this post was submitted on 25 Jun 2023
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Those same Americans will just ignore that there are other candidates and it'll be yet another presidential election where 49% of voters claim that they don't really support the person they vote for, and that you have to do the same as a moral imperative.
And, as it's been since Reagan, no matter who we elect we'll only get conservative outcomes.
Railing against this fact doesn't magically make it untrue. Not voting for the lesser evil means you don't care which evil wins. If you legitimately think GOP rule isn't any worse than Dem rule, then by all means don't vote or vote third party. But if you think Christian fascism + neoliberalism is worse than just neoliberalism, then once the primaries are over you need to vote accordingly. Voter disenfranchisement is an age-old tactic you're comment is falling right into.
And I say this all as a market socialist, so don't for a second think I like the Dems
I'd hope you wouldn't. On any issue that matters to their voters they're effectively no different than Republicans. The minimum wage/living wages, housing scarcity, war (and endless funding for it), cost-prohibitive education and health care, equality for queer people, militarization of police, fascism (or ignoring it), gun control, and oddly, we can now add abortion to the list after their response to Roe repeal was to fundraise. (Even though they had control of Congress and the presidency.) They did make a cool 80 million, though, so that's something: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/democrats-pull-in-80-million-following-supreme-court-ruling-on-roe
I can't convince myself that voting Democrat is a moral action anymore. That they say nicer things doesn't matter much when they're voting records and policies are conservative and regressive. Republicans may stab me in the back but Democrats stab me in the front.
I need more than pretty speeches and broken promises, and really, so does this country.
You're not voting for Dems, you're voting to keep Reps out. "My vote won't help things appreciably progress so instead I'm gonna let things deteriorate" is the argument you're making. People's rights are getting stripped because of this kind of apathy
This is what I have to keep telling myself, especially with how utterly feckless Dems have been, and how completely uninterested they are in trying to make things better. Repubs are well on their way in turning this country into a fascist dictatorship, and any roadblock is better than nothing. It's infuriating and I despise the fact that I voted for Hillary or Biden. But I just have to keep reminding myself it wasn't a vote for them, it was a vote against Trump.
I really wish we had people we could vote for instead of only focusing on who we have to vote against, but here we are
an important step toward this, if you want something actionable to do, is advocating for voting reform. pretty much any reform away from FPTP will do at this point, although personally i'm partial to working toward mixed-member proportional representation. the organization FairVote prefers RCV; STAR Voting and Equal Vote are both orgs that prefer STAR voting for starter orgs in this space. as far as recent switches to novel systems: Fargo and St. Louis have recently switched to approval voting!
Agreed, and the way I've come to view it is that federal elections aren't ever going to be making huge waves. It's a representation of what the system is already moving towards and expecting monumental changes here is unrealistic. Local and state elections, however, is where we can push for legitimate change that eventually cascades up to the federal level. E.g. we need to reach a critical mass of state and local places using alternative voting systems before we have enough momentum to force it at the federal level, since the entrenched parties don't want it.
Agreed. The best thing is, only one state needs to adopt proportional representation for sending reps to Congress for it to have an impact. Even a small new party with a dozen seats is likely to be a tie breaker.
Respectfully, you just watched women lose the right to abortion a year ago when Democrats had the presidency and control of Congress. Their response was to use it to raise money, not act in any way to stop it or create positive change.
There are so many more examples of this too.
You voted for deterioration, and so did I. That's not a matter of opinion, but of historical record.
I'm not sure if you're just ignorant of the topics you're bringing up or are actually being disingenuous, but I'm going to act as if you're being genuine for the sake of other people reading this.
Women lost abortion because R senators fucked with the system while Obama was in office and then pushed another SCOTUS appointment through while Trump was in office. Repealing RvW had literally nothing to do with who was sitting in the oval office and everything to do with Rs abusing the lack of a D supermajority to put corrupt judges on the SCOTUS. With that knowledge taken into consideration here, your argument boils down to "Rs abused the system while a minority and Ds didnt have a supermajority to stop it, therefore I don't care if Rs gain a majority. Things couldn't be done to stop the abusers before so idc if the abusers get more power."
I voted against the US moving towards A Handmaid's Tale; you're arguing for who cares if it moves towards A Handmaid's Tale
Women lost the right to abortion, because of the previous administrations actions and ability to install judges to the federal courts, at all levels, but specifically at the SCOTUS level. Though it alsorequired that cases make it through the federal courts too.
@storksforlegs @alongwaysgone Should it be ok to execute gay people? I think so
@storksforlegs @alongwaysgone Have you tried murdering the gays?
@alongwaysgone @FlashMobOfOne Women belong in the kitchen
Here's the trick, if you keep voting dem, you will keep getting worse, Republicans. It's a cycle that cannot be fixed by voting for the democratic party. The reality is action beyond voting is necessary. But if voting is all we have, then the only path is to attempt to vote for something else, even if it means losing, because losing will happen anyway. The future Republicans will be worse, and the delay by a few years will be moot.
Completely nonsensical. Republicans have gotten worse because their bid to court the south and unite all Christian denominations under abortion was successful. It's completely independent from Dems.
The reality is that voting for Dems in federal elections is currently the only option available for fighting Christian nationalists getting voted into federal office. Other options are much more available at the state and local levels
Yea sorry to burst your bubble but I'm not interested in helping fascists takeover the country. This kind of accelerationist argument only helps the people trying to keep pushing the Overton window to the right. It's another form of disenfranchisement
Perhaps it's not an outright positive/negative moral action, but I'd call it a moral action in the same way the trolley problem is.
You're a dumbass, democrats have passed tons of legislation to make things better. People just don't pay attention to it because it's not exciting.
Your argument is that you're mad that a political party fundraises and therfore you'll continue to support conditions that allow fascism to grow?
I mean the gop does the same thing except they also actively take away rights and stoke an environment of stochastic terrorism so...
No.
My argument is that the two parties are functionally the same. You're voting for fascism no matter which lever you pull. The difference is between perpetrator and collaborator.
This is a ludicrous assessment.
How is a vote for Biden a vote for facsism?
Edit: Sorry, let me clarify. I read your previous remarks. I agree that the democrats (the corporate centrist wing) are more concerned with fundraising and corporate lobbying, doing the neo-liberal bare minimum. You are correct.
But you realize that by sitting out this election you are helping to elect literal authoritarian fascists, yes? Which is worse than shitty neoliberals by a very wide margin.
I appreciate your opinion. I've outlined why I feel that way further up in the thread.