I have problems with people who abstained. The hard thing is, how do you change voter behavior?

  • @Modern_medicine_isnt
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    291 month ago

    I will never look down on someone who voted or refused to vote because of thier conscience. Obviously for this specific question, that excludes people claiming to care about gaza, but still voting for trump. There was no illusion that trump was going to do anything positive for gaza.

    • @[email protected]
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      71 month ago

      I will never look down on someone who voted or refused to vote because of thier conscience.

      You should. They only bring about worse situations at best. Pretending to be moral when what you’re doing is the opposite is pure hypocrisy.

      • @[email protected]
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        161 month ago

        Remember, the most constructive thing you can do is get mad at other, equally powerless people like yourself! This is how political change happens.

        • @[email protected]
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          1 month ago

          Remember! People aren’t powerless! Voting is a power! Not voting is not how political change happens

          • @[email protected]
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            121 month ago

            that’s a good point

            I wonder what would happen if the Democrats tried to activate those chronic non-voters, rather than trying to flip those moderate republicans i keep being told are real

          • Flying Squid
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            41 month ago

            It really does baffle me that some people think a lack of an effort will bring about change.

            • @[email protected]
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              41 month ago

              Removing your support from a party you previously supported is an effort to bring about change. Evidenced by the democrats trying to figure out how to get people to vote for them again.

              I bet you think divorce is a bad thing too.

              • @Rhoeri
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                11 month ago

                Divorce isn’t something from nothing, so I’m not too sure what that false equivalency is supposed to do for you.

                You cannot expect action from inaction.

                • @Modern_medicine_isnt
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                  21 month ago

                  I guess you never just ignored a toddler… lots of action comes from that inaction.

                • @[email protected]
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                  21 month ago

                  Its the same type of situation: would you make the best of a bad situation or blow it up? Would you vote for the lesser evil or abstain/vote third party?

                  • @Rhoeri
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                    1 month ago

                    Voting for the lesser evil is a no brainer considering the threat America faced. In better times, I’d absolutely agree with the ideology.

                    Now is not those times.

              • Flying Squid
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                -11 month ago

                How are you enjoying the divorce so far? Got what you wanted out of it?

                • @[email protected]
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                  51 month ago

                  It wasnt a personal reference. The point I’m making is that it tends to be overwhelmingly bad relationships end in divorce, as they should. It would be awful if people were forced to stay in bad situations like that.

                  The democrats have a horrible relationship with their party members, and so many chose divorce, rightly so.

                  • Flying Squid
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                    1 month ago

                    Yes, I know you still think this is about political parties. It was not then and it certainly is not now. It was about stopping America from becoming the one-party fascist state it has now become.

                    You can complain about the Democrats all you want. They are no longer an entity because there is only one legitimate political party in America right now- the one in control of all three branches of government that will never, ever give that up willingly.

                    So, again, I hope you got all you wanted out of the divorce.

                • @JcbAzPx
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                  31 month ago

                  Well the DNC is now forced to either pull their collective head out their ass or destroy themselves in spite. We’ll see how it goes.

                  • Flying Squid
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                    -11 month ago

                    You actually think the Democratic Party will ever have any real power ever again? Or any party other than the Republican Party?

                    You actually think the Republican Party will ever willingly give up power?

                    You still think these people give a shit about the law?

                    Amazing. Just amazing.

          • djsoren19
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            21 month ago

            Voting is a power that has been consistently weakened for the past four decades in the United States, and is completely useless in a two party system with two captured parties. Political change has historically been accomplished with money and violence; it is extraordinarily rare for countries to vote themselves out of the slide to fascism.

            • @[email protected]
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              01 month ago

              A vote not used is a vote for oppression. Get out an organize, run for election, etc. change is still possible

              • djsoren19
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                21 month ago

                Getting out and organizing strikes/protests and building third-party grassroots political movements are absolutely great suggestions; neither are voting. Both of them require a significant amount of additional effort than voting. In fact, you may even notice that one requires money, and the other often implies a threat of further violence.

                A large reason we are in this is because Americans see voting as the be-all end-all to their political participation. It is the absolute weakest tool to actually enact change in the U.S. political system.

                • @[email protected]
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                  01 month ago

                  Getting out and organizing strikes/protests and building third-party grassroots political movements are absolutely great suggestions;

                  Yes, voting isn’t the only action. As a union steward, I’m well aware. People should use multiple tools, but at a MINIMUM people need to vote(as long as we remain mildly democratic).

                  It is the absolute weakest tool to actually enact change in the U.S. political system.

                  It is a very strong tool in preventing down sliding.

            • @[email protected]
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              01 month ago

              They “get to vote”. Their votes don’t actually matter, at all. We are not yet in a position like Russia’s.

              • @Modern_medicine_isnt
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                41 month ago

                When all we can vote for are one of two people who don’t represent us, but instead represent themselves and the rich… I would say we are close enough.

      • @Modern_medicine_isnt
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        21 month ago

        You are welcome to your own definition of things like moral, only, and pure hypocrisy. But understand that your lack of tolerance is why many of those people didn’t vote.

        • @[email protected]
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          01 month ago

          No, they didn’t vote because they don’t understand how reality works and think that problems will go away or won’t exist if they just ignore them

          • @Modern_medicine_isnt
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            31 month ago

            Or the opposite, they know nothing will change if they keep voting for someone from the same two parties.

              • @Modern_medicine_isnt
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                230 days ago

                Germany changed to fascism, and now look at them. The world united against them, and now they are a democracy again. Maybe it’s like ripping off a bandaid. Or like addiction (in this case to money and greed), where you often have to hit rock bottom to truely recover. I have no idea. No one knows. So no point spending your hate on nonvoters, focus it on the ones actively doing wrong. And don’t get distracted.

                • @[email protected]
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                  30 days ago

                  no point spending your hate on nonvoters, focus it on the ones actively doing wrong

                  You are entirely missing the point. Inaction is an action in it of itself, they are actively doing wrong.

                  But more importantly, and a lot of people never seem to not understand this when I comment things, I can blame more than what target. Like, wild concept right? I am not lacking in hatred for this.

                  So you think it’s fine that literal millions would die overthrowing fascism? It’s just like ripping off a bandaid?

                  • @Modern_medicine_isnt
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                    128 days ago

                    While “you” can blame more than one target, a lot of people prefer one target. And the tone of your post was one of trying to convince others to blame the target you named, with no mention of other targets. That is what compelled me to comment.

                    As for fine with people dieing… no. I am not fine with much of what goes on in this world. It seems to me that human nature drives us to make a society that is good for only a few at the expense of the many. And I see no way out of it.

    • @nyamlae
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      01 month ago

      I know plenty of supposed leftists (really these are people who spend 90% of their time criticizing liberals and calling them “shitlibs”) who are relieved that Trump is in office, say that he is better than Kamala on Gaza, and believe that America’s descent into fascism will spur a revolution that will save humanity.

      Don’t underestimate people’s stupidity.

      • @Modern_medicine_isnt
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        230 days ago

        In fairness, it is possible that it takes a decent into fascismto wake the people up. Or it could be like ww2, where it gives the world a common enemy to defeat. Noone knows. So they could be right. Less probable things have happened… like trumps 1st term. Noone saw that coming 4 years before it happened. The reality is that noone knows what the result of thier actions will really be on the world stage.

        • @nyamlae
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          230 days ago

          “It’s possible” is a god-awful basis for a political strategy that involves electing a known fascist.

          Or it could be like ww2, where it gives the world a common enemy to defeat.

          Who cares? Having a common enemy to defeat isn’t a “good” thing, this isn’t a superhero movie. It’s a sign that evil people have become too powerful. Millions of people died in WWII as a result. And fascism is still going strong around the world.

          There are a lot of very clearly known things, and accelerationists ignore all of those in favour of a crackpot theory of social change.

          • @Modern_medicine_isnt
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            128 days ago

            Well you implied that anyone who believed in the possibility that decending into facsism could end up with positive results was stupid. I just pointed out that history shows it can end well for the rest of the world and that eventually the nation in question can recover. So it isn’t stupid, just a difference of opinion.

      • @[email protected]
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        130 days ago

        I know plenty of supposed leftists (really these are people who spend 90% of their time criticizing liberals and calling them “shitlibs”)

        Seems like what most “leftists” on lemmy are… It’s almost like a concerted effort to make leftists, as a whole, look bad. So people associate the word with these insufferable blowhards, and not actual progressive thought and political/economic theory.

    • @Fedizen
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      -11 month ago

      Single issue voting is a reactionary tendency. I don’t think moral people are going “lets pick one issue and decide based on that”. This is a person whose easily manipulated and not moral.

      A moral person goes “am I doing more harm than good” and puts effort into engaging with that.