I’m a green voter. I have voted green in the past three presidential elections, and intend to do so again this year. If you have an argument as to why that’s a bad idea that isn’t one that I’ve heard before, get in touch!
I have a question…do you actually expect them to ever win without voting reform?
If it wasn’t for democrats and republicans spoiling the election, yes!
The smaller party is the spoiler, and the big parties wont just…not run. Barring electoral reform, under what circumstances do you think they could actually win? Please remember to account for strategic voting
so, no.
Not voting for a party decreaces their odds of winning.
cool, i’m sure glad inaction is virtuous, makes being lazy feel better
/s
you’ve probably heard this before, but you’ve been voting republican for three elections. the fact that you’ve heard it before doesn’t make it untrue, it just makes you vote republican on purpose.
I heard that argument in 2016 and it hadn’t become any less false than it was then.
33.1% of eligible voters didn’t vote in 2020, 40.8% didn’t vote in 2016. Your priorities are misplaced. You should be more concerned about these nonvoters, they outnumber third party voters seventeenfold and are far less stubborn.
You haven’t changed my mind.
first of all, there are no priorities, you asked about your vote and I answered. i would say the same to a nonvoter.
second of all, oh wait i did. because you are not really different from a nonvoter. except as you admitted more stubborn… so you’re just worse. thanks for just volunteering that info.
you can add yourself to the 40.8% because you’re all doing the same thing: voting for the republican party.
People are far more likely to call out or blame third party voters than nonvoters, despite nonvoters having an order of magnitude larger effect on the outcome. I wasn’t meaning to call you out specifically.
However, I think you should probably stop encouraging third party and nonvoters to vote for republicans. That doesn’t seem to be in your best interest.
they do it because at least nonvoters can say they’re too lazy or apathetic. the fact that you get your ass all the way to the ballot box to essentially do the same thing does attract some attention.
also take your threats to someone who thinks it holds any weight; i personally don’t give a shit if you vote republican or third party or not at all, cause as I’ve been saying, they’re the same vote. if you don’t vote D you’re voting R one way or another.
… Is far easier to convince someone who hasn’t already made up their mind. Spend your time productively.
I do not make threats. I have never made any threats. Your argument reads far more as encouragement to vote for an R instead of a D. That is an unwise argument to make if you care about maximizing the number of D votes.
But I’m voting G regardless. Goodbye!
you were the one who invited people, i don’t give a shit either way
Because of the nature of FPTP voting it only matters if you’re in a swing state. If you’re voting green from a solidly blue state, keep at it, but if you’re in i.e. Michigan or Nevada, please reconsider.
My only regret in 2016 was not living in a swing state. I know how ftpt works.
Democrats can earn my vote by implementing ranked choice voting. They’re a solid 3rd choice pick on the ballot.
It’s FPTP, but ok.
In that system, it is two-party and people who didn’t vote for the opponent of the winner, gave their vote to the winner (it was one less vote needed to win). You can never win with your candidate but you make the winning side need one less vote…just like if you voted for them. In some cases, like green party, they would only vote blue if they literally had no choice but red and blue. So they are always taking a vote away from blue. Every single election, green party voters have only helped the GOP. Like libertarians voting third party only ever helps the Democrats.
Democrats have had many opportunities to push for ranked choice voting but chose not to. How is ftpt the fault of the parties that have never had the power to do anything about it?
It is F P T P…and yeah, full voting reform takes time. SOME STATES have ranked choice or at least a representative split of their electoral votes instead of winner take all…just like SOME STATES started with weed legalization and it spread, SOME STATES started with abolishing slavery and it spread…we are JUST getting it going and we might lose any chance at it if p2025 gets pushed through and we lose all hope of it. Read about p2025 and the entrenchment of garbage people into every facit of our government so we don’t have a chance of it spreading ever again…assuming we get to actually vote (and not end up with a Russian “democracy”).
It is just a confluence of bad timings as inaction was finally starting to become change.
I mean I was green but I left it after the party nominees were all garbage rich fucks who mostly just seem to like being popular and having money.
Plus after the hissy fit of blaming other parties for not getting their own paperwork in order and demanding the party members not vote in protest which doesn’t respect the importance of voting.
But hey you do you.
Is there a party without rich fucks? I would prefer that but I’m yet to find one.
Not really but I don’t need to support another one who brags about getting air time in Russia because it doesn’t matter what person is talking about them as long as they feel special. That’s a level of incompetence I don’t think is better than the current.
Voting Green appears to be the way to go. Current Democrats are unwilling to compromise on anything, not even stop a Genocide.
Promoting this behavior any further is the actual biggest danger to democracy not their permastuck 2016 fiction of having to save democracy every 4 years.
I can’t my head around how voting Republican stops genocide…that is a leap in logic my brain just isn’t doing.
I can’t my head around how voting Democrat stops genocide…that is a leap in logic my brain just isn’t doing.
My statement is actually not a strawman. Sad reality.
Nobody said voting Democrat will stop genocide…you said voting Republican will. Just trying to figure out how.
Am I the only one who read the right side in the voice of Scruffy from Futurma?
As a South American who had to choose between right and extreme right, being a leftist, I completely understand the frustration about voting Biden. And what’s more, agree completely he does not deserve to be voted. But, in order to defeat fascism and with all other cards now played, Biden is the lesser of two evils and taking the moral high ground could result on fascism taking over the USA. I suggest voting for Biden. My two cents…
He’s not the lesser of two evils. Cut this horseshit rhetoric. Biden has done a good job. No-one is perfect but calling him evil is just right wing propaganda both sides bullshit.
Trump is evil. If you want to see evil, vote Trump.
He’s not the lesser of two evils.
I wish Americans had enough of a heart to give your average Palestinian the same benefit of the doubt as Strom Thurmond’s best friend.
I understand where are you coming from. But you honestly believe that a person that enables genocide abroad isn’t evil?
By your logic, every leader of a 1st world country for the last several decades is evil.
I have this conversation every single time I open up lemmy these days…
Biden isn’t enabling a genocide. If the US completely stopped sending anything to Israel, Israel would still be conducting this genocide. Netanyahu said so himself. Israel generates its own war supplies and exports its excess.
The only thing that would change is the US would lose the influence it has left in the middle east and some other (likely hostile) nation would scoop up that spot. That’s the real reason the US is still party to this.
Everyone who believes Biden is evil because they think he has a magic genocide-off button on his desk isn’t paying attention.
I understand and agree. But being complicit and helping the genocide (and basically enabling it by not saying it is one out loud) could be considered evil.
Now, Biden may not be evil. But it’s foreign policy in this regard might be.
Still, the genocide will be carried out. But enabling it does not help. And I say it again. If Biden is evil, it does not matter. It is better than Trump. You do not need to portray him in a good light. He just needs to be supported more than Trump. Vote Biden.
We Argentinians elected a fascist as president. I can and would have got behind the right if it meant stopping this pos.
Say it louder for the people in the back!
By your logic, every leader of a 1st world country for the last several decades is evil.
They are, unironically
The US is one of only a few countries that have voted against the last two UN resolutions. You’re not wrong, but the US government is a special type of evil.
Both the Biden and Trump regimes have also opposed separate UN resolutions against condemning the glorification of Nazism
I’m not saying they aren’t. I’m saying that taking the moral high ground by relinquishing your vote to choose between a number of leaders because you don’t want to vote for someone “evil” means that you are disqualifying yourself from every major election almost everywhere by default.
That’s an enormously stupid take.
Everyone who believes Biden is evil because they think he has a magic genocide-off button on his desk isn’t paying attention.
Who’s been blocking the last two UN resolutions on a ceasefire? Who’s been bypassing congress to arm a genocidal settler state? I’m sure Trump would also do this, maybe worse, but stop trying to pretend your corpse emperors shit doesn’t stink
🙄 Way to miss the point.
Do you understand that it’s possible to hold the belief that what the US is doing with Israel is wrong and also realize that the US can’t independently stop it from happening?
Did you read what I typed or not? The reason the US is still in this is their influence in the middle east. I’m not arguing that corpse-emperor is almighty and correct, I’m saying that geopolitics is a thing.
If we can’t have an actual discussion about this without you putting words in my mouth to paint it like I support that, then I guess this conversation ends here.
several hundred years ago we had the choice between electing a slaveowner that fucked his slaves vs a slaveowner that didn’t fuck his slaves. Now we get to pick between a genocidal warmonger bent on keeping us all in debt servitude that is pro trans rights vs a genocidal dictatorship that is against trans rights.
Biden sucks ass, stop gaslighting us if you want us to vote for your shithead
When did Biden support genocide?
Failing to do enough to immediately prevent an entirely separate foreign government from conducting its own genocide does not count.
If I was american I’d obviously be voting for Biden, but ignoring or denying that he’s supporting the genocide currently being undertaken by the Israeli government doesn’t make him look better.
Of course, Trump would support it too, hence the obviously.
Why would Israel have a hard time getting munitions from any other first-world country, especially when they have the excuse of getting attacked by terrorists?
goalpost moved
Withholding munitions from Israel doesn’t stop the genocide. I’m keeping that end goal in mind.
Biden is presiding over the most progressive/liberal administration in U.S. history. That doesn’t mean it’s liberal enough but it sure as hell beats any previous administration by a mile.
Biden isn’t a “neo-liberal shill” he’s a boring, middle of the road corporatist.
Republicans and Democrats have been moving steadily to the right for the last 40 years. So now, the Democrats are where the Republicans used to be in the 1980s: friends of banks, insurance and pharmaceutical companies. And the Republicans have moved all the way into an insane asylum.
Biden isn’t a “neo-liberal shill” he’s a {exact definition of neo-liberal shill}
It boggles the mind sometimes.
I mean… What else would that mean?
There are dictionaries that tell you what the words “liberal” and “conservative” mean. Quit relying on your own snazzy spidey-sense and check them out.
No, Ronald Reagan closed the asylums so they had to stay in office
I understand your stance and respect your freedom to do that. I myself have held my nose and voted for the lesser evil many times in my life.
But now that the lesser evil is literally evil, I can’t do it anymore. I can’t back Trump or Biden. I won’t vote for a genocide.
If a genocide happens, it won’t be by my vote. And if this country collapses under Trump, it’s only the inevitable happening a little sooner.
When folks start winding up in camps,I hope you’ll take comfort in the thought of “I didn’t do anything to stop it, so it’s not my fault!”
If trump wins, he voted for trump. That is how spoiler votes and non-voting works in our system.
The people with his absurd mentality are quitters. If the worst comes to pass, and the world suffers harshly for it, I trust history will remember his ilk in the exact same vein as MAGA.
I still heap a large amount of blame on the bernie bros for 2016.
As much as I wanted Bernie, same.
The people with his absurd mentality are quitters.
I’m sorry, is supporting Biden supposed to be a test of endurance?
That’s pretty fucked up.
Endure, maintain the crappy status quo, try as we might to bring about change strikes me as better than Give up and bring about the worst timeline possible.
Also, I support stopping p2025, not Biden directly. At most it is supporting those around him.
I’m not giving up. I’m throwing my efforts behind other options.
Your “other option” is going into a Burger King and demanding spaghetti.
Our trash-tier system only supports two parties. If you would normally vote blue (caring about others and being anti-genocide tells me you would be more left than right) and don’t do so this time, your lack of a blue vote means red needs one less to win. This functionally means you would be voting red. Your spoiler-vote protest would actually mean something in ranked-choice or other systems, but we don’t have that, so you are just voting red, but with more steps.
I am all for any other candidate, to be fair, but the whole non-voting or spoiler-votingis a different thing entirely.
This functionally means you would be voting red. Your spoiler-vote protest
It’s not a protest vote. I want the Greens to win. And if everyone voted Green, then the Greens would win.
Maybe you’re preventing the Greens from winning by voting Blue.
If, 30 years from now, the choice is between a democrat who wants 5 genocides and a republican who wants 10, will you still cling to American electoralism as hard as you are now? Will you still be militantly democrat?
This logic isn’t sustainable.
The correct answer for genuine supporters of Harm Reduction via electoralism is usually yes, as that’s the logic of electoralism. Anything else is to admit you simply have a different “no return” threshold from others.
The fact of the matter is that you either stick to your guns about believing in electoralism, and no matter what vote for the lesser evil among the 2 largest candiates, or you don’t. If you don’t, you’re picking where you draw your personal line in the sand.
For some people, genocide at all is a line, domestic or foreign. For others, foreign is fine, domestic is not.
I don’t think a vote is an endorsement. Sometimes it’s an end of a bus to stand in as it’s teetering over the edge of a cliff. You might be shoulder to shoulder with a murderer, and you might be there for a while ,it might also be for nothing - but there’s a chance it doesn’t fall off. It isn’t inevitable. It’s very evitable.
Ah, so you plan on no longer paying taxes?
I don’t know much about US presidential candidates, but maybe all of you can vote for this Brandon person if the other side doesn’t like Biden?
It’s either Biden winning or violence at this point. The American political system is slow to adept to change… at least until a constitutional convention is held. The founding fathers being rich white land owning slavers isn’t what is relevant here. It is that they lived in a time that didn’t have the telegraph & trains, let alone stuff like nuclear weapons, nerve agents, space travel, and the internet.
I actually love this model:
Biden supporters: “Unite around candidate Biden or prepare to watch Democracy die!”
Biden detractors: “You guys are nuts! That old bastard can barely put 3 sentences together. I will argue we should have a younger more vibrant candidate like Big Gretch who would wipe the floor with Trump all the way until I vote for Biden’s senile ass on November 5th!”
Biden supporter: “You dumb fucks, Whitmer herself says she isn’t interested and is all-in for Biden! But she’d be a great candidate and I would fully support her if Biden steps down and she was the nominee. But he won’t, so pull your heads out of your asses and support him!”
Like, if we gotta argue, let’s have fun with it and just vote 100% for dems top to bottom on November 5th.
Who is Big Gretch?
Forget reality. Embrace Blue MAGA. Run senile geriatric. Lose because not everyone is in the Blue MAGA cult.
The outcome of this election is either Trump or not Trump, The election system has been specifically fine-tuned over decades so that it strongly favours Trump’s party, despite him having fewer votes overall. There is one other party that is financially entrenched enough to have a chance at being voted, realistically.
Tackling the entire election process to actually catch up to democracies worldwide is a whole different topic altogether and realistically not achievable before this particular election, so if you are talking about preventing Trump via election (before Trump factually prevents being elected out of office during his term), the choice between either Trump or Biden is the reality.
The outcome is Trump or not Trump.
Nowhere does it say Biden has to be the candidate. Biden will only guarantee Trump.
Don’t care who the DNC picks…voting Blue.
That’s great for you let’s hope all other Democrats are mindless drones as well and literally nobody cares about the candidate.
Why even have a primary? Just place a sack of potatoes there and call it a day. Nobody cares who the president is right?
Not mindless, just operating in reality.
Linkerbaan knows the winner is gonna be the Dem or Rep nominee. They just REALLY don’t want to admit it.
“Blue MAGA” is straight up propaganda. If you think these two parties are alike enough to address democrats like that, you either have an agenda or are woefully uninformed.
IIRC, this was posted earlier today on the lemmy.ml instance, and very, very quickly deleted by a mod.
…Which undermines the central claim.
They didn’t want anyone getting any funny ideas about tankies. Like that they weren’t braindead, authoritarian boot lickers.
i just realized I’ve misread the meme.
tbf its kinda wild OP identifies as a Tankie when he’s capable of understanding lesser evils
you could have stopped two words earlier
I dont see how dropping those two words changes my message much?
Dude, those cowards over there will remove and ban people just for being liberal. No joke. It’s in the mod logs. Those clowns even put it as the ban reason.
And yet, the minions that flock to those shitholes come to these communities and and whine about bias and how they’re treated unfairly.
Sounds like typical conservatives…so…
I dunno. Have you noticed that the guy is portrayed as a soyjak?
What I mean is that lemmy.ml is an explicitly communist-apologist instance*, and that anything that is supportive of Biden, even when it’s solely about minimizing other harms to marginalized people, is quickly deleted. Comrade Dale is depicted as being a tankie that the soyjack says can’t support Biden.
…But it was deleted by tankie mods, because they can’t support Biden even if the only realistic alternative is many magnitudes worse.
*To be clear, I have no issues with libertarian communism; I think it’s great, and I’m mostly anarchistic myself, even if I recognize that pure anarchism doesn’t scale well to countries. I have a problem with authoritarian communism, and I have a problem with people that would hand-wave all the massive amounts of murder committed by Lenin, Stalin, Mao Zedong, Pol Pot, Fidel Castro, and many other communist dictators.
While true, I can still be pissed off that Dems force me to vote for someone I don’t want instead of offering someone about whom I can be enthused.
You could also look at it as Trump forcing you to do everything you can to protect democracy from collapsing in on itself like a dying star.
deleted by creator
Well I lean further left than a guy who’s left leg has been blown off and I’ve never heard of ‘Action T4’ . I’m also staunchly opposed to holocausting all disabled people.
Every sane person should oppose euthanasia. It’s not going to stay consensual and it will lead to people killing themselves because they think that they’re a burden.
Lmao
Well, the one to the right (probably) isn’t a tankie though, but I approve their actions
Pretty much all Marxists are called tankies at this point, and Grayox is a Marxist. I’ve even seen Anarchists called tankie.
Yet I get called Tankie all the time … interesting.
See that makes it sound like you’re getting called out on much more anti-voting sounding commentary than the above stated point of view
An image that isn’t helped by the fact that the post makes it seem that you are completely oblivious to how often tankies try to start fights defending the choice to abandon the most vulnerable for the sake of some bougie kid socialism accelerationist shit.
I never advocate anti-voting rhetoric, but think any and all means should be used to defend a socialist revolution once it has occurred. The only thing i want ro accelerate is class conciousness, which must be achieved before a revolution can begin to occur, most humans are too brainwashed by Capitalist propaganda for that revolution to be successful.
Usually “I want to help spread class consciousness” means just saying “hurr durr both sides same,” which encourages people not to vote, which historically favors the conservative candidate.
but think any and all means should be used to defend a socialist revolution once it has occurred.
You would kill and imprison those that would vote differently or disagree with your revolution? That’s exactly why all those revolutions in Russia, China, N Korea etc failed. As someone who Trends anarcho communist I am down for some communism. But you Marxist leninists never learn.
Lmao the Revolution in China didnt fail.
They aren’t socialist anymore. And they aren’t communist now either. They’re state capitalist. That seems to be a solid failure. Even the party isn’t holding regular elections for many of the posts. Xi jinping has moved back into the Forbidden City and is basically their de facto new emperor. Enriching his bourgeoisie friends. While throwing miniscule amounts of scrap towards the proletariat. Sounds pretty failed to me. And likely to lead to heavy class strife soon since they failed the class war. But please do go ahead and continue to flail and cope uselessly.
It’s extremely telling that that was what and how you chose to respond. Not addressing the fact that you would kill and slaughter everyone who disagrees with you.
Bruh i literally identify as a tankie im not naive enough to think we can vote away the oppression of the ruling class lmao
Hey, if tankies were gonna vote for Biden to thwart trump, we wouldn’t have a problem. It’s that most that I’ve seen explicitly say they won’t. And they advocate that people shouldn’t. So - i don’t get it.
Youre right .If you vote for genocide, dont call yourself a communist. This meme is pure BS
You can choose between the genocide abroad, or at home. You lot read to me like you weigh Palestinian lives as more important than mine
You’re right which is why we should not vote and let the current genocide continue and add several more to the list when trump gets elected. Genocide for everyone!
Lesser evil always ends well
Because good is totally on the table rn
“I know, if the lesser evil is bad, let’s oppose it absolutely and help the greater evil get all the power!”
-lemmy.ml
You right, let’s let the greater evil win then
…. Said the .ml, thinking they’d be taken seriously.
Ok I’ll bite. What would you have people do instead and how do you think that would go if they did?
Im not the one to decide this. Its up to a party to elaborate the decision. As far as i can see, you should have a candidate that represents working people as a class. Its this interest that should be in the center of any left wing politician. And no, identitarism is not the intesrest of the working class. That being said, no man of the system will ever represent the working class, you need an authentic option. And yes, it means a communist option inevitably, but thats another discussion (why any other political position will be insufficient in the long run). But to even think about this is absurd to most usamericans
No shit, Sherlock.
But what are you going to specifically do come November? What specific outcome do you see if others don’t vote for Biden because he doesn’t pass your purity test? Do you see this outcome being good for the country, good for workers, or good for marginalized peoples?
You just called doing a genocide “not passing a purity test” ffs i dont need to talk to you
Let me be as clear as I can: If you get your way and Biden loses DO YOU THINK TRUMP WILL DO MORE OR LESS GENOCIDE?
Professional anti-shiller here. These fuckers aren’t worth wasting the time on.
And you just said “doing a genocide.” If it helps, the only people that think that’s edgy are other people just like you.
And that isn’t a compliment.
Sorry if i dont express myself so well in my third language. If you think the phrasing is the important part, id suggest you talk to a baby or something, not to me
Let me guess, “Something something literally anything that interacts with outsiders makes you actual Hitler something something accelerationism something something historicism something something capitalism is scientifically destined to fall like, tomorrow if you just don’t vote for anyone but CPUSA guys I swear.”
EDIT: Wait do people not know that I’m mocking tankies here?
At this point, I’m pretty sure this rhetoric is a result of deliberate ignorance about FPTP.
There’s only so many times we can explain elementary math to you people.
Deliberate ignorance, accelerationist “if we let the fascists win it’ll totally result in a communist revolution, trust me bro, you definitely won’t be one of the thousands whose bones are used for the foundation” idiocy, or actual fascists trying to depress left turnout. Take your pick.
The maybe, MAYBE, it’s time for the US to start thinking in another way of electing the government.
100%. It’s unfortunate that the “harm reduction” thing is overshadowing anyone talking about why we have to do harm reduction in the first place.
The US as a whole seems more content on treating the symptoms of FPTP than taking care of the underlying issue.
Communism isn’t about identity and moral superiority. It is about making strategic decisions that enable the ultimate revolution of the working class to do away with capitalism, that includes tactical, cynical decisions at times. Some communists tried to do the whole “never voting on principle” or “only voting for the perfect fringe candidate” bit already, so we know how that turns out - sectarianism removed from class, and underestimating the enemy. Think of how some communists thought if Hitler got elected, Germany would finally have a revolution - turns out, no, it just led to the last bit of the mask of humanity to fall off capital and them being killed in the most brutal fashion. That mask of humanity may be a lie and indeed just a mask, but it has real effects, and the inhumanity can always get worse.
The big project in these times of reactionary drift globally is to build as much organised proletarian power as is possible - catch and organise those that fall from the middle class, learn how to use guns and fly drones, learn how to coordinate as a movement, learn how to support each other in day-to-day life, gain some class consciousness. While those that lack consciousness and still hold dreams of escaping their proletarisation within capitalism enable fascism, as long as they can cling to the ideological dream of the wealth of the past without realising the very system that enabled the old wealth already had the crises of today within it.
Thinking its the same to organise all that under a senile proto-fascist like Biden compared to a full-blown fascist like Trump and his allies is genuinely foolish. It reads like an utopian socialist dream about moral fortitude and self-serving identity instead of trying everything that can materially advance the working class and its consciousness.
Im not even sure what was your point. Just want to say that biden is not a proto fascist, he is a fascist. And trump is another. To think theres much difference between them is the same of thinking theres difference between the shit a dog did today and the one he did yesterday
I mean, idk, one will get me killed for being trans and the other wont; seems pretty significant to me. At least relatively speaking, a bit hard to fight for the working class while Im dead, yknow?
Have you ever owned a dog? Their shits can be quite different in their nastiness from day to day. Your definition of fascism seems also to be lacking and reductive, thinking an out-of-their-time neolib like Biden puts out the same kind of repression on the working class as someone like Trump (Or Franco, Pinochet, Mussolini, Hitler) and the outlines in Project 2025 will.
Things will only get worse over the next few decades, we are currently still in a phase where the privileges of welfare state capitalism break away globally, leading to proper proletarisation of the population in the advanced capitalist, imperialist nations. That induces reactionary movements politically, and every year we can buy ourselves to organise and spread class consciousness before the violent repression is turned up to 11 is valuable.
Add the climate catastrophe on the top of capitalist decay, and things will get really, really ugly in the coming decades. If the communist movement isn’t properly organised as soon as possible, there is no guarantee that can be transformed into ultimately an opportunity for change.
Their shits can be quite different in their nastiness from day to day.
Would you eat any of them? Is this one less smelly than the other enought for you to eat it?
If the communist movement isn’t properly organised as soon as possible
Good starting point: reject that genocide joe is an alternative to trump. As long as you belive the democratic-republican system is all you have, you are doomed
You do realise it’s possible to vote while also wanting and working towards a better system, right?
The majority will not be convinced otherwise in a matter of five months. Thats not even a pipe dream, thats a drug trip
Would you eat any of them?
I think this is really telling, actually.
You are so emotionally invested in the vain idea that you, personally, are above handling dog shit that you are refusing to actually think through the problem.
I mean, I don’t know what eating it has to do with anything. Some questions are just too gross to consider? Best to purge your mind of it than think at all about strategy?
Just want to say that it’s incredibly refreshing to read a self-described communist calling out the utter lack of evidence supporting accelerationism/anti-electoralism as a way to achieve positive societal change. As a kinda anarcho-syndicalist (there are dozens of us!) that believes strongly in data-informed decision-making, it feels good to see philosophical allies in the wild and bolsters my hope that humanity will eventually be able to achieve greater levels of equity and equality.
Danke schön! Viel glück und alles gute!
Thank you for the kind words. Yeah, accelerationism is a bit of ideological nonsense to me, I think capitalism is doing fine on its own to reach the ultimate conclusion of its dynamics. I’m admittedly not as optimistic when it comes to positive change through electoralism, to me, it is much more about postponing negative change. But it is a tool in the toolkit - as you identify as an anarcho-syndicalist, one example would be how the Spanish anarchists participated in elections to explicitly get the huge amount of political prisoners freed in the preludes to the Spanish Civil War, a conscious decision where they, as an organised group, pressured the republican forces to give in to their demands. That’s also an example of where not voting can be a valid tactic - if you actually have a large, organised group of people that is able to use it as a means to pressure concrete government actions.
Granted, I am too disillusioned to be an anarchist. I worked within anarchist groups in the past and my personal experience has been, that they are maybe a bit too idealistic and loyal to principles instead of practicality. Finding consensus, in my experience, led to a whole slew of psychological dynamics within the discussions. Stuff like people feeling pressured to give up their own position, later regretting it, charismatic “leaders” de-facto still taking over discussions, and it being very vulnerable to inducing gridlock on purpose by bad-faith actors. Also, the idea of changing the minds of a vast amount of the population, instead of being willing to take power if necessary, is something I encountered a lot, and I simply don’t agree with, especially in light of how the present and future look.
That all being said, in my experience anarchists are at least more open to study and learn with a proper, reflective mind, while many MLs I met treat their own position as a holy, unshakable truth, which in my opinion, goes against everything the Marxist project has been about. They unironically talk about scientific Marxism, while treating it as a religion, it can be quite tiring in my opinion.
No matter what side we are on when it comes to how we see ourselves - good luck to you too, and most of all, good luck to all proletarians worldwide. We are all gonna need it in the decades to come.
I’m admittedly not as optimistic when it comes to positive change through electoralism, to me, it is much more about postponing negative change. But it is a tool in the toolkit
Exactly. I, myself, do not think that electoralism is the only tool needed for positive change. It is like a gauze pad in a first aid kit. It is primarily used for treating wounds and trying to staunch bleeding. There are a lot of other tools available, some of them very much overlooked. Yes, there’s direct action and protests but there’s also community building, education, and kindness. The latter three, I find, are frequently overlooked, due to the lack of immediate return.
Spanish anarchists participated in elections to explicitly get the huge amount of political prisoners freed in the preludes to the Spanish Civil War, a conscious decision where they, as an organised group, pressured the republican forces to give in to their demands. That’s also an example of where not voting can be a valid tactic - if you actually have a large, organised group of people that is able to use it as a means to pressure concrete government actions.
Again, a lot of agreement with you there. Context and data are critical. Without the right context (which I’m not aware of existing anywhere in the West at this time), not voting is, by the data, completely ineffectual at creating change. That’s why things like community building and interpersonal diplomacy are so vital. That’s also why there have been such concerted efforts against Leftism, intentional communities, etc for the last half-century.
Granted, I am too disillusioned to be an anarchist.
I deal with that, like I dealt with my depression; developing near-pathological optimism as a coping mechanism. Also, with radical acceptance. I know that the changes that I would like to see and world that I would like to live in is not achievable in my lifetime. Maybe if we had healthy generational power transfers but, at least in the US, that’s a bit of a pipedream and patience is required. My ideals are a “North Star” to guide my actions when attempting to make long-term changes to society (if something good can happen overnight, it can be taken away just as quickly).
I worked within anarchist groups in the past and my personal experience has been, that they are maybe a bit too idealistic and loyal to principles instead of practicality. Finding consensus, in my experience, led to a whole slew of psychological dynamics within the discussions. Stuff like people feeling pressured to give up their own position, later regretting it, charismatic “leaders” de-facto still taking over discussions, and it being very vulnerable to inducing gridlock on purpose by bad-faith actors.
This has been a huge problem over here. Both intentional bad actors and those that have the same impact due to ignorance or short-sightedness.
Also, the idea of changing the minds of a vast amount of the population, instead of being willing to take power if necessary, is something I encountered a lot, and I simply don’t agree with, especially in light of how the present and future look.
This one hits me hard too. I’m a “no first strikes” pacifist. I wasn’t always but learning about the histories of peoples that have suffered far more than most of my ancestors pushed me there. My allegiance is to humanity, not ideology. Is violence necessary to protect and defend? Sometimes, like with slavers and fascists. However, I do see a lot of people, especially online MLs, that are chomping at the bit for it, without regards to the fact that violence itself causes harm but just to the recipient, but also the perpetrator and society at large (see: Ireland and Algeria).
That all being said, in my experience anarchists are at least more open to study and learn with a proper, reflective mind, while many MLs I met treat their own position as a holy, unshakable truth, which in my opinion, goes against everything the Marxist project has been about. They unironically talk about scientific Marxism, while treating it as a religion, it can be quite tiring in my opinion.
Yes! It is good to see that others, especially a communist, have found a similar pattern of behavior. You cannot have dialectics without making everything open to analysis, including ideology and recorded history. I received a ban from an ML-moderated comm a while back by suggesting further analysis of the motivations and historical context of the Finns and the alliances formed in the wars that they fought during WW2 (maybe invading a country that has a history of centuries of repression at the hands of the Russian Empire wasn’t a good way to win over its people). Not to mention suggesting any leaders of historical communist countries or movements may not have always been in the right or had the best of intentions (they really didn’t like that). Not being able to examine and analyize the pillars of one’s ideology with any depth or criticality without being excommunicated puts it solidly in “religion” territory.
No matter what side we are on when it comes to how we see ourselves - good luck to you too, and most of all, good luck to all proletarians worldwide. We are all gonna need it in the decades to come.
The same to yourself! And absolutely, again, no matter what happens in the coming years, I wish there best of Luck to our fellow people (sure, maybe we’ll have artificial prolitarians that need our help too at some stage) and hope that we’re able to lay the foundations for a world where they have no need of Luck.
But communists are notoriously genocidal
The only thing communist want to Genocide is inequality.
Holodomor is a real thing that happened and was as wrong as everyone thinks. You will never undo that
No one denies Holodomor. It happened. The funny thing is you can’t fully point at it with your finger and say “it happened cause communism” but most genocides the US did can and will be pointed at with the “that’s cause capitalism”.
Of course it was horrible. Of course it should not happen again. And should not have happened. But it is not the gotcha you think it is.
Also, you’ll surely understand that Soviet Communism in that specific period is not the only type of communism that existed, right?
How would the holodomor have been possible without a centrally controlled food supply?
That is a good question. But still, not a gotcha. Communism does not mean centrally controlled food supply. A lot of man made famines have existed in the history of mankind, yet this is the only one that gets used to demonize a socio-political system. To be fair, im not invested in the history of Ukraine nor the Soviet Union to explain the details of what happened. Although it is possible that what you mention has a good amount of merit in the situation, never are this things so clear. I guess it was a factor, but how big, I can not tell right now.
Bengal famine, only 10 years later. It was Churchill.
Haha sure
Lol the post you made this as a response to literally has tankies calling themselves tankies and stating that they will not vote for Biden.
Seethe harder.
Maybe Tankies arent a monolith 🫨
And yet y’all will happily dismiss anybody who is to the right of you (or a different flavour of left from you) as a ‘lib’. 🤔
Buddy, the meme wasn’t about you, clearly. Why are you simping so hard for tankies?
There are non-tankies on lemmy.ml? Stockholm syndrome?
Gaslighters and people who’ve been gaslit into thinking Tankie doesnt mean “Communist who backs/supports Russia and China and how they maintain power” and so have become useful idiots
Edit: Nvm saw more of OP’s comments, they’re definitely a Tankie, and thus very much belong in .ml
Gotta say, I’m confused as to why Dale Earnhardt is in this meme…
He was very left leaning. He would vote for Biden to defeat Trump
Til
Raise hell praise Dale