood America with Hispanic illegals to vote Democrat in elections. I'm against the Wall because it's a pointless waste that distracts from actual worthwhile border protection measures (which will be necessary anyway to protect the damn thing) and is only promoted because Trump is a malignant narcissistic demagogue.
I'm aware about the Paraguayan War's specific circumstances, I'm just saying that the fallout of that military clusterfrakas wasn't particularly good for South American economic development.

Agreed on the rest.
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Re: Democrats Want to Make Border Crisis Worse

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Worffan101 wrote: Fri Mar 15, 2019 5:04 pm
Darth Wedgius wrote: Fri Mar 15, 2019 3:58 pm That could be the reason for Central and South America's problems, but it also might not be. Every nation has been interfered with, including the U.S., and certainly Europe was heavily hit by two world wars and sprang back within decades after WW2. Yes, there was the Marshall Plan, but we've been sending aid south of the border for quite a while now.

Meanwhile, nations in the Anglosphere have done pretty well compared to much of the world. My suspicion is that there are cultural factors involved with the U.S.'s success.

I can't prove a cause and effect relationship, and I think you can't prove one rooting all these other nations' ills to past American (or European) interference. Perhaps it would be a good idea to preserve American culture, just in case? And I think that would necessitate keeping immigration to levels where the immigrants will assimilate.
If you genuinely believe, or even suspect, that Hispanic people are culturally inferior or whatever, then you're not just a fucking idiot with no understanding of history, but a racist idiot to boot.
:roll: When did I mention race? Just as you can criticize Israel without being anti-Semitic, you can compare cultures without really caring about skin colors.
Worffan101 wrote: Fri Mar 15, 2019 5:04 pm America's advantage is that we were located relatively close to Europe, with easily-established trade routes (MUCH easier to do triangle trade in the North atlantic than breaking through to the south in the age of sail), a gigantic mass of arable land that we got relatively early, control of all the really important river systems, and a series of lucky breaks in our early history that hit us just hard enough to make us centralize but not hard enough to seriously damage us. 1812 in particular was the single most valuable loss a nation has ever experienced. Latin America meanwhile was generally more sparsely populated, got fewer immigrants (side note, without immigration the US would've barely gotten off the floor, we literally wouldn't have had the surplus population to be able to industrialize to the degree that we did), and suffered political instability from early on due to the more complex colonial system breaking down much more than it did here. There are also at least 6 points of divergence that I can think of (Articles of Confederation survive, Federalists try rigging more elections, 1812 goes worse, Civil War happens early, actual franco-British intervention in the Civil War, different distribution of colonies join the rebellion in the ARW, etc.) that could either break America almost or before we began, or could leave the USA crippled for generations, which we successfully avoided through luck, cool heads prevailing in dark moments, lack of British desire to bloodily slog through us, and Ben Franklin locking a bunch of old farts in a room until they came up with a workable compromise.

To say that a nation as cosmopolitan and spectacularly lucky as the USA is "culturally" superior to another is flatly ridiculous.
And that people die trying to get into the US, Australia, Europe, etc.? How amazingly lucky all those are, all coincidentally of course. :roll: As far as cosmopolitanism goes, I don't much care how people eat, dress, dance, worship, sing, paint, or whatever.
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Re: Democrats Want to Make Border Crisis Worse

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Darth, can you stop the alt-right talking points and implications that Mexicans are lazy durr hurr right now and explain to me what "cultural traits" of the massively divergent societies of a continent and a half (formed from the assimilation of literally dozens of native societies and imported slaves into the social frameworks of two similar but distinct Iberian cultures) you think have somehow affected Latin America?

Because all I see is the US getting lucky and having initial strategic advantages while the Latin American nations were actively fucked over for literally centuries.
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Re: Democrats Want to Make Border Crisis Worse

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Hell fucking yes, we were lucky. Even lucky in the sense that we bought Alaska so Russia couldn't set up a base there in the Cold War. And invading by land or sea would have been a strategic nightmare. It makes you wonder if some people's belief we are God's chosen country might not be entirely inaccurate, given all these coincidences. Though if we are, it speaks volumes to what a tyrannical monster God is. :P
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Re: Democrats Want to Make Border Crisis Worse

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Arguably the biggest advantage the US has enjoyed (and Canada) is the particular way the British governed their colonies compared to the clusterfuck of Spain's Empire, where to ship things from Argentina legally you had to send it by mule to Peru, then up to Panama, then to Spain. Much of the former Spanish colonies' problems can likely be traced to the messed up social caste structure the Spanish built in their colonial system.

And frankly we got lucky on a number of occasions anyway. We were lucky the British weren't more interested in curtailing US expansionism, we were lucky to have managed a reconciliation after our civil war, and that we won it in a way to enable that, instead of ending up with a recurring conflict that would have sapped our energies. The US also had the advantage of a lot of very rich and valuable land falling into its lap from these factors and that Mexico's own internal conflicts left it unable to keep us from snatching a third of its territory in a war of aggression.
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Re: Democrats Want to Make Border Crisis Worse

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Steve wrote: Fri Mar 15, 2019 7:22 pm Arguably the biggest advantage the US has enjoyed (and Canada) is the particular way the British governed their colonies compared to the clusterfuck of Spain's Empire, where to ship things from Argentina legally you had to send it by mule to Peru, then up to Panama, then to Spain. Much of the former Spanish colonies' problems can likely be traced to the messed up social caste structure the Spanish built in their colonial system.

And frankly we got lucky on a number of occasions anyway. We were lucky the British weren't more interested in curtailing US expansionism, we were lucky to have managed a reconciliation after our civil war, and that we won it in a way to enable that, instead of ending up with a recurring conflict that would have sapped our energies. The US also had the advantage of a lot of very rich and valuable land falling into its lap from these factors and that Mexico's own internal conflicts left it unable to keep us from snatching a third of its territory in a war of aggression.
Social caste system was a DISASTER for the long-term social health of Latin America. Much as it's been for the American South. Notably, the North, which has always been able to mostly get away from overt prejudice in a few decades, has been alot more successful in attracting immigrants and thereby generating a constantly-expanding GDP.

The Louisiana Purchase was also probably the #1 biggest break the USA ever had. Literally 90% of the best land in the entire continent, just fucking dropped into our lap, AND the best trade route. Amazing.

Latin America could have at least been a competitor as a general region (i.e. a theoretical EU-for-South-America COULD have been a rival to the USA by the modern day, though none of the individual nations would be) if it weren't for the fallout of the social caste system, economic and technological starvation, and the lost decades in the mid-19th and mid-late 20th centuries.
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