(this is a sarcastic post meant to highlight the absurdity of some of the “greater good” rhetoric we’ve been hearing, especially around leaving vulnerable populations like disabled people behind in case of revolution, basically accelerationism)
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Fight all you want, by all means, bring those in power further left. But at the ballot box come election day, I don’t care if the dem wants to sacrifice puppies on weekends. Guaranteed their Republican opponent has a factory grinding puppies into various consumer products by the millions. And their 3rd party counterpart likely has a greater chance of getting elected to mayor of flavortown than to congress/president (and also still probably kills puppies casually among friends themselves).
Is this system bullshit? Yup. Is it the one we got? Yup. We need to deal within that reality. By all means, let’s work to change that system, but for the love of God, let’s not shoot ourselves in the foot when our favorite candidate doesn’t stand a chance in hell, or the more likely candidate is blatantly flawed (but still better than the alternative)
100%. Prior to Election Day? Get a democratic butt in every race and challenge the people advocating for puppy sacrifices.
Unfortunately we are at a point where only one party can be fixed.
But I was told democrats are worse than hitler
They aren’t worse then Hitler. They just kept saying Hitler has a right to defend himself and selling him the gas for his chambers.
Not the best way to win an election.
Do you see us electing ourselves out of this mess (that we elected ourselves into)?
I’m not going to lie, this mess will only end with the sitting congress and judiciary growing some nuts and shutting all of this shit down, OR with a military coup. I don’t see either happening. Realistically, we have likely had our last truly free election for the foreseeable future the way this is going. I hope I’m wrong.
I don’t think either of those is very likely. The congress and judiciary are made up of people who used their powers to facilitate the current problems. A military coup is also pretty unlikely but I don’t really have much to base that feeling on. Trump dying might break the spell enough for some congressional action. Outside of that, I’m afraid that civil resistance is the only thing that will impede these deportations. And I don’t mean orderly protests on the weekends.
Organizing takes time, you want to flip a switch and have millions in the streets for a general strike but it’s going to take gradual steps to get there.
I’m pessimistic about a general strike in the US. We don’t have anywhere near the union participation required, IMO. I’m talking about smaller, ad-hoc groups doing real damage, hopefully with broad (if tacit) support. See what’s happening with Teslas as an example. Next should come some serious anti-ICE actions. Sweet username btw.
I don’t care if the dem wants to sacrifice puppies on weekends.
How’s that been working for you? It looks to me like this attitude brought us Trump. Maybe it’s time the Democrats started demanding better.
I say demanding. Sitting out an election doesn’t count. The system doesn’t change just because you refuse to participate.
I’m really having trouble parsing your suggestion here.
- DEMAND better.
- Don’t just sit out election.
But surely a demand comes with a consequence if not met, right? What is the consequence in an election if not withholding your vote? But you said not to sit it out. Are you arguing in favor of voting 3rd party then? I have to assume that’s your intent, though you didn’t actually say that.
If that is your position, sure, but the problem with voting third party is that, without the mother of all grassroots followings, no third party candidate stands a shadow of a chance. And there was clearly no such popular candidate for president last election. And providing third parties with support is as bad as just not voting if they no chance of winning. It just amounts to not supporting your preferred candidate that does stand a chance.
That is fucked. I know and I agree. But that is the nature of First Past The Post voting and always will be. It’s a lot like the prisoners dilemma. The best possible outcome for you would be to get your most preferred third party candidate, but if you vote for them, and the rest of the voters don’t, you split the vote and end up giving your least preferred candidate an advantage instead. But voting your mosr preferred two-party candidate/popular candidate, or least of two evils as it may well be, comes with some negatives, but is an objectively better outcome.
We need election reform to get rid of FPTP and the two-party system with it. That is no small thing, I know, and there is no quick way to get that done. All we can do is advocate for it, vote for other advocates for it, and hope that eventually it becomes a party platform. But until then, we have to live with the reality and vote strategically. Demand better in so far as you use your voice and your dollars to support better candidates, vote in the primaries for the better candidate, but use your vote on election day with the system we have. Unfortunately, that does sometimes mean voting for a bit of evil to save yourself from a lot of evil.
What got us Trump 2.0 was people refusing to support Kamala. Apathy, protest, contempt, indifference, whatever their reasons, they didn’t show up and give her their votes. A big part of that is her fault for failing to live up to the standards the left expected of her, for failing to excite left wing voters. Those voters were perfectly justified in not being happy about the idea of voting for her, but, ultimately we are worse off because they didn’t. And choosing not to vote at all or to vote third party instead is on them alone.
No, what got us Trump 2.0 was the Democrats running a shitty candidate, on the coattails of another shitty candidate, on the coattails of a shitty presidential run. People were clamoring for a new candidate that actualy gave a shit, and the Democrats told them to sit down and shut up.
The Democrats chose money, war-mongers, and genocide over winning a slam-dunk election. It’s not the voter’s fault that we’re here, as they loudly told the Democrats what they wanted. It’s the Democrat’s fault for ignoring those demands from their base.
Why should people vote for a party that fights against what they want, when they can vote for a third party that is fighting for what they want?
The problem is, all that fighting, criticizing and finger pointing can be weaponized. That’s why FUD works.
You just amplify any legit concerns until they seem worse than Trump.
I’m convinced most of the leftists on here are either foreign actors or repeating their talking points.
I agree. It’s important to not lose the thread or your sense of reality when focusing on internal problems. Internal problems are usually differences of opinion, perspective, or goals, but with the same or similar basic values behind them. It’s important to keep those shared values in mind even while nitpicking the other stuff when you’re trying to influence the direction of your side. Keep in mind that you are all going generally the same direction while the Right is pulling against every step you take together, and just because your differences among the Left is your focus now doesn’t mean it is a bigger deal than your differences with the Right.
The Neoliberals have had 50 years in control of the “leftist” party, and they have only enabled the country to move further right.
They are either impotent or complicit.
This election the Neoliberals will either lose control of the party or we start a new leftist party. If they try to shove another milquetoast neolib down our throats they might get elected, but then the next Trump gets elected after 4 years of impotence and the cycle of the Duopoly continues.
Obvious bad faith argument. Voters and gerrymandering from the GOP moved the country further right.
The country will move left when leftists start winning elections.
Which is much less likely now that Trump is in office.
My bad I must have forgotten the part where Democrats, the “leftist” party of unions and ending slavery, wasn’t allowed to ever gain power in my lifetime, and that’s why they have done absolutely nothing to protect unions and push leftist policy.
OH WAIT A DEMOCRAT GETS ELECTED EVERY 4 YEARS AND THEN FUCKING MEETS FASCISTS IN THE MIDDLE, MOVING US FURTHER TO THE RIGHT.
No one is “allowed” to take power. There is a constant struggle for it. Leftists have been losing that struggle because they don’t get enough votes.
Dems move right because it is a politician’s job to cater to their constituents regardless of their ideology. If there are fewer leftist constituents then the politicians move right.
Ahh yes, that’s why Republicans do such a good job representing the normies and leftists in their constituents, because they represent all of their constituents, right?
Your brain is mush if you seriously believe it’s perfectly OK for Dems to move right and repugs to also move right…
umm akshually there’s nothing they can do even tho they had the presidency and a congressional majority because…
Just shut up man
Good point, the Dems stink! They haven’t done anything to stop Trump!
I’m gonna vote for Trump next election and until the Democrats start opposing Trump
Lazy troll
If you read theory, you’d know Marxist-Leninists aren’t trolls
Personally, I think some states are close to center, some are further left and others are further right. Rather than splitting the party and the vote share, we can grassroots organize, get signatures for a ballot initiative, and change the voting system away from First Past the Post. Our voting system is what ultimately prevents viable alternative parties from appearing and is causing the “safe incumbent” neoliberals to win out over “risky” progressive picks since people only get one vote and they don’t want to have their least favorite candidate win over their favorite and their safe choice.
Organizing now matters a lot. If we change even a few more states away from First Past the Post voting, like we did with Alaska and Maine, then third parties will have much more stable ground to actually form and win elections on the state and federal level. I still think supporting incumbents in many cases make sense until we act to change the voting systems. Although rallying around potential candidates which are pushing for change can make a difference in some races.
We can try to change the voting system on the county level and city level if trying to get the state as a whole to change has not been working in your state.
It’s always the leftists “splitting the party”, never the conservative Neoliberals.
That’s not something I would say or agree with. My statement is separate from that type of perspective and not what my comment was talking about.
Rather than splitting the party and the vote share, we can grassroots organize, get signatures for a
You don’t even read your own comments
Well said.
But at the ballot box come election day, I don’t care if the dem wants to sacrifice puppies on weekends
Every time a democrat talks like this they lose votes. “Yeah my candidate supports genocide, but-” stop you’ve just smeared your own candidate. If you don’t have anything nice about your candidate then keep your mouth shut.
Any normal american will see the rest of your comment and think they’re better off investing in bullets and silver than worrying about the election. You’re basically doing voter surppression.
Or maybe their candidates shouldn’t support genocide. It’d be much easier to sell the Democrats as a valid party to vote for if they weren’t in support of things like genocide.
Buddy this post is about leftists. You are not a leftist. You’re a left-leaning liberal. Read a book ffs.
Bring them further left how? Why would they need to do anything when you’d vote for them anyways? Every election both parties move a little bit to the right, and you have no choice but vote Dem. What can you realistically do when the only power you have is voting unless you are a billionaire? Your electoral system is truly fucked and the probably of it fixing itself is low, because why would the party in power want to change the system that just gave them that power?
All I can say is leave if you are able to.
Tbh I think the Republicans get us closer to revolution than the Democrats do. I think the only way out is to break the system.
Means to an end, maybe. But do the ends justify these means? And what makes you think a leftist utopia is even the ends of all this in the first place?
Yeah that’s the biggest problem is I can’t guarantee the revolution would be leftist or that the emerging system would be better than our current system. We need to build a leadership system now.
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Anything that gets you to target people with less power than you is a psy-op.
There is only one group of people to oppose. It’s a small group of extremely wealthy people. All their mouthpieces on the internet are irrelevant (and likely bots) and are best ignored/blocked.
There is one small, powerful group who are the only justifiable targets. Everything else is a distraction and likely a divide-and-weaken tactic.
One small group of powerful, wealthy people. That is the enemy. No one with less power than you is worth focusing on.
You’re absolutely right.
The billionaire owner class is at the root of all this. They own the politicians, they buy up the media outlets and bot farms to control the narrative, and they make our lives miserable in order to further pad their already incomprehensibly massive bank accounts.
Working class must look out for each other. We have so much more in common with our brothers and sisters across the aisle than we ever will have with these parasitic elites.
This is why leftists consistently lose elections.
Low-key truth here
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Good good, let the hate flow through you. Purity is what matters, not affecting change. Go now, inquisitor.
Be Democrat
Compromise on all your ideals and field the most mediocre candidate
Lose to Donald Trump
You Lemmy progressives need to be honest with yourselves. If “not a fascist” wasn’t enough to make you vote for Harris there isn’t a candidate in the universe that would have passed your purity test. It’s almost like you actually wanted Trump to win.
Oh I voted for Harris (and am also not the person you replied to) but “Compromise on all your ideals” describes the trajectory of the Kamala candidacy quite well. And that’s best case. Worst case, as the atlantic suggested way back in 2020, she didn’t share those ideals to begin with.
And that sprint to the right that she made didn’t move the needle on R voters at all. She should have campaigned like she wanted Democrat votes, but she didn’t. She talked a lot about her Glock and got cozy with the war criminals of the prior generation, didn’t talk much about climate change, and even gave space on stage to Liz Cheney at the DNC instead of even giving a single minute to a pro-Palestine Democrat, to try getting some of the basket of deplorables to pick her. None of them did, and it didn’t make Democrats very happy either.
Maybe if the Democratic candidate had acted like she wanted Democrat votes, this map would have looked different in the end.
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If the first week and a half had been indicative of the rest of the campaign we’d have a woman in the white house right now. Skipping a meeting with Bibi, picking walz, Republicans are weird, joy, the coconut shit. Cringe as fuck but people were excited and that’s all that matters in American politics, then she came out and gave a full throated right wing speech at the dnc and it all went down from there.
💯
Keep going… What drives turnout? Citizen campaigning.
Maybe if leftists didn’t spend the year leading up to the election protesting the better candidate we would have seen a better outcome.
So Kamala had no duty to motivate the people she wanted to vote for her? That seems a bit backwards from how I’ve always understood elections.
I agree that “Not Trump” actually should be enough in today’s climate - but it wasn’t in 2016, so why trot out that playbook again? Seems shortsighted and stupid, almost as if corporate donations and Republican voters seemed more imporantant to the DNC than Democrat voters, who were just expected to be “in the bag.”
The proper assignment of blame is on Joe Biden for not getting out of the way to have a real primary.
People weren’t given a choice for their candidate. Excitement drives Democratic turnout, and they’ve been tamping down expectations for decades now. There’s nothing exciting about the campaign strategy of “we’re not Donald Trump.”
Blaming leftists for the failings of liberals is what keeps pushing the party establishment to the right.
I see the BlueMAGA crowd has moved from “you have to vote for Democrats” to “you can never criticize Democrats”
Moved? That’s been the policy since 2016.
Maybe if the Democratic candidate had acted like she wanted Democrat votes, this map would have looked different in the end.
Ah, professional politician eh? That’s some rarefied air there.
Lemmy Democrats did their strategy, lost, and blame leftists. Talk about being in denial.
That strategy won the majority of elections since the 90s.
Trump lost by more in 2020 and repeated his strategy just to win. Too bad he didn’t follow the leftist strategy of complaining and not trying to win.
He complained a lot. He complained after winning. The difference is, Trump campaigned to win right wing losers… The problem is… so did Kamala.
This constant blaming the left for Democrats’ failure is the true psyop, and you seem to be foolish enough to play along…
He didnt just complain without trying to win. Like leftists are popular for doing.
Kamala campaigned to everyone. Trying to reach as many voters as possible because that is a prerequisite for winning elections and a reason leftists don’t win elections.
Russia needed Trump to win for their invasion. It is public knowledge that their strategy is to create infighting in the US so we are more divided and don’t get anything done. This is done by trying to push the right further right and the left further left.
We already know the GOP campaigns with the goal of preventing Dems from winning.
Kamala campaigned on making the wealthy pay their fair share so the billionaire class didn’t want her to win.
These are the obvious sources of “psyops” that are rampant on the internet right now.
This constant blaming the left for Democrats’ failure is the true psyop
This doesn’t even make sense.
If “not a fascist” wasn’t enough to make you vote for Harris
if they want this title then maybe they shouldn’t have been arming and defending the extermination campaign in Palestine
I’m convinced they are bad actors. With all the damage Trump is doing they still complain about the alternative like they are campaigning for the GOP.
All or nothing isn’t as easy as you think for people. Lefties have a lot of destructive ideas that look superficially good, but cause mass division that doesnt need to be.
But every single mainstream Democrat is just as fascist outside of the US as the Republicans. They proved that when they didn’t do anything about a genocide. They are also increasingly fascistic in the US as they demonstrated by being better at deportations than the Republicans. (Also, regularly breaking with Democrat voters to side with MAGA in Congress/Senate).
The Democrats are the same team as the Republicans, they just use different language.
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Link because I don’t think I can upload images on here: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FjBAU1OWAAAJB8W?format=jpg&name=medium
I bet you most leftists that use alternative media like lemmy DID vote for Harris. You’re screaming at all the lemmings still over at Reddit…
I voted for Jill Stein, who’s anti-genocide, among other things. The left needs to support more anti-genocide candidates.
The Democrats policy on Palestine seems pretty fascist to me.
Seriously lemmy can be wild in this regard. I got a death threat for implying democrats were better than Republicans.
I’m not in love with many of their policies, they don’t go nearly far enough, but like damn they’re obviously the better choice
You think Democrats didn’t go far enough on exterminateing Palestinians?
The problem is that the democrats have been name calling for so long, that calling anyone fascist holds no weight. No one cares, they simply don’t believe the democrats.
And so you need a bigger platform than “I’m not a republican”.
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Compromise on all your ideals and field the most mediocre candidate
If Kamala is mediocre what does that make Trump?
Secondly what is it about Trump that most strikes him as a conservative? What conservative values do you think he thinks about and values the most?
Trump represents what Republicans want to vote for.
But this is about ideals and values of the left wing vs right.
What values and ideals does Trump have that appeals to them?
Six Trump voters on why he won their support in 2024 https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwyg5jdgzy1o
Lets see these “ideals” and “values” that Trump voters hold dear to their hearts:
They don’t like immigrants, the border crossings
They thought he could do a better job with the economy
They thought he could do a better job with the economy
‘With his grandkids, I see the softer side’ <- Lady is on drugs I assume, going to ignore this one
They thought he could do a better job with the economy
Doesn’t like war, likes a strong man leader
So 3 out of 5 were about the economy 1 didn’t like illegal immigration 1 didn’t like war
So people voted largely for Trump because they felt the economy does better under him
And this looks to be backed up with this poll:
https://news.gallup.com/poll/651719/economy-important-issue-2024-presidential-vote.aspx
Economy Most Important Issue to 2024 Presidential Vote
The economy ranks as the most important of 22 issues that U.S. registered voters say will influence their choice for president. It is the only issue on which a majority of voters, 52%, say the candidates’ positions on it are an “extremely important” influence on their vote. Another 38% of voters rate the economy as “very important,” which means the issue could be a significant factor to nine in 10 voters.
Is this a conservative value? a good economy? do leftists not value a good economy?
Is this a conservative value? a good economy? do leftists not value a good economy?
The term “the economy” here is too broad. Under Biden, by most statistical measures, the economy at a national level was doing pretty well with back to back 20%+ increases in the stock market in the last 2 years. But that wasn’t what these voters were referring to. They were referring to their personal finances, their family’s economy. Even the bits about not liking immigrants was their misdiagnosis that immigrants were negatively affecting their family economy. They think that immigrant being present meant that their family’s economy was reduced. They think that any taxes levied on them unfairly reduce their family’s economy. They were being squeezed from all directions, lower pay & job insecurity, sky high housing costs (“the rent is too damn high!”), out of control undischargable student loan burdens, bottomless health insurance and health care costs, spiraling home insurance costs from floods/wildfires/hurricanes, and finally the price of eggs.
These voters thought that this was a broken economy, but that is a misdiagnosis. This is an issue of income inequality. Too much of the wealth of the prosperous nation is confined to a tiny fraction at the top. And this mass of voters ended up voting to make this problem worse.
i agree with you but the guy i was arguing with claimed that kamala strayed too far from left wing values and thats why she didn’t win
my claim is something more fundamental, she didn’t assure voters that she would do better on the economy than trump
imo even if she did turn around and become the biggest pro Palestinian, transgender, anarchist, radical communist out there she still wouldn’t have won because the biggest issue to people was the local economy not gaza
she probably should have just offered everyone a tax cut
edit: and that trump has pretty much no values or ideals, just donald is #1 and he’s gonna fix everything and everyone else is wrong or stupid
I am not a fan of Bernie Sanders but I guarantee he would have won. The Democrats refused to give people the policies they wanted.
do you think aoc would have won as well?
Yes but like Bernie her goal is to not run so she can sheepdog leftists into the Democratic party. Not to run and win.
What conservative values do you think he thinks about and values the most?
That Conservative value would be: an in party that the law protects, but does not bind.
If Kamala is mediocre what does that make Trump?
You are aware that Harris lost right?
Yes, it’s possible to have 2 shit candidates you know :P
In Australia we are frequently voting for the ‘least worst’ candidate, we have mandatory voting so very few of us have this idea in our head that we need to run out and enthusiastically support a candidate, we just vote for the one who we think will do the least damage, in Australia Kamala would have won easily
Yes, it’s possible to have 2 shit candidates you know :P
Yes, and Kamala lost.
In Australia we are frequently voting for the ‘least worst’ candidate
Australian doesn’t have first past the post voting! What are you talking about!
Australian doesn’t have first past the post voting! What are you talking about!
I don’t get it, how does this preclude having shit options to vote for?
Because the entire justification for “lesser evil” voting is that America has first past the post voting
I feel like you may have missed the sarcasm in OP, unless I’m misunderstanding you.
This post could actually be the psy-op. Spread the idea that infighting is happening to then create it
“Left unity” IS the psy-op. The notion that leftism is some sort of singular concept that is harmonious with all forms of itself. What a great manipulation. There are good ways to do leftism and bad ways. Anyone who tells you different is intentionally trying to create divisiveness of the known differences in approaches to leftism to agitate leftists and gaslight them into thinking there is an ideal and that the ideal is only achievable if they all somehow agree. But as they never will as this doesn’t make sense, these contradictions positioned as truths are the manipulation used to destabilize any movements. For any success of movement leftists will need to agree to disagree or one will have to over power the other.
I’ve seen enough infighting already, if anything this joke is late to the punch.
Infighting amongst leftist has literally existed as long as leftist ideology itself has existed. You can’t learn the history of the left without reading about dozens of examples.
And that’s why fascism seems to win. Seems like they can compromise as long as the people the don’t like suffer
It’s less that they can compromise and more that the only policy that they care about is policy that hurts minorities. They’d happily jump on a grenade or march into an oven so long as they can take a liberal and an immigrant with them.
On the other hand, look at how much effort it’s taken for the fascists to get power again. The groundwork for the current administration was started under Reagan and solidified under Bush Jr. They had to take every branch of the government by force to get to where they are because there just aren’t enough of their supporters to actually get them into office without bending the rules until they break.
also spread the idea that anyone that expresses a pragmatic approach to the moving the needle left incrementally should be shamed because they weren’t “pure” enough.
I see it quite a lot, personally. Democrats are blaming other Pro-palestine democrats for not voting for pro-Israel candidates.
US Dems are center-right, not leftists.
They’re taking about leftists, not Democrats.
Ah sorry, I’m getting the terms confused.
No war but the class war. Everyone you disagree with is an ally in waiting except billionaires.
Until you somehow “deal” with the billionaires. Then you’ll all kill each other.
Lol humanity existed before oligarchs and kings.
It didn’t. Someone is always in charge.
A straight up Moldbug bootlicker. Get bent. No monarchies, no Kings, in America.
Lol, capitalist education system at work.
Hurdur. Name a period in time where people weren’t ruled. Either in a tribe or in an empire there is a leader or group of leaders in charge. There has never been a time when that isn’t the case. People naturally create governing hierarchies.
You know there is a difference between wise people being listened to because of experience or just because it’s been smart and suggesting rules everyone then agrees on and a feudal lord or class thereof that are exploiting a poorer majority with threats of violence and living a lavish lifestyle. There are still existing tribes in Asia or Amazonas that don’t even have words for mine and yours because the concept of owning is so foreign to them. Everything is shared. To say that they are being ruled comparably to medieval and modern systems just doesn’t make sense.
Tankies justifying slave labor “only 10% of industries were built with gulag forces” calling socialist countries that succeeded with market socialism revisionist “Tito is a revisionist prick delaying global Revolution” and then not even batting an eye to the worse state capitalism that USSR and china engaged in “it improved the lives of people! No, it wasn’t authoritarian! And yes, the party members we sent to gulags and killed were DEFINITELY anti revolutionists and not trying to stop the state capitalism that was forming.”
Tankies… calling socialist countries that succeeded with market socialism revisionist “Tito is a revisionist prick delaying global Revolution”
Hate to break it to you but supporting Tito would make you a tankie in the eyes of most people on Lemmy who use the term (though you may get a pass for denouncing others).
Personally, I like a hybrid system. You know the famous Laffer Curve? Laffer was a hack who just used it to justify tax cuts, but he did have a point. At a 0% tax rate and a 100% tax rate, the government is bringing in zero revenue. However, the shaped of the curve in between is unknown. He just arbitrarily assumed that wherever tax rates happened to be at, the optimal rate was lower. I say we actually study it and harness the principle.
Personally, I like the idea of using this principle not just as a crank tool to justify tax cuts, but as a way to maximize redistributive spending. Figure out what tax rate allows you to have the absolute most generous social welfare system possible, and set your tax policies to that rate. I like the free market, but as a practical tool, not for its own sake. I want to keep the free market around…chained to a treadmill, set to the maximum speed possible that won’t cause it to die of exhaustion.
That curve is so stupid on so many levels, wow.
But also, when we talk about socialism, we don’t mean “capitalism but we tax the rich”. A socialist society would not even need taxes, in the liberal sense. When the means of production are controlled democratically by the workers, by extending democracy from the political to the economic, who would you even tax, and who would the money go to?
It’s a big problem that people have been so convinced that capitalism and liberal democracy are the only way to organize society. We can do better!
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Essentially the ‘left’ on the topic of Palestine
“The left, american left, and right should join hands to fight american right”
Kamala voters in a nutshell
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I mean, I voted for Kamala, I pushed for the harm reduction ‘‘best hand available’’ strategy… but like… it was predicated on strategically sacrificing Palestine for the ‘‘greater good’’.
Sure, the alternative was sacrificing Palestine plus a bunch of additional minorities and at risk groups…
But it was still sacrificing a minority group. Less of a braindead take, more of a ‘‘you caught us, we did indeed try to strategically sacrifice as few minorities as possible while abandoning those we thought we had no chance to save even if logically a large scale united front would have potentially meant sacrificing no one’’ take.
I still believe it was our best play, but only because a terrifying percentage of folks left of MAGA felt it was a necessary sacrifice.
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If that was your main issue the options were a) accelerate the genocide with no possibility of slowing or stopping it politically b) continue the genocide with the possibility of stopping or slowing it at least being somewhere in the conversation
No. The genocide was just as “accelerated” under the Democrats, and they were just as steadfastly opposed to slowing or stopping it, as over a year of fruitless attempts to get them to showed. The only difference is that you were a genocide denier when it was your team doing it. In that sense, Trump has been better for Gaza, because at least now you people will actually acknowledge what’s happening.
and probably condemned all of Gaza.
You had already condemned all of Gaza on the alter of lesser evilism, and if you’d gotten your way, you’d still be doing genocide denial and apologia.
I absolutely see your point, even employed more or less the same logic when “deciding” who to cast my vote for.
Though I don’t know if I can fully agree with the logic that having no viable alternative somehow removes the reality that it was still a sacrifice. If you need to sacrifice a pawn to win a game off chess, you still had to sacrifice that pawn. Only in this case the pawn was a group of people that we as a nation theoretically collectively could have helped but didn’t.
This isn’t the only case mind you, voting for Obama meant voting “for” drone strikes that killed children. Being a voter in the United States means constantly trying to collectively push for harm reduction as we all collectively agree that “we had no real say in the horrors wrought in our names”.
I guess it just makes me wonder why we all are so sure all that this harm is “required”. When in all reality, we could stand united against it at any time and push for a better world.
But instead trying to do so gets you told you support Fascism and are just causing “leftist in-fighting”, because the largest semi-left-ish voting bloc says there is no other way. So you just shut up and fall in line lest something worse happens.
It is this cold logic that made me only talk about how bad Trump would be on Gaza, and vote for Kamala, knowing full well that I was still abandoning Palestinians to their fate.
Anyways, sorry for the rant. I agree whole heartedly that voting for Kamala was the only option to stop Trump, and that doing so was the least horrific option most American’s could agree on. The reality of those facts just make me sick to my stomach sometimes.
ETA: To clarify, knowing you have no chance of winning and still pushing for voters to abstain or go 3rd party is also sacrificing minorities regardless of if it was done for moral or strategic reasons, just as you said. I guess I just get mad at the whole world when our options are so shit.
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now that I think of it, it works both ways, you could use it to criticise people who vote for Harris as she obviously didn’t have great policies on things like Palestine.
Or you could use it to criticise people who don’t vote because then they let trump win which is far worse for minorities than Harris.
why would people ever vote for Biden/Harris when they established the legal basis for Palestinians getting deported and mask bans being enacted? they could vote for the proud fascists instead of the fascism-lite.
I also hate the rhetoric pushed by blue MAGA that equates not voting with letting Trump win. I can’t recall a single time in history where voting has defeated fascism. Also the fact that the people most impacted by Trump can’t vote or don’t have accommodations in place to be able to vote.
Couple examples of elections preventing facism:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_legislative_election,_1974 – Marked the end of military junta and blocked far-right resurgence
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_presidential_election,_2002 – Voters united to block Jean-Marie Le Pen, far-right candidate, in second round
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austrian_presidential_election,_2016 – Voters narrowly rejected far-right FPÖ candidate Norbert Hofer
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brazilian_general_election,_2022 – Lula defeated Jair Bolsonaro, preventing further slide into authoritarianism
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_parliamentary_election,_2023 – Opposition coalition defeated Law and Justice party, halting authoritarian drift
Theoretically, anytime a facist runs and loses an election and doesn’t subsequently stage a coup into power, voting prevents facism.
why did the system let them run in the first place? this leads back to my original point, electoralism and liberalism are inherently dangerous and normalize fascism by allowing people to vote them into power just like they did for Hitler.
it makes as much sense as “the marketplace of ideas”. we don’t debate or “vote out” fascists, we use force
Who decides what ideas are and aren’t okay? Who decides which ideas are bad enough to use force against? What’s to stop those in charge of making those decisions from being compromised, or plants, or changing their minds, or having morals counter to the morals of their society, seeing as the voting clearly cannot be trusted. All it takes is fascism and conservatism to quietly seep into government and now we’ve created the perfect framework for them to shift the targets to those they oppose.
This week, trans people have been declared anti-party. Next week it’s disabled people. Tune in the week after for nationalism.
This is like building a big gun to protect ourselves from fascists but not putting any checks to make sure it’s wielded in the best interests of the people.
what makes you think someone against electoralism believes in having a state?
That’s a fair point, but the question still stands. In a stateless society, who decides when violence is appropriate and which ideas deserve violence? What differentiates such individuals from the state, seeing as they are acting in lieu of one, enforcing certain ideals and rules via violence? My questions still stand.
equates not voting with letting Trump win
This is MAGA-levels of denying reality. Trump got more votes than Kamala. Kamala did not get enough votes. Bitching and belly aching about Kamala lead to lower voter turnout for her. Therefore Trump won.
If and when the revolution happens, I can trust that blowhards like you won’t even be there. You’ll just be here, terminally online, waiting for the day you get to tell our piles of ashes “I told you so.”
i always get a little chuckle when blue maga resorts to using dogwhistles like terminally online instead of calling me a disabled slur. if you wanna support fascism at least don’t be a coward 😘
blue maga
🤡
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Bitching and belly aching about Kamala lead to lower voter turnout for her.
Kamala decided genocide and fracking were more important then her constituents. That’s what led to the lower turnout.
I voted for her and was vocal about holding the line and ignoring all the stupidity they were showing, but it’s completely insane to try to spin the lost as anyone else’s fault.
Bitching and belly aching about Kamala lead to lower voter turnout for her.
Kamala lead to lower turnout for Kamala. Although a lot of blame can be placed on Biden for not dropping out sooner. He should’ve been a one-term president.
I can’t recall a single time in history where voting has defeated fascism.
Fascists mostly start by winning legitimate elections. Defeating fascism with votes would just look like Clinton winning the election instead of Trump.
You might as well say that you can’t recall a single time when having a visible security presence stopped a robbery.
You’re being absolutely disingenuous. If voting could stop fascists, then in 2020 when Joe Biden got more votes than Donald Trump, he would have been president. There would have been a democrat in office from 2021-2024. And your fantasy world sounds nice, but it’s not what happened here in the real world.
If voting could stop fascists, then in 2020 when Joe Biden got more votes than Donald Trump, he would have been president. There would have been a democrat in office from 2021-2024. And your fantasy world sounds nice, but it’s not what happened here in the real world.
Is this some kind of advanced sarcasm? Because I’m not understanding what you’re trying to say.
the people most impacted by Trump can’t vote or don’t have accommodations in place to be able to vote.
So we’re strategically sacrificing minorities. Got it.
why would people ever vote for Biden/Harris
*Gestures at everything*
oh, so you prefer our current administration?
I mean criticising opponent doesn’t necessarily mean preferring current administration
There was absolutely an effort to demoralize Democratic voters here on Lemmy. Those people did support the Trump campaign by engaging in consistent, high-volume criticism and justification of it using logic such as yours.
Not just Lemmy, unfortunately. I had a guy in my politics discord who spammed nothing but Gaza right before the election, but since the election, he’s only posted a handful of things criticizing Trump. And I know he’s not a bot, because I’ve been chatting with him for years.
I wonder how many people are just burnt out from the outrage, and I wonder how much of that was an intentional ploy to get us to stop caring.
Democrats don’t need to be demoralized. Their party does that for them.
I was one of them.
I didn’t do it because I support trump or because I’m a russian troll or some other bullshit.
I did it because genocide is appealing and a friend of mine died in Beyruth last year.
I still think you’re appealing yourself.
What did you learn?
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I know that you’re really concerned about being stabbed with knives. But you just need to accept the Hard Truth that you not being stabbed with knives is losing political issue! Really, that’s why we’re losing elections. You can’t have everything that you want. And you need to see where the other side is coming from…
vs
I know that you’re really concerned about being stabbed with knives. One of these candidates is implicitly okay with you being stabbed with knives, and the other wants to personally stab you with even more knives. I recognize the injustice in this and will therefore vote for neither of them! (the worse one won and now you’re being stabbed with even more knives)
Who will win? (spoiler: I don’t know but certainly not you because you’re too busy being stabbed with knives)
Strawman meme.
In reality you can agree with someone on a topic but disagree on the execution, and you’ll get called a fascist along with a bunch of personal attacks on your intelligence. Trump has infected everyone, even the left who now have become toxic as well. No ally is good enough, no leftist is leftist enough, and anyone even slightly to the right or even left of you is a “fascist”. This is very much an American problem, and I guess it makes sense how it happened, and they can’t see it from the inside, like us outside of the u.s can
Cool story
Why say anything if you literally have nothing to contribute?
You had literally nothing to contribute, so I thought I’d tell you how cool your story was.
You’re a prime example of the problem people here on Lemmy. No respect, no empathy, just vitriol and hate with a leftist twist. There’s plenty of right wingers but I ignore them so I have noticed the toxicity rise on the left in the last couple of years. Toxic , if you have nothing to contribute, no solutions to put forward, only throwing shade at anyone to feel big. The other side of the coin to the current American political climate, you’re not the good guy. Try talking to people and not getting angry, try realizing that your opinions worth isn’t determined by how loud and insulting you are.
If you have all the political leanings of Bernie sanders, but the personality and need to shit on everyone like trump, you’re still shit, even if I’m still glad to have you on my side. If you’re liberal, Democrat, communist, socialist, whatever just keep up the fight, but the fight is over there.
You’re the one who’s ranting. I made one sarcastic comment on your rant, and now you’ve followed it up with another rant. The vitriol and hate is coming from you.
I agree with your comment except for this being an American only problem. It seems lefties the world over are arguing amongst themselves over minutia. I was threatened to be “skinned alive” and called a “western chauvinist” on hexbear for saying China is a mixed economy 😂
this is why so many people had an issue with the Democrat party platform of “let’s sacrifice Palestine”
it feels hypocritical to post about infighting while inciting arguments and heated discussion, and not offer any solutions.
The solution is to stop letting perfect be the enemy of good.
You have a strange definition of perfection.
And and even stranger definition of “the good” tbh.
And what would that be?
Seems like you’re characterizing the dems as “good”. Aren’t they the “lesser evil”?
I don’t consider Democrats as leftist, and I thought the subject was leftist infighting
I’ve misunderstood you then. Can you explain who is perfect and who is good in your analogy?
semantics - and thus we fight. point proven. Orange Hitler didn’t win against left. left couldn’t agree if they save democracy or defend democracy so they did neither
You say semantics, but I find that liberals genuinely can’t seem to decide if their political leaders are “super good people, actually”, or “admittedly terrible war criminals, but not as bad as the other guy”.
thanks OP!
The entire concept of “accelerationism” is complete nonsense. First of all, none of the people advocating for it are willing to say, “Yes, I am perfectly happy to become homeless and starve to death in order to foment the revolution.”
And what are people gonna do? Take up arms? We’re just gonna wait until everyone is starving but armed with an AR-15 and then hope the state doesn’t crush us with nukes? It’s highly privileged absurdist faux revolutionary nonsense.
Heh Penis Prager
This is the fart side shat
