> You're allowed to say what you just said in that post without getting taken away at night and your family never talking about you again. Or a drone taking you out while you sleep. Palantir logs all our comments and it would be trivially easy for them if there weren't still some lingering democratic handrails holding them back.

I don't live in the US. The US is not going to start a war with my country to kill some random internet commenter for criticising them, even if they could identify me. They certainly will arrest Americans for speaking out[1], but although the domestic situation is becoming even worse than it already was, it was never anything like your propaganda would have you believe. The American government slaughtered students for protesting the Vietnam War[2] and yet the brainwashed masses can't stop boasting about how free their country is, it would be funny if it weren't so pathetic.

[1]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47342776 [2]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings

> As someone who apparently reads leftist theory

You don't need to read leftist theory to be opposed to American imperialism, you simply need to not be American, or else be a non-nationalist American with a conscience (exceedingly rare, I am aware). I do understand that it is difficult for American commenters to conceive that they could be speaking to someone who is not American, given the usual belief that the US is the center of the universe.

> also typing on a computer on HN, so you're a "beneficiary of the empire" regardless of where you live

Speaking of which, "computers/the internet wouldn't have been invented if not for the US" is a classically arrogant American thing to say.

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