He’s a malignant narcissist. It takes a long time to escape that kind of programing. Being in a relationship like that is basically like being in a cult.

It’s gas lighting, like a lot of the posts in response. Being socialized as a man sucks. You’re both measured by your partners and expected to not need anyone or express any emotions. So basically you get shit like you described where men end up having no self esteem so they are desperate for women to validate them but they also feel smothered and confused by the completely normal and human need for emotional connection that woman have been allowed to keep.

Patriarchy is a machine that turns normal humans in to abusers, and it takes a lot of work to deprogram from this… Especially when it’s constantly being reinforced all around you (like a lot of the guys who responded).

The subject is called “economics.”

They don’t care about profits any more than feudalism did. It’s about domination and sadism. Read “Bullshit Jobs” if you want to understand the dynamics here. Profit had absolutely nothing to do with it.

Lemmygrad is 100% not joking about guillotines and gulags.

The problem with all this, and that the guillotine is symbolic of, is that state power is always used against the weak. The guillotine isn’t a defensive weapon. It can only be used, by definition, after an enemy has been subjugated. The logic of the guillotine, and it’s symbolism, is revenge. The core logic of fascism is also revenge. The path from leftist ideals to reactionary dictatorship cloaked in those ideals follows that path.

Vengeance feels right because we are fighting against generations of injustice, but it can’t end in a world without injustice. The world anarchists want to create is one that is fundamentally compassionate, even to those who have harmed us. Because everyone is a human, and everyone makes mistakes.

The defense of the revolution is the revolution. If the formerly rich are a threat to the post-revolutionary order, what has the revolution achieved? The world should be better for them too. They no longer have to chase wealth or fear for their lives, they can have time to work out whatever trauma drove them to hoard all that wealth.

The guillotine cannot reform. It cannot help. It can only kill those who are, by definition, no longer a threat. It cannot be used for anything but revenge, and there is no place for revenge in a revolution that seeks to build a better world.

This is why I advocate for gun ownership but refused to testify against the person who shot me. This is one of my favorite crimethinc pieces and I reference it a lot.

There was a twilight zone episode called “a nice place to visit” where this petty crook died and ended up in a place where he could have anything he wanted any time. Every time he’d gamble, he’d win. Every woman he talked to wanted him. Etc. But he couldn’t lose.

A billionaire can have anything, but without challenge nothing really means anything. It’s all fake, and they’re surrounded by people who just agree with them in order to get to their money. They have no friends. They can’t even go outside. They’re trapped in the mansions and sports cars and yachts, unable to live in or even experience the world they have so much influence over. They are trapped by their wealth, so they come up with impossible plans to escape… To Mars, to space… But there is no escape. They are trapped on a world they are killing, surrounded by people who they need who also hate them.

The crook in the twilight zone episode asked to lose or get turned down, wanted some kind of challenge. He didn’t want to be in heaven anymore… And he was informed that he was not in heaven. That was hell.

Of course they’re broken. They’re in a living hell that everyone imagines is heaven.

Both Bezos and Musk were also abused or neglected by their parents. They feel like they have to prove something, but there’s nothing to prove and the people they want to prove themselves to are dead.

There is no saving America, there’s only buying time. Democrats can’t do what’s needed to prevent fascism because actually doing something about the Republican party would risk creating actual democracy. Prepare to fight fascism now because at best you’re buying yourself another 4 years. Vote, don’t vote, vote for a third party out of protest, whatever you do organize with other people and prepare for the worst.

In the best case, I’m wrong and you’ve made new friends. But if you don’t organize now it will be too late to organize in the worst case.