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Bar Ran Dun posted:It’s bizarre to advocate for anything that would allow a openly fascist party to win. Okay, explain how voting for centrist Dems will prevent that?
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Jun 26, 2022 17:25
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speng31b posted:This only makes sense if you genuinely believe Democrats are significantly less fascist. If you take their agenda at face value of course they are, but that's not the lived experience of many Americans. I grew up in Florida and my family lives there. I live in Washington state. Democrats are significantly less fascist materially.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:25
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Bar Ran Dun posted:I grew up in Florida and my family lives there. I live in Washington state. It is very difficult to take arguments like this seriously when the leader ship that created the current version of the democratic party which has allowed all of this to go on for decades without any meaningful resistance are still in power with no pressure to relinquish it. I think the “lesser of two evils“ argument would be a lot more convincing if the people whose incompetence has got us to this point were facing any kind of professional consequences.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:28
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SMEGMA_MAIL posted:Okay, explain how voting for centrist Dems will prevent that? Any election win by a Republican is a fascist win. The Dems are merely the status quo of a capitalist republic. Both aren’t great. But they aren’t the same and the “finding out “ stage on that is going to really suck.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:29
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speng31b posted:This only makes sense if you genuinely believe Democrats are significantly less fascist. If you take their agenda at face value of course they are, but that's not the lived experience of many Americans. The Dems aren’t fascist but they’re liberals who represent the interests of capital, and and guess who historically picks the fascists over the left during a time of crisis? So to the vote blue no matter who people, why are you voting for the fascist’s allies?
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Jun 26, 2022 17:30
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Yeowch!!! My Balls!!! posted:a government full of Henry Cuellars will not help you, and the leadership has just finished telling you they will personally intervene to make sure there are as many of him in congress as possible. But neither NYC nor the Democratic Party are "full of" Cuellars so I don't understand your point. The only reason he's brought up is that he's terrible, and as an anti-abortion Democrat, the exception in a party that very obviously supports reproductive rights.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:30
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FizFashizzle posted:It is very difficult to take arguments like this seriously when the leader ship that created the current version of the democratic party which has allowed all of this to go on for decades without any meaningful resistance are still in power with no pressure to relinquish it. Right and we should be doing direct action, in the traditions of direct action (eg abolitionism, suffrage, prohibition, civil rights) in our country right now to change that. It’s probably too late.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:32
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Bar Ran Dun posted:Any election win by a Republican is a fascist win. The Dems are merely the status quo of a capitalist republic. Both aren’t great. But they aren’t the same and the “finding out “ stage on that is going to really suck. They’re actively enabling the GOP by blocking and preventing every legal avenue to meaningfully challenging the GOPs strategy. They are effectively in league with the GOP because both groups represent capital. Refusing to support them means they will be less able to block and suppress progressives.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:32
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enahs posted:I have a question for those in the thread who are arguing that we must continue to vote for democrats - no matter who they field - if they are the only option to vote for other than a republican. What would it take for you, personally, to change your mind about this? Is there anything that would be a threshold for which you decide that voting is not working? Who has argued this? I may have been missing some posts lately with everything that's been happening, but has anyone literally said "vote blue no matter who"? I've seen people saying we need to get more progressive democrats in, or broadly even just more democrats who would vote party line against republicans, but I haven't quite seen what you're suggesting. edit: okay maybe I see some of it now
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Jun 26, 2022 17:32
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small butter posted:But neither NYC nor the Democratic Party are "full of" Cuellars so I don't understand your point. The only reason he's brought up is that he's terrible, and as an anti-abortion Democrat, the exception in a party that very obviously supports reproductive rights. You should absolutely vote for a progressive candidate in your area. I’m baffled why anyone would vote for Joe Biden, Cuellar, Pelosi, or Schumer because they don’t actually support reproductive rights and would rather work to block progressives in their own party.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:34
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Bar Ran Dun posted:It’s bizarre to advocate for anything that would allow a openly fascist party to win. That's why we need to let the party that enables the fascists to win. The Dems are literally in power right now. What is their plan to stop the GOP? Pelosi recently stated that the GOP needs to be strong. Why does she want the fascist party to be strong?
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Jun 26, 2022 17:35
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XboxPants posted:Who has argued this? I may have been missing some posts lately with everything that's been happening, but has anyone literally said "vote blue no matter who"? I've seen people saying we need to get more progressive democrats in, or broadly even just more democrats who would vote party line against republicans, but I haven't quite seen what you're suggesting. CommieGIR bar run dun and the Cuellar district guy all said effectively this in just the last page
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Jun 26, 2022 17:35
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Bar Ran Dun posted:Any election win by a Republican is a fascist win. The Dems are merely the status quo of a capitalist republic. Both aren’t great. But they aren’t the same and the “finding out “ stage on that is going to really suck. Okay, so lay out the steps you see that will lead this preventing the GOP from locking in minority rule forever
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Jun 26, 2022 17:37
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Bar Ran Dun posted:I grew up in Florida and my family lives there. I live in Washington state. If you're living paycheck to paycheck, without affordable healthcare, and in constant fear that law enforcement will casually murder you for no reason, there isn't a huge material difference between voting for democrats who claim to want to improve your circumstances but either are lying or failing for as long as you can remember, and not voting.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:37
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FizFashizzle posted:It is very difficult to take arguments like this seriously when the leader ship that created the current version of the democratic party which has allowed all of this to go on for decades without any meaningful resistance are still in power with no pressure to relinquish it. "Vote for the lesser evil to hold onto the status quo" would definitely be more convincing if there was some kind of sign that people were actually fighting so that you could stop voting for the lesser evil one day, but that's not what we get. What we get is "It's so dangerous to even try to primary Manchin that anyone more progressive than him must be stopped from trying. That's not "pushing back." If you want to convince people to vote for the lesser evil, you need to be clear that one day they won't have to - but if we are called upon to defend Manchin against primary challengers because it's too scary to have a real election, that just means you are asking people to vote for the lesser evil forever. That won't work. Or, to put it another way: https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1540755954395930624
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Jun 26, 2022 17:42
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speng31b posted:This only makes sense if you genuinely believe Democrats are significantly less fascist. If you take their agenda at face value of course they are, but that's not the lived experience of many Americans.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:42
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CommieGIR posted:No, I quoted that because you are gatekeeper. If you really believe that, then you are saying you will reject anyone who voted who tries to join the revolution because you have some convulted idea of what qualifies you to BE a revolutionary. as you may have noticed, i started off by saying there are times and places voting is still worth doing! but you must be aware that it is an exchange: you give the government some fraction of legitimacy, in exchange for the hope it will do what you want it to do. 'you cannot serve both god and mammon' was not the Bible commanding its readers not to use money. it was telling them that one will, inevitably, take precedence over the other. you have been presented with a system that not only says women no longer have the right to an abortion, the portion ostensibly tasked with representing you has made it clear they have no intention of fighting this. the question is not "are you now or have you ever been a voter." the question is "what does it offer you that you are willing to still offer it legitimacy in exchange."
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Jun 26, 2022 17:43
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Mormon Star Wars posted:"Vote for the lesser evil to hold onto the status quo" would definitely be more convincing if there was some kind of sign that people were actually fighting so that you could stop voting for the lesser evil one day, but that's not what we get. What we get is "It's so dangerous to even try to primary Manchin that anyone more progressive than him must be stopped from trying. That's not "pushing back." If you want to convince people to vote for the lesser evil, you need to be clear that one day they won't have to - but if we are called upon to defend Manchin against primary challengers because it's too scary to have a real election, that just means you are asking people to vote for the lesser evil forever. That won't work. "Dems must do something!" says the 2nd most popular and well known person in that group in the country
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Jun 26, 2022 17:43
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bird food bathtub posted:Well when the Left gets a few sugar daddy billionaires willing to build that infrastructure for them over decades and also run a globe-spanning propaganda machine to blare the Left's message in to every brain whether they want to hear it or not maybe that can happen the same way. I'm not particularly expecting the people on the winning side of class warfare to do that though. The left has money, social media presence and other media viewership. Controversial messages get free publicity as well. Do you really think that nobody knew what say, Bernie Sanders was about, whether they wanted to hear it or not? All he did was talk about taking rich people's money, and I saw plenty of media sources covering him. The problem isn't that they don't have money or means to get their message out, the message just isn't motivating enough. Hate motivates. Fear motivates. Try it out. Sephyr posted:The Tea party had a big impact due to having a lot of support across several fronts: tons of money from conservative think tanks, magnates and foundations, and an institutional media either willing to take it seriously as a grassroots movement ('centrist' media like CNN) or fully on board. This is just defeatism before even trying. This idea that leftists can't raise money doesn't work when you look at say, their fundraising totals. This idea that cops will be sent to shoot and beat down just any protest doesn't work when you look at protests where that doesn't happen, including leftist ones. And any media will cover you if you are controversial enough and piss off enough people. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Jun 26, 2022 17:44
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B B posted:He won because the Democratic Party circled the wagons to protect an anti-abortion incumbent when they knew this decision was weeks away, instead of supporting a pro-choice alternative. "He won because his opponent did not give voters enough reason to vote for her. She just didn't "excite" the voters! MAKE them WANT to vote for you!" Or is this reasoning only valid for shitlibs losing to Republicans? I will say this: a lot of you are underestimating how demonic voters are. Bernie was telling his base that he'd cancel 100% of their student debt and give everyone healthcare only to lose to Biden in states in which he had 100x the advertising. I thought that Bernie had it locked. But then, I remembered that Americans are demons.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:45
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small butter posted:"He won because his opponent did not give voters enough reason to vote for her. She just didn't "excite" the voters! MAKE them WANT to vote for you!" Or is this reasoning only valid for shitlibs losing to Republicans? American voters want bad things actually is just centrist defeatism.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:48
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small butter posted:I will say this: a lot of you are underestimating how demonic voters are. Bernie was telling his base that he'd cancel 100% of their student debt and give everyone healthcare only to lose to Biden in states in which he had 100x the advertising. I thought that Bernie had it locked. But then, I remembered that Americans are demons. Yeowch!!! My Balls!!! posted:https://twitter.com/randygdub/status/796229362643152896?lang=en there's something oddly self-flagellating about it; 'truly, we worms deserve no better.' you deserve better. better is possible. the fact that the system will not give you anything better is a condemnation of the system. not of you. Yeowch!!! My Balls!!! fucked around with this message at 17:52 on Jun 26, 2022 |
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Jun 26, 2022 17:50
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Bar Ran Dun posted:Yesterday Stephen Miller thanked Trump for protecting white babies. pretty sure you meant Mary Miller?
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Jun 26, 2022 17:50
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Tatsuta Age posted:"Dems must do something!" says the 2nd most popular and well known person in that group in the country Are you trying to imply that she isn't?
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Jun 26, 2022 17:50
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Willa Rogers posted:Or maybe if the House leadership hadn't heavily campaigned & fundraised for the pro-rights/anti-choice candidate he would've lost. Now this has me wondering how many people donated to the dem party specifically for pro-choice reasons and their funds were used to push Cuellar over the line.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:50
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speng31b posted:If you're living paycheck to paycheck, without affordable healthcare, and in constant fear that law enforcement will casually murder you for no reason, there isn't a huge material difference between voting for democrats who claim to want to improve your circumstances but either are lying or failing for as long as you can remember, and not voting. Where I live in NYC, living paycheck to paycheck will get you free or near-free healthcare. And the undocumented qualify as well. And Permanent Residents do, too, unlike in Republican states. That is a huge material difference to people's lives.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:51
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small butter posted:"He won because his opponent did not give voters enough reason to vote for her. She just didn't "excite" the voters! MAKE them WANT to vote for you!" Or is this reasoning only valid for shitlibs losing to Republicans? if Americans are demons, how does voting help? Do you intend to keep voting for Democrats even if they are lovely? On a different note, we must remember that abortion rights have been eroded for years now. Many clinics across the country have closed due to various laws and the Democrats didn't do anything nationally. They've had majorities in Congress several times in the last 50 years yet they haven't gotten rid of the Hyde Amendment that prevents federal money from being used to pay for abortions. As recently as 2017, Nancy Pelosi said that abortion rights aren't as much of a priority and that ideological causes such as bodily autonomy shouldn't be the main focus of the party because they want to cater to more conservative votes. Why should we vote for a party that wants to cater to those who want to dehumanize women?
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Jun 26, 2022 17:52
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small butter posted:But then, I remembered that Americans are demons. You generally* shouldn't presume bad or evil motivations when a more likely explanation is ignorance or apathy. * This rule of thumb does not apply to Republicans.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:54
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small butter posted:Where I live in NYC, living paycheck to paycheck will get you free or near-free healthcare. And the undocumented qualify as well. And Permanent Residents do, too, unlike in Republican states. That is a huge material difference to people's lives. Question from a non-american: how that works? I mean, how do you prove you are living " paycheck to paycheck"?
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Jun 26, 2022 17:55
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Rigel posted:You generally* shouldn't presume bad or evil motivations when a more likely explanation is ignorance or apathy.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:55
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Yeowch!!! My Balls!!! posted:as you may have noticed, i started off by saying there are times and places voting is still worth doing! but you must be aware that it is an exchange: you give the government some fraction of legitimacy, in exchange for the hope it will do what you want it to do. If you're looking for examples, a few years ago I was able to get a restraining order against my queer partner. Just this week, SCOTUS basically said they want to reintroduce sodomy laws, which would mean I could have gotten arrested, fined, or at the least, our relationship wouldn't have been recognized, meaning I never could have gotten that order. Voting is not sufficient in itself, and I don't personally believe electoral work is even the most important element, but in the meantime, there are millions of people who are going to suffer terribly if we allow Republicans to gain power just because the Democrats aren't making things actively better.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:56
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Elias_Maluco posted:Question from a non-american: how that works? I mean, how do you prove you are living " paycheck to paycheck"? He's just talking about means testing. Showing you have low income and that you don't have a lot of cash in the bank.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:56
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SMEGMA_MAIL posted:American voters want bad things actually is just centrist defeatism. They don't necessarily "want" bad things but "bad" is all they understand. Americans are deeply and profoundly broken. It's often trotted out that if you give voters what they want, they'd vote for you. Bernie was lagging with young voters! How the gently caress did Bernie lose to Biden?
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Jun 26, 2022 17:56
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Crows Turn Off posted:But both ignorance and apathy lead to the same result as actively voting for Republicans, so what is the difference? If Americans are demons, then hope is a lie. If they are instead ignorant or apathetic, you can educate and motivate them to do good things.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:57
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Voting and violent revolution both seem equally unlikely to save us from the course we're on, environmentally or domestically/politically/culturally. The "good" vote (democrats) are more of an impediment to constructive change than an avenue forward, and the increasing terribleness of the Republicans will mean we can never afford not to vote for the party that is demonstratably non-commital or even opposed to doing anything to preserve our state and our world. The bad things are happening, and they're going to get worse. The only way to overcome this is sow an attitude rejecting the whole concept of dems and republicans, the two party system, and what stability and material comfort is offered us by our systems. I'm not ignorant of how many things might go wrong during that course of events, it'll suck. Yet our trajectory is both doomed and unconscionable, we are loving damned for kicking this can down the road. I'm basically advocating the exact opposite of darkcrawlers pet philosophy of hate and division. Strength is confronting and working with people around you, let us not leverage hate but strength. I'm so unbelievably cynical and disgusted regarding the American people at large, but maybe faced with different paradigms many would be less interested in hating the current target of the culture war... if they felt some strength, some community. We cannot achieve that at this point with two party thinking, it requires an acceptance of the fact that our system has already failed. It Americans are so irredeemable as to make that impossible, then we need to collapse utterly regardless.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:57
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Elias_Maluco posted:Question from a non-american: how that works? I mean, how do you prove you are living " paycheck to paycheck"? Purely a guess on my part, but based how to recieve other federal benefits, I would guess you have to explicitly start the process (as opposed to simply qualifying and receiving the benefit) and fill out forms along with your most recent tax return, a recent paystub (to show your current earnings) along with bills to show what you pay for utilities, rent, and other necessities or loans.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:58
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Elias_Maluco posted:Question from a non-american: how that works? I mean, how do you prove you are living " paycheck to paycheck"? I take paycheck to paycheck to mean generally low income. (You can technically make 250k and spend it all and live paycheck to paycheck which wouldn't qualify you.) Yes, you have to prove your income, which is usually just saying your yearly income.
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Jun 26, 2022 17:59
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small butter posted:They don't necessarily "want" bad things but "bad" is all they understand. Americans are deeply and profoundly broken. It's often trotted out that if you give voters what they want, they'd vote for you. Bernie was lagging with young voters! How the gently caress did Bernie lose to Biden? Because the DNC pulled out every possible stop to block him and demonize him when he started getting momentum? The actual American electorate wants much better policies than we actually have. Yet for some reason the policy preferences of the DNC align exactly with the donors and not it’s voters at all.
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Jun 26, 2022 18:02
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https://twitter.com/WrittenByHanna/status/1541094348636520449?s=20&t=RC68DlLXzpLTBKso-tNVAQ This is from a while back, but it shows the contempt the Democrats (or at the very least Nancy Pelosi) has for the people they govern. These people, who the Democrats are supposedly here to save, are being dehumanized by the democrats. I remember Feinstein being contemptuous with children who were rightfully worried about climate change. The problem with voting blue no matter who is that you let lovely Democrats get into power who will vote for lovely things and will try to stay in power for as long as possible.
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Jun 26, 2022 18:02
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XboxPants posted:If you're looking for examples, a few years ago I was able to get a restraining order against my queer partner. Just this week, SCOTUS basically said they want to reintroduce sodomy laws, which would mean I could have gotten arrested, fined, or at the least, our relationship wouldn't have been recognized, meaning I never could have gotten that order. perfectly understandable answer to the question! if you are being listened to, and are willing to accept all the other awful poo poo the government is doing, then why not offer the government legitimacy in exchange! but the key is to understand that is what you are doing. we were taught that voting was an act of civic virtue in much the same way a boss might tell you unpaid overtime shows you're a real go-getter: because hopefully you never realize that you are being scammed into giving up something they have no right to.
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Jun 26, 2022 18:07
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