this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2024
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United States | News & Politics
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All politicians seek to gain power and uphold the unjust, undemocratic, hierarchical power structures that constrain individual freedom -- power structures that are ultimately backed by the monopolization of violence through the police.
It's just that one party also wants to use those structures to surveil women's bodies, ban books, delegitimize science, push religion, and extract capital from natural resources and workers without restriction.
Same policies, different PR approach. Democrats didn't codify Roe v. Wade, for example, because that would have taken away one of their main selling points. Best you can do is vote different in each election so they have it harder to form a coherent strategy.
If you can't even draw the line at enabling a genocide, there's no point having a discussion with you.
If everybody else is the else is the asshole, mb you should look in the mirror.
don't shame me for being willing to ignore a genocide is a hell of a take bud
Again, what do you want me to do? Obviously if I could choose someone who would impart a weapons embargo and trade sanctions against Israel, I would. But the choices I have in front of me are a person who, while publicly calling for a ceasefire, sends weapons to an apartheid state that is currently genociding the Palestinian people, and another who will not only certainly still send weapons to that state, but also strengthen ties with it, and urge them to "finish the job." Do you want me to stay home, and give the latter option a better chance of winning?
edit: Like idk who's out here praising Kamala Harris and the rest of the Democratic party for their soft-as-shit stance on Israel, but I still gonna vote for her, because Trump and Republicans wouldn't only be worse for the Palestinian people, they'd be worse for the US
Go sign up for an org like PSL, organize your community. Educate people. Go read up on how the MAS movement in Bolivia started.
Dude, if this was your way to try to educate and get people to organize, you've gotta do way better. I'm sorry. You can't essentially accuse folks of supporting genocide and then turn around and try to convert them to Communism lol
You gotta meet them where they are and introduce it softly to them. They're not going to understand your anger toward the state for all it's injustices, because they haven't seen them yet. You're fuckin scaring em off
Besides, I'm not gonna join a political party that is ultimately going to be just another top down hierarchical structure. I'd prefer the decision making in my commune to be bottom-up.
The party you're voting for is committing a literal genocide in which many thousands of people have been massacred already. You have absolutely no shame. There is no educating people like you.
What you're really saying there is that you prefer people who do genocide to continue to hold power while you fantasize about your utopia.
So who are you voting for?
I don't live in US, but I certainly wouldn't be voting for a party committing a genocide if I did.
So who do you recommend the american people vote for?
They can vote for whichever clown they want, but should stop pretending that it's somehow meaningful.
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/testing-theories-of-american-politics-elites-interest-groups-and-average-citizens/62327F513959D0A304D4893B382B992B
So you have no answer then.
You come in here, yell and whinge that everyone is an idiot except for you, and you offer no advice whatsoever.
Of what use is this thread? Or this conversation we're having? You have not solved a single thing.
The answer is that it doesn't really matter. You are placing too much emphasis on your personal voting decision. This is a line handed down to you by ruling class interests. Voting could only ever matter as a block with clear interests and discipline. And even then it will be highly limited, you cannot vote out the root driver of dispossession and marginskization, the economic system itself. They will destroy every bourgeois electoral structure you try to use, and probably you, before you even get close.
So acquire the knowledge and political tools that can change the economic system.
look up what bourgeois democracy means
I offered advice in this very thread, which is to study effective movements like MAS in Bolivia, and to emulate what they do to gain meaningful political power. Here's a starter for you https://www.jstor.org/stable/43284846
What the fuck are you on about? What do you want me to do? Dissolve the state myself?
I'm fucking communist already, just not your hierarchical brand. But I'm still gonna vote, because the US can still swing further to the right.
How do you expect to get people on your side if you say shit like
Jesus.
Nah, you're not a communist, you're a LARPer. There are no historical examples of this non hierarchical brand of communism actually achieving anything. Therefore, you don't actually want to do anything practical to address the problems, and you are content to let the system keep running as it is. The actual tangible action you take is to reinforce the system by giving your vote for the genocide.
First of all, who are you to tell me what I believe? If I believe that living in a commune-style societal arrangement would be better than market or trade-style arrangement, who are you to tell me that I actually don't believe that? Perhaps I'm not a communist like yourself -- I'm guessing you want something that preserves some level of social stratification -- but to me that is equally unacceptable. If we believe that all people are equal, why are we always trying to establish these top-down decision making structures, in which one person has arbitrary power over another?
Second of all, there are actually numerous examples in the archaeological and anthropological records of communities that lived in just that for hundreds of years -- hierarchy-less societies that had little notion of private property. Two books on the subject are Debt: The First 5000 years by David Graeber and The Dawn of Everything, by Graeber and David Wengrow, both of which are backed by academic rigor. This isn't to say anarchist societies are impermeable to outside forces -- obviously those anarchistic societies no longer exist, so you could say that they "failed." But I'm sure you, yourself, would be a bit offended if I told you state communism has never been successful historically, when in fact one of the main reasons it hasn't is because the West has been at war with state communism as an ideology for the past century and a half. Still, these anthropological examples at the very least expand our understanding of what is politically possible, and you saying "it has never worked, so it will never work," is just as silly as you saying "capitalism won, and therefore it must be the correct form of societal and economic arrangement."
Third of all, and I repeat myself, who are you to say that I'm content with how things are, I'm not doing anything practical to address problems, and that I'm giving a vote for genocide? The only way to not vote for a genociding politician in the upcoming election is to not vote at all, which is doing less than I'm already doing, and likely only going to help the party even further right. Not to mention, you don't fucking know me, or know what levels of organization I have or haven't been a part of. And furthermore, why would I be propelled to further organize, when people like you are so unpleasant to discuss politics with? Why would I want to collaborate with you when you talk like this?
We're on the same side, but -- Jesus -- you're making me wish we weren't. Your entire demeanor in this thread is what prevents liberals from realizing what you, yourself, are trying to convince them -- that the American Democratic party are part of the problem.
For the sake of leftists, please do better.
edit: Oh and you're a mod of this page? For the love of god dude please improve your rhetorical skills. I understand your frustration, but American liberals are entrenched in a two party system that forces them to choose between two evils. Alienating them from the getgo is not a good strategy
I'm telling you what you purport to believe in results in tangible terms.
If I believe in unicorns and fairies, who are you to tell me that I actually don’t believe that?
Yes, these things work on a small scale, as society grows and becomes more complex, it starts to require things likes specialization, delegation of works, and gasp, central planning. The same way complex organisms require things like nervous systems and brains. That's why every large scale society ends up being structured in a hierarchical fashion. The evolutionary pressures select for that sort of structure because it's more efficient.
If you are not willing to take meaningful action to stand up to genocide, then you are in fact complicit. It's really that simple.
For the sake of people being genocided by your deplorable regime, do better.
Actually, the archaeological record proves this to be false, as some of the cities they've found consisted of hundreds of thousands of inhabitants. You're just perpetuating a pseudo scientific idea of social organization, in the same way that capitalists do.
But you don't seem to be really interested in actual conversation, just "you're complicit in genocide."
Which, again, there isn't much I can do besides go to protests and declare, "yes, it is a genocide. Yes, the US and the democratic party is complicit, and yes, if Republicans are elected they will attempt to legitimize Israel's illegal occupation of the West Bank and their overall utter destruction of the Palestinian people."
That's small scale compared to millions of people living in modern countries. It's literally an order of magnitude smaller scale.
Seems to me that you're the one who's not interested in actual conversation, and don't want to talk about what the tangible outcomes of your position entail. Instead, you just want to talk about fantasies of yours that are divorced from the material reality we inhabit.
The least you can do is not give your vote to people conducting a genocide. That much should be obvious.
Wow! You've convinced me! I'll never take part in a US election ever again! Where can I join your political party, so that they can tell me what to do from the top-down instead? Yay! I'm not a genocider anymore!
I never expected to convince you of anything. It's pretty clear that it's not possible to have a rational discussion with somebody who says they refuse to join a political party due to its top-down organization while voting for a party committing a genocide within a system of top-down organization without any hint of irony.
I'm really not sure what could be more rational than voting in the direction that leans away from what you don't want (further genocide, further authoritarianism) while still recognizing that direction does not lean far enough, and therefore continuing to organize outside the political system.
What you would have me do is not vote at all (an irrational, symbolic gesture, ceding increased power to hard right authoritarians) and continue to organize outside the political system.
I choose to do both, vote and organize, because that's really the maximum amount I can do here. You say a vote for Harris is supporting genocide. Well, a vote for Trump is also supporting genocide. And a vote for nobody means I have no preference at all. Well, I do have a preference -- I prefer the party that, at least publicly, supports a two state solution. The party which consists of at least a few individuals who actually calls the conflict what it is, which is a genocide. As opposed to the other, which has ZERO members even willing to call it a genocide.
At the same time, recognizing that the system is broken, that the Democratic party is complicit in the crimes of the US, and pushing from outside the political system, for radical change.
I would use the full extent of my power as an individual, while you would prefer me to use only a portion of it. Could you explain to me how that is more rational than using my full power? (and that's a genuine question, because if I know how your mind works maybe I'll agree)
Olympic level mental gymnastics on display