As the title states I am confused on this matter. The way I see it, the USA has a two party system and in the next few weeks they’re either going to have Trump or Harris as president, come inauguration day. With this in mind doesn’t it make sense to vote for the person least likely to escalate the situation even more.
Giving your vote to an independent or worse not voting at all, just gives more of a chance for Trump to win the election and then who knows what crazy stuff he will allow, or encourage, Israel to get away with.
I really don’t get the logic. As sure nobody wants to vote for a party allowing these heinous crimes to be committed, but given you’re getting one of them shouldn’t you be voting for the one that will be the least horrible of the two.
Please don’t come at me with pro-Israeli rhetoric as this isn’t the post for that, I’m asking about why people would make such choices and I’m not up for debate on the Middle East, on this post, you can DM me for that.
Edit: Bedtime here now so will respond to incoming comments in the morning, love starting the day with an inbox full 😊.
Edit 2: This blew up, it’s a little overwhelming right now but I do intent on replying to everybody that took the time to comment. Just need to get in the right headspace.
It’s the Trolley Problem. Many people finding themselves in that problem would say, “Of course I flip the switch, one person is less than five people”.
But if you take a step back it’s reasonable to ask, “WHY did I suddenly find myself in this Trolley Problem? Trolleys don’t spring into existence fully formed like Athena springing from Zeus’ forehead. They are designed and built, piece by piece. The switch was setup by the agency of someone. People were kidnapped and tied down by force. I was placed here on purpose.”
So given that realization it’s also reasonable when told you must choose to say, “Why? You designed this system. You tied the people down. You could have done it differently and instead deliberately did THIS. I had nothing to do with it and I refuse the premise that I must participate in your fucked up game. No matter what happens the blood is on your hands and I refuse to share in your guilt.”
That’s the essential argument. There’s the realpolitik decision to do “less harm”, but you can also reject the fucked up premise.
And then the trolley cross track drifts and murders six people while the third party voter feels smug and self-righteous about ‘doing the right thing’.
The time to prevent the construction of the trolley, to prevent people from being kidnapped from their homes and tied to trolley tracks, is every time other than the election, so your election options are the ‘Not Murdering People With Trolleys’ group.
During the election, you minimize harm.
And for everything else, you push for improvements.
The time to suddenly pull a principled stance about Trolleys out of your ass is not ten seconds before your inaction kills people.
You need to care before the trolley is barrelling down the tracks.
The time to suddenly pull a principled stance about Trolleys out of your ass is not ten seconds before your inaction kills people.
So why do establishment liberals ignore the demands of progressives until it’s time to suddenly demand their votes?
Because you’re cherry picking people to be “establishment liberals.”
Bernie sanders exists. AOC exists. Etc etc etc
What cherry was allegedly picked in the comment you replied to?
AOC is somehow not an establishment democrat??
“She is working tirelessly to secure a cease-fire in Gaza and bringing the hostages home,” the Squad member said Monday night in championing Kamala Harris for president.
I’m point out establishment liberals that ARE listening to progressives, or are progressives themselves.
every post about this topic we have one person saying its the trolley problem, and starting a digression based on that, and one person saying its all first past the post voting, and starting a digression on that. The uniformity of the pattern of distraction setting is pretty suspicious.
You can reject the fucked up premise, and find you still live in a reality that doesn’t give a shit. In reality there are two outcomes to this election, and just a smidge of knowledge of game theory would show it doesn’t make sense to help the worse side, both in the short and long term.
I hate that we have 2 options, I hate that there is no ‘no genocide’ option. Me hating that shouldn’t cause me to make worse decisions with clearly worse outcomes for everyone
The no genocide option is to protest against the current regime instead of vote shaming people who probably don’t even live in a single swing state (where your candidate brought Liz Fucking Cheney btw).
There is no “No Genocide” option. There only Same Genocide with Harris and More Genocide with Trump.
Do you even hear yourself?
Do you know the reality of our electrical system?
The critique of the trolly problem isn’t that you don’t still make the choice, it’s that the outcome was predetermined before you even got there.
Leftists who are making a point of abstaining are doing so to point out that voters have no control over the trolly to begin with - that the choice is artificial because the outcomes were pre-selected by someone/something else to ensure a particular outcome, and that participating in that choice only ends up legitimizing that process.
Because why would a pro-Palestine person vote for the person who has aided the genocide against them and continues to vow further support for the regime responsible?
The way I see it, the USA has a two party system and in the next few weeks they’re either going to have Trump or Harris as president, come inauguration day. With this in mind doesn’t it make sense to vote for the person least likely to escalate the situation even more.
How is Kamala less likely to escalate it further when she has supported the actual ongoing genocide? What will Trump escalate it to? Double genocide? Either way I’m not voting for Trump so I don’t have to agree with his policies. I’m just not going to let the Dems conduct Genocide and scare me into agreeance with them using the threat of Trump.
If you’re talking about escalation with Iran, we have already been working with Israel for a “response” to Iran response and she has again supported Israels right to continue their provocations in the name of “defense”.
Giving your vote to an independent or worse not voting at all, just gives more of a chance for Trump to win the election and then who knows what crazy stuff he will allow, or encourage, Israel to get away with.
Crazy stuff like genocide? Expanding the “war” in Gaza into Lebanon? Provoking Iran with a strike on their soil then planning “retaliation” for their retaliation?
As sure nobody wants to vote for a party allowing these heinous crimes to be committed, but given you’re getting one of them shouldn’t you be voting for the one that will be the least horrible of the two.
Kamala is actively engaged in a genocide. There should be punishments for this. The least of which should be losing your role in any sort of elected office. A vote for Kamala is literally a vote saying that you are okay with genocide as long as it benefits you to do so.
What will Trump escalate it to? Double genocide?
Genuinely, have you read any of the man’s comments? He is criticising the Biden administration for being too harsh on Israel. To quote him: ““From the start, Harris has worked to tie Israel’s hand behind its back, demanding an immediate ceasefire, always demanding ceasefire”. However bad things currently are, Trump’s openly-stated position on that horrific situation is that Israel needs to go in harder.
https://hexbear.net/post/3754069
saw this and figured id point it out to u
To quote him: ““From the start, Harris has worked to tie Israel’s hand behind its back, demanding an immediate ceasefire, always demanding ceasefire”.
Okay? Do you usually treat what Trump says as gospel? …Do you think she got a ceasefire or successfully restrained Israels genocidal ambitions so far?
Materially, what is the difference between them.
“Genocide but sad” vs “Genocide and happy”, I’m not choosing Genocide period.
However bad things currently are, Trump’s openly-stated position that horrific situation is that Israel needs to go in harder.
Things are genocide, Harris’ openly stated positions are horrific and enabling of a genocide we have seen be carried out.
Kamala Harris is actively engaging in genocide and it’s worked for over a year, you’re engaging in hypotheticals on it getting worse based off Trump’s words. Perhaps Trump’s incompetence would even lead to a forced end to the genocide if we are engaging in hypotheticals, in fact, I’d wager thats much more likely than Harris suddenly switching from a genocider to a compassionate human being and ending it.
Do you usually treat what Trump says as gospel?
In so far as it being a reflection of his intentions when otherwise entirely plausible? Yeah, sure. This isn’t him drawing on a hurricane map with a pen.
“Genocide but sad” vs “Genocide and happy”, I’m not choosing Genocide period.
Fifty thousand dead Palestinians is fifty thousand too many - or however many the real number is by now - but there are two million Palestinians in Gaza, and three million in the West Bank. Despite how bad it already is, this can still get so, so much worse.
Your claim to not choose genocide is, in fact, a choice to let the rest of the country decide without your input. If Harris’ lukewarm opposition saves literally any Palestinian lives whatsoever relative to the alternative, that’s worth more than someone feeling smug about not voting. I don’t know about you, but I think that the most ethical choice, if you are voting solely on the matter of Palestine, is whichever option is materially best for actual Palestinians even if that option is still horrible
you’re engaging in hypotheticals on it getting worse based off Trump’s words
Are you suggesting it is not reasonable to judge a politician based on the things they say?
But don’t worry, because I’m also judging him on his actions when he was president last time. Like pardoning American war criminals, massively increasing the amount of drone strikes conducted, assassinating an Iranian general, recognising Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, attempting to extort Ukraine for his own political gains, and actively backing the Saudi bombing campaign in Yemen. And as a reminder, even the Biden administration dropped support for that last one. He’s as belligerent as any American president and no hypotheticals are needed to demonstrate that. So when he says he wants Israel to do more in Gaza? Yeah I consider that a genuine and meaningful threat to the millions of Palestinians that haven’t been killed yet, and I will absolutely take Harris’ nothing response over that.
So on what basis do you think that Trump is the preferable option?
50k is not a true figure, it’s confirmed deaths. most are stuck in rubble and israel destroys all of their heavy machinery they have no way to dig up the bodies. and no, Harris nor Biden are holding Israel back. what a joke. I hope you’re a paid poster and not a real person because that’s a real dumb opinion. I don’t care if you read it in MSM and for some reason believe it. It was such a blatant attempt at damage control. If you’re a real person I recommend you get your news from sources such as the grayzone, mintpressnews, mondoweiss, the electronic intifada, etc
I know 50k is the confirmed number, that’s why I specifically made an aside about the real number
I’m not even saying Biden or Harris are holding Israel back. I’m saying Trump has openly stated that he wants to push Israel even further than it is already going.
Considering you apparently didn’t read what I actually wrote and instead chose to insult me over something you made up, I’m hardly about to take your news recommendations. I’m even less inclined to do so when the first one is the Grayzone.
I’m not even saying Biden or Harris are holding Israel back. I’m saying Trump has openly stated that he wants to push Israel even further than it is already going.
Yes, you are repeatedly stating this while seemingly ignoring that Kamala and Biden are already doing genocide, because it doesn’t get worse than that. If Kamala isn’t stopping the genocide or even holding Israel back, how will Trump be worse? What could Trump possibly do that’s worse than genocide? “Finish the job” vs “finish the job faster”, either way the same result, genocide.
As I stated in my last message, if Trump gets in and starts directing Israel how to do the genocide and demands they do it faster, there’s a real chance his incompetence leads to its failure. Whereas under Kamala Biden it’s already been ongoing for over a year.
If we have to choose between “slow effective genocide” vs “fast sloppy genocide” I’m choosing the sloppy one. As it has the best chance of failing. (I don’t support this argument of choosing a “lesser genocide” though, just stating the flaws in your argument).
Considering you apparently didn’t read what I actually wrote and instead chose to insult me over something you made up
They most likely insulted you because they read what you wrote, the same reason I didn’t respond initially.
Your entire previous reply to me is ignoring context almost to the point of strawmanning and borderline genocide denial*. It comes off as someone who doesn’t actually care about the issue and just wants to get their talking points out about why genocidal Trump is bad and genocidal Democrats are good.
*edit for clarification: the “Trump would do it faster” is an echo of the “it’s not a genocide because they could destroy Palestine anytime and haven’t” form of denialism
If Kamala isn’t stopping the genocide or even holding Israel back, how will Trump be worse? What could Trump possibly do that’s worse than genocide?
America absolutely has the capacity to supply far more equipment than it already is, and it has a track record of engaging in bombing campaigns in its own right in similar situations. Like in Yemen, under Trump. I do not want America to start bombing Palestine directly as well
“Finish the job” vs “finish the job faster”, either way the same result, genocide.
If they get to finish the job. The less quickly they can finish it, the more of a chance there is of Israeli and/or international public support turning against it enough to actually change it. The American election is not going to do that by itself because both realistic candidates are pro-Israel, so there is no point in making decisions that only work if they completely stop the genocide by voting or not voting.
You clearly also think that there is a chance of it being stopped since that’s your foundation for saying faster genocide is preferable. I don’t think your logic holds there, because I don’t see why a faster one would be likely to fail faster. On that basis, slower means fewer dead Palestinians.
It comes off as someone who doesn’t actually care about the issue and just wants to get their talking points out about why genocidal Trump is bad and genocidal Democrats are good.
Literally every point I made was explicitly rooted in what I believe will result in the fewest Palestinian deaths.
They most likely insulted you because they read what you wrote, the same reason I didn’t respond initially.
I accused them of not reading because they started off by trying to nitpick me by restating the exact same thing I pointed out literally in the same sentence.
Hi i am a different person and just read thru your convo there. I wanna chime in and ask you a genuine question that hopefully you will think over.
If right now as we speak Israel is being given unlimited material support for their genocide and actively killing as many Palestinians as they materially can (They only have so much bomb dropping capacity) No matter what Trump might say in what way do you think he would make it worse? Like what actual material steps would he take to kill more Palestinians? Because short of just nuking the Gaza strip over and over again(They wont do this since they want to take the land and Israel is too close anyway would be radiation issues) i struggle to see how he could. Especially considering the articles coming out recently about how the US is running out of surplus equipment to send Ukraine and Israel.
Some people think the trolley problem is just a funny template.
Some people think it’s the height of political thought and a sufficient salve for supporting genocide.
Was that why people couldn’t vote for Hillary?
Or Kerry?
Or Gore?
It’s always something with people’s excuses for letting things get worse and feeling smug about it. This is worse than usual - but the system hasn’t changed, and your inaction still makes things worse. Y’think open American fascism is gonna make anything better?
Gore won the popular vote and the electoral college. Kerry wasn’t voted for because more than 80% of democrats fully supported the w bush admin.
Clinton was a genocidal monster, as she has always been.
We e had open American fascism since the 1980s, we just invested tens of billions into things like project mockingbird to eliminate realization amongst most the population.
Your questions don’t make sense.
Do you think that the people overinvested in trolley problem electoral logic vote shaming are the ones that didn’t vote for Hillary? You seem to be confused about who gets gung-ho about that kind of stuff.
I get the sense that you were just searching for phrases you feel comfortable with but didn’t know how to put them together in any kind of coherent way.
Because they don’t understand that voting is just one part of the democratic process.
I’m going to tell you a secret.
The people who say this, the leftists that threaten to withhold their votes, tend to vote strategically anyways. But threatening to withhold votes is one way to apply pressure to politicians to do things like, say, stop promoting a fucking genocide. And then liberals lose their minds for some reason and make it totally irrelevant. And then we have a genocide that lasts for 75 years and starts world war 3.
4 years ago, Democrats said the border wall was stupid and bad. They said that Republicans were racist for claiming all Mexicans were drug dealers and criminals. Today, Harris is saying she’s gonna build the border wall, be tough on migrants, and has basically adopted Trump’s policies on immigration.
There is no indication that the Democrats will not be just as bad as the Republicans on Israel in 4 years.
To address your second point “not voting for Harris is a vote for Trump”; why isn’t the opposite true? “Not voting for Trump is a vote for Harris”, follows the same logic, so refusing to vote or voting independent should be net neutral, no?
This election should be a slam dunk victory for Harris. The data shows that adopting leftist progressive policies is popular. Biden dropping out resulted in $4 million in small donor fundraising. Picking Walz resulted in another $2 million. People got really excited when it looked like the Democratic party was making leftist progressive movement.
Since then, the Dems have been aggressively moving towards the center. More lethal military, inciting panic about the border, ignoring Palestine. This has resulted in an extremely tight race as people are no longer excited to vote for Harris.
I want Harris to win. Moving leftward politically will attract more voters. Taking a firm stance on stopping the Israeli government’s genocide is a leftist progressive policy. The bag is right there, she just needs to grab it.
The opposite of „not voting for Harris is a vote for Trump“ isn’t true because of the electoral college, which heavily skews towards rural states with not many voters, which are often conservative.
You need roughly 4 Californian votes to match 1 Wyoming vote. That’s why Republicans seldom win the popular vote and still manage to win elections.
So if left leaning people don’t vote (or vote third party), the negative effect for Harris is amplified in comparison to conservatives.
Well, in that case, the Democrats should adopt policies that attract more left leaning voters. Saying stuff like, “I will prosecute migrants” doesn’t make any sense because if that is an important topic to a voter, why wouldn’t they just vote Trump who has promised that and more?
If the problem is, “not enough left leaning votes”, the solution seems like, “attract more left leaning votes”. People in this country love progressive leftist policies like universal healthcare or not funding genocides, no matter their party affiliation. People have not responded well to neo-liberal/conservative policies like means testing school lunches or increasingly stringent border laws.
And yet, the Democratic party continually adopts neo-liberal/conservative policies. It feels like voting Democrat is just, “voting Republican but slower”. The Democratic party has accepted the Republican framing about an imaginary migrant crisis, and that was with a much more firm stance against racism only 4 years ago. Yeah, they would possibly be better on Israel’s genocide than Republicans, but all the actions protesting the genocide have been met with vitriol from the current administration. It seems far more likely that the Democrats would just do the same thing as Republicans, just less loudly.
The Democratic party cannot expect to win simply because, “orange man bad”. They have not shown they will not continue to adopt Republican ideas and policies. If they want people to vote for them, they should do things to attract those voters. They should stop doing things that pushes away voters.
It’s not as easy as you make it out to be.
The Democrats have to try to achieve the impossible: trying to retain left-leaning voters while getting enough centrists/swing votes to overcome the systematic disadvantage the electoral college poses for them.
In a de facto two party system that puts them between a rock and a hard place.
But what does that mean for you as a (I assume) left leaning voter?
It’s actually quite simple: vote for the least bad option.
By not voting for Harris you may successfully show the democrats your discontent for their policies. But you pay for that by helping a possible fascist into power (remember: we already found out that not voting, helps republican candidates in most cases), who will be far worse on most policies you care about.
It really doesn’t feel like the Democrats are the least bad option when they keep adopting Republican policies. Sure, they don’t want to kill trans people or conduct mass deportations now, but it sure feels like 4 years down the line I’m gonna be asked to vote Democrat even though Harris or whoever is trying to increase police budgets to “fight rising crime” or something ridiculous.
I keep having to vote for “the least bad option” while the Democratic party only ever courts neo-liberal/conservative voters. It really seems like my options are Fascist Now Party or Fascist Later Party. If the Democrats don’t listen when I vote and don’t listen when I abstain, why should I vote?
I feel like it is not a winning campaign strategy to say, “vote for Democrats because the Republicans are far worse”. Progressive left policies are popular amongst centrist and swing voters, so it isn’t like the Democrats will lose centrists by adopting progressive policies. Everybody likes expanding healthcare. Nobody likes genocide. So if adopting progressive policies attracts voters from all across the spectrum, why are the Democrats only focusing on stuff like, “build the wall” or “stay silent about genocide”?
It really seems like my options are Fascist Now Party or Fascist Later Party. If the Democrats don’t listen when I vote and don’t listen when I abstain, why should I vote?
The answer is in your question. Fascism later is the better option because it buys you time to do something else. Fascism now means the game is over today. Nothing about that is difficult to understand.
You’ll have ample time (and freedom) to oppose Harris after November, but now’s not the time.
Based on how liberals have accepted genocide as necessary at this point, the “fascism later” option seems more likely to make people comfortable with fascism, rather than buying us time to resist.
Even if that was true, how is that better than having fascism today, given than genocide will happen no matter what? You seem to imply people will have more willingness to resist if it happens tomorrow (and I doubt it). But are you really willing to take the chance on actual fascism? It really seems like you want it to happen…
You guys have a twisted sense of priorities. You’re willing to trade a maybe for a surely.
The electoral college ensures the vote in California has nothing to do with the one in Wyoming.
You still haven’t provided any proof that the net result of third party or not voting favors republicans though. It could just as easily still be neutral, or favor democrats.
It’s not rocket science. The person I responded to said they want Harris to win. Thus they are a potential Harris voter. When they don’t vote, Harris loses a potential vote, not Trump.
Depending on where they live, this gets amplified by the systemic disadvantage of left-leaning states in the electoral college.
If someone says they want kamala to win but doesnt vote for her, maybe you shouldnt trust what they say.
To address your second point “not voting for Harris is a vote for Trump”; why isn’t the opposite true? “Not voting for Trump is a vote for Harris”, follows the same logic, so refusing to vote or voting independent should be net neutral, no?
You’re missing some context - “not voting [instead of] for Harris is a vote for Trump”. If the dilemma is between not voting and voting Harris, choosing not to vote subtracts a vote from Harris.
Of course Harris got a boost in donations after she became the candidate - she appealed the the people who thought Biden was too conservative. That doesn’t mean conservative democrats are an insignificant demographic, they simply already donated earlier. The move towards the center is meant to not drive them away into not voting [instead of voting for Harris]. Obviously there will be some progressives and some conservatives who will decide to not vote [instead of voting for Harris], the goal is to move to the point where these margins from both sides will be minimal.
There are far more people that don’t vote than there are conservative democrats. In fact, non-voters are the biggest chunk of population in this country. Instead of courting the center conservative voters, wouldn’t it make more sense to target non-voters with policies that have been proven to be widely popular?
People like progressive left-leaning policies. Streamlining the citizenship process for immigrants is popular. Fighting price gouging is popular. Not supporting genocide is popular. It seems like getting the couch potatoes excited to vote would have more beneficial results than trying to attract conservative democrats with unpopular neo-liberal conservative policies.
You simply cannot count votes you never had.
Classic progressive defeatist mantra: you’re not left enough so fuck you. Bring on the fascist.
The anti-genocide people have drawn a line in the sand and decided to stick to that principle. I think it is pretty reasonable to have lines you do not cross with genocide being a pretty understandable one. These people have decided, “if you use our tax dollars for genocide, we will not vote for you”.
You are asking them to, “ignore the genocide stuff and focus on the good stuff”, but unlike Biden, these people have red lines they will not cross.
If you don’t want fascists to come into power, then the Democrats should stop doing fascism-lite. I think it is reasonable for people not to support fascism-lite. They should indeed move further left away from the fascism they are barreling towards.
Stupid take. Genocide light is better than genocide on steroids. Netanyahu wants Trump to win so he can go in and show you what real genocide looks like.
Do you even hear yourself?
100%. And you are either a Russian/Chinese troll or worse, an idiot that think a dictator wannabe is better than a moderate.
Thanks for the elaborated comment! Don’t mind the negativity around the replies, some ppl are so simple they will hate until you literally say ‘Harris good, Trump bad’.
I’ve recently seen a nice description of that - “peasant mindset”.
People who are not ready and willing to peacefully discuss reality with literally anyone, and most of all marginal and weird viewpoints, like sovcits and antivaxxers, because those are more interesting, - have that “peasant mindset”.
(I’ve found something like that in my head too this morning, so sharing the thought.)
Aggression is a sign of fear, and fear is something we feel when we are not ready to change our mind if we get some good arguments, or when we get bad, insufficient arguments, but are pressed to change our mind anyway.
Why can we not be ready for that, feel powerless before that possibility of deciding to think differently 5 minutes from now?
Because there’s something that we follow like a peasant follows their master. It’s the assumed identity, the family, the group, the party, the state, the nation. Such a decision, and a decision to discuss reality preceding that, is an act of defiance toward those. It’s a conflict, and we as humans sometimes try to avoid conflicts. It’s like discussing orders. Only there’s not a single soul above us who is entitled to order us how we vote or how we think.
Every decision worth making is destructive, everything new comes in the place of something old and something that could be, there’s nothing to fear.
Changing one’s mind by a conscious decision after careful consideration is a sign of having personal dignity. Not changing one’s mind in the same situation is too a sign of having personal dignity.
Keeping your head down and trying to eat anyone not in line is not.
(too long again)
Democrats making obviously winning plays? You cannot be serious.
They are intentionally bad at politics. Their greatest skills are snatching defeat from the jaws of victory and shitting and falling back in it. Wanna see how for yourself? Dig into the DNC. They’re not a political entity, they’re a corp. And they work for the interests of corps. If what they do occasionally isnt absolute shit its almost entirely incidental.
I think something that contributes to people talking past each other here is a difference in belief in how necessary/desirable revolution/overthrow of the U.S government is. Like many of the people who I’ve talked to online, who advocate not voting and are also highly engaged, believe in revolution as the necessary alternative. Which does make sense. It’s hard to believe that the system is fundamentally genocidal and not worth working within (by voting for the lesser evil) without also believing that the solution is to overthrow that system.
And in that case, we’re discussing the wrong thing. Like the question isn’t whether you should vote or not . it’s whether the system is worth preserving (and of course what do you do to change it. How much violence in a revolution is necessary/acceptable). Like if you believe it is worth preserving, then clearly you should vote. And if you believe it isn’t, there’s stronger case for not voting and instead working on a revolution.
Does anyone here believe that revolution isn’t necessary and also that voting for the lesser isn’t necessary?
The opposite is more plausible to me: believing in the necessity of revolution while also voting
Personally I believe that revolution or its attempt is unlikely to effective and voting+activism is more effective, and also requires agreement from fewer people in order to progress on its goals. Tragically, this likely means that thousands more people will be murdered, but I don’t know what can actually be effective at stopping that.
They can’t be arsed to choose pragmatically between two bad candidates when voting and we’re to believe they can do a revolution that involves several harder choices? Do these people think revolutions are easy walks in the park where you never have to make hard choices like, for example, killing your neighbors for being in the way of the revolution or how to handle POWs, etc.
Some people assume that voting and political activism are mutually exclusive, these people are stupid and won’t win a revolution. These two things are not mutually exclusive, voting doesn’t stop you from protesting and being politically engaged and vice versa.
Oh man this thread is a real breath of fresh air, thank you three for having heads on your shoulders.
To push her to change her stance… you only own your vote. That’s the only leverage. She is the reason they aren’t voting for her.
Correct! That’s a great reason not to vote for either of them.
Pragmatically, Harris losing votes should make her understand the need to not support a genocide. But no, we have to lay the burden on everyone else but her.
What does that have to with anything? No one’s claiming that Trump would be good on Palestine or that you should vote for him, it’s a whataboutism.
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Actually yes, and that may one day even break the deadlock American politicians put onto their failed two party system.
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I mean it does doesn’t it? Trump supports can also threaten not to vote for him if he continues bad policies.
But we are talking about Harris supporters here. If Americans don’t even have a real vote with real value then what would stop Harris or Trump policies that will eventually render everyone in Gaza dead? If you can’t even speak to politicians with your own vote and if they don’t even value your vote, then how are we going to achieve anything?
Harris is the one losing votes for her shitty policy. It’s not the fault of the voter. It’s the fault of the candidate.
I think it’s because of stuff like this:
I’m not a U.S.A-ian. From my view(might be too critical), I don’t think the foreign policy would be greatly affected by the President or party, unless there’s some massive movement and notion of losing resources like during the invasion of Vietnam.
I think you’re generally right that foreign policy won’t be very affected (not sure what the image has to do with it), but domestic policy certainly will be. It’s very disheartening to see all of these self-proclaimed leftists basically discarding LGBTQ people, whose rights are extremely up for debate in this election, to make a performative stance against a policy that both sides support equally.
Sometimes, I see a quality discussion between principled people who care deeply about the issues. They both want to do what’s best, but simply disagree on what “best” is.
Their opinions can be so far apart, though, that they’re unable to even comprehend the other position.
Because it’s a far right party. Trump happens to be more far right, but that doesn’t change that fact. I’m not voting for far right, neoliberal, genocidal freaks.
At how many genocides do you draw the line? If the democrats committed a second one along with the Palestinian genocide they are committing right now? You’d again say trump would be worse, vote for Harris. If they committed three? Four? No matter what they do, Trump would do worse, so again you’d tell us to vote for Harris.
I draw the line at a genocide and at everything this neoliberal party stands for. I am not giving that party my approval because it is going in the exact opposite direction of what I stand for. At some point, the lesser evil is too evil.
This is about the stupidest shit ever. You should also stop eating completely. It’s not that you’re wrong about the parties, it’s just that you are being sucking stupid about the payoff here. Don’t vote for the lesser evil and enjoy the shit you bring to your stupid country and the help you give to all of the right wing cunts - directly helping the genocide. Fucking stupid, you people don’t live in fucking reality
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I completely understand this. But, assisting in the lesser evil outcome is always worth the voting effort. If you don’t, then even worse evil will be on the ballot next time, and your voice can be counted on being ignored once again.
Never try and figure out single issue voters, they tend to be dumb as fuck
Does your logic apply to single issue (anti Trump) voters?
dumb as fuck
Yep
i wonder how much of a single issue a genocide is
Upvoted for proving the point.
What did you think about Hitlers economic policies?
And there it is, liberal genocide support going mask off yet again
Jesus wept. Get a grip.
The single issue? Genocide.
Why in the world would you make this thread? Almost every single day for at least the last month (and still often beforehand) there have been threads where the liberals and the leftists aggressively talk in circles on this issue. The odds of you hearing anything new are incredibly low, and you might as well just go back to .ml’s c/news threads for the same material.
I just can’t keep having people yell the same nonsense at me over and over. If you’re really badly in need of leftist takes, I’ll DM you on request, but I don’t really want to talk about it publicly anymore except in more convincingly leftist spaces than .ml has been rendered by its federation.
If you want a more leftist space without so many liberals, you should try the dbzer0 instance.
I already found (and in fact am coming from, this is an alt account) some more appropriate instances, but I appreciate your trying to be helpful.
Democrats: “Either you vote us or you are fucked. And no you won’t get what you really want (the end of the genocide, healthcare, whatever), but you can choose to eat out shit or the republican’s. Are you happy with that? No? Fuck you and vote Harris anyway ah ah ah. You don’t have a choice, we don’t give a shit about you and your problems but you have to vote us. You have to.”
You see, people are realising that their vote is useless by design, and maybe the only way to change something is to punish the party that pretend to be the good one, the one that pretend to be at your side and pretend to work for you but it really doesn’t.
They are making you believe that democracy is just about preventing the others to get elected because they are worst. No it’s not, and you should stop being a victim and do something, anything, to force them to change. Even if you get 4 years of Trump: whoever think that it makes a difference is delusional, he’s just blatant fascist while Harris is secretly fascist. They are just two different seasoning for the same plate of shit.
I mean their choices are shit, but third parties dont exist, so I guess these democrats are right. Its gonna be democratic cold shower or acid bath republican, and perhaps the libs hope that they both dont get the acid bath through their inaction.
Its not like the americans are gonna rebel, they clearly dont have any political will, guns or alcohol.
Democrats: “Either you vote us or you are fucked
Dems tend to be in favor of ranked choice voting and often clear the way easy for independents to run when they have a better shot.
For instance, I live in Maine, and Independent senator Angus King caucuses with the Democrats. The Dems don’t say vote for us or you’re fucked, they get out of the way and let him run unopposed. (Technically there is a Dem candidate but he’s getting no institutional support.) They did that a couple years ago in an Alaska Senate race also, and are currently doing it in Nebraska.
I don’t think it helps anyone to reduce these things to cartoon caricatures and lose sight of real issues. I don’t think the internet is good for people’s brains and I think it’s good for your mental health to walk into your local state legislature and go to a committee meeting and hear the folks talk about, I don’t know, how to fund the water utilities, or emergency heating fuel deliveries in the winter, or needle exchange programs or something. Once you do, you don’t come out the other side talking like an internet poster with a fried brain.
