Democrats are controlled opposition, which the belief is solidified by the recent senate vote. I’ll still vote blue, but if the politician option of it being a coward/establishment then I might as well vote for a rat. Absolute disgusted our elected leaders have no spine as Republicans continue on their quest to achieve fascism and white supremacy.
The republicans have a strong enough, brainwashed base that will vote for them come hell or high water. Around 35% of people who will vote are seriously engaged on their side and will do whatever they need to vote for them. That’s a pretty strong hurdle to overcome
The democrats also have a contingent of Better Blue than Red and will vote for them no matter what.
The largest party next in line would be the Green party, and honestly, they’re barely trying. I mean the head of the party has investments in Fossil Fuel companies supporting fracking. AOC rightfully critisized them for a lack of organiztional development. It’s just this mess of funding going in and our for visibility and the dilution of the “not republican” vote.
So voting for a third party, at best, lets the republicans continue their destruction of the country and sends a message to the democrats that we’re tired of their crap, which has happened twice now with zero changes.
If you want us to vote for 3rd party, you need to deliver us a 3rd party with enough leadership to campaign and win it.
For nationwide elections I agree there isn’t much of a choice, but I’d argue voting third party outside of swing states is still good to express dissatisfaction, and third parties and independents can still win in local elections.
So voting for a third party, at best, lets the republicans continue their destruction of the country and sends a message to the democrats that we’re tired of their crap, which has happened twice now with zero changes
the democrats and republicans are 2 extremes of this same pro-late stage capitalist status quo system so expecting anything to change by vacillating between them is an unrealistic non-starter.
s are 2 extremes of this same pro-late stage capitalist status quo system so expecting anything to change by vacillating between them is an unrealistic non-starter.
I don’t disagree, but voting for a 3rd in a tw- party race will also be a useless non-starter.
history has given us several examples of this happening; with mexico being the most recent one and in our lifetimes.
those examples prove over and over again that it’s the self-reinforcing propaganda that keeps us back, not two-party; spoiler-vote; fptp; electoral-college; etc. nonsense.
Because the system currently only supports 2 parties for president. We would need current politicians to be selfless enough to make the necessary changes that would allow for a 3rd party to receive enough funding and media coverage for the vast majority of the American voters - who pay no attention at all to politics - to hear about them. Our politicians only work for themselves, and have no reason to work against their own interests by introducing a 3rd party - hell, they’ve almost condensed down to a single party, but at least one side of it is still keeping up appearances enough to only terrorize its people a little bit so that they can say they’re better than the other guys.
Presidential voting is just trying to use the system to change the system, which only works when the system itself works. The current system is broken to the point that presidential voting won’t fix it - the best we can do is make sure the lesser of the evils wins until we can garner enough support for an actual overthrowing of the system, then begin the work to make one that would allow for politicians that actually care about us. A presidential vote to make actual change is a wasted vote, because a vote no longer holds that much power in America. The best it can do on its own is hold back the greater evil.
For local elections you should absolutely vote for the most progressive person you can, because the voters that don’t pay attention don’t even show up to those votes, making them much more volatile to the point where a true leftist can win. Maybe we’d even be able to get a new generation of politicians to change the system from the ground up over the course of several decades, if the country lasts that long. But the presidential election is far too padded by people who would vote for their party’s candidate even if they killed their own mother - it can’t suddenly change, not in its current state.
presidential elections do seem like a really lofty goal, but history has given us plenty of examples to prove that it’s possible; with mexico being the most recent one with amlo & shienbaum.
i think it’s a testament to the power of american propaganda that a 3rd party candidate won a presidential election in not only one of the largest and most populous countries of the world; but one of the closest possible to the united states and most of americans are still completely unaware that it actually happened and that it happened in our lifetime.
That’s exactly what I’m saying. Our media has the vast majority of the voters’ sole attention - they don’t know and don’t care that other options exist. If a presidential candidate doesn’t have equal media coverage to the other 2 parties, they immediately lose more Americans than they would need to win the election.
the media and republican/democrat duopoly are powered by the same source, the american oligarchy; expecting the media to ever give airtime to 3rd party is unrealistic.
it’s self-fulfilling propaganda that we’re inflicting upon ourselves.
Correct, which is why the 3rd part is itself unrealistic. We need to change things from the ground-up at a local level, which will take decades, or overthrow everything and start over, which will lead to a huge amount of deaths regardless of whether or not we even win the battle. Regardless, to win the presidential election with a 3rd party right now, we need the media, and that’s not going to happen, so to put your vote in that hole is the same as not voting.
or you can just jump into it like mexico and the other historical examples have done and witness a dramatic improvements in your lifetime without the huge amounts of deaths.
You seem to understand that the vast majority of Americans simply vote for what they see in the media, meaning that only a candidate backed by the media can win, and you seem to understand that we can’t shift the media with our current government, but you don’t seem to understand that, given those 2 facts, there is no way for us to recreate the phenomenon seen in other countries with a larger proportion of people willing to look outside of their televisions and smartphones.
For a 3rd party candidate to win a modern-day American presidential election, either the media would have to validate them, or tens of millions of Americans would have to, in unison, spontaneously decide not to follow the media that they trust implicitly without question.
You cant build popular support for dismantling the system as it is while you’re actively advocating for people to accept the lesser evil.
Imagine if Sanders got up on the senate floor and said “i believe we cannot compromise on ACA subsidies and let millions of americans lose health coverage, be forced to ration their insulin or die because they cant afford a doctor, but I’ll be voting to reopen the government without them anyway because i have no choice”.
Democrats rely on the inherent violence of a 2 party system. Playing into it isnt pragmatic, it’s denial. Either we’re in this together or we aren’t, and democrats have made it perfectly clear that they aren’t.
I’m not advocating for people to accept the lesser evil, I’m asking them to understand that their vote is no longer a form of acceptance - it doesn’t hold enough power for you to use it that way anymore. Your acceptance or rejection of the system comes from your actions outside of the polling place, in the form of protests and what inevitably comes after protests if they’re ignored for long enough.
A vote in the presidential election currently only holds the power to slightly shift the current power between bad and worse. It’s like the trolley problem - there’s no real 3rd track right now, no matter how much we want one. If we start building one now at the local level, maybe there will be one for someone later, but we’ve gotta make our own lever choice without it for now.
I’m not advocating for people to accept the lesser evil, I’m asking them to understand that their vote is no longer a form of acceptance
This is a fun rhetorical trick, but I’m not interested in playing a semantic game over the definition of ‘acceptance’. This:
A vote in the presidential election currently only holds the power to slightly shift the current power between bad and worse
is absolutely advocating for the lesser evil. Fine if you don’t want to call that ‘acceptance’, but what I’m pointing to is not the choice itself, it’s the act of advocating for it to begin with. Spending any amount of energy trying to convey the importance of voting for the moderate wing of fascism is a distraction from the message that both parties pose an existential threat to the working class. If your goal is to build support for radical systemic change, then there should be no ambiguity about what actions are necessary to achieve it. To use your bullshit trolly problem analogy- the ‘two tracks’ forced choice is a distraction from the fact that we need to stop the fucking trolly. Even if we end up pulling that lever in the end, you will never get enough people to get off to help derail it if you keep ensuring them that the worst will be averted even if they chose not to.
You can’t build a popular movement against the democratic coalition while openly admitting that you have no choice but to support them no matter how aligned they are with the fascists. Liberals will continue happily existing in the status quo until it’s made clear to them that their privileged position within it is threatened along with everyone else’s if they choose not to act.
not only is it possible, but it has happened and is currently happening in our lifetimes: either read a non-western history book to see several historical examples of political duopolies being overturned by 3rd parties (until the americans reversed it) or look for modern sources showing a 3rd party named morena overthrow its american backed duopoloy in mexico less than 10 years ago.
Democrats are controlled opposition, which the belief is solidified by the recent senate vote. I’ll still vote blue, but if the politician option of it being a coward/establishment then I might as well vote for a rat. Absolute disgusted our elected leaders have no spine as Republicans continue on their quest to achieve fascism and white supremacy.
Fuck those 6 and fuck Schumer.
why not vote for 3rd party instead of wasting your vote like this?
The republicans have a strong enough, brainwashed base that will vote for them come hell or high water. Around 35% of people who will vote are seriously engaged on their side and will do whatever they need to vote for them. That’s a pretty strong hurdle to overcome
The democrats also have a contingent of Better Blue than Red and will vote for them no matter what.
The largest party next in line would be the Green party, and honestly, they’re barely trying. I mean the head of the party has investments in Fossil Fuel companies supporting fracking. AOC rightfully critisized them for a lack of organiztional development. It’s just this mess of funding going in and our for visibility and the dilution of the “not republican” vote.
So voting for a third party, at best, lets the republicans continue their destruction of the country and sends a message to the democrats that we’re tired of their crap, which has happened twice now with zero changes.
If you want us to vote for 3rd party, you need to deliver us a 3rd party with enough leadership to campaign and win it.
For nationwide elections I agree there isn’t much of a choice, but I’d argue voting third party outside of swing states is still good to express dissatisfaction, and third parties and independents can still win in local elections.
the democrats and republicans are 2 extremes of this same pro-late stage capitalist status quo system so expecting anything to change by vacillating between them is an unrealistic non-starter.
I don’t disagree, but voting for a 3rd in a tw- party race will also be a useless non-starter.
history has given us several examples of this happening; with mexico being the most recent one and in our lifetimes.
those examples prove over and over again that it’s the self-reinforcing propaganda that keeps us back, not two-party; spoiler-vote; fptp; electoral-college; etc. nonsense.
Because the system currently only supports 2 parties for president. We would need current politicians to be selfless enough to make the necessary changes that would allow for a 3rd party to receive enough funding and media coverage for the vast majority of the American voters - who pay no attention at all to politics - to hear about them. Our politicians only work for themselves, and have no reason to work against their own interests by introducing a 3rd party - hell, they’ve almost condensed down to a single party, but at least one side of it is still keeping up appearances enough to only terrorize its people a little bit so that they can say they’re better than the other guys.
Presidential voting is just trying to use the system to change the system, which only works when the system itself works. The current system is broken to the point that presidential voting won’t fix it - the best we can do is make sure the lesser of the evils wins until we can garner enough support for an actual overthrowing of the system, then begin the work to make one that would allow for politicians that actually care about us. A presidential vote to make actual change is a wasted vote, because a vote no longer holds that much power in America. The best it can do on its own is hold back the greater evil.
For local elections you should absolutely vote for the most progressive person you can, because the voters that don’t pay attention don’t even show up to those votes, making them much more volatile to the point where a true leftist can win. Maybe we’d even be able to get a new generation of politicians to change the system from the ground up over the course of several decades, if the country lasts that long. But the presidential election is far too padded by people who would vote for their party’s candidate even if they killed their own mother - it can’t suddenly change, not in its current state.
presidential elections do seem like a really lofty goal, but history has given us plenty of examples to prove that it’s possible; with mexico being the most recent one with amlo & shienbaum.
i think it’s a testament to the power of american propaganda that a 3rd party candidate won a presidential election in not only one of the largest and most populous countries of the world; but one of the closest possible to the united states and most of americans are still completely unaware that it actually happened and that it happened in our lifetime.
That’s exactly what I’m saying. Our media has the vast majority of the voters’ sole attention - they don’t know and don’t care that other options exist. If a presidential candidate doesn’t have equal media coverage to the other 2 parties, they immediately lose more Americans than they would need to win the election.
the media and republican/democrat duopoly are powered by the same source, the american oligarchy; expecting the media to ever give airtime to 3rd party is unrealistic.
it’s self-fulfilling propaganda that we’re inflicting upon ourselves.
Correct, which is why the 3rd part is itself unrealistic. We need to change things from the ground-up at a local level, which will take decades, or overthrow everything and start over, which will lead to a huge amount of deaths regardless of whether or not we even win the battle. Regardless, to win the presidential election with a 3rd party right now, we need the media, and that’s not going to happen, so to put your vote in that hole is the same as not voting.
or you can just jump into it like mexico and the other historical examples have done and witness a dramatic improvements in your lifetime without the huge amounts of deaths.
that is until the americans reverse it… again.
You seem to understand that the vast majority of Americans simply vote for what they see in the media, meaning that only a candidate backed by the media can win, and you seem to understand that we can’t shift the media with our current government, but you don’t seem to understand that, given those 2 facts, there is no way for us to recreate the phenomenon seen in other countries with a larger proportion of people willing to look outside of their televisions and smartphones.
For a 3rd party candidate to win a modern-day American presidential election, either the media would have to validate them, or tens of millions of Americans would have to, in unison, spontaneously decide not to follow the media that they trust implicitly without question.
You cant build popular support for dismantling the system as it is while you’re actively advocating for people to accept the lesser evil.
Imagine if Sanders got up on the senate floor and said “i believe we cannot compromise on ACA subsidies and let millions of americans lose health coverage, be forced to ration their insulin or die because they cant afford a doctor, but I’ll be voting to reopen the government without them anyway because i have no choice”.
Democrats rely on the inherent violence of a 2 party system. Playing into it isnt pragmatic, it’s denial. Either we’re in this together or we aren’t, and democrats have made it perfectly clear that they aren’t.
I’m not advocating for people to accept the lesser evil, I’m asking them to understand that their vote is no longer a form of acceptance - it doesn’t hold enough power for you to use it that way anymore. Your acceptance or rejection of the system comes from your actions outside of the polling place, in the form of protests and what inevitably comes after protests if they’re ignored for long enough.
A vote in the presidential election currently only holds the power to slightly shift the current power between bad and worse. It’s like the trolley problem - there’s no real 3rd track right now, no matter how much we want one. If we start building one now at the local level, maybe there will be one for someone later, but we’ve gotta make our own lever choice without it for now.
This is a fun rhetorical trick, but I’m not interested in playing a semantic game over the definition of ‘acceptance’. This:
is absolutely advocating for the lesser evil. Fine if you don’t want to call that ‘acceptance’, but what I’m pointing to is not the choice itself, it’s the act of advocating for it to begin with. Spending any amount of energy trying to convey the importance of voting for the moderate wing of fascism is a distraction from the message that both parties pose an existential threat to the working class. If your goal is to build support for radical systemic change, then there should be no ambiguity about what actions are necessary to achieve it. To use your bullshit trolly problem analogy- the ‘two tracks’ forced choice is a distraction from the fact that we need to stop the fucking trolly. Even if we end up pulling that lever in the end, you will never get enough people to get off to help derail it if you keep ensuring them that the worst will be averted even if they chose not to.
You can’t build a popular movement against the democratic coalition while openly admitting that you have no choice but to support them no matter how aligned they are with the fascists. Liberals will continue happily existing in the status quo until it’s made clear to them that their privileged position within it is threatened along with everyone else’s if they choose not to act.
When did America decide to remove first past the post? Oh they didn’t …so how is 3rd party not a wasted vote?
not only is it possible, but it has happened and is currently happening in our lifetimes: either read a non-western history book to see several historical examples of political duopolies being overturned by 3rd parties (until the americans reversed it) or look for modern sources showing a 3rd party named morena overthrow its american backed duopoloy in mexico less than 10 years ago.