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No, the problem isn’t not voting, it’s only voting, a distinction those of you who are dedicated to doing the latter refuse to acknowledge.
It is people who look at the system and think that a tick in a box once every four years can or ever will change that system, but in actuality only maintains it, who are the ones who need to be rethinking their strategy. 🙄
Nobody refuses to acknowledge this. It comes up in every single one of these goddamn threads.
There are just too many people who are a little bit lazy and think this gives them an excuse not to show up at all. A way to feel self-justified about it: well both sides are bad, so I’ll go jack off some more. Downballot? I don’t know what that is because I’ve never seen a ballot. Because I do this every election.
Low turnout doesn’t change their minds it makes them think they need to either go further to the center or that Americans are too lazy
The Democrats go further to the center no matter what, but they only win when they run to the left. Obama ran as a radical leftist that was going to deliver universal healthcare and hold the banks accountable, but jettisoned that as quick as he could. The truth is they just want to be in the center, and they’ll justify it no matter the turnout or outcome of the election.
Obama ran as a radical leftist
Do we live in the same reality?
Off the top of my head, he was going to bailout the mortgage holders, reign in the banks, close Gitmo, end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, pass universal healthcare, and end warrantless wiretaps. He either abandoned those objectives (sometimes when he held a super-majority) or technically did something but not really (like ending the warrantless wiretap program but creating a mass surveillance program). Anyway, maybe, “radical leftist,” is a little hyperbolic, but he ran further to the left than anyone had since the 70s and he governed slightly to the left of George W.
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It’s more accurate to say he made leftist promises, and then turned out to be just another conservative asshole with amazing oratory skills.
I’m sorry, I must have missed the part where Obama stripped gay people of their rights
By my understanding, radical left for Americans and also slightly less so but also Canadians is kinda center right for the rest of the world. I’ve also heard people start calling politicians radical when they bait and switch even though that’s not really how that word works.
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What more should Obama have done on the front of universal healthcare than to draft a universal healthcare plan and try to get Congress to pass it? Which is what he did. They didn’t have the votes and the president doesn’t write laws. They got healthcare reform as far as they could with a few asshole Democrats and a totally stonewalling GOP. Also how is that platform radically leftist
Anything that’s not fascism is running to the left now.
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Low turnout consistently favors republicans, that’s why they do all they can to make it harder to vote, not going out to vote is basically for the republicans, who are at this point, basically a Fascist party.
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Ah yes, Joe Biden committing Genocide, the right-wing talking point.
It is a right-wing talking point. It’s meant to sow division among Biden voters so that it becomes more likely Trump will win.
It’s chess not checkers.
The Democrats are starting to change their stance on the Genocide solely because they are seeing that voters are starting to walk away.
You are the person enabling the Genocide in Gaza with your rhetoric that Democrats can continue it and not lose voters.
Right? I love how mad centrists democrats get at the fact that leftists have a standard for whether they will vote for someone or not. It makes it pretty clear to me this is precisely what leftists should be doing because that anger tells me that centrists are having to actually listen to leftists instead of spitting in their face constantly and assuming leftists will fall in line without having their input taken into account.
Of course these arguments are always framed as “YOU are the reason we are going to lose” which ignores EVERY SINGLE step along the way the got us to this point of centrists democrats machine gunning themselves in the foot and aggressively ignoring what voters actually want. All of those steps and all of that responsibility is somehow invisible and all of the fault is directed at the voter…for having standards?
Vote undecided in the primaries and in the general well… I am not gonna tell you to vote for genocide Joe even though I don’t disagree for a nano-second Trump is worse. That is a decision everyone has to make for themselves.
I think I will vote for Biden but honestly I just don’t have it in me to try to convince anyone else to vote for someone who is so clearly using their position to aid and facilitate genocide. I do think it is best to think of voting as damage control not the primary strategy and thus there are many very good arguments to vote for Biden, but at the end of the day it is also true that centrist democrats just will not fucking listen unless they are panicking about losing to fascists it seems.
Spoil your ballot. Sends the message that they’re all wankers and you get to draw a cock on the paper!
I don’t think they count the cocks on the ballots either
“That’s Republican, we count those!”
-Jack Donaghy, 30 Rock
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A vote for the dick is a vote for trmp
You mean “give Trump less competition”. Trump voters will not be spoiling their ballots.
I live in LA and there is an electoral system that hands this city to the Democrats in single party rule, even if they believe in Republican policies. I watched the person who got the most votes for president lose twice in my life since I’ve been voting age.
What if they started a way and nobody came? "The problem with not starting a war …’
When your choices in an election are between “boring corporatists” and “100% concentrated evil” you don’t have the luxury of sitting this election out with your adorable little “protest vote.”
If authoritarians win the next election, you won’t have to worry about voting ever again.
Got it, should riot instead.
You should.
You won’t though.
A riot on your own is just a tantrum. There’s no point of you’re not organised.
Well that’s the left fucked then.
I’m convinced that the CIA is somehow causing the American left to be unable to organize, because with organization comes power, and the left having power would mean a shift away from corporate rule.
Closest they seemed to get was the Black Panthers. So it was the FBI rather than the CIA that busted that in.
Like by infiltrating, arresting, and executing them? It’s the FBI. You know about COINTELPRO, right? There are tons of FBI documents talking about how they did exactly that. Or like… The drug war?
This shit is recent and still going on. I have a friend who’s an organizer. The FBI comes and knocks on his door every April just to tell him they’re watching him. This happens to every visible organizer in the Seattle area. I mean, fucking Durkan and Robert Child’s.
The US apparatus of state violence primarily targets the left. We live under a continuous counterinsurgency program and it’s mostly targeted and keeping the left from organizing. Go read Life During Wartime and watch Trouble episode 6.
There’s huge and well documented paper trail. The CIA prevents democracy aborad, the FBI prevents it at home.
Who’s the one that tried to get MLK Jr. to off himself due to him getting a bit too socialist? FBI? Whoever it was was probably also involved in his shooting.
That would be the FBI.
The CIA killed socialist politician in my country.
And I’m not some banana south-american dictature, I’m in western europe.
I’m going to show the government by not voting!
-66% of Americans
Showed them.
just vote for a third party or none of the above
I’m currently in a discussion on here with a user who refuses to vote. Pointing out that Biden has done nothing and rule under Democrats has yielded zero change. All I want is for us to come together, vote Biden in, and then carry that momentum into his next term. Historically, us not on the Right have been rather poor at coming together for a goal. Republicans on the other hand act like rabid dogs until some smuck tosses a week old rancid steak in a direction and they all surge forward.
Course then it’s back to infighting. Fuck me if it hasn’t gotten us all to the point we’re at now though.
All I want is for us to come together, vote Biden in, and then carry that momentum into his next term.
So like every four years forever?
Damn, they should really have thought about that when picking their nominees
counter-point: Voting for someone that does not represent you because you are more scared of the other guy is indistinguishable, as a signal, from someone that fully supports them. By voting against your own interests you are actively undermining the democratic process.
That’s not how democracy works, like at all
Democracy is about compromise. By definition. Not about demanding exactly what you want and sabotaging the system if you don’t get it. That’s the opposite of democracy.
Western democracy originated in ancient Greece. This political system granted democratic citizenship to free men, while excluding slaves, foreigners and women from political participation. In virtually all democratic governments throughout ancient and modern history, this was what democracy meant. An elite class of free men made all the decisions for everyone. Before Athens adopted democracy, aristocrats ruled society, so “rule by the people”, or the idea of a government controlled (in theory) by all its (free) male citizens instead of a few wealthy families seemed like a good deal. But really it was just a new iteration of Aristocracy rule rather than the revolution it’s painted as. The rich still rule society by feeding voters carefully constructed propaganda and keeping everyone poor, overworked and desperate to be granted basic needs by the state.
In democracies today, only legal citizens of a country are granted democracy. In a lot of countries, people who have been convicted of a “crime” are denied the right to vote, regardless of how long ago they served their sentence. In the US, this is used to deny voting rights to minority groups, who make up a large proportion of the prison population.
In some societies only a small minority group are allowed to participate in the democracy. In Apartheid South Africa, the minority group (European settlers) granted themselves democracy and excluded the native majority, using democracy to deprive the native population of the rights granted to European settlers. Anarchy, of course, is an absence of government; of rulers. Democracy aims for the individual to be governed, ruled, controlled by others.
Our rulers use democracy to separate us into in-groups and out-groups, pitting the majority group against the minority groups and giving everyone a false sense of control. We’re made to believe we have a say in how our lives are run because we get to participate in glorious democracy. Of course, all of us outside the ruling class continue to be exploited, living in perpetual servitude, and the only people who really benefit from democracy are the ruling class who use it to keep us alienated and distracted so we don’t rise up and kill them all for the debilitating misery they create.
Democracy grants authority to favored groups to oppress minority groups. Democracy ignores the autonomy of the individual in favor of the collective will of the dominant group. Democracy exists to enable rulers to uphold brutal power hierarchies. It’s really the full embodiment of authority; used to maintain the tyrannical capitalist-statist status quo all over the world today.
Democracy bad?
Now there’s a hot take
Democracy is the tyranny of the majority, however you try to window-dress it. In practice, all forms of democracy have been used by a majority group to control or otherwise dictate to a minority group. All forms of democracy have been used to smother autonomy, to stifle self-determination, and to absolve rulers of responsibility for their actions. How can a ruler be responsible for their atrocities when “the people” elected them and empowered them to commit those atrocities?
Instead of a large group laboring to make democracy work so they can agree on a course of action, it would be far more productive for smaller groups made up of people with shared interests to splinter off and co-operate to follow their own plans that require no compromise because their interests are already aligned.
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You know I kind of question that. I think democracy is more about rich people controlling the mechanisms through which everyone votes in order to sort of fool the masses into believing that whatever the oligarchs decide they want, is what they must’ve wanted, while simultaneously also being a good way for the rich to kind of gauge public interests through a periodic census and more easily manipulate them.
No, but I kid. Mostly. I think, democracy, more, in it’s pure forms, is less maybe about compromise, and more about a kind of assumption that the majority of people are reasonable, and can be reasoned with, which I think is kind of a foundational assumption you need to make if you want any non-authoritarian form of society. Which isn’t to really say that democracy can’t be authoritarian, or employ authoritarian methods, because it can.
Most people don’t believe we should get rid of all guns, or that we should be able to freely own machine guns, or even lots of regular guns. A functioning democracy would end up having some level of background checks, and mental health checks, and general procedures that you would have to go through (probably involving hands-on training classes and certifications), in order to own a gun. If you poll people, with a good poll, rather than a stupid binary dynamic single choice poll, you’ll find that’s what most people want. From what I’ve seen, the same is true for abortion, and I haven’t seen the public sentiment on drugs, but I’d imagine most people probably would like most hard drugs to remain more illegal, or harder to access, than most “soft drugs”. You can find this across most different things you’d poll people on. Healthcare, other forms of public infrastructure, including civic infrastructure, military funding, space research, every aspect of government.
This isn’t to necessarily say that most people are moderates, but I think a very underrated aspect of democracy is the fact that people can choose not to vote if they feel like they’re not informed enough on a concept, which will naturally select, if done correctly, for people who are more knowledgeable on a subject. Even the general public is capable of giving you a somewhat nuanced answer on many different political topics, that kind of breaks through two-party dynamics, and might even break through what are thought to be general consistent ideological positions.
None of this is to say that democracy isn’t also about some level of compromise, but I think it’s also up to the reasonable participants of a democracy to decide their level of compromise, what they’re willing to accept and what they’re not okay with. I think, you know, if your democracy was more on the side of my initial, joking answer, than on the side of all of what I’ve laid out, it would be kind of a shame were the whole system NOT sabotaged and taken down. In my view, at least. And, you know, providing something worse didn’t sprout up in it’s place.
I think it’s pretty much a given that something worse would sprout up in its place.
But I do agree that an educated voting base is critical to functioning democracy. That’s why I think the long term solution to our current fascism problem is education, a front we’re failing miserably on
What if I don’t want to compromise with fascists?
Then you get full fascism
When 40% of the voting population wants fascism those are your options.
If 40% of the voting population wants fascism your democracy is fucked and its time to re-open gulags.
And now 40% of the population + you wants fascism
Just with different people in charge
Ah yes, the horseshoe theory. Hitler came in power because liberals sided with him instead of the communists. Exactly like the current American democratic party would rather side with fascists than mere socialism. They proved it time and time again. Libs and fascists are too face of the same coin lol
Horseshoe theory is more like pointing out the similarities between Hitler and Stalin.
Fascism isn’t the opposite of voting. Words have meaning. Open an history book once in a while.
I was referring to the gulags comment.
“Don’t like fascism? Lock up your political enemies. Problem solved.”
The answer isn’t even voting. Voting is actually important in this scenario because, yes, you are actually voting to keep fascists from the door.
The actual answer isn’t electoralism.
The answer is withholding what’s most valuable to them: your labor. General strike with a clearly defined goal and a pissed off populace is literally the most powerful tool we can harness.
Liberals will get people killed before you could organize a general strike. Quit being naive.
And they won’t when you try to open gulags? Lmao what is your actual plan here? Or are you just a defeatist
lol love it. Every single time without fail, people will find an excuse for why iT WoULd jUsT nEVeR wOrK HErE!
Although I will admit I haven’t heard this one before. Kudos for being original I guess?
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yes we made a bunch of noise about the failures of the democrats in an effort to pressure them to fucking do something. whether you think we are stupid for refusing to vote or not, you can’t deny how much discourse there is and how much engagement has occurred.
Refusing to vote in the general election is actually beyond stupid. None of your arguments will have any merit, and when Trump wins, you can buy some golden shoes to commemorate sticking it to the DNC.
Voting for someone that does not represent you because you are more scared of the other guy is indistinguishable, as a signal, from someone that fully supports them. By voting against your own interests you are actively undermining the democratic process.
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See that’s where your argument makes no sense. Unless you want Trump to win, not voting is in effect “against your own interests”. Undermining the democratic process is what Trump WILL DO if he is elected.
This is the reality of our election process, like it or not.
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yes we made a bunch of noise about the failures of the democrats in an effort to pressure them to fucking do something
Is that what 2016 was? Cuz boy howdy did that plan backfire. Or are you just going for the repeat? And trying to claim credit for “making a bunch of noise” by sitting on your ass like you’ve contributed to some organized movement that’s progressing towards actual change is laughable.
Democracy requires participation to be legitimized by the people.
But sure, don’t vote and have the fascists take away those annoying voting rights. Like an idiot.
Stop thinking and start voting!
I should add, everyone absolutely should vote. Even if you feel compelled to abstain from either candidate, casting a blank ballot or voting “abstain” is a much clearer message of dissatisfaction.
Maybe rephrase your other comment then.
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How?
Who do you think is going to read your blank ballot?
My constituency has 250,000+ people in it.
Do you REALLY think that someone is going to sift through over two hundred and fifty THOUSAND ballots, find one that has “abstain” on it and go “oh – we must find this person and find out why they are upset with the process”?
Also – not to put too fine a point on it – voting is supposed to be anonymous. If I write “abstain” on my ballot and they track me down, isn’t that FAR more worrying?
Vote early and vote often!
Think AND vote
Putin really love the way you think! <3
Counter-counter-point : democracy, as a system of government, is pointless because whether you vote, you don’t vote, you protest vote, you vote tactically or you just set your ballot paper on fire it’s not going to make a difference – you still get shafted by corrupt fuckers.
“Voting is pointless because they’re all corrupt fuckers” sure, tell that to the gay people who now have rights because of Democrats, or the trans people who do not have rights because of Republicans. Dumbass
Should I also tell that to all the people who voted Democrat and lost their right to abortion because every Democrat failed to pass a Federal abortion law in forty years because it didn’t serve their own interests to do so?
Should I also tell that to all the people who voted Democrat and might lose their right to same-sex marriage because every Democrat as so far failed to pass a federal same-sex marriage law because it didn’t serve their own interests to do so?
Do you want me to carry on about how corrupt the Democrats are? About how – when it comes down to it – they failed the people just as badly as the Republicans have?
Besides, I live in the UK and frankly don’t give a shit about the clusterfuck that the American clownshow of politics is. We have our own problems.
Besides, I live in the UK and frankly don’t give a shit about the clusterfuck that the American clownshow of politics is.
Then why in the flying fuck are you out here giving opinions on something you don’t know about and don’t care about?
Hold on – you think we don’t vote in the UK? We don’t have democracy in the UK?
Where does the original image mention the USA?
Where do I mention the USA – aside from this post where do I mention the USA?
Every time I have referred to voting I have been talking about elections in the UK.
Fucks’ sake – the entire world doesn’t revolve around your pitiful excuse for a democracy. And given what I’ve read here, most of your country doesn’t give a shit about your pitiful excuse for democracy.
the entire world doesn’t revolve around your pitiful excuse for a democracy
No, but this post does.
Where does it say that, exactly?
Point out for me where this image mentions America, American democracy, the American election or anything else about your country?
I’ll wait.
I agree with you in boiling it down to: Democrats have failed the people because they haven’t done enough good things, while Republicans have failed the people by actively doing terrible things.
So my conclusion is that yes, both parties have done terrible things, and I agree that Democrats haven’t gone far enough on most issues I care about, but the GOP is actively going against the things I care about.
It’s an easy decision at the ballot box, and it is an easy decision for me to do more than simply vote. Voting is the lowest bar for participation in a democracy.
This is where all the “Genocide Joe” folks’ arguments fall apart completely. It shows how incredibly misguided they are. There is literally no scenario where Trump is better than Biden.
That’s not a counterpoint, that’s just pointing out that both aren’t good signals. The main difference is that not voting or voting third party makes it more likely that the guy you yourself admit you’re more scared of more likely to win.
The only thing worse than not voting is voting for a third party.
Uuuh, you know that Kang and Kodos both want to enslave humanity and that’s the point of the episode right 🤨
I do. I thought including a Simpsons gif to accompany an otherwise bombastic and outlandish statement would be sufficient to communicate my sarcasm. Alas, I regret not including a /s.
