This is specifically in regards to the most recent No Kings, because I’ve been seeing, for the first time, normie libs being jaded toward the No Kings protests, I’ve seen surprising amount of “what are these actually accomplishing?” But what’s wild/sadder to me is all the responses being “well, I know they’re useless, but we can’t do anything until November”
Like Americans venerate non-violent protests, to the point all protesting is just completely symbolic, but can’t even take a page out of the civil rights movement and do a nonviolent protest that are actually a protest, like blocking a highway or a sit in, physically blocking people/things from getting places, you know, actually being disruptive, they just accept this tepid shouting parade for a couple hours every 6 months. I’ve been a doomer on American protesting for years now, sorry about the rant post
You aren't going to stop evil people from trying to be evil. You aren't going to stop shitty assholes from being shitty assholes and voting for evil people. You have to get more people on your side than they have on theirs. That's the only way this works. Then, over time, their voices are drowned out, their opportunities to spread their hate are diminished, and they fizzle out. But that takes decades. Trump voters didn't appear overnight. And they won't disappear overnight either.
And you're wrong about people not being paid. The roads we drive on, the public schools we send our children to, and every other public service that's afforded to us... these are all the things we receive in exchange for our participation in governance. That's the social contract we have to uphold: that in exchange for our participation, we receive the benefits of living in a governed society. You can't sit back, enjoy the benefits of governance, and then say you have no obligation to participate.
It may rub you the wrong way that people don't have a choice in the matter, that they're born into it and expected to participate, but that's how it is, at least for now. Maybe someday we'll have a system where people can opt out of public services to avoid taxes and the expectation of participation but I personally think that's a horrible idea that would lead to fairly rapid collapse.
And while individuals struggle to focus on more than one thing, it's wasteful not to approach both problems at once. Not everyone thinks the same way. There are people who won't respond to one problem or the other. Why would you leave those people to do nothing while you hyper-focus on just one problem? Maximize your impact by sending the right people to focus on the right problem.
And you aren't gonna get lazy people to stop being lazy. So i guess the country is fucked.