this post was submitted on 03 Dec 2023
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Yes, voting for the lesser evil on its own is not enough.
If you have more resources, you should be organizing in other ways. Spread information. Building other power structures. And voting for the lesser evil.
If you don't have resources to spare, just vote for the lesser evil. It will give the people who are able to change the system more time. At the vary least, it might give some people a couple more days to enjoy life.
Just because something won't solve the problem doesn't mean it doesn't help.
Don't give up! They want you to give up and roll over. They might get what they want. I can't predict the future. But let's win, or make them work for it. Don't just give them what they want.
You know what helps as far as voting goes? Not voting for the entrched parties. Every vote they get, keeps their position more secure. Do other stuff. But when it comes to voting do not give them ANY support. Best is voting for someone closest to your ideals, second best is not voting, actively detrimental is voting either R or D.
In a first passed the post voting system, there will always be only two candidates that matter. 3rd party candidates do exist but every vote you give to them instead of the lesser evil ultimately removes a vote against the grater evil.
This is basic voting strategy. It sucks that the system works this way, but reality sucks sometimes.
Voting 3rd party to "show them" is waisting your power and playing into the desires of the current power structures. With the little power we have been given by the system, we should be using it to maximize our desired outcomes.
The best we can do in the US currently though voting for a president is to slow the decay and allow other initiatives more time to work and give more people a chance to wake up before this power is removed from us.
If you want more details CPG Grey does an excellent video on how this happens called Minority Rule: First Past the Post Voting https://youtu.be/s7tWHJfhiyo?si=agab-WYAn5Ro5Gs2
If my desire is to stop the genocide of innocent Palestinians, is the liberal answer "shut the fuck up and vote for Biden, thanks"? Because that feels unsatisfactory.
There are coalitions of Muslims/leftists refusing to vote for Biden because of his pro-genocide stance. These people aren't claiming that Republicans will be the saviors of Palestine, rather they're speaking in the only language liberals understand. "Don't do what we want and we remove you from power".
Yes, 2024-2028 would be worse, but the hope is that losing an election due to being pro-genocide might make them anti-genocide.
I don't know what the liberal answer is to "how to stop the genocide of innocent Palestinians". Who are the liberals here? Are they in power? If they are in power, voting probably isn't going to punish them because as I have said before, voting will only slow the decay.
Ideally we would have a voting system that would support more choices so we could actually "punish" a leader without pushing the US into fascism faster, but we aren't there yet.
If it's clearly demonstrable that being anti-genocide would keep Democrats in power longer, that increases the chances they'd be anti-genocide.
I get that Americans aren't the ones being genocided, but some people understand that Palestinians have the same right to life as Americans, so it's fine to treat this as if there was an active genocide happening in America.
Both parties are pro-genocide, but one side might actually cave because their constituents are generally anti-genocide, while Republicans tend to be happy with it.
I see it as totally plausible that Biden loses 2024 because of a sharp drop in the support from anti-genocide leftists, and that it could end up being extremely clear to the Democrats in power that they need to concede this issue to us in 2028.
If Biden wins in 2024, it'd be a clear signal that their current strategy is working, just guilt everyone into voting for a Democrat no matter what, even if they're actively encouraging genocide.
Guilt is a strong word. Genocide and fascism are both terrible. The goal should be to minimize both.
If a Democrat gets elected next, will the genocide against the Palestinians stop, probably not. Will the US get more fascist, a little.
If a Republican gets elected next, will the genocide against the Palestinians stop, probably not. Will the US get more fascist, a lot.
It's clear what the better outcome is. If you don't vote towards the goal, then what are you doing? You're taking the moral high ground, to make yourself feel better. Which is fine, but totally unproductive.
We would just be rewarding the fascist party for the mistakes made by the slightly less fascist party. . It's not ganing us any ground.
You ignored or missed the main point of my comment. Do you think the entire world ends in 2027?
I admitted the country would be worse off between 2024-2028. But you entirely ignored the idea that we might get some concession from politicians if it's clear to them they lost due to being pro-genocide.
Do you think that's literally impossible? That even in a world where it's abundantly clear that being pro-genocide lost them 2024, that they'd definitely stay pro-genocide in 2028?
It's not clear what the better outcome is, unless you can only see 3 years out. If you're able to look 5+ years out, then a Republican winning in 2024 could mean an anti-genocide Democrat president in 2028 that wouldn't have won otherwise.
Sorry, yes, maybe something would change. No the world won't end 2027. But is punishing Biden (who won't be running again) and the Democrats worth giving more power to Republicans and pushing the country deeper into fascism?
If the US loses democracy, the US might be the one committing the next genocide.
I disagree, In the long term, 20 years plus, voting Democrat would be the best option. The only exceptions would be if a leftist 3rd party is getting better polling numbers that the D or R candidate or the Rs became less fascist than the Ds for some reason.