this post was submitted on 18 Oct 2026
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Climate
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As we all know, if you just keep telling people to vote, eventually they'll just be like "Yeah! I'm gonna take off work from the job that doesn't give me time off, go find a polling place, which isn't close and crowded because the state doesn't run enough polling places, then try to go there in a town without public transportation! Why didn't I think of this sooner?" Then they get there and find out that most of the local elections are uncontested and the federal ones have only a choice between no climate policy and climate policy which is insufficient but delays the necessary work until it's too late. Then after begrudgingly voting, they realize that their districts are so gerrymandered their vote basically didn't count anyway.
Nope, no need to change anything, we just need to keep telling people to go vote. It hasn't worked yet, but... uh....................................
Thats being very generous to the massive fracking bills and military operations (the worlds largest polluter) we see under Biden. Truth is they are both actively harmful. One might be slightly less harmful but they are both stepping heavy on the speeder accelerating us towards climate apocalypse
To be clear, this isn’t telling you not to vote. It’s telling you to do more than vote.
Yes.
That's not really how it reads? The end of the comment is the definition of apathy. "Oh my vote doesn't matter"....
Just because someone is accurately describing the effectiveness of a single vote does not mean they are saying you shouldn’t do it. It’s supposed to be a call to action. Like, if you really care about political outcomes, voting should be the least thing you do.
I don't think it accurately describes a single vote. That's like looking at a large data set and only showing a single data point. The point is that there are A LOT of votes.
It doesn't read like a call to action to me at all... Reads like a doomer post, which is what comment OP says they're mocking but it definitely doesn't read that way.
Either way, I'm in agreement with both of you, but I disagree with the approach. I believe it's the opposite of the stated intent.
Personally, I think it's more doomer to insist that everyone beat their heads against the wall doing the same one thing that has been proven to not work than to say, "hey, this isn't working, we should try something else."
Totally, I don't insist on beating any heads against any walls.
But simultaneously, I am against apathy posts.
Voting is the baseline. The absolute minimum effort required. Its the least effective yet simplest thing to do to fix things.
Anyone who doesn't vote doesn't get an opinion. But pretending that voting will magically fix everything on its own is equally dumb.
Given that voting doesn't really affect policy (like at all, studies have shown this), I don't think it can be considered the baseline. If you want to count yourself as politically active and not just passively acquiescing to the system, you have to be involved with organizing your community.
"thoughts and prayers are the baseline for gun control" and other supernatural beliefs meant to steer people away from actually changing anything
Indeed!
Nothing is substantial until it is substantiated. If these poo-liticians and the Killionaires that bribe them actually gave a fuck about the climate they would have enforced policies that substantiated substantial changes DECADES ago when we first started seeing climate change's effects....
Havent seenthat yet...
Im starting to think that the people oughta govern themselves and get rid of these Shillionaires and their bribed Poo-litiicians and their mercenary pigs so that we can sunstantiate the substantial changes we want to see for ourselves.
We should come up with some kind of name for this new system. Perhaps we’ll use some Greek? That usually sounds cool.
Oh fuck off. Look up early voting in your area. Nearly every state has it, they are available on weekends. Stumble into one and you'll be in and out in less than 10 minutes.
Or you can sit there as an uninformed dumbass and go "Oh woe is me! I haven't spent 5 seconds looking up how to vote so I'm just gonna sit and complain that it's all hopeless and pretend there are no alternatives to voting exactly on election day! Oh why must the world be so cruel!?"
Learn where and when you can vote early. You have weeks to do it. You are a piece of shit if you can't be bothered to do that.
I have voted in most elections and my area is good about at least early voting and mail in voting. But not everyone lives in a state/city where this is the case and not everyone is in the same situation as me.
But more to the point: Go on shaming people. That has worked SO WELL in the past. Clearly there is absolutely no need to change our strategy.
EDIT: Also those policies like early voting, mail in voting, time off work, etc. are the kind of things that we need.
God, the amount of comments that rip on a reply calling the kettle black is nuts. Did you read the original comment?
Why are you defending apathy comments if you yourself believe it matters?
This guy isn't saying it's rainbows and butterflies.
Edit: I see, you ARE the original comment. Didn't see that at first. Your Original Comment is an apathy post. You are shaming people yourself Pot.
This is a thread about asking why Americans don't vote at a very high rate. I am pushing back against the sadly very common doomer narrative that people just don't care, are lazy, or stupid. For starters it's just wrong, but also it accepts a framing where every single individual is responsible for the current situation we're in, and therefore they just need to change. This is an entirely unproductive way of looking at things. Individual responsibility blame games are just about making the people making them feel superior to others. It encourages you to sit back and basically just say "I guess democracy doesn't work! I did my part!"
My comment is the opposite of advocating for apathy. I am pointing out that more needs to be done to fix this problem. If you're in a position to be angry at people for not voting, you should go do something about that. What are your state's electoral laws like? Could you change them? What about participation in civic organizations like unions that can organize people to vote? Are there any around you that are doing that work? Do anything other than just telling random internet strangers that they should go vote.
I agree, I'm saying your comment DOESN'T advocate for any of what you've described.
I'm sorry, I forgot we're on the internet and Poe's Law applies. Next time I'll add a "THIS IS SARCASM :D" disclaimer to the end of my posts when relevant.
THIS IS SARCASM :D
I don't know how you read a post going through all the structural problems with elections which culminates in a point about people not dealing with non-voting in an effective way and not get the point. Other people did.
THIS IS NOT SARCASM :(
Oh, I picked up the sarcasm at the very end... It's just not well applied.
Sarcasm doesn't work well as a tool to advocate... It's great for advocating against though...
You seem to love sending absolute walls of text
That’s fair. Sarcasm can be misunderstood and places the work of interpretation on the reader.
I’m not really the most concise writer but complex issues can’t be easily discussed in the length of a tweet.
THIS IS NOT SARCASM :(
Tell you what, let’s meet in the middle. I’ll work on my writing skills and you work on your reading comprehension and attention span.
THIS IS SARCASM :D
I’m sorry if this got a little mean/heated. I just get really mad about certain issues. We’re on the same team and that’s what matters.
THIS IS NOT SARCASM : (
Man I get heated too, I'll happily meet you in the middle.
Someone pointed out to me that I was too quick to make angry comments so I've been working on sending neutral or positive ones instead....
Still working on it.
No, you're right. Clearly the strategy of telling people to go vote and then complaining about the difficulty of voting while never mentioning early voting is the right way to go. After all, that's been the tactic for the last 5 elections, and they've all gone so well!
So you think the tactic of lying about how voting works is a better tactic?
Also, the last 5 elections have been shit, because the candidates and policies are all shit, not because of the voters.
Y'all live in some barbaric states that haven't already gone to mail-in voting as standard.
You've had decades to do it. Your state is a real shithole if it can't be bothered to enable this.