I made time to listen. To tend to this Democracy, you should too. Don’t listen to people like me, listen to experts that have studied for years.
Edit: Here’s the show notes of what they cover:
“This is the most important election of our lifetimes.” “Voting for a third-party candidate? Might as well throw away your vote!” “You may not like him, but you’ve just got to hold your nose and vote for him — otherwise, Trump might win.”
We’re sure you’ve heard each of these lines many times — we know that we have. But, at some point you have to ask: how can every election be the most important one? Am I really throwing away my vote by voting for a candidate whose policies I agree with? Can we ever actually affect change if we’re always voting for the “lesser evil” candidate or party? Isn’t that just a race to the bottom — or, as we’re seeing currently, a race towards genocide?
Well, in this conversation, we’re going to tackle all of those questions — and much more — with our guest, August Nimtz, Professor of political science and African American and African studies in the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Minnesota. Professor Nimtz is the author of The Ballot, The Streets, Or Both? published by Haymarket Books.
In this conversation, Professor Nimtz explores the question of electoralism as it relates to revolutionary left politics through a deep dive into the history of the Russian Revolution — examining how Marx, Engels, and Lenin approached electoralism and then applying their analyses and viewpoints to today’s situation.
What is the role of elections for the revolutionary left? How can we engage with electoralism without falling into what Professor Nimtz refers to as “electoral fetishism”? What about the “lesser evil” or “spoiler” phenomenon? How can we build a party for the working and oppressed classes without falling prey to opportunism or bourgeois distraction? What can we learn from the European Revolutions of 1848, the Paris Commune, the Russian Revolution, and other historic attempts at revolution — both successful and unsuccessful? These are just some of the questions and themes we explore in this episode with Professor Nimtz.
Yeah I read the summary that was provided but it provided exactly zero meaningful insight about the importance of preventing far right takeover of US government and did little to acknowledge the terrible foreign policy that Republicans have shown again and again. You really think DeSantis/Trump won’t both support the genocide by Israel?
Even not mentioning that fact, who is this taking voted away from? Because it’s not the most dangerous candidates that will have an outsized impact on our democracy, one of which has literally already attempted a coup, calls his political opposition vermin and other fascie shit.
If you take your head out of your ass you’ll certainly realize that not every election is the most important election of our lives, but if you’ve ever studied history or the rise to power of fascist leaders throughout history, you’d also know that this one is quite fucking important to US democracy.
You can always begin change with local elections and grassroots movements. Actually go make the change you want to see in our political sphere. Start by convincing people in your community and it will start to spread. There’s a reason some blue states actually vote for independents and it’s that they’ve done the work to have that luxury by convincing the people around them not to be obvious racist dickheads.
It all has to start somewhere, but if you think it starts at the ballot box I think you just have a fundamental misunderstanding of how change is actually made, at least in the US.
I made time to listen. To tend to this Democracy, you should too. Don’t listen to people like me, listen to experts that have studied for years.
Edit: Here’s the show notes of what they cover:
Yeah I read the summary that was provided but it provided exactly zero meaningful insight about the importance of preventing far right takeover of US government and did little to acknowledge the terrible foreign policy that Republicans have shown again and again. You really think DeSantis/Trump won’t both support the genocide by Israel?
Even not mentioning that fact, who is this taking voted away from? Because it’s not the most dangerous candidates that will have an outsized impact on our democracy, one of which has literally already attempted a coup, calls his political opposition vermin and other fascie shit.
If you take your head out of your ass you’ll certainly realize that not every election is the most important election of our lives, but if you’ve ever studied history or the rise to power of fascist leaders throughout history, you’d also know that this one is quite fucking important to US democracy.
You can always begin change with local elections and grassroots movements. Actually go make the change you want to see in our political sphere. Start by convincing people in your community and it will start to spread. There’s a reason some blue states actually vote for independents and it’s that they’ve done the work to have that luxury by convincing the people around them not to be obvious racist dickheads.
It all has to start somewhere, but if you think it starts at the ballot box I think you just have a fundamental misunderstanding of how change is actually made, at least in the US.
Judging by your comment, you’d really like the podcast. It