Sure, more Palestinians will die
Sure, Ukrainians will die
Sure, US minorities will die
Sure, the entire world will suffer from a fascist demagogue at the head of the most powerful country in the world
But have you considered that, for a few brief moments of time,
we created a lot of value for the shareholderswe got to feel smug over the SHITLIBS who wanted to prevent fascism?Ahh, but you see, you disagreed with Stalin that one time, and therefore you were the fascist all along
As I believe in the abolition of capitalism and the creation of a popular base of support for such a measure, instead of a narrow oligarchy oppressing the proletariat and enforcing its will on society, I am a shitlib. It’s a terrible burden to bear. 😔
Correct, my harm reduction framework is much more violent than your harm reduction framework, and is therefore more interesting, which makes you wrong.
Communism sucks! We should have a classless, moneyless, stateless society where goods are distributed from each according to ability to each according to need instead! And according to Hexbear users, such a model is called liberal capitalism.
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And hardly takes that. All you have to do is have a subtle difference of opinion, and BAM! You’re a fascist.
My favorite, however, is that when you point out that their arguments are 100% logical fallacies, you get banned from multiple communities at once.
Did you know if you support Harris, you’re also a transphobe?
Just admit it!
Something something chronically online lmfao touch grass bougie.
It’s honestly such a shockingly privileged position it almost defies belief that anyone could actually be so dense unless they are operating in bad faith. Yes, there are several serious problems in the world, and absolutely none of them are solved by helping the US slip into fascism. Leftists in particular are supposed to hate fascists, so I can’t imagine how anyone with leftist sympathies could possibly want to see what the world looks like with an unrestrained Trunp at the helm. Again, unless they are so privileged they don’t think the consequences would affect them personally, in which case I would call any other profession of external empathy which they might bleet ad nauseum, as questionably sincere.
They don’t think the consequences will touch them. They’re the leftist equivalent of “shitlibs”
it almost defies belief that anyone could actually be so dense
There is no end to the depths of human stupidity.
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But what else am I gonna do with my feelings of impotent rage? Try to actually change something?
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This was a great comment until you implied only conservatives are deciding not to vote for Harris due to our support of Israel.
I was making fun of that short-sighted self-serving nature by making a comparison to capitalist conservatives, not asserting that champagne socialists are, themselves, capitalist conservatives (though, functionally, their actions serve the same goals).
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Prefferring the surety of another four years where they don’t have to think about politics over the chance for fundamental changes in how our political system functions when a large majority of the country aligns against a second Trump administration.
God, accelerationism is so fucking dumb.
If we just let the fascists win then we’ll be able to usher in a socialist paradise! What’s unclear about that to you? Read a book! /s
I hate and love how this is pretty much exactly accelerationism explained without the childlike naiveté.
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A literal pandemic killed millions of Americans and the status quo between the Democrats and the Ivermectin party barely even twitched.
If you think there is a realistic electoral path out of our bipartisan death spiral, I would love to hear it. I’m just cynical enough not to be surprised that neither complicity in genocide abroad or the mass murders of schoolchildren at home will convince the Democrats to start treating Republicans like a threat.
What exactly does “treating Republicans like a threat” look like to you?
The way out of a death spiral is not directly into oblivion. It fucking sucks that genocide is in the category of really important things that need addressing but it is not in the category of things that can be addressed in this particular election.
The electoral path is not at the ballot box every four years at the presidential level. It’s down the ballot and on the other the years. It’s building political capital for the cause you believe in by showing usefulness to the people seeking or holding power and talking to them about the issues you care about. Volunteer for your local house candidate and talk to people in their campaign about how important it is to you that they don’t support genocide, urge them to vote against arms shipments and denounce settlements. Tell your representative how you want them to vote and get other people to do the same.
Working to get people elected gets them to listen to you, that’s why there’s so much money involved in elections.
You’re a fucking idiot.
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As opposed to what, doing the same thing every election in the hopes that it will somehow turn out differently this time?
Every time the Dems look left they lose. They go to the center because they lose control (they need all 3 houses to do anything), so they go to the center to find voters. They’ve had control of all 3 houses for, drumroll please, 4 of the last 24 years. Want them to stop going to the center? Them give them victories.
I wish more people could understand this. Or even made an effort to.
As opposed to trying to make things better and avoid more suffering for everyone.
Accelerationists have never lived through what they claim to want because if they did, and lived, they would no longer be accelerationists.
Accelerationists won’t have to live with the consequences because they don’t originate in the US.
Doing the same thing you’ve always done isn’t “trying to make things better”, it’s “trying to make things stay the same”.
If you want to avoid suffering, you have to be against genocide.
Check your privilege
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I mean, that or all the angry young/middle age voters could, gasp show up to the primaries and move the party to the direction they’d like to see. Instead, the elderly voters, despite being a much smaller share of the population, outvote the heck out of them.
If folks like you paid attention to politics when it matters, not just when it was trendy, things would be a lot different.
Then again, reading what you’ve written, maybe it’s for the best y’all don’t.
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I got into this argument the other day. People’s arrogance and lack of common sense was disappointing.
I’m going to be 100% with yall that comment and post this shit.
Before I go on, let me say I voted dem and know they would be better for the world over Trump.
But is that’s the standard and argument you expect people to vote for, you are in for a rude awakening… To anyone reading this or agreeing with these outright insulting comments and posts about how you know better need to take a long look in the mirror. Because…
If the only support you are giving to the Palestinian and Arab people is voting Dem and having arguments about lesser evils, then you are not helping the situation.
Yes vote dem. But get off your ass and protest, donate, and support those communities currently harmed be democrats disastrous Gaza and Middle East policy. That’s how you sway hearts and minds. These fucking backhanded, self serving, ignorant posts and comments won’t stop anything but prove to those communities that the democrats base does not give a shit about anything that doesn’t directly effect themselves.
Yall are missing the forest from the trees. Not voting for the light genicidal party nor the full genicidal party isn’t some gotcha win for Trump. It’s a failure on our part to demand our party doesn’t continue using our votes to do harm.
call your senators daily and demand they publicly denounce Israel and the IDF. Donate money to organizations that are saving lives destroyed by our bombs. March with your fellow Palestinian and Arab brothers and sisters. Divest and boycott any business with ties to Isreal and the IDF.
But Ya im sure comparing individuals that have lost friends and family to bombs provided by the Democrat administration, to Lord Farquaad. We’re better than this. This is just conservative tactics used on a population that we need to vote blue! We are better than this! show some empathy and get involved. I have Palestinian friends and they would spit in your face if you said this kind of shit to their face because it’s removing the humanity of the 40k people killed by Isreal via bombs provided by Biden/Harris. If you/we don’t care why should they?
Edit: just realized how tone deaf this post is. Who’s more like Lord Farquaad? Palestinian and Arab Americans who’s friends and family are being displaced, starved, and bombed? Or literally the leadership that didn’t even allow Palestinians to speak at a convention and is currently providing bombs and aid to Isreal?
Thank you so much for this detailed response. I think I’m gonna vote for Kamala, not because I think Kamala is gonna do good things for the Middle East.
I’m voting because either we get a president that may or may not listen to protesters, or we’ll get one that will wipe out protesting nationwide.
Yeah tell ne qbout it thinking not voting for either one somehow helps trump 😂 same people that failed basic arithmetic clearly. What they really msan to say is that people voting third party are not helping harris…and yeah thats the point and entirely not the same thing.
49k votes for Stein in Pennsylvania, Trump won by 47k
32k votes for Stein in Wisconsin, Trump won by 22k
51k votes for Stein in Michigan, Trump won by 10k.
Third party voters are useful idiots.
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Its literally how they behave everywhere, business or military.
You are judged by your ability to attack opinions or people you don’t like.
Maybe you should convince the democrats to try and win some third party votes then. Can’t blame people for voting according to their values.
I’m sure you call multiple groups of americans idiots though. Thats definitely not the same thing the republicans do to minorities right?
You’re doing the good discrimination right?
“Useful idiot” has a specific meaning.
Yes you are very intellectual indeed.
Yes, using a common term makes me an intellectual 🤡
I like your clown outfit.
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I am not reading that.
Sorry i shouldn’t have made it so advanced. Ill try to come up with a simpler example in the future!
But maybe sit out of the political bitch fest if you can’t handle how basic arithmetic works eh?
If harris or the dnc want votes, then promote and deliver on policies that people want. If you cant well thats a them problem.
Copy pasting the same smug wall of text every time is not the political own you think it is. In fact, it makes people not want to read it.
Maybe you should get off of the internet and enjoy the nature outside. It’s good for people, y’know?
shrug maybe people should get a clue on what third party votes mean and stop posting the same tired, wrong, and pointless ‘theyre helping Y’ nonsense and ill stop treating them all like children.
Try taking your own advice. A bit of time away from a screen should help with these feeling that everyone who fails to vote for Harris is a Trump suppprter.
If by “third party” you mean Jill Stein, well…
😂 those in glass houses shouldnt throw stones. Funny that harris has one supporting her too.
Is this a bot account or something? Every post has obvious typing mistakes and they all say utter bullshit. When shortly scrolling through their comments I didn’t see a single upvote.
Every comment is on the usa election. Account created 2 weeka ago.
That’s good enough for me. Blocked.
Stop blocking these people! It just amplifies their voices!
I don’t hear anything
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and yes, everyone comment is on the election because thats all I particularly care about atm ;) please support rank choice in your state so this nonsense can stop. I’m tired of watching my country kill people for no good fucking reason. I’m tired of watching people shit on 3rd party voters for having a moral conscience that is clearly superior to the majority of liberals.
I am sorry every argument against 3rd party voters is so easily torn apart by simple addition demonstrating that its harmless. if more people had a spine maybe harris wouldn’t be supporting a genocide. but then again maybe she would. either way hard pass.
beep boop.
Did you even read this article? This is what Liz Cheney actually said:
“Reactionaries make statements. Conscientious and thoughtful people take action because they know moral statements will never change the world.”
If you’re interpreting that statement as indicating support for Apartheid, then you clearly have problems with reading comprehension.
In any case, there’s a big difference between Liz Cheney’s bad opinion in 1987, and the guy who founded the “Knights of the Ku Klux Klan” in Louisiana. There’s quite a gap in scale there.
Your “stone” seems to be more of a bouncy ball.
Dick Cheney is responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. Incredible that liberals will defend the Cheneys, not sure if it’s that you don’t care about people’s lives if they happened to be born in another country, or if you’re just willing to defend anyone and anything if you think it’ll help you win.
How did Stein’s response to David Duke’s endorsement compare to Harris’ response to Cheney’s? Did she accept the endorsement?
Its the part you said about lives in other countries not mattering.
The propaganda there is strong.
Dick Cheney sweet heart. Dick. But liz is also a shit human. Seems like harris is attracting alot of them with a warm embrace. 🤔
But the article you linked is about an op-ed that Liz Cheney wrote while in college? I don’t understand what point you’re trying to make about Dick.
indeed it is. that op-ed is just as bad. anyways.
Dick Cheney voted against imposing economic sanctions on South Africa’s apartheid government and opposed a resolution calling for Nelson Mandela to be released from prison, saying Mandela was a “terrorist”—a position Cheney defended as recently as 2000, when he ran for vice president.
there are a lot of things about dick we can reference here if you want. but that was the relevant bit. I was just pointing in a direction for you to get you started.
Oh the irony here.
If there are only two viable options, not helping one is the same as helping the other.
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Sorry, those are the choices for what election?
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If there’s a toddler about to walk into traffic and you choose to keep swiping on tinder or whatever instead of helping the kid, that kid’s death is still on you.
Samw thing with not stopping trump.
It’s really not complicated.
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Okay, 40k have died, you can choose to be on your phone and another 80k will die ot you can help and only 40k more will die.
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Hey kiddo, instead of deflecting to Palestine, how about you explain how either this voting instance is different than the analogy I’ve given or admit that you’d be fine letting the kid die because of whatever.
If you’re going to be incorrectly smug about voting third party, try answering a reasonable question about it.
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What’s trumps excuse? What’s your excuse? What’s God’s excuse?
I’m tired of all this. I take full responsibility. If I had done more this tragedy could have been averted. I’m sorry to those who have suffered because of my inadequacy. Render what ever judgment you will on me and in the future, if there is one for scum like me, I will try to do better.
What’s trumps excuse?
who cares? he never had a chance at my vote to begin with for a large number of reasons. we can just add it to the pile of shitty things trump is okay doing. but we already knew he was willing to commit genocide. this is a surprise to no one who as paid attention.
What’s God’s excuse?
dunno if i could find him i’d ask him.
What’s your excuse?
for what? not supporting harris? I’ve been very clear on this: genocide.
I’m tired of all this.
so am I friend, so am I. I’m not the one running around trying to convince people to vote for a particular candidate by shaming others using intellectually dishonest claims of ‘helping trump’, ‘both parties were going genocide, pick the lesser evil’, etc.
I want people to get off their ass and vote. I didnt vote for harris or trump, I voted down ballot. I’m also not in a swing state or a state with shitty womens rights. harris is going to win my state regardless. That being said the liberals running around spouting nonsense about helping trump when its clearly and demonstrably not true is going to lead to people not voting at all.
And that my friend is why I call this shit out. because they might have voted down ticket regardless which can only help the situation. and quite frankly im happy to treat people with the same level of vitriol that they treat others. Now I will continue campaigning against genocide and getting ranked choice done, please volunteer so people can stop being asses to each other.
Gotta love people trying to use maþ to defend someþing ð actual maþ clearly says is ð complete fucking opposite of helpful.
😂 gotta love people who fail to contextualize math. Let me know you when you determine what helpful means to me, was that even the goal? Kind of an important detail dont you think?
Someday you’ll realize that your failure to understand motivation was exactly one of the points i was making. But alas i fear that day is far off.
Yeah, because that worked out so well when in 2016 when Trump got elected, the GOP got multiple Supreme Court picks, multiple federal judges were given life terms, and Roe vs Wade got struck down. Let’s see how that plays out when Ukraine falls, war breaks out in Europe, America becomes a theocratic dictatorship, and what little progress we may have seen with the environment completely falls apart and the world goes full tilt towards becoming an uninhabitable hellscape. Whatever the protest was about will be utterly meaningless.
If you want to protest, you protest AFTER you get sympathetic ears into office, not after you get the opposition elected. Trump gets in, then suddenly he’ll give you plenty to protest about, vs protesting when Harris is in office and she actually has a willingness to listen to protests and meet their demands.
They are either Russian trolls or children who have a Disney level perspective on politics, I think. They don’t want to recognize that they have very limited options or the harsh realities surrounding them.
It’s almost like the current and immediate conflict between Israel and Palestinians isn’t the singular thing that the world should have serious concern about, and that realistic solutions to longstanding international diplomacy issues are - wait for it - hard.
But hard things are hard and involve complexity and nuance! I’d much rather call people racist, spout a simplistic solution and call it a day.
You forgot to smugly pat yourself on the back!
Nuh uh!
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It’s a genocide not a “conflict.” An ongoing genocide is the number one thing I will care about and you don’t get to decide I shouldn’t care about it
So you’re gonna make sure that the guy who told Netanyahu “Do what you need to do” doesn’t get into office, right?
Just making sure you call it what it is, it’s not a conflict, it’s a genocide
You’re right, we should definitely end all trade with China.
Ongoing genocide is at the top of my “what I’m concerned about” list. If it isn’t for you, maybe you should reflect on that a little
Some people think an administration and a party that out right lies about a genocide happening care about them. If someone in a position of power, not only ignore but also support clear evidence of genocide and keep repeating statement that means nothing, they are either agent for a foreign country “AIPAC” or they are in it for themselves and have zero care for poor people.
Don’t forget CUFI, it’s actually bigger and more powerful than AIPAC but doesn’t get as much attention. Christian Zionists are insane psychopaths hell bent on destroying the world (literally)
- North Korea
- Myanmar
- Bangladesh and India
- China
- Hamas and Israel
- Ethiopia
- Democratic Republic of Congo
Or is it only what Israel is doing, and only your concern because you can use it as propaganda to tweak the 2024 presidential election in the US?
The one that is made possible by my tax dollars
So definitely China, then, because it’s super impossible for you to avoid products made there and exported to the US.
And fuck those people being genocided where your tax dollars aren’t going, amirite?
And fuck those people being genocided where your tax dollars aren’t going, amirite?
Isn’t that what you’re saying? Except for all of them including Palestinians?
Getting back to the point, why aren’t you raging about Chinese genocide?
Ongoing genocide is at the top of my “what I’m concerned about” list.
I’ll ask again: Which one(s)?
The one my government is aiding and defending regularly
Ukraine, actually.
The US is actively, ongoing, and directly funding and supporting the genocide of the Palestinians
Who is North Korea even meant to be genociding?
I’m gonna venture a guess that the US could more easily stop Israel’s genocide than any of the others on the list. Like your source’s recommendation for how to address whatever’s allegedly happening in North Korea is to go in and overthrow the government, like we did in Iraq. Seems just a little bit harder than making arms shipments conditional.
Their own citizens, I’d assume
I’d ask whether there’s even a shred of evidence that North Koreans are genociding themselves, but I’m not sure if this is another one of those situations where examining evidence is a bannable offense.
Ongoing genocide isn’t at the top of drag’s priority list. The top of drag’s list is the imminent omnicide due to climate change. Drag thinks omnicide is a bigger deal than genocide.
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People refusing to vote for Harris becuase of a foreign conflict they understand nothing about is peak stupidty.
It really depends on which state you live in whether or not you have the luxury of a protest vote. If you live in NY state that has a 20% lead for Harris, sure, some people can vote Jill Stein or something. But if you live in a state that actually might be close or not an obvious blowout, you can’t vote that way. You actually have to be tactical with your vote, not idealistic or symbolic.
Even if you’re in a solidly blue state, don’t fuck around with your vote.
You fuck around, and we all find out.
Back in 2000 I traded my vote for Nader in a swing state with someone in a solidly blue state. We should do that now.
Kinda like a tactical wee?
Whenever I hear people pushing the, you’re either with us or against us, kind of rhetoric it makes me shake my head. It should go without saying, but obviously it doesn’t, that you don’t get to tell other people how to vote, and if you try to, they’re going to think you’re a raving lunatic. If you actually want to convince them to vote, you might want to consider making a plan for how to reasonably sway their views.
Or don’t, do whatever you want, it’s your life.
you don’t get to tell other people how to vote, and if you try to, they’re going to think you’re a raving lunatic
Umm…that’s the entire way we select leaders. The entire campaign for any office, high or low, is telling people how to vote. That’s literally democracy in action.
And it is not wrong to tell people that if they want third party candidates, the path to do so is to start with voting reform. I’m in Oregon, and we’re actually making progress on this instead of just bitching about it or running spoiler third party candidates. We have ranked-choice voting on the ballot this year. If it passes, all our state and federal elections will be decided by ranked-choice voting. We’ll actually make it viable for progressive third party candidates to run for our US House and Senate seats without just serving as a spoiler for Republicans. We’re actually doing something about the two party duopoly.
But you never hear these anti-Kamala trolls suggesting doing something that would actually make a difference. They show up every election, and their platform is ALWAYS “don’t vote for the democrat.” Doesn’t matter what election. Doesn’t matter what year. They always find some reason that you shouldn’t vote for the Democratic candidate. Their criticisms always attack the Democratic candidate and ignore the Republican.
They’re clowns and trolls. Nothing more. They bitch about the two-party duopoly, but they don’t actually want to do anything. The truth is they’re actually just Republican trolls.
Don’t you see how you come across? You think you get to tell other people what to do. But humans don’t like it when you try to tell them what to do. Instead of barking orders and calling names, why don’t you try to convince people that you have a reasonable position?
I’m not sure what kind of red herring you’ve been smoking, and I would love to try some, but these people that you think show up every election and insist that we vote against the Democrat but never say anything bad about the Republicans, who exactly are you talking about? Certainly there are some centrist pundits on TV who have ridiculous positions like that, but fortunately I’m not seeing too many comments on this platform of such an absurd nature.
LOL, what rhetoric? I’m generally of the opinion that voting is an end in itself in democracies, and wish we had mandatory/compulsory voting laws. If you live in a democracy there should be obligation to vote, and the citizens should feel confident that we are accounting for the will of the people. But with the electoral college and first past the post system, there are realities of outcomes. There are really only 2 possible outcomes of a presidential race. And if you live in a swing state your vote does a lot more to tip realize one of those 2 outcomes. So the motivation to vote should be to help achieve one of those 2 outcomes that you find more preferable. If you live in a state that is not even close, that is when you don’t have to worry much about your vote impacting the outcome and therefore have more latitude. I’ve voted 3rd party in multiple elections, but I did so in good conscious knowing I wasn’t impacting the outcome of actual leadership due to the area I vote in. In pure rational choice model, sure, your individual vote likely won’t matter (how often is a race decided by 1 vote?), but if the level of effort to vote is low, might as well do it just in case and for a sense of moral civic duty to a democracy.
oh i’m sure the comments on this post will be real civil
A large portion of the people you’re referring to are Arab Americans. In fact, Trump is now leading with them. I also think Trump would be worse for Palestinians than Harris, but I doubt the best way to convince Arab Americans of that is with condescending memes about how they don’t care about the Middle East.
So pandering to idiots is bad when democrats veer to the center to get centrist votes, but it’s good when Harris takes a stand on Gaza?
Hot take: morons are morons. Left and right. Fuck em.
I mean, her poll numbers are dropping as she goes to the center, so yes, apparently.
I don’t think any serious analysts are suggesting that stronger support of Gaza would help her. If you know of any, I’d love to read about them.
Representatives Ayanna Pressley, Summer Lee, Ilhan Omar, Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, Cori Bush, Chuy Garcia, as well Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, Chicago Mayor Brandon, Johnson, the United Auto Workers and J Street have all warned her that she needs to be more supportive of the Palestinian community. No one is saying she would win if she denounced Israel, but many people were warning her that she had to do something to show Palestinians that she gave a shit about them, like have a Palestinian speaker at the DNC or meet with Uncommitted leaders. She refused to do any of those things, and now the Uncommitted movement has declined to endorsed her, Muslim Women for Harris has disbanded, and she’s two points behind Trump with Arab Americans. I don’t think any serious analysts are saying her position on Gaza is helping her.
None of those are analysts lol
LOL, yeah, man, it’s just dozens of Democratic politicians, a union, and a lobbying firm. It’s not real until some chud with a Poli Sci degree says it on MSNBC.
I mean… You say all that as if it’s supposed to be ridiculous. I specifically asked for a non biased professional opinion.
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If they vote for Trump, overwhelmingly yes.
The numbers according to the Newsweek article show about 45% Trump, 43% Harris, 4% Stein, 6% undecided, and 2% refused to say (not sure why the Libertarian candidate wasn’t included, as he’s on the ballot in 47 states). It seems most Arab Americans don’t want to vote for Trump, but even more don’t want to vote for Harris.
I would argue that Harris is the better vote for people who support Gaza, but I’m not going to tell the Palestinian Americans who won’t support her that what they’re doing is a, “protest vote,” or imply they’re indifferent to the carnage in Gaza. The privileged position is the one where you get to make a cool, detached argument for harm reduction, not the one where you have to choose between which candidate will fund the ethnic cleansing of your homeland.
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The point of the meme isn’t to convince anyone, the point is to yell at people you hate and tell yourself you’re so much better than them. Any claim of “activism” and “raising awareness” is transparently false.
Everyone else is a villain huh? I’m petty sure the author thinks their view should be self-evident and doesn’t understand why do many people here seem to take actions the author would never consider.
I therefore think the point of the meme is to bring some levity into what would otherwise be helpless frustration.
Have some empathy. Don’t think everyone is bitter and miserable.
I empathize with everyone who gets stressed out in election season. These things matter and sometimes it feels like no matter what we do, we’re going to lose, but then other times it doesn’t. It’s a wild ride, and if people want to make things and upload them to social media to relieve their stress, high five. If they get the details wrong, then they’ll get called out in the comments section. That’s life, everyone knows it, no big deal.
If we’re going to preach empathy, maybe we should start by trying to understand the people who are watching their homeland get bombed into rubble with the support of both major parties, not the people sharing snide memes.
Do you only have the capacity to empathize with a limited amount of people owe day or how an I to understand your comment?
Take it as this; when one person says, “you should be less harsh on these people, many of them are seeing their homeland destroyed,” and another replies, “they don’t care, they just want to lash out at them to make themselves feel better,” if you jump in to defend the latter group, it gives the impression that you have more sympathy for the latter group than the former.
It would, but that’s not what happened.
You get what you deserve. I’m done with all of this.
From now on, whenever I encounter someone who says they’re not voting/voting 3rd party, I’m gunna ask if they’ve tried to reach out to their representatives trying to get them to raise some support for what they believe in. Or if they’ve tried nothing and are now just giving up. These people are literally supposed to work for us.
Usually they live in blue states that will partially insulate them from the consequences. Or they’re young and don’t understand knock on effects yet.
Let me take a stab at this. As a non American non voter who is interested in the outcome of the election.
There are 3 parties to this discussion: the Harris campaign (Democrats in general), the Gaza issue voter, and the lesser evil voters.
The Gaza issue voters clearly believe a genocide is occuring, sometimes affecting them personally, and funded by their tax dollars. They would like some concessions from the Dems (the only likely party to take any action) and their only bargaining chip is their vote. It is clear to me that, if a large number of Americans felt strongly and this way, action would happen.
The Harris campaign has been non responsive on this issue, trying to tread the thin line, where they not only look powerless politically, but also unwilling to take a moral stand for what is right.
The lesser evil voters are absolutely correct that she is still better than Trump, and in more ways than just Middle east.
What I think all 3 parties need to do:
The lesser evil camp, instead of mocking the hold outs, needs to pressure the Harris campaign to make a change. Maybe even join them! (See the last point)
The Harris campaign, needs to think long and hard about what they stand for, and the implications of the Republican-lite gamble paying off. There needs to be some fear of losing voters who they cannot take for granted as they shift to the right.
Finally the Gaza voters. Its fine to play the game of chicken, keep screaming as loud as you can demanding change, but ultimately (secretly) get to the ballot and vote D.
There’s a reason the Democrats always end up tilting right and trying to court some moderate Republicans. There’s a reason Harris is spending her efforts trying to pick off some moderate Republicans in the suburbs rather than trying to appease the hard left.
The problem with the hard left voters is that they are fickle and contrarian by nature. Yes, they’re talking about Palestine this year, but that’s just the cause of the day. The truth is, many on the left will simply look for any excuse not to sully their precious clean hands by voting for a mainstream liberal party. They look for an excuse, any excuse will do. And every four year, they find one. For Kamala it’s Gaza. For Biden it was the Crime Bill. For Hillary it was Bernie. There’s always some grievance the far left reactionaries will find, their precious excuse not to be one of the normies and vote for the mainstream candidate. They’re professional contrarians to the core. They start with the end goal - be a cool outsider above the sludge of normal average politics. And then they work backwards from there. Gaza is simply the cause of the day.
Note, this doesn’t happen with the far right. The far right instead recognizes that it’s better to support the mainstream right party, but to work continuously to pull them further and further to the extreme. This strategy is why they’ve been far more successful than the far left. The far right holds their nose, votes for the mainstream candidate, and works to pull the party further to the right in the future. The far left stamps their feet, demands perfection, and takes their ball and goes home. They always find an excuse to not participate. Ultimately, they just want to be the cool kids that are too cool to participate in the normie fight. They will always find an excuse not to support the Democratic candidate. They’re petulant children, not voters candidates can actually appeal to.
This is why Dems always pander to the right. It’s simply a better strategy. Far left voters are fickle, unreliable, and will always invent a new purity test. They’re ultimately politically irrelevant, and they have no one but themselves to blame.
The problem is that any stance on Isreal/Gaza by a Democrat will lose them votes. Hence, the wishy-washy, trying to thread the middle, not really saying anything tactic.
Demecrats should also focus on rural issues more. The city voters are all already democrat and the biggest gains come from appealing to issues of rural voters that increasingly feel as an afterthought of the democrat party.
Agricultural subsidies for owner operated farms is for example is a good policy. Solar panel loans where you use the savings on them to pay them back is another.
That reduces food and power prices then you also need a housing policy.
This is complete trash. There are not 3 issue voters here. There are two. A non-vote for Harris is a full vote for greater support for genocide. A vote for Harris has a chance to change that. Any other thoughts on it are completely ridiculous.
…did…you read what I said?
How is voting for pro-genocide Harris going to reduce genocide?
If you have to choose between losing a hand and losing a whole arm, the correct choice isn’t choosing the hand, it’s fighting back against the system that forces you to make that choice.
And the solution to the trolley problem is obviously to stop the trolley from running over anyone. Thank you for solving this philosophical problem.
Finally the Gaza voters. Its fine to play the game of chicken, keep screaming as loud as you can demanding change, but ultimately (secretly) get to the ballot and vote D.
This is how you destroy your credibility and ensure you won’t be listened to on anything. The Democrats count on the two party system (which they are responsible for, in part) to make us fall in line. They’re not going to shift on anything so long as they can write off our objections as empty rhetoric, so long as they can make calculations based on the assumption that we will ultimately fall in line.
but ultimately (secretly) get to the ballot and vote D.
By this point, it’s too late. Probably already too late now.
You dumb fucks never realized that your true power is NOT your votes. It’s your voice. It’s the power to convince people to stay home. And you just… kept doing that. There’s no threat to be made; the act of making the threat IS the damage.
I’m so tired dude. At least in a month most of you will forget all about Gaza and I won’t have to hear about it anymore.
Im not sure I understand. Are you comfortable with Harris’ right shift being uncontested by anyone on the left?
In the primary? Contest away.
In the general? Fuck that, fall in line. Any blue is better than literal, actual Nazis.
If the nominee was Bernie, I’d be out there bashing any salty Kamala-or-bust people.
the lesser evil camp refuses to pressure the harris campaign and the harris campaign refuses to self reflect on their republican lite gamble; but the gaza voters should give up their only bargaining chip and vote for them anyways?
I doubt the Democrats will learn their lesson when they lose. They didn’t became more progressive when Hillary lost when the Bernie voters stayed home. The only shift to the left in the party that happened was when incumbent democrats got replaced by outsiders like AOC. So if you want to punish Democrats do it during a primary and vote an incumbent out.
So much this. They will go where the votes are.
People who are so worried about their left wing voter purity to vote Dem when the alternative is explicitly fascist are going to come across as unwinnable as voters and will have no effect whatsoever on Dem strategizing any more than insane racists who vote for Trump because they like the idea of mass deportation of all the ethnic minorities in the USA; the kind that tell Native Americans to go back to their own country are not worth the Dems pursuing on policy grounds either.
If your vote is clearly unwinnable and you chose the greater evil from some sort of backwards purity argument, what good is being better than the Republicans on policy grounds for winning your vote?
It is not winning elections that forces the Democrats right, it is losing to the right that forces the Democrats right, you know, to get the votes they have a hope of getting.
It might not matter anyway, because Trump told a rally a while back that if he was elected, they wouldn’t have to vote again and since then has accused Harris of planning to end democracy, and pretty much every accusation from Trump is to cover for an admission. Project 25 is grim reading for anyone who likes freedom.
So yeah, people who vote in a way that makes things worse for Gaza are putting electoral pressure on the Democrats to support the genocide, because calling for ceasefire, agreeing with Gaza protestors at rallies and putting diplomatic pressure on Netanyahu aren’t enough to get votes for Harris, but are sadly enough to lose her votes from “centrists”.
So if you listen to the “genocidal vice president” folks, and ignore the “finish them” “best King of Israel” Republicans, your third party vote or abstention actually encourages the genocide and in your twisted logic you think that people who care about Gaza choosing to not affect the presidency somehow affects it, and that the country choosing the more genocidal candidate will somehow be interpreted as the people not wanting genocide.
americans have committed lots of documented genocides and it’s about not perpetuating them as someone who descends from the survivors of those genocides.
i do not want to help create another vulnerable minority for the sake of the almighty dollar and a blue team win.
you can try to convince yourself that democrats are the lesser evil, as we’ve all been doing here for generations; yet here we nonetheless given a choice between an active genocider and someone who wishes they were.
the democrat’s movement right wards guarantees that it will continue to get worse and i don’t want to know what’s worse than genocide that everyone ignores.
Yes. That’s how the two party system works. Dems are still miles better than Republicans on the issue, and thus don’t need to improve. It sucks, but that’s the hand that’s been dealt I don’t see any better strategy to help the people of Gaza. If you see one, feel free to share.
I just did. I think they should cave (and vote Harris), but the rest of the crowd needs to spend time on drawing concessions from Harris instead of alienating the left. It might just be that the dems are way past redemption with their recent Liz Cheney tours.
There’s also the fact that Harris has to appeal to the electoral college. She’s not just trying to win our votes.
If she took a firm stance on stopping the killing in Gaza the electoral college could very easily hand their votes to trump. Like they did in 2016.I’m fairly certain it’s a big contributing factor as to why democrats keep inching to the right on certain issues. The electoral college has too much power. At the end of the day it’s their votes that count, so Harris has to appeal to them too.
If she took a firm stance on stopping the killing in Gaza the electoral college could very easily hand their votes to trump.
Why couldn’t they do a better job pushing Palestine as a civil rights issue and raising awareness among their voter base like they’ve successfully done with LGBTQ and women’s rights? Or at the very least pretend to support Israel to appear more centrist while stopping the genocide instead of pretending to support Palestinians then handing Israel tons of weapons? Plus it seems like many voters are more concerned about our own economy than what’s happening on the other side of the world, so regarding combining pro-Palestine with their current economic policies I don’t see how that would be a big issue in attracting undecided voters. The only real obstacle I can think of here is donors and the media beholding the party to their interests, which is a much bigger problem than just the electoral college.
Edit: Wait I think I misread your post, I assumed you were talking about swing states controlling the outcome not the electors themselves.
I wonder if there’s some misunderstanding on your part about the electoral college or if I’m just not interpreting your phrasing correctly. It’s not an entity to appeal to, it’s a flawed system that has subsets of the popular vote represented by electors who are pledged to a certain candidate.
The whole system is basically fucked. The Supreme Court can be bought and so can other politicians via “gratuities”… including the electoral college.
They already did not honor the popular vote in 2016 for whatever reason, and it’s not the first time it’s happened in recent history.
I can imagine Harris doesn’t want to give them anymore reason to just say fuck it and hand us another trump presidency.
So I can say now with certainty that you’re not clear on how the EC works in the US. Unless there is a faithless elector, the chosen electors represent the majority vote in their state (or district, in the case of Maine and Nebraska). Some states, due to higher population, have a greater number of voters represented by each elector.
The EC has no mandate to follow the national popular vote. That is by design. Electors sent to the EC are beholden to the popular vote in their state (or district).
Campaigns do not directly court the EC, but they do game the system by focusing on states with a large number of electors and traditionally narrow margins in the popular vote. That’s where we get the term “battleground states.”
So the “for whatever reason” you allude to in 2016 was absolutely for a known reason: Clinton won in heavily lopsided blue states with high populations while losing in lower population red states and closely contested swing states. Faithless electors did come into play that year, but their impact was negligible. Clinton lost handily in the EC despite taking the popular vote.
It’s not that not don’t understand how things are supposed to work… it’s that fewer and fewer parts of the government are functioning free of corruption.
Forgive me for not assuming the electoral college is functioning outside of that type of influence.
Learning how things actually function vs what we were taught are two different things.
we’ve been holding our nose and voting for democrats this entire time and now our choices has descended into choosing between an active genocider and someone who wishes that they were.
each time we’ve descended into a madness into this country; there’s been another crazier level that we squabble about, but end up it doing anyways because democrats are the lesser evil; i don’t want to know what’s crazier than a genocide.
if you’re not american or western european; you too should be wondering what’s crazier than genocide for the world’s only super power to consider and enact because it will happen if we can’t change our political trajectory.
Do you have a better idea, though?
there are plenty of ideas and many of them have been enacted by other countries; the problem is that both the democrats and republicans are effective at suppressing them to maintain their duopoly.
A better idea about what should be done now. Everybody knows that things could be better.
ideas that we can do now are also shared and just as suppressed as any of the others.
the one i’m going to do is voting third party. i live in a state that will never vote for a republican so a third party vote has no bearing on cheeto hitler’s re-election. the american voting system is setup so that, even if it voted for trump, it still wouldn’t matter in my state.
I respect your choice and conviction to “let it all burn”, and without people like you there would never be incentive for the Dems to move left. That said, this is not the action I would take, there are far too many things wrong with the Rs right now.
the republicans are predictable and their descent into madness was easy to see for the last 60 years, since goldwater.
the democrats are more troublesome partially because they have the ability to be better and extol the better aspects of humanity; but don’t for the money and for a team win at all costs; especially the cost of caving in on every single one of your principles just to beat the republicans who don’t give af about principles. the republicans pretend they do care about principles, but only as a means to keep misleading their voter base and now it’s the same with the democrats too; i can’t convince myself they’re the lesser evil anymore when they nakedly do the same things and are actively enabling a genocide.
americans have committed MANY documented genocides and most of them were committed on the the people i descend from; i refuse to participate in perpetuating this generational trauma just so that a couple hundred rich people can keep getting richer.
it’s not a team sport for me like it is for you and also not about making the dems move left; it’s about not repeating the history that turned me into a vulnerable minority and, most importantly, not helping inflict it on others in the name of the almighty dollar and a blue team win. you can try to convince yourself that voting democrat is the best course of action; but most of us here, especially me, have been doing that for the last 60 years and here we are, deciding between an active genocider and someone who wishes they were.
up until now i’ve held my nose to vote for democrats and now genocide is a line that’s too far for me. if we continue to participate in the same form we are now, it continue will get worse as it has been for the last 60 years.
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OF COURSE Trump supporters are selfish and dumb. That’s what makes them great dupes for evil forces. Trump himself knew this, as he’s famously said.
Someone else summed it up almost a century ago: “It works the same in every country.”
Everyone who doesn’t support a corporatist duopoly is lazy, dumb, and/or working for the geopolitical rival to my dominant hegemonic country!
One can only wonder why you have not convinced more people with your message and Harris is now losing.
Pretty sure people are gonna die regardless of which genocidal wacko is elected.
