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"voting"
(thelemmy.club)
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this post was submitted on 07 Jul 2026
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Give a better alternative to vote for then.
These so called lefty memes telling people not to vote for the opposition to the Republicans feels like a psi op now. "Only REAL leftys let Republicans take office!"
Look at how angry people get about the rules of their collective fiction. The capitalists put on this big stage play about electoralism and america so you don't notice that all that's actually happening is they're robbing you blind, working you like a dog, poisoning your water, raping children and putting you under 20 different kinds of surveillance. They will never allow you to vote these things away. They will never allow you to vote ther dominance away. The elections whose parameters have been so carefully fixed for you are not a path to progress, they are a busy box meant to keep you distracted until you die so that you don't pour that energy into affecting real change.
Hey, at least I'm using every tool at my disposal. If you don't want to vote, disempower yourself, that's on you.
No one's said voting is the only solution and the magic bullet that will fix things.
there's zero power in voting
Name one other tool you're using
I've been volunteering with a group that's been trying to unite Hispanic and non Hispanic people through education involving worker history, and using those presentations as ways to learn how to organize so we can meet the needs of the community. We've been doing ICE spotting, giving rides to people so they are safe traveling for work or school, getting legal assistance for people who need it and food/financial assistance to people who are hiding because they are being targeted by ICE.
So, you know, that whole localized community building and support people say is fundamental for long term actionable change.
What are you doing, besides saying people who vote love genocide?
It's quite the opposite: its your belief that voting is of primary importance, it's your constant public ritual affirmation of the system that's choking you, that disempowers you. A vote withheld is leverage. A vote given in exhange for nothing changes nothing, and only further normalizes fascist policy.
If the dems can run further and further to the right, while still counting on your vote, then what's keeping them loyal to you? Its like enabling a "friend" who steals from you. By not enforcing consequences, you've taught them that there is no downside to treating you like dirt.
How, exactly, is not voting "leverage"? That's the most trapeze ass brain gymnastics I've ever read. Refusing to vote literally doesn't fix anything. If anything it makes whatever people who do vote have more influence, and with a bunch of conservative old fucks voting, I'm not willing to give them more say in things.
Well you see Billy,
If you threaten to withhold the literal only thing you have that they care about,
That can sometimes result in a change of behavior.
There are better and more permanent ways to change the behavior of oligarchs, but something tells me you're not cool enough for that yet.
Whereas if you keep doing the exact same thing that has never worked,
That's called "insanity."
Ok Jimmy, that's a neato idea, but it doesn't work.
That's like just letting anyone steer your car.
And the people in charge would rather have less people vote, so you're not withholding anything, you're just playing into their hands.
Don't be fooled into thinking not voting is somehow going to do something, Jimmy, that's a known route to failure.
The whole premise of BlueMAGA is that you'll let anyone steer the car, so long as they run Democrat
Source: it came to me in a Reddit post.
As opposed to mindlessly voting for democrats...
Show me any time where people withholding their votes did anything productive with long term change and I'll change my mind.
Voting is less than the bare minimum required to enact positive change. Revolution is necessary, which requires organizing.
Yeah aight but in the meantime I'll still vote for the not Republican which has a chance of winning
Are you going to organize? I'm not an accelerationist so I can't recommend voting for the DNC.
"organize" is vague. I've been doing some activism locally.
But let's say, for the sake of argument, there is a huge socialist revolution in America. One that somehow didn't involve voting and the government at all, something completely outside of the system.
The thing with that sort of revolution is that it takes time. Not only to build, but to actually do something when it's started. It would probably take more than a year, probably more than four years, to effectively take over the country.
So during this revolutionary period, let's also say you're a secret revolutionary so you can get into the ballot box. You're on a secret mission and you can change the election results.
You need to do this in such a way that it's not obvious that the election has been tampered with, so a third party candidate is right out. If they saw one was rejected to the presidentcy they would throw the whole election out the window and you'd also get caught, so it's pointless.
So you're left with generic Republican and generic Democrat. Generic Democrat is doing what generic Democrat does, a lot of lip service to the center and light left, still is in cahoots with big business, saying we can make peace with the revolutionaries, and passively for Israel. Generic Republican is doing what generic Republican is doing, overtly says they are going to attack minorities, overtly saying they are going to crack down on revolutionaries, obviously going to be catering to the interests of capital, and is extremely pro genocide.
So, secret agent, which one do you rig the election for, for the betterment of everyone and the revolution?
This is the most 12 year old "what if" nonsense retort I've ever seen.
I was gonna go somewhere with it but I guess people can't like, imagine something very well these days.
"what if the world was made out of pudding" if you want people to take you seriously make a serious point instead thinking up nonsense hypotheticals.
In case anyone’s curious of this analogy’s origin:
📺 Story from North America
I was going to illustrate the point of voting for the lesser evil while working towards the greater good, but that got shot down so nevermind I guess.
(Just to preface this I am neither and American nor a European)
If you had simply made that point you would have been taken more seriously than the nonsense hypothetical. However it is still a dumb point. Voting for the lesser evil over and over with no reservations is how you have gotten to where you are now. You should vote for things not against things. If you vote for the D fascist over the R fascist they're still a fascist even if they're nicer at home (plus that niceness will only last as long as there is no real threat posed by national movements).
I don't know where you live, but here we don't have the privilege of voting for things. Only against. In an ideal situation we would vote for the things we want, but that's not reality here.
The Democrats wouldn't be making peace with the revolutionaries, lmao. Your hypothetical is already absurd when you imagine that the revolution would risk secret assets to rig elections, but the very idea that outright revolution would be going on and elections would both continue and that the democrats somehow would be aiming for peace with revolutionaries is even more fantastical.
I reject the hypothetical because it will never happen.
Bro never heard of what hypothetical means, lmao
Ok, to scared to answer because you don't like cognitive dissidence, no problem. I'll talk with people who are willing to have a good faith discussion if you're not even willing to try to understand people around you.
Not a great tactic for getting support for your cause but you do you
Oh my god, go back to Reddit you insufferable fucking dork
I know what a hypothetical is, the purpose of a hypothetical is to propose a relevant and reasonable question. Your hypothetical only makes sense if we assume that the DNC would treat revolutionaries differently from how the GOP would, which is historically inaccurate. Accusing me of bad-faith for pointing out where your hypothetical falls apart is nonsense, it isn't bad-faith to reject a useless hypothetical, I took your hypothetical seriously and responded as such.
It was going to illustrate a point but hey, whatever, if you can't figure out how to play in the sandbox it's not my fault. I was going somewhere but if you're refusing to work with me then we can try this a different way or not bother.
What point were you trying to illustrate? That it would be strategically better to organize under a milquetoast liberal regime than a republican regime? My response is how I already responded, neither is acceptable and both would pivot to open fascism against revolution if it actually broke out.
Hell, in modern days, organizing under the GOP is paradoxically easier because they are less competent managers of empire, and spark more discontent among the populace, driving support for revolutionary change. I would never argue for voting for the GOP though, so that's why I support third party voting, at most.
Nah, accelerationism would be supporting the DNC. Accelerationism isn't "ruin everything," it's a strategy that says that if capitalism continuing results in crisis, we should have the most competent managers of empire in the front seat. This accelerates capital accumulation and crisis. I also said I am not in favor of the "ruin everything" tactic either.
That's why I am a revolutionary, and I don't support the DNC nor GOP. I told you why I wouldn't vote for the GOP nor DNC. Sacrificing minority groups is unnacceptable, and climate change is an ever-present danger. That's why revolution is necessary.
You're probably referencing the Nazi bar that stalks communists at the end there, for what reason I don't know.
Sorry, you haven't made a very compelling argument so I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing, thanks.
Ok genocide supporter, just don't complain about Nuremburg 2
Offer a better solution then
A better solution would be doing away with genocidal ghouls like you.
Wtf are you even on about?
"What if my arms and legs turn into rubber and droop down and you have to help me carry my arms like a big firehose"
"Not only is that never gonna happen, it has fuck all to do with studying for your driving test"
"Psh, bro's never heard of a hypothetical."
Dudes argument was the hypothetical could and would never happen, but that's the whole point of hypotheticals. I was going to use it to illustrate a point but hey, they copped out.
What was the point gonna be?
That, while the revolution is important and what we need to work towards, it's also not happening right now. Right now, we need to do what we can. The US government still exists, the empire isn't toppled yet, so while that system is still around, you should be doing what you can within and without the system to help people. So yeah, both sides are bad, but one is slightly less bad and the other has gone rabid, so maybe don't hand over the reigns to the rabid worse people? Both are shit sandwiches but one is on fire and covered in glass, so if you have to make everyone eat some of the sandwich, do the regular shit sandwich.
Your daily reminder that shitlibs don't consider Palestinians human
They really don't
See, you seem to think that electoralism runs parallel to revolution instead of counter to it. The entire purpose of the Democratic party is to kill exactly the kind of reform you seek. We've been here at this idiotic standtill for a hundred years, and now we are out of time to fuck around. From the excellent Caitlin Johnstone, who puts it better than I can:
Ok, so until this glorious revolution happens, while it's getting started, I'm still going to vote, and I'm going to vote against the Republicans until I'm presented with a better option. I'm going to do what I can inside and outside of the system, and I'm not going to throw away agency I've got for a hypothetical revolution.
Not voting doesn't magically make the whole system fall apart, so yeah, it's still going to run parallel as long as that's true.
Go read a book. Seriously.
Revolution comes out of the barrel of a gun, not a ballot box, not because we seek violence but because capital will respond to nothing less.
I know. It's like I was using this hypothetical to illustrate a point. Get some reading comprehension, I was leading up to a point.