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“I Am Done Voting for the Lesser of Two Evils. I Will Not Vote for Joe Biden in 2024.”
(inthesetimes.com)
this post was submitted on 25 Oct 2023
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electoralism
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the plan is not to vote at all.
I'm failing to understand this POV. Even if you think neither outcome is good why wouldn't you do what minimal thing you can to keep the worse option from happening?
The vote is performative.
At this point, you're voting for the window dressing.
Which bill was it where dems legalized gay marriage?
Which bill was it where they protected abortion rights?
Which bill was it where they protected the right to marry other races?
etc.
Basing your record on a few supreme court decisions, which can (and have) get overturned is fatuous.
Aside from taking a slightly less shitty stance on things, you'll find that for the most part, the dems, when they had full government control, did fuck all to enshrine minority rights, provide a living wage, or make steps towards universal healthcare.
I used to think like this, I'm 50 and voted like my life depended on it since '92. All I've seen since then, are conditions getting worse and worse, regardless of who was in office. I bought Obama's schtick and watched as he did half assed measures and frittered a majority away.
And by the way "b-b-but conservative democrats" line has been used as far back as I can remember. If you consistently see members of a party blocking vital legislation over and over and over again. Maybe that shit is performative too.
This country needs a reset.
Shit, is this not actually the law, just another SC ruling?
Loving v Virginia
Look if Genocide Joe wants my vote, he could try doing something to earn it instead of just saying "I'm not Trump".
I can agree Joe is a genocider and still vote for him instead of trump*.
Trump is happy to apply his genocidal ideals to his own countrymen. Biden, less so - mostly directed outward/foreign. If my vote has influence on this matter, even slightly, who am I going to choose?
Moreover, I'm not pretending my vote is some sacred gift I can only give to the most perfect candidate. Rather, I am happy if my trash vote can negate a even more-trash vote.
* I predict being the_dunk_tank material and I accept my fate.
Also I want to say, I am really trying to understand this. even if I say wierd/bad faith/something stuff it's an accident and I want to understand the point of view of "anti electoralism" -- if that's the right term.
I can't. It should be an easy red line to have
That's relatively straightforward. Elections are a distraction, they redirect energy into a form the political order can digest without changing. The more you invest in them the less you are putting into alternatives that are more useful. Vote, if you want, it might do marginal good in an infinitesimal scale, but agonizing over voting is playing into a system that exists to funnel all your energy into itself.
I guess this is where I'm lost. They mail me ballots, I fill them out and mail them back. It's almost the least I can do. If every person opposed to fascism did the same, I believe fascism's encroachment would be slowed.
I don't know what you mean. Democrats keep winning by the numbers. Fascism is still encroaching. It's been encroaching my entire life, and Republicans have won the popular vote once in that time. People do vote. And this still happens.
I'm not telling you not to, I keep saying it's fine to do if you feel like it. So is watching a movie or getting a snack at 3 in the morning. You do you. But don't act like it's fixing anything. It clearly isn't. That's why you get to keep doing it.
I'm not sure I understand your point. The way the popular vote influences the result is a travesty. But that doesn't mean that voting (or not) in a way that encourages anti-suffrage is better. There's no way things will improve by walking away - that just hands control to fascism faster.
By that same token, if it doesn't do anything then why are some states working to expand voting and ease-of-voting versus some that are trying to restrict it in various ways? There's a clear party divide on this topic in the US and one side is more fascist than the other.
Oh I see, yes I should clarify. Democrats keep literally winning elections, in addition to sometimes not winning them. Regardless of the result fascism gets no further away.
Let's not forget Obama, drone striking American citizens and their children without trial or warrant. Or all the money and weapons he gave the Saudis and Israelis to continue the project of violent extermination they were both embarked on. Or the way he aggressively pursued whistleblowers like Manning and Assange who tried to warn the public about the things the government was doing. Nobody forced him to do those things, he did them voluntarily.
Let's not forget that he rode into power in control of the entire government, both houses of congress, the Court and the executive, and did nothing to enshrine any protection against the reactionaries that he ostensibly dislikes. Why didn't they codify abortion protections into law? Or take steps to secure voting rights, if those are so important? Why did they piss away their control of, again, ALL of the government? For what, Obamacare?
Why is Joe building the wall for Trump, overturning regulations that protect sacred indigenous sites and wildlife to do so? Why the fuck are the cages still there? Why are we flying Venezuelans back to a country that our country's policies have turned into a humanitarian disaster?
I cannot reiterate enough how much it's totally fine if you feel like voting for these people. Do it, if you want, you'll contribute in an imperceptible way to the total vote count at the end, and that might be satisfying for you or, as I've acknowledged a few times, it might even mean some marginal benefit happens sometimes. I mean, not literally, your vote still doesn't matter, whether you did or not would not have made the difference. But sometimes an okay thing might happen.
I think it's fine to do that. I think if you want things to change you should look at historically what sorts of things actually had to happen to defeat reactionaries. It's basically never voting.
(Well I wrote out a whole thing but then the lemmy web UI disappeared it somehow 🤦 ... I'll try to rewrite some variation of it)
I understand and agree with your assessment of the dems, but to me this is exactly why the "lesser evil" argument sways me. Republicans would be doing all the same things, and worse - e.g., "don't say gay" bills and other anti-lgbtq policies, rolling back abortion access, etc. Are dems wrong for not protecting those things when they had the chance? Yes -- But Reps are the ones actually doing it.
From my casual bystander reading of hexbear/lemmygrad content over the past few months, "totally fine if you feel like voting" was not a part of my understanding of the anti-electoralism sentiment I've read. My impression was more "that's dumb, you're dumb, anyone who votes is dumb" and no one with a conscience should vote. Which, to me, seems like simply handing over the keys to drive us off a cliff.
Anyway, thanks for taking the time to write everything you have, and trying to help me understand. Cheers
That should be true. Its totally sound reasoning. Except the system in the US is designed to frustrate popular will and facilitate minority rule. Individuals simply voting their conscious will never solve anything within this system.
Liberal democracy and the spectacle of the election, is a perfect vehicle for the rise of fascism, but it actively hinders what is needed to stop it
Even if it's designed to "frustrate popular will", isn't not voting frustrating that will even further? That just seems to be playing into their hands.
To me, the question is accentuated further when considering those people who willingly give up their suffrage which many others fought and died for. And further with the sentiment of "If voting didn't do anything, they wouldn't try to stop certain people from doing it".
I can't shake any of that when the barrier is so low and the stakes can (occasionally) be so high.
No. And that's not even what I'm saying. I'm saying individuals voting individually is pointless. Voting can only really matter as a collective action as part of an organized group or movement. In short, exactly what the people in the article are doing. Organizing to withhold votes in key districts unless demands are met is far more powerful and a better expression of democracy then what you're talking about.
This is just lib shit. You're not really engaging with what any of us are bringing up, especially if you think these silly clichés are worth mentioning. I'm sorry for being harsh, but i feel the need to be direct here
No one is saying its hard to vote or cares if you or anyone does it. The larger point people here are making is that the spectacle of electoral politics and the illusion that individuals can engage in this low effort behavior and actually effect any meaningful change is a distraction that steals energy form organization and movement building which is the only way to effect change, and the only way that any political action, even electoralism, can accomplish anything.
You should be embarassed to have written this. Withholding votes is only a strategy when you are able to vote. A person with no access to food cannot go on a hunger strike.
Also, the saying that you are butchering was originally "If voting could change anything, they'd make it illegal".
Biden has Trump beat on deportations, police funding, military funding, and he's completely unwilling to stand for abortion right, trans rights, and debt forgiveness
And now he's a genocider, so what actually are we supposed to be afraid of from Trump? At least with Trump most of the media and 50% of the establishment will oppose him, unlike with Biden where the 90% of the media backs him and 80% of the establishment cosigns his genocidal ideals
I fear Biden and his ilk more than I fear Trump and his incompetent clown show, because at least with Trump I can be confident most of the country will oppose him
I can't even be confident that so-called "leftists" will oppose Biden, because here you are arguing we should vote for a man who's committing genocide
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/45a/298.html
Linked elsewhere in the thread, but W.E.B. Dubois explains it here, in ways that still ring clearly today.
Thanks for pointing out the discourse from elsewhere in the thread (and from history) , I'll give it a skim-read soon and an honest sober read tomorrow
If neither party represents your interests, what's your vote doing? Making sure that they can both ignore your interests even more?
The US two-party system is a complete and abject failure of democracy.
If a fascist finds it important to vote, I intend my vote to counteract theirs.
It's less important that someone "represents my interests" than it is that overall suffrage and equity is reduced at a slower rate. It's sad, but that's what it seems we're up against in the modern republican party.
The two party system IS a failure, and I have a laundry list(*) of electoral changes I want throughout the country, some of which are already in place in a few voting districts including my own. How is not voting going to improve any of that?
(* If you're interested I can add them tomorrow when I'm more sober and at a keyboard)
If you're forced to vote for a party to avoid the collapse of your democracy, that's no longer a democracy. That's a one-party state with a few more steps.
If you are doing this at the expense of not taking even a chance at stopping the reduction of equity, you are in fact helping the reduction of equity even as you are slowing it.
If they want my vote they've got to do something to earn it
I was willing to vote for Bernie Sanders in 2020 for harm reduction reasons. He was the compromise. Dems rejected it.
It's a pressure campaign. They're offering to stop if Biden backs a ceasefire.
I don't follow - this seems to be about a very specific thing; I was speaking very generally trying to understand the anti electoral stance.
Maybe I missed the demonstrative nature of your example - if you're willing to explain further, I'm happy to read/learn.
Thanks for your perspective and time.
Sorry, I assumed you were talking about the article. I'm not anti voting, I'm against using running for office as a strategy for social change.
No worries, that's a reasonable assumption. My apologies for being off on a tangent here in the comments :)
Thanks for inspiring me to be conversational
I think it boils down to a few factors.
Why would they ever change if people keep supporting them?
Materially all you are doing is helping the Democrats keep being shit because they believe they are entitled to the vote of every decent person on the basis of this lesser evilism. Breaking their base, even if it lets the Republicans win one cycle, would actually pressure concessions out of them.
I appreciate what you're saying, but its not resonating with me.
"This is the most important election of our lifetime" -- yes, I know you all make fun of people for saying that, and I am mostly quoting it because I know I'll get called out if I try to dance around the wording. But, that sentiment seems true to me based on what R's have been getting up to lately. They seem poised to take over if they win one more cycle.
I appreciate your attempting to exercise self-awareness, but I am again asking you to step back and look at the bigger picture: Let's say there is validity to the claim "This is the most important election of our lifetime." I reject that claim, it seems to have no material basis, but let's say it is real. What is this really saying? "This is the most important election you have encountered yet" This is a critical distinction that is never articulated because the simple fact of the matter is that what you are saying didn't become a meme this cycle, it became a meme -- being generous -- in 2016 (less generous would put it in the mid-20th century). 2016 got this treatment, 2020 got this treatment, 2024 is getting this treatment, and can you tell me with a straight face that 2028 won't be treated the same way?
So we have a pattern of crisis being proclaimed, where each one is said to be worse than the previous crises, and there is absolutely no model to stop it except by being so myopic you can't see the future 3 inches past your nose. Let us say that it is "the most important election of our lifetimes [so far]," that's because it beat out the previous crises, but the ones after will surely be worse. Even giving what I view as an unreasonable amount of leeway to your hypothesis, the calculus of risking Trump winning in order to actually make positive change and develop a means to break this vicious cycle of ever-greater threat of catastrophe. You are sinking and debating that we should spend forever slowing how quickly we sink instead of trying to get out of the water.
We make fun of it because its been an excuse for like 40 years if not more