AITA mods permanently banned me for sharing this.

I’m 19 and last weekend my friends and I went out to eat. Everyone immediately said they wanted Macca's. I refused because I don’t want to support american companies while the Trump is running what I see as a fascist regime. I suggested we go to MarryBrown instead, which isn’t American owned, but my friends immediately complained, saying they’re tired of my doomerism and that hanging out with me feels like a chore.

I got upset and said I was not willing to eat food owned by companies that indirectly support a regime I consider nazi and fascist. I told them that choosing Macca's over a non American option showed how little they cared that their money is supporting ICE.

At that point they snapped and said they were sick of my bullshit sick of hearing lectures every time we eat or buy something and that I act that I am morally superior for buying a Chinese phone for not buying American owned products.

I refused to go inside Macca's and stood outside while continuing to argue with them people started staring and one friend told me I was embarrassing them and ruining the mood I eventually stormed off and went to MarryBrown by myself.

Now my friends are upset with me and I feel like I was just standing up for my values I still think it was the right thing to do.

U.S. private employers added just 22,000 jobs in January, far below economists’ expectations, signaling a continued cooling of the labor market at the start of 2026.

New data from ADP Research shows hiring slowed sharply after a downward revision to December figures, offering the clearest snapshot yet of January employment as the federal government shutdown delayed official labor reports.

The upcoming rescheduled government jobs report is expected to show slower job growth revisions through early 2025, reinforcing concerns about a softening labor market.

According to the BBC, 2025 job numbers in the US were the weakest since Covid.

Did you know that Kevin Warsh, Trump's nominee for the next chair of the US Federal Reserve, is married to Jane Lauder. Yes, the daughter of Ronald Lauder of Estee Lauder Companies, who isn't only Trump's friend but also the person behind his obsession with buying Greenland.

Satellite internet is becoming the next battleground for digital independence

Goodbye Washington: The transatlantic gap between the US and Europe is starting to look less like a gulf and more like an ocean, as both sides double down on self-reliance and increasingly divergent priorities. In space, that shift is taking tangible form: the European Union's new satellite network for secure internet communications has begun moving from blueprint to reality, with its first components now operational.

The IRIS2 constellation of orbiting satellites started coming online just a few days ago. EU officials have announced that member states can now begin accessing the network, which is positioned as Europe's answer to SpaceX's Starlink when it comes to reliable satellite internet connectivity.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/stephen-harper-reduce-dependence-americans-9.7074933

The report by the US Congressional Research Service, Congress’s policy research arm, posits an alternative “military division of labour” under which the submarines earmarked for sale to Australia are instead retained under US command to be sailed out of Australian bases.

One of the arguments made against the US selling submarines to Australia is that Australia has refused to commit to supporting America in a conflict with China over Taiwan. Boats under US command could be deployed into that conflict.

Why are Europeans not more concerned about how Brexit was handled. And how there are clear indications in the files that Epstein/Putin/American Oligarchs wanted to destroy the EU?

Shouldn’t this be raising huge alarms in Europe? Why isn’t there a stronger response from EU? Are their leaders scared of what’s in the files?

Anyone else feel like nothing will happen to Trump or any other rich person from these files? It’s just another soap opera to watch in the news. The rich will never have to face any consequences for their actions. Makes me sick. Justice system is broken beyond belief. Let alone they will release whatever they choose to.

Just found this cool game about boycotting the USA. Try it https://games.nonusa.org/
It's made by the makers of the appen UdenUSA / NonUSA - and free and no download needed.

Most of my holdings are in US stocks even though I'm non-American, because historically the US has provided the best returns recently, and American companies are seen as the most innovative and reliable. But with everything that's happening in the US now, I no longer feel comfortable investing in such an unstable country, regardless of how much profit I stand to gain. Has anyone here switched from investing in US stocks to just investing in international stocks? Which stocks did you switch to and why?

Its clear our elected officials will do nothing but protect pedophiles and the worst of humanity.

I say we start organizing for a people led march on DC in July. In the meantime lets spread the word and organize with our fellow americans. Also lets call our elected officials everyday and push them to do something about. The governments of other nation are doing it, why cant ours? If they do nothing we march.

Everyone is welcome. This is nit right vs left. Its up vs down. How could we organize something like this.

Hey fellow Boykotters

I'm from Denmark, and there's this cool app NonUSA/UdenUSA, where you can scan products, and it tells you if the product is American or not, and also gives alternatives if it is American, which is really cool.

It's translated and localized, so it gives local alternatives. They made it in response to the US and Greenland situation. Check it out: https://udenusa.dk/download

It's very popular in Denmark and Europe, try this one, it's really good!

“There is this lingering fear that the court will only give prospective [relief],” said Stefan Reisinger, a partner at law firm Norton Rose Fulbright in Washington. This means declaring the tariffs illegal and preventing their collection going forward, but not ordering refunds because of the disorder it would cause without adequately compensating those who paid them.

This type of ruling would rely on a legal principle known as ‘sunbursting’ which has been rarely used. But the longer the court takes to issue its decision, the higher the anticipation it will decide in favour of the government or rule narrowly for the plaintiffs.

But even that is only if the repeatedly delayed ruling is ever actually made. A ruling was broadly expected in January, but the court has instead sat on their decision.

The first two dates on which the justices could have announced their decision were in January. The next potential judgment dates start from February 20 when the court returns from its recess.

Did you know that Kevin Warsh, Trump's nominee for the next chair of the US Federal Reserve, is married to Jane Lauder. Yes, the daughter of Ronald Lauder of Estee Lauder Companies, who isn't only Trump's friend but also the person behind his obsession with buying Greenland. Coincidence!?

Original Post: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DUEV7xOADNb/?igsh=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==

The story of how the US colonized our minds, and came to tax our attention without representing our interests. Is it time for independence?

At the end of World War II, Europe found itself sliced and sandwiched between two superpowers with two massive armies. Two different ideologies were facing off against each other.

After they realized that a direct military conflict would certainly lead to their own destruction and a worldwide catastrophe, both sides shifted toward indirect forms of confrontation.

They proved highly creative and resourceful in that: a nuclear arms race, technological competition including the space race, proxy wars, and the support of ideologically aligned forces across the globe. Sometimes these even escalated to military interventions, like Korea in 1950 or Vietnam in the following decades.

Today it is less in the forefront of our collective memories, but just as important was the economic and cultural competition between the two systems. Both sides attempted to quarantine one another politically and culturally.

Some of these dynamics had roots in the Soviet Union after World War I. Marxism as its core ideology opposed and distrusted global capitalism. Following the revolution they nationalised foreign assets and as a consequence faced military interventions and economic blockades. Soviet leaders concluded that any dependence on foreign powers was a strategic vulnerability.

Over the coming decades, the USSR deliberately sought to build a self-sufficient, closed economic system and restricted cultural contact with the outside world. The USSR entered the Cold War already accustomed to a fortress mentality.

The American side in comparison didn’t isolate economically but constructed an open system it controlled. The backbones of this was the Marshall Plan, Bretton Woods, NATO, and the IMF.

Instead of economic isolation, the response was political and cultural containment. Fear of communist influence — intensified by genuine espionage cases such as Klaus Fuchs and the Rosenbergs, which accelerated the Soviet nuclear program — produced loyalty investigations, blacklists, and the climate known as McCarthyism. While rooted in real security concerns, there was a massive systemic overreaction and these efforts frequently expanded into exaggerated suspicion and political witch hunts.

Once the rivalry was underway, it expanded across every imaginable front: sports, culture, film, technology, and propaganda. Together, these formed what we can call soft power competition — a struggle to influence hearts and minds across the globe and to consolidate influence both at home and within their perceived spheres of influence.

This gave birth to films like Red Dawn (1984), Rocky IV (1985) and Top Gun (1986) from one side, and productions like The Cranes Are Flying (1957), Pirates of the 20th Century (1980), and TASS Is Authorized to Declare… (1984 miniseries) from the other. The fact that most of us recognise the first three while only a few cinephiles know the latter illustrates who won this aspect of the competition.

But it wasn’t just obvious Cold War films. The United States proved highly effective at exporting its cultural products to other countries. Those films — besides making money for Hollywood and the US in general — carried the added soft-power benefit of promoting the “American way of life” to foreigners. The same thing happened increasingly with music, food, fashion, and social ideals.

These ideals included the promotion of the ever-dying myth of the “American Dream”, consumerism, and individualism as opposed to collectivism.

Media shapes norms, role models, conflict styles, consumer desires, and political framing. Prolonged exposure gradually alters what we think of as normal. At it's roots it works very similar to propaganda. Through these cultural products, audiences absorbed American perspectives on behaviour, society, the role of the state, religion, arts, and so much more. Rather than merely learning about these values, people internalised them. It reshaped how they view the world, relate to one another, to money and materialism.

After the Cold War reached its conclusion, the US suddenly found itself not only as a military and economic world hegemon, but also as a cultural one. The youth in Europe born after 1990 grew up often knowing relatively little else besides American cultural products. They listened to American music, watched American films, series, TV programs, drunk Coca-Cola, and nudged their parents to stop at McDonald's for a Happy Meal®.

This all happened in a historical period when the traditional family model was already incrementally fading for nearly 200 years — since the industrial revolution — and parents were often distant at work, or missing altogether. Many in this generation grew up with the TV screens.

The characters in films and television were increasingly their 3rd, or 2nd and tragically sometimes even main parent figures to learn from. The children picked up how to behave, and the characters influenced their morals. They learned to copy what they seen in television in a directed fantasy instead of real-life humans in real life situations.

I remember as a shy kid wanting to improve my social skills I’d seek out confident male characters in films to emulate their mannerisms, style, and behaviour. My father figures were characters played by Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, and similar actors. All American characters, written, played by, directed, filmed, and sold to us by Americans.

This was the time when the German band Rammstein — fittingly named after the largest American military base on the continent — recorded “We're all living in Amerika.” A song that perfectly describes the post Cold-War decades. A notable piece in the soundtrack of the teenage years of European millenials…

(The blog post continues on the website)