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Most definitely.

reshared this

in reply to Brian Jopek

by the way, these checks and balances do not just apply to the supreme court and congress

it applies to *you*

FUCKING #VOTE, PEOPLE

the next dem candidate may SUCK. fucking SUCK

(they won't suck IF YOU SHOW UP IN THE FUCKING PRIMARIES, USELESS WHINERS)

as if the dem candidate sucking fucking matters with a fascist threat like trump and MAGA

a vote is not a statement of eternal love

it's tactics in a larger war

fight the war and fuck your mindless cynicism and toxic idealism

#vote
This entry was edited (1 week ago)
in reply to Ben Royce πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ πŸ‡ΈπŸ‡©

@benroyce β€œBut Candidate X isn’t flawless! I might as well just vote for the tyrant!”

I do appreciate when people say that out loud so I know whose opinions I can ignore from that moment on.

in reply to Tekniquelly correct

@tek @benroyce Who ever said that? Name three. This sounds like a straw man argument to me. 🀷

Speaking for myself, most people who hate both the GOP Candidate and the DNC Candidate either vote 3rd party or don't vote at all.

in reply to Grumble πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ πŸ‡¬πŸ‡±

I heard it about 100x a day here. β€œIt doesn’t matter if the Rep beats the Dem. They’re all the same!”

And on behalf of my friends and family and neighbors affected by the policies that the greater evil has put in place since then, those people can go fuck themselves with a chainsaw.

This entry was edited (1 week ago)
in reply to Tekniquelly correct

in reply to Grumble πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ πŸ‡¬πŸ‡±

@grumble209 @benroyce My idea is that a critical number of voters in close states were persuaded not to vote for Harris by that kind of propaganda.

Meanwhile, approximately zero Trump voters turned to Harris or stayed home for those reasons. It’s a plague on the left here, one the right seems immune to.

in reply to Tekniquelly correct

left leaning nonvoters are victims of the same psyop agenda as MAGA is

-the same agenda, not exactly the same psyop

the psyop on MAGA is to pump them up, get them to vote

the psyop method playing on the toxic idealism and mindless cynicism on the left is to spread hopelessness and helplessness, to immobilize and suppress their vote

and many people supposedly on the left listen to these agent provocateur voices cosplaying left, and believe them

fucking morons

This entry was edited (1 week ago)
in reply to Ben Royce πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ πŸ‡ΈπŸ‡©

@benroyce @tek Once, I thought voting Green Party was a reasonable position.

Then I saw this photo.

There might be 3rd parties in the US that aren't compromised or useful idiots. But the Green Party isn't one of them.

in reply to Grumble πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ πŸ‡¬πŸ‡±

@grumble209 @benroyce The US Green Party is a siphon to tip the scales away from the Dems. That's their sole raison d'Γͺtre. It's the only plausible explanation for their existance.

And the right has its own weird splinter groups, but once the primaries are over and it's time to cast the final ballot, they all fall into line behind the Republican.

The American left is simply pathologically terrible at game theory.

in reply to Tekniquelly correct

@grumble209 @benroyce Now, if we switched to "approval voting" or something other than "first past the post", yes, fine, by all means vote for a marginal 3rd party with the mainstream leftward candidate as the fallback. That's completely logical and reasonable. Do it.

But when it's all or nothing, a vote for a 3rd party is mathematically identical to not voting.

in reply to Ben Royce πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ πŸ‡ΈπŸ‡©

@benroyce @grumble209
Heh! I don't remember what it was about, but I've seen you post things I disagreed with. We're not exactly clones. But wow, I wanted to shout "YES! THIS EXACTLY!" when I read your first words in this thread on my way to work today. I've been saying these things until I'm blue in the face, and it's nice to have reassurance that I'm not alone on this.

Please, y'all, _just vote_. Both sides aren't the same, no matter what you hear.

Vote.

in reply to Tekniquelly correct

"For years the rallying cry for the left has been 'I thought you were bringing the leaflets!'." - Jeremy Hardy.
This entry was edited (1 week ago)
in reply to Angelina

@Angelina @benroyce @tek You're probably right.

But remember, democracy doesn't imply political parties. Certainly, cliques and cabals and conspiracies and clubs are as old as humanity. But a private club that demands (rewards) allegiance and loyalty to the club above that demanded of citizenship or the duties of a political office?

That shit is modern, and it's the root of the corruption the US has endured for almost two centuries now.

We could have legislated what parties can do, but in the 20 or so decades we've had them, and in over 40 presidencies, I guess we've all just been *too darn busy*.

in reply to Grumble πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ πŸ‡¬πŸ‡±

@grumble209 @Angelina @benroyce Not saying this to support the party system, which I do no, in fact support, but...

I think they're inevitable as long as you have freedom of association. "Hey, I'll vote with you on X if you vote with me on Y, alright?" Do that a few times, and you end up with a mutual-support pact. Opponents will have to do the same to keep from being outvoted at every turn. Next thing you know, hey, we have parties again.

in reply to Ben Royce πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ πŸ‡ΈπŸ‡©

@benroyce @tek @grumble209
I know I've mentioned it before, but it bears repeating. All of those Palestinian concern trolls talking about how Harris would enable genocide is a prime example of this. As though Trump wouldn't have done the same or worse (and has, as it turns out.)

In the next election, be vigilant for exactly this playbook. The subjects might differ. Maybe it'll be Thailand or Ukraine, but the rhetoric will be the same.

in reply to Bruce Heerssen

Now I'm back to wanting to yell at my screen. πŸ˜€

Yes. I disagreed with Harris on Palestine. Not as much as I disagreed with Trump, but still.

So in math, if you have an inequality, and you remove the same quantity from both sides, _you still have the same inequality_:

Harris + (bad Palestine opinion) > Trump + (bad Palestine opinion)

⬇️

Harris > Trump

If they're the same on that issue, you can delete it and compare on the other thousand issues.

This entry was edited (1 week ago)
in reply to Tekniquelly correct

@tek

That's exactly right, but no amount of argument can convince a concern troll of that sort because they are not interested in honest debate. They are trying to poison the well. It's infuriating.

in reply to Bruce Heerssen

@bruce @tek This is almost a good use case for AI. An agent that looks at the posts an account and what kind of engagement it drives. Provide word clouds of the terms and frequency the account uses vs the responses they get, also how frequently the comment on friend accounts vs total strangers about subjects outside their primary word cloud. I'd need to think about it a bit but it seems like bad actors should be quantifiable by their behavior so I tool to get them out of your DMs is possible.
in reply to Tekniquelly correct

Correct. There's also the addage: You cannot save others when you need to be saved. Trump's cult is an existential threat to this nation, certainly my personal safety as a trans feminist with a boyfriend of color whose parents are both legal immigrants.

Also, I'll take the flames for saying it: In Palestine at BEST I would be imprisoned; probably stoned to death. Why are misogynists so much more important than me, other women, and PoC?

This entry was edited (1 week ago)
in reply to obscurestar

@obscurestar @bruce @benroyce @grumble209
How I've personally phrased it: I hate what's happening in Palestine, but I'll be damned if I'm going to vote for a politician who wants to hurt my trans friends. If Harris wanted to nuke Palestine or something, that'd require some philosophical pondering. She didn't, though. She just wasn't as ideal as we on the left might've hoped.

So: (Support trans) + (mediocre on Palestine) > (Hurt trans) + (bad on Palestine)

That was an easy choice.

in reply to Tekniquelly correct

I hate conspiracy theory but trolls cosplaying American isn't conspiracy it's real. Only the scale of it is unknown

Voices harping on how imperfect Harris was on Gaza: some were real Americans. But it's such an easy high holy outrage psyop play. So how many were fake?

Likud trollfarm knew Trump works better for Netanyahu than Harris

So how many nonvoters-for-Palestine were, ironically, serving Netanyahu by buying into "Genocide Joe" astroturf?

This entry was edited (1 week ago)
in reply to Bruce Heerssen

@bruce @benroyce @tek @grumble209
It's the same mis-info campaign as the so-called 'Bernie Bros'.

You remember the tactic:
"They treated Bernie badly and didn't consider him viable! Hillary will win anyway, so withhold your vote in protest, or vote for Jill Stein! Your vote won't count, but your soul will be pure!"

Just another way to manipulate the easily led in order for Epstein class to stay in power.

in reply to Sean Lynch

@SeanPLynch @bruce @benroyce @grumble209 Yup. I wonder what the smug, self-righteous pro-Republican meme will be next time around? "Newsom and Trump both eat at fancy restaurants. I could never vote for either of them!"
in reply to Grumble πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ πŸ‡¬πŸ‡±

@grumble209
Any time someone starts off their discussions about the evils of a specific person with "But what about X"... They are basically admitting it. "Trump is in the Epstein files, but what about Bill Clinton" or "Trump is gonna support Israel's massacre, but what about Harris, she didn't do anything to stop them either"

Those are things I have either read here on Mastodon or heard in coffee shops in the US.

@tek @benroyce @BrianJopek

in reply to Cy

@cy @tek

both tyrants as in reality

or "both tyrants" as in edgelord mindlessly cynical bullshit, often pumped from MAGA/ geopolitical trollfarm accounts cosplaying left to help to do an easy psyop to suppress the left vote and help elect the real tyrant, and unfortunately believed by toxic idealism morons

This entry was edited (1 week ago)
in reply to Ben Royce πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ πŸ‡ΈπŸ‡©

@benroyce @cy Nailed it all around.

The many β€œboth sides are the same!” whiners were either hopelessly ignorant or wholly gullible.

Imagine Harris invading Minnesota. As if.

in reply to Tekniquelly correct

@tek @benroyce @cy Hmm, #Kamala a tyrant? Could somebody with that laugh ever be considered a tyrant? I say no. Many have categorized that laugh as annoying, or unPresidential, or whatever, I always considered it infectious.
in reply to Kevin LaRose, Antifa Member

@Thumper1964 @benroyce @cy Well, she definitely wasn't a perfect candidate, as though such a thing exists.

But wow, to settle for "just" intelligent, educated, rational, experienced, competent, and a decent human? Again, and I cannot stress this enough, the "both sides are the same" crowd are freaking idiots.

in reply to Ben Royce πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ πŸ‡ΈπŸ‡©

As in reality. Here, I'll answer my own question.

If they're both tyrants, who will continue the same tyranny, then your electoral process has already been compromised by tyrants, who are pretending to be different sides to mislead you into voting for them. In that scenario, no vote you make will stop your election from being rigged, so you're an idiot if you think voting third party, abstaining from voting, or voting for the Devil Himself would make anything different happen.

So vote for Harris, but it'll only prolong the tyranny unless you do something besides vote, to stop the propaganda, ballot stuffing, and voter disenfranchisement. And redistribute the wealth so no one has the power to rig your elections.

CC: @BrianJopek@mastodon.world @tek@freeradical.zone

in reply to Cy

@cy
I vehemently disagree. If we could all collectively decide to opt-out, then sure. But we can't. We won't. The right will absolutely, positively, never agree to abstain from elections. Ergo, the left abstaining is mathematically identical to voting for the right.

Voting for the lesser evil sucks. Not voting for the lesser evil is implicitly voting for the greater evil.

Sometimes the lesser evil is genuinely, truly... Less Evil.

@Cy
Unknown parent

mastodon - Link to source
Tekniquelly correct
@nikatjef @grumble209 @benroyce If I could change exactly one thing about our elections, it'd be to switch to that (or approval or instant runoff or Condorcet or...) instead of FPTP. Almost anything is better. We could have a commission of mathematicians and political scientists to nail down the particulars, but the final answer would be "something other than what we have today".
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