Updated 2 years ago
Confederates after the war: We can’t defeat the Yankees, so let’s go after the disenfranchised blacks and stick up statues and Jim Crow laws!
US military in Vietnam: We can’t defeat the Viet Kong, so let’s napalm all the civilians!
Me at age 5, in 1973: I can’t win this checkers match. I’m gonna upend the checkers board and call my brother a big fat jerk!
Nixon in the 70s and Reagan in the 80s: We can’t win the War on Drugs, so let’s make disadvantaged people’s lives miserable
Trump: I couldn’t win in 2020 so let’s burn it all down!
Republicans: We can’t defeat Biden, so let’s deplete our precious and precarious resources by going after his screwup son!
Putin: We can’t defeat Ukraine, so let’s deplete our precious and precarious resources by going after their civilians!
Honorable concession is the first step on the long road back to winning again.
History has shown us time and time again that doubling down on losing, sitting on your butt and wallowing in defeat out of spite, refusing to admit you lost, and not trying to take lessons, adapt to reality, adjust your arsenal, and get better, is a classic recipe for being a perennial, perpetual loser, and your road to redemption is just that much longer and more painful.
And the people who soundly beat you will trust you that much less.