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this post was submitted on 11 May 2024
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Yes we both agree that you can vote and also protest. My argument here was that voting for Dems does not move them left, so I'm not sure how protest is relevant.
But since you asked for the alternative, I think the american labor movement of a century ago is the last truly successful model. It required a large peaceful protest movement, various forms of violent direct action, and a broad base of support in the populace who would not be swayed by propaganda. Those who died in that fight earned us the weekend, workplace safety, and dignified retirement. They planted the seeds for the most progressive era in American history.
I think we have to reckon with the fact that recent protest movements all failed. George Floyd defunded 0 police departments. The Womens March was a punchline. After Occupy Wall Street, banks and hedge funds just got bigger. Anti-Iraq war protests may have curbed some brutality, but that war continued for 2 decades.
These protests are on the right side of history, and changing peoples minds is good, but to change peoples material condition you need to change policy too.
I know there’s alternatives, my point was just that voting Dem doesn’t preclude, or slow down, any of them.
It eventually has to. But they have to win a lot for that to happen. In the past 80 years, the US never had three consecutive Dem terms, which means the needle is very much in between of the two parties (if not leaning right since Republicans actually had them once). So both can continue with their current policies and hope to be elected.
In the end that’s what matters to politicians, more than upholding any values they might champion: getting elected. Therefore the only way to shift the window in a FPTP system (barring violent protests, which are viable but a different matter), is to keep electing one party and send the message to the other that, unless they calm the fuck down, they’re not getting the seat ever again.
There’s no way that after three or four consecutive Dem terms Republicans will still keep campaigning on killing abortion and LGBT rights. They want that seat, and, like every political party in a similar system, they’ll compromise to get it. At that point, when their opponent isn’t a cartoon villain anymore, Dems will lose their main selling point and will be forced to prop up actual leftist policies to retain votes.
I still dont understand why, after 3 or 4 victories, the Dems would abandon neoliberalism and become a leftist party. Why would they change their winning strategy?
Is there any precedent for this in history?
Because they don’t win due to neoliberalism, they win due to their opponent being the literal antichrist. The point is to force Republicans to change their (supposedly) losing strategy, and have Dems react to that.
You can see how, for example, after the three consecutive Republican terms of ‘80-‘92, Democratic candidates have shifted more towards the right on average, in order to recapture more “average” voters.
I don’t have the competence to lay down accurately the process or know the best examples for it, but it’s pretty much basic game theory. If you keep losing consensus you have to adjust your strategy to be more similar to whoever is winning.