Chat

: i am just not sympathetic to the idea that voting for Biden constitutes blood on your hands in a meaningful way. i think if you accept this line of argumentation, you would ultimately have to bite the bullet that this could also be said of paying taxes[1]–and i certainly don’t begrudge people for paying their taxes even as this lines the pocket of the war machine, so then why should judge them for voting?

This is such an important perspective that often seems ignored in these discussions. There is such a wide nuance to being an American and our participation, be it taxes or voting. It's always seemed clear to me that at bare minimum voting for the lesser evil is the first step down the path of doing the right thing as a citizen. However I also would say that I do somewhat feel this to Trump voters, but I would say that's more about the intent. I would hazard the assumption that if you're voting for Trump again it's likely because you have been pushed to have hate in your heart, not because his foreign policy is just so stellar. Whereas if you're voting for Biden the intent is likely to not have the other guy.

OP's post is a very good conversation of exactly this. "I won't support a genocide, so I won't vote!" That's awesome, but by not participating you are inherently accepting to the default winner - your bare minimum participation of voting could have had an affect which you abstained from. In a hypothetical landslide of 1 vote for Trump, suddenly voting has a lot of power. By the way, some of our votes in the last 8 years have been down to barely triple digit breaks - legitimately 1 small town voting could have swayed the results in that towns favor. Voting matters quite a bit.

Given our current circumstances, in regards to deciding a vote for the lesser evil, I personally see a former president who placed as many restrictions as possible on specific citizens while relieving as many restrictions as possible on (mostly specific) corporations, and who had been all too happy to engage with the wrong sorts of International Relations, belligerently ignoring allies and goading more dangerous countries. I also see a current President who is historically known for not making the best decisions for the people, while also having a lot of policy that specifically is (or at least tries to... or at bare minimum says he'll try to even if he won't which should go without saying for sooo many Presidents).

Which by the way, yes, I would rather have a President who says he is for ____ rights but maybe doesn't always have policies that fully align with that. As opposed to a president who says he is actively against those same rights, and actively promotes harm to certain demographics... Damn right. Send yourself back in time 10-15 years, try to remember the general public perception from 2008 to 2014. We were calmer citizens because we had a rational leader who wasn't spewing hate speech at every turn. Of course other factors had an effect, media exacerbation and whatever else, but that wouldn't have been the case had we had literally any other President.

And that's the whole thing of it - if you don't vote, the voter has no power (giving it to the rest of the voters). If you do vote, the voter has very little power. At. Bare. Minimum. If you are a voter who canvases in your area, you have made a much larger difference - you have gone above and beyond the bare minimum. And who knows, maybe you just happened to live in the town that changed your swing states results. The thing is, the bare minimum should be much more than just voting. Just voting is how we got here in the first place. Just voting isn't ever going to change anything, because just voting alone doesn't rally people together under a united ideal.

All this to say - I personally do not think that it is wrong to take what power you have to vote for "fascism in 50 years" as some have recently started to say about Democrats. It's not wrong to vote this way when the alternative is fascism in 4 years. Futhermore, I think it's also admitting that doing the absolute bare minimum just isn't entirely effective.

As U.S. citizens, voting is what we have to do at the bare minimum. We should all be out actively campaigning in our local elections specifically to encourage, inform, and expand our collective understanding of politics. This works two-fold, because as we become more engaged @Kwakigra@beehaw.org we become much more observant. As you say, if Dems are on a path to evil, isn't the solution for all of us to get as possibly involved as we can? At a certain point, we would be the Dems playing the game.

I say this as someone who has written to my California representatives about many things and having gotten response letters basically calling me an idiot for me expressing my wishes for him to reconsider his position, and why the evil things he's supporting are actually a good thing. It's obviously not easy, we're fighting against 2 generations of propaganda and a media mogul. Some say that we are too far gone, though I don't believe in that sort of defeatism.

We have many steps that we need to take in order to be set on the right path again. It should start with revitalizing the nations public education system, with a stronger focus on a healthy life-work balance. The fact that basic things about the U.S. system aren't taught anymore has been a huge setback. I'm young, I didn't have any sort of homeroom or home ec, it took until my senior year in High School to even learn about how we do our taxes (and it did nothing). These classes were supplemented with "extra critical thinking", which has clearly failed, something that can be seen by reading just about any comment about a piece of media online. Home Economics, Time Management, and Critical Thinking all meld to make life at home manageable and enjoyable. From working with schools it's been clear to see what I went through growing up has gotten even worse, especially with Covid putting all of the students on screens and a significant portion of them hardly even learning during that time at all.

Catch up our nations students and we'll be well on our way back to civility. Fighting against the anti-education crowd and having homeschooling be far, far, far more rigorous than it currently is - state dependent I'm certain but the 3 I've lived in, CA, OR, and WI, holy shit they are awful. Homeschoolings seems to have almost become co-opted by the anti- crowds, I've regrettably only had 1 good encounter over the last 10 years and it was because the school remained open during Covid, to which the parents said screw that we're homeschooling. As opposed to homeschooling because they'd have to get a vaccine otherwise, or because the schools "agenda"...

Anyway, I've said far too much and gotten pretty off topic. It's been a while since I've gotten to say anything about this and it's clearly been pent up, otherwise I'd have wrapped this up many paragraphs ago.

I am also primarily a utilitarian thinker. What has me considering the deontological position on this specifically is that, for utilitarian purposes, I have voted to allow our entire federal government to continue to drift right. When choosing the lesser of the two evils every time I did, I think I failed to consider that my permissiveness would embolden the lesser of the two evils to become increasingly evil as they were aware I wasn’t voting for them but against their opponent. I gave them license though my voting behavior to move to the right as much as they wanted and be financially rewarded for doing so because they knew they would always have my vote as long as they weren’t as bad as their opponents. This genocide is a red flag to me that since I have been voting to avoid immediate consequences, the ultimate consequence is that some of those consequences I was afraid of are now guaranteed from both options to varying degrees. The more I have rewarded the Democrats with my vote which they need to be elected, the only thing they need from me, they have no incentive whatsoever to do anything but what benefits themselves just as long as what they do isn’t as bad as what the Republicans would do. Average people aren’t funding their campaigns, we are only handing our votes over to them because their opponents are worse, despite both of them becoming worse all the time.

When I talk about whether to grant or withhold my vote to my only actual option, it’s a matter of currency and power rather than morality. I have found that if I always grant my vote regardless of the behavior of who receives my vote, they know they have license to do the things they were doing when I voted for them and no reason whatsoever to change course according to what I would like to see and not see, such as a genocide.

You are absolutely right that there isn’t an option for president outside blue and red. Our system isn’t built for it. Blue knows I’m not suicidal and can’t vote for Red, so the question becomes whether or not I will tolerate them becoming worse every cycle as long as during each cycle their candidate isn’t as bad as their opponent who is also getting worse every cycle. The option is whether to support Blue regardless of what we do and watch the system deteriorate, or demonstrate to blue that there are limits to how far right they can move regardless of who they’re up against with the hope that at least one side will stop getting worse because there are still consequences.

The reason I want to stop this cycle is survival. I think we are guaranteed to drift into explicit oligarchy as long as both sides are allowed to continue moving rightward. Every election since 2010 has been worse than the one before it, and I don’t think there’s a reason that would change after this cycle. The Republicans are going to try to capture the appeal of Trump even though they haven’t yet, and the right wing runs on delusion so they aren’t accountable to anything. All they have to worry about is telling lies that people strongly want to believe. The Democrats have to contend with reality and in my view are party far more likely to react to something that happened here in real life so they have better chances at being elected in the future.

I will easily concede that this is awful timing. Trump is a massive threat as you described. If I thought he would be highly successful in everything you mentioned, I would not consider doing what I’ve been advocating for. Even though I know him to be incompetent and without much support outside his base for anything he wants to do, any amount of success he has will be a problem. The primary reason I see fit to act as I described is because I predict the 2028 election will be between someone who is to the right of Biden vs someone who is to the right of Trump, and every future election it will be more and more difficult to change course from where we’re headed. All future elections could be about how appealing Republican lies are vs how many people don’t want them elected and are willing to vote for anything else.

It was never a secret what an awful man Joe Biden is, for many of the reasons OP listed in their post. Many people in 2020 said something similar: "Elect him and then pressure him to the left." It's a useless sentiment.

Since 2020, despite partisans' supposed pressure, we've not only seen another genocide, but homelessness has spiked, wages have not improved in a meaningful way, education and health care are still cost-prohibitive, prices for everyday goods are 2-3x what they were Pre-Biden, Roe has been repealed and SCOTUS has made it very clear they're going to target queer people next, and they've added hundreds of billions more in debt to help Ukraine while neglecting Americans. He even withheld $600 of promised COVID aid. He's been such an atrocity of a president that it's likely to get Trump reelected.

And this is coming from someone who voted Biden in the hopes that a cultural win against rising fascist interests might turn back the clock, but I was wrong. Biden, either in his greed or fecklessness (depending on who you ask, I suppose) has created the conditions for a probable fascist takeover. Personally, I think it's greed.

I'm not sure there's a reasonable argument to be made that there isn't a fascist candidate in the next presidential election. One candidate will stab you in the front. The other will stab you in the back.

Also, just a personal pet peeve, but people need to stop using the word 'democracy'. We don't have one, and it was designed that way.

If Biden changes course in a major way I won't have to risk a Trump presidency just to prove I am serious about not rewarding genocide with my vote they need for elected positions. If they actually believe us rather than making us prove it and take every measure to end this genocide economically and in international court, it would at least quintuple my faith that our democracy isn't doomed. My cynical side thinks that they are confident it's all a bluff and will make no changes, but I would highly prefer the good path.

I agree with pretty much everything you’ve said here, and I agree that more extreme protests have historically been highly influential regarding governmental policy. This is probably the more important part of trying to redirect Biden’s behavior. There have to be some consequences or there is no incentive to change course, and a major public uprising could possibly be more significant than an election loss when considering policy. I suppose to avoid having to do what I’ve been discussing, leaning harder into public disruption could cause some changes without having to risk Trump. It’s definitely Plan A.

It's like you didn't even read the original post. Your first three paragraphs are redundant because the OP already mentioned that they agree with you, barring calling it bullshit.

Your utilitarianism the the whole problems they're pointing out, if you read the actual post, you'll notice that all it does is draw us further and further to the right, with no end in sight.

This is a different argument than the one I was making but I will address it.

The next 4 years would be far better under Biden than Trump. I don't think it's good to consider allowing Trump to win and I am terrified of what could happen if Trump were re-elected. The reason I am considering allowing this immediate consequence is that it could be a better option than continuing the unabated rightward shift of both parties. Every election in my lifetime prior to this one, on issues such as war there was an option for and an option against. Now that genocide is on the table, the option is between for and for but worse. How did this happen? We assume there are no consequences for permitting the Democrats to do whatever they want as long as they're not as bad as the Republicans and here we are. Both parties continue to move right and voting for every candidate who is more right-wing than the candidate who came before them just because they aren't as radical as their series of opponents who will always be more right-wing than them just means we are demonstrating that we will tolerate anything they do as long as it's not as bad as their opponent who will always be worse. There is nothing to stop the parties from continuing to move right. What is the next horrible choice we will have to make? Do we really think this election is the end of the process of moving away from voters and toward corporate interests which went into high gear with Citizen's United by both parties? When the investors are all universally profiting from genocide, how can we redirect Democrats from going with that and profiting majorly from it other than causing them to associate supporting such things with election loss?

I largely agree - which is why voting uncommitted in Michigan (or other states where it's available) is a clever and effective idea.

The fine line, though, is this: it's logical and just to spend time between now and the fall applying pressure to the campaign and administration to change course via uncommitted votes, campaigns, protests, etc. It's not logical and just, however, to spend time telling others they should not vote in November, which has become sadly common in every left-leaning space I spend time in.

The former could result in policy changes. The latter is pretty much just pushing to allow fascists into power.

It's really a game of chicken. I'm not about to say I'll give Biden my vote as long as there's a genocide and this primary is the safest way to send that message. However, they know that we don't really have a choice to avoid what could be a catastrophe so they could very well assume we're bluffing as they usually do. This is why I can't afford to indicate if I'm willing to vote for a genocide to prevent a worse genocide because they will take any evidence that we're not serious to not take our demands seriously. Why would they change anything if they know we'll vote for them regardless? Importantly, I've engaged this conversation in February during the primary. The most I'm willing to say is that I'm not arrogant enough to be absolutely certain about anything. Actually driving off the cliff with Biden's campaign would be a disaster. I'm really hoping we can swerve before the chips are down and we find out how many people are serious.

Unfortunately, the DNC is wise to this and are counting on it. They understand that whatever we say or whatever criticism we give no matter how severe, many or even most of us will still vote for them anyway because of the duress. There is nothing they need to do to earn votes because that's not the decision we've been making for the last few cycles. They know the choice is between voting for your own destruction, not voting and allowing the possibility of destruction, or voting blue no matter who. They can keep moving right as long as the Republicans are moving further right. I completely understand voting like this since I did it myself last time. This is only my thinking this time, and whatever I say my vote is expected so unfortunately I can't expect any change unless possibly if they face consequences for not having the votes of those who share my thinking. Emphasis on being possible, because they definitely didn't change anything after Hillary lost other than to get rid of superdelgates and resort to other underhanded tactics in the subsequent primary.

I'm just as uncertain as you are. I posted this here because I wanted more perspectives. No one knows how to fix this, but it's at least encouraging that more people are recognizing that it needs to be fixed especially among younger generations.

Although I can't deny that I don't feel good about voting for certain Democrats, if voting for a Democrat now were likely to move the country left instead of right I would do it and consider it to be the right decision. Your argument is interesting to me because you are advocating the opposite action to get the same result I desire, which is to stop the Overton window from continuing to drift rightward. I would like to focus on this aspect in particular.

I think politicians, especially if they are skilled enough to be elected into federal congress or the presidency, think in purely practical terms. I do think Biden would be less likely to economically support this genocide if he were out of office because he would then lack the power to support it or to do anything else as president. Of course this would mean the situation would be in Trump's hands which I agree would clearly be worse. The reason I am considering allowing this worse outcome to transpire is not because I refuse to vote since I don't feel represented or strongly disagree with both candidates(I don't think I'll see a general election candidate I'm happy to support in my lifetime), but because I am deliberately withholding a vote they would have received if they had not continued to facilitate a genocide which could be established as a line they may no longer approach or move past if they want to win. If the Democrats lose an election because of an issue their voters are especially vocal about, I think that they would be less likely to support that issue in the future. If we tell the Democrats that they must stop facilitating this genocide but vote for them regardless, having our votes is significantly more important to them than our disapproval which they could simply disregard since they already have our vote. If they lose an election because they moved too far right on an issue, they will probably stop moving right on that issue. In 2016 Hillary Clinton lost the electoral college despite winning the popular vote, and the message voters were sending at the time was "We do not want Hillary Clinton." As a consequence, they didn't run Hillary Clinton again because they want to win. If in 2024 Biden loses and the message voters send is "We do not want to support genocide," it is my belief that they would be less likely to support genocide in the future because they would consider it a risk to their electoral success.

As for the public reaction to Trump's election and presidency affecting the overton window, I have observed the opposite effect of Trump's presence in American politics. Trumpism, though popular, is just to the right of the Overton window. He has a solid base of support and disapproval outside of that. Trumpists are not being featured as legitimate political thinkers on any platforms other than their own. The radical right wing elements inspired by Trump have not become an accepted part of American culture. I have never heard from anyone who feels neutral about neo-nazis or the proud boys. January 6th was not seen as a simple evolution of our politics. Though it is true Trump has emboldened many of the the worst of us, there is a visceral contempt of Trumpism everywhere he isn't worshiped, and Trumpists are the minority. As I mentioned above, the only Trumpist who has a chance at winning an election is Trump himself. All this being said, Trumpists are still a legitimate threat of course. I am only arguing that Trump inspires more revulsion than support even though he has enough support to be a threat himself.

Unfortunately, I don't think Trump is going to be the worst Republican we will see if the Democrats believe we will support anything including genocide as long as it's less severe than what their Republican opponent promises. Right-wing lunatics have been a massive boon to democrats since Trump was elected as there are more people like all of us who would rather see Trump's ideology defeated than elected regardless of who they're up against. The track record of Trump-endorsed candidates demonstrates this. Since the democrats don't need to run on their own merits when they are up against a lunatic, they are empowered to do anything and everything short of what their opponent is threatening. Since winning an election is massively influenced by campaign funding and the majority of campaign funding now comes from the corporate world due to the Citizen's United decision, the Democrats can govern in favor of Wall Street against workers all they want just as long as they don't go as far as a Republican would. This means it is to their advantage that the Republicans move even further right or prop up more lunatics. They can then follow along and enjoy the benefits of increased funding. This is the pattern I've been observing since 2010 and is specifically what I want to be some limit on. I think genocide is a clear enough issue that it might possibly have an effect, and those invested in the infrastructure passing through Israel will seek to have have their economic interests rewarded through methods other than genocide. I think this pattern will continue until it is stopped in some way, and I hope it is not stopped due to the end of democracy in general which will happen if our two dominant parties keep going right without ever looking back. I don't think it can be stopped if the Democrats never find a red line which could cost them votes even against the lunatics they're up against.

Are we a house, or a baby-crushing machine with a cushy bench affixed on top for the oligarchs and war profiteers to enjoy the view from?

Biden did exceed my expectations by doing a lot of what you mentioned, and I was fully ready to support him as better than nothing rather than bad but not the worst. I would have been thrilled with another few years of non-chaos and a handful of good deeds which are even more progressive than almost anything we’ve had in decades. After he did a 180 on unions after getting called out for busting them we have had some real meaningful progress in the area of labor rights. I was ready to accept Biden not on terms of my own desires and values but in the context of the pressures of an American president, especially one since the Citizen’s United decision. Like pretty much everyone who typically votes Democrat, I have my preferred candidate but would support the nominee considering the danger of the alternative.

I never thought I would be a single-issue voter and I’ve even thought that engaging like that is naive and even immature. My thing is that once both of my choices are pro-genocide I have really started to re-consider the political direction we’re heading and what has lead us to this point. I don’t think we’re now experiencing how bad it can get, and I’m now considering how things might have been different if voters had made a stronger stand by letting pre-Trump Republicans win to show the DNC that their behavior will have electoral consequences. The thing is we really had no idea how things would go when this kind of thing would have far less dire consequences.

I am fully aware that Biden is far from unique in his support of Israel regardless of what they do. Although especially severe, the current ethnic cleansing going on is far from the first push and is happening in the context of the greater genocide which has been occurring for the better part of a century. The US has almost always supported and covered for them, as you mentioned. You are also correct to say that Biden isn’t himself driving this genocide and is even attempting to reduce the carnage through diplomacy. I will even go so far as to say that a Democrat supporting Operation Cast Lead in 2004 wouldn’t have been a deal-breaker for me if they were running against GWB, and I consider that event to be heinous. I am holding Biden to a different standard than I would have in the past, and this is due to context.

In 2004 Operation Cast Lead was a fringe issue with managed exposure and general bipartisan support. Only those who had gone out of their way to learn about the situation outside of American media, government, and education in 2004 had any idea what was really going on. Anyone making a big deal about it would have been easily swept under the rug. Everyone else can credibly claim that they had no idea what was really going on. The whole Overton window was from “I support Israel” to “It’s a very complicated situation, and I support Israel,” and this was due to the extent of the information Americans were commonly exposed to at that time.

2024 is quite a bit different than 2004. Information is now out of control for good and for bad. All the information which has always been managed to be pro-Israel still exists but is now no longer the whole picture the average person sees. Despite the best efforts of the US and Israeli governments to manage exposure carefully of this event, no such ability for such overwhelming control exists at the moment without cracking down on free speech. As a consequence, far more people than these governments are comfortable with have seen what they don’t want to be seen. The New York Times and the Washington Post are the same as they’ve ever been, but it is more commonly understood now than ever that these sources are far from objective as they claim to be, and foreign english-language media is more accessible than ever. The information is everywhere and now everyone at least has the opportunity to learn as much about it as they can. At this point anyone sticking to the government line is responsible for the behavior of choosing to believe lies for whatever reason, and anyone interested in what is true and is not true understands that our government is facilitating a genocide. It is now a well-known and well-understood issue compared to decades past.

Although Biden didn’t himself order this ethnic cleansing, he has chosen to support it economically and politically. What has been happening would not be happening to this degree if not for this support. I consider the behavior of the Biden administration to be instrumental in the level of destruction which has been undertaken, and I blame Biden for not even conditioning our political and economic support on the polite requests he’s been making which are barely even acknowledged. This behavior disturbs me because it’s as if they aren’t even considering holding Israel to any reasonable standards regardless of the new rapidly spreading awareness that what Israel is doing is plainly horrendous. They expect no consequences for fueling the genocidal fire.

With that context, unlike in 2004 the general voting public is aware that a genocide is happening and their voting behavior knowing this is going to be taken into account in future political strategy. They know that we know there’s a genocide happening, so whatever message we send with our voting behavior is going to be considered in future political action. I hope the message they receive is “We know there’s a genocide, and the reason you lost is because we can’t support a genocide” rather than “We know there’s a genocide, but your threat worked so we voted for you anyway. It’ll take a lot worse than that to lose my vote!” I know that from the administration’s perspective, 2024 is no different than 2004 in terms of the potential consequences of funding a genocidal action. I think it would be a good thing if they were wrong about that.

To clarify my argument, I don’t think that since Biden is bad that alone would lead me to allow a far worse evil to take power. My argument is that supporting a Democratic candidate when they know that we know about the genocide they’re facilitating, they will have a basis to push our boundaries even further in the interests of their campaign funders as they have been doing since since Citizen’s United. I think it’s pretty late to take the extreme action I’m advocating for in my post to allow Trump to run rampant in the hopes that the Democrats understand there are limits to what voters will tolerate. If the lesson they learn is that there are no limits to what voters will tolerate as long as there is a worse option, then I’m afraid our two evil options will continue to get worse.

four paid sick days a year

If this is progress we are all truly screwed.

The populist message has always done so well regardless of political party because we all see how broken the system is and candidates like Obama, Sanders, and even Trump capitalize on that message to win hearts and minds.

I don't think it's correct to describe the populist message as overwhelmingly successful. Sanders didn't win. Trump won once and lost once (and in fact lost the popular vote both times). We can trace back a bunch of other populists who failed, too.

The nuts and bolts of elections and campaigns tend to reward coalition builders. Populists with no establishment allies tend not to do well (note that Obama courted the popularity of the masses at the same time that he was locking up endorsements from the Democratic Party's old guard, including Biden, Byrd, Kennedy, and Dodd).

Humans tend to sort themselves into coalitions, led by organizations. Popularity is a feedback loop, and the fickle public can and does change their collective mind over whether someone is beloved or not.

Congratulations, by not voting for Biden none of your politics are being represented and you're helping Trump get elected.

As a bonus, by helping Trump get elected you'll be actively aiding and abetting whatever Trump decides to do, which I'm sure will be great for the people in Gaza.

But you're not crossing your line in the sand so I'm sure you'll sleep well at night knowing you stuck to your guns.

Thanks for the support, although I wish it was a happier topic. @Schmoo@slrpnk.net made the excellent point that direct action has historically been majorly significant to affect US policy and is in my view the best path for right now. It's time to escalate.

I live in a very red state and until recently didn't have the option to just jump to another more progressive state. But I also recognize that the ability to just jump ship is a privilege that the majority do not have. Even now I am on the fence because this is still my home where I have grown roots. The issue is those who decided to abstain or vote 3rd party in 2016 allowed for the rise of Trump. From there SCOTUS became a right-wing powerhouse and Roe was overturned. If Hillary had won in 2016, SCOTUS would have been provided justices who would not have taken that action. As much as I disliked Hillary, I knew she was the safer choice when it came to my reproductive rights and the rights of other minorities.

I cannot for the life of me find a gynecologist that isn't some crazy pro-lifer obsessed with bAbieZ and the overturning of Roe only has made this worse. I've called gynos in my conservative state asking if they're trauma trained and every damn time they act like they've never heard of sexual assault. It's all talk of how can we get you to have bAbieZ because how dare you want to be a child free woman in such a godly state! How many other women are in my position in similar red states and delaying vital checks for cancer when the only providers want to shame you? All the decent gynos that I would have seeked care from have no desire to practice in a state that is so restrictive on abortion so instead it caters to the extreme.

As much as Biden's backing of Isreal bothers me, I will still vote for him because the situation above will only get worse for I and other women. There's also the whole war against Trans and Gay individuals by those on the right, and voting for Biden is another dam preventing their way of life being persecuted federally. The right is itching to hurt or even kill those they do not agree with and abstaining to vote just ushers this possibility to be greater and allow Trump to return.