And I’m being serious. I feel like there might be an argument there, I just don’t understand it. Can someone please “steelman” that argument for me?
The arguments are as stupid as you guessed.
These are naive emotional people who are dumb as fuck. I know so many in my life and it’s like arguying with a brick wall.
Children still believe we live in a black and white world, democrats are in power now, genocide is happening, they will not vote for them. The concept that both will finance the genocide but another will be much worse is not something they can understand.
You have others that want to intentionally punish democrats for not doing anything. Great in the meantime, Trump will provide a full carte blanche to Nettanyahu in the middle east, he will continue what he’s doing, annex everything without any limits. They were partying in Israel after Trump won.
A third group wants the system to break down because they think if you’re a post collapse society, they will be able to build their utopia.
Yes as dumb idiots living in la la land.
Because the standard for Democrats is perfectionism, but the standard for Republicans is “That’s just Trump being Trump.”
In other words, they didn’t think it through, they got suckered by propaganda.
Don’t worry. Trump won. You’ll hear a whole lot less about Gaza and genocide now.
Why? The yanks and the west have been commiting genocide for a year now, the elections does not matter. They had the choice between two gencodiers, they picked one, they are still shit. We’re not gonna shut up.
As a foreigner, if you voted for a genocider (there was two in this race), I do not think you are human.
Democrats were ready to throw foreigners under the bus so they wouldn’t have to fight fascism. Now they get neither
If the table turns sometime, if I have to pick between genocide in the US and fascism here, well, I hope you have a place to hide lmao
As a foreigner, if you voted for a genocider (there was two in this race), I do not think you are human.
I feel like that’s such an idealistic way of viewing things. Hypothetically, if you had a choice between indirectly supporting genocide or throwing your entire life into chaos you’d rather ruin your own life? If you’re actually willing to ruin your own life for it you’re more passionate about this issue than 99% of the population. For example I don’t have an issue supporting Ukraine, I’ve donated to support packages going to Ukraine. But you won’t find me on the battlefield because there’s a limit to my support and that limit is at not throwing away my life. I guess that makes me inhuman because I could do more and I’m choosing to not to.
If the table turns sometime, if I have to pick between genocide in the US and fascism here, well, I hope you have a place to hide lmao
How hypocritical and vindictive. I won’t do what I consider humane because you deserve it.
Also Ukraine is bullshit. Putin is a fascist bitch sponsored by the west, like Yeltsin is a fascist bitch supported by the west. The yanks wanted the USSR out so they sponsored fascist. The eastern block had nothing to eat for ten years. And now they are whining about election interferance?
Laughable country, really. I know ukrainians. They call their own country north korea. You know, coz they cannot leave. You don’t give a shit about ukrainians. The war is solely about the nasdaq and subsidizing lockheed martin.
if you had a choice between indirectly supporting genocide
Indirectly? How is this indirect? THE DEMS BROKE THE LAW TO SUPPORT GENOCIDE, ASSHOLE.
If you think you can have a little genocide because of reality and need a wall of text full of mental gymnastic, you might just be a scum.
I can’t speak for others, but I can tell you why I didn’t vote for Harris.
I am a lifelong independent voter. In 2016 I wrote in Kanye West, in 2020 I wrote in Nobody, this year I didn’t even vote. (I also voted Bush in '04, Ron Paul in '08, and Obama in '12) I go to the polls even if I am planning to writing in a presidential pick because there are usually ballot issues or other races I care about.
I decided not to vote when the DNC opted to not hold a primary even though absolutely no one wanted a Biden second term and the deal was elect Biden in 2020 and they’d find someone good for '24. After Biden’s disastrous debate and he dropped out, I was angry because everyone said no to Kamala already in 2020, but they still ran her.
On the issues, Kamala is too centrist for me and Gaza is a deal breaker. Most Palestinian casualties have been civilians and waaaaay too many children. Using my tax dollars to kill foreign children is not acceptable. I don’t care that Israel is our ally or they they provide us an important strategic resource in the region. I honestly don’t care if Israel wants to do a genocide or if Palestine wants to do a bunch or terrorism, that’s on them. But we don’t have to support it and I won’t vote for anyone who will.
I strongly disagree with aspects of your perspective but I appreciate your honest engagement
If Gaza is such a hot topic for you, how do you justify letting someone that absolutely despises muslims and would love to see them eradicated, enter the white house and likely lift all restrictions on Israel and delivery anything they ask for? There’s little doubt that Haris would have changed the situation much at all, but a Trump win basically solidifies the Palestinian’s fate to die as Israel’s war equipment guinea pigs. Do you feel like your inaction is fine because either way, the genocide doesn’t end?
You voted for genocide, idiot, shut the fuck up.
If you’re not gonna adress anything I said, you should reconsider the value of your time here, it’s being wasted.
Oh wait lol, BOT alert, this account was created literally 2 hours ago to shit on people in politics channels.
You got me comrad. I’m currently in the lubjanka with medvedev, we’re shoving caviar in our butthole.
Americans are still stuck in their retarded cold war logic lmao. What a bunch of idiot.
Ej, das a good one!
Do you feel like your inaction is fine because either way, the genocide doesn’t end?
Pretty much. Less genocide is not a compelling argument. The children who died with Kamala in the White House would be just as dead with Trump.
What about the kids who wouldn’t die under kamala but now will? You say less genocide is the same, but even if it’s 10% less, I bet those 10% of kids would want kamala.
Any innocent death is unacceptable. If under Trump every single Palestinian in Gaza would be killed and under Kamala a single old man would die, I still would make the same choice.
That old man has just as much right to live as anyone else, just because he is the only casualty that doesn’t make his life any less valuable or gives someone any more right to kill him.
I am truly sorry this is the outcome we have gotten and that my actions have played a small part in how things have unfolded. But I do not regret my choice not to vote.
Kanye West?
well at least you’re consistent…
Btw, your chosen course of actions indirectly supported the option of spending even more tax dollars on killing people in gaza, so you might want to consider breaking your consistent streak of picking the wrong choice and try woting in a way that aligns with your stated goals
Unlike you voting for the dem, which was directly supporting spending more tax dollars on killing people in gaza. Funny how americans are so brainwashed they need their bad-faithed gaslighting not to feel bad about voting for litteral genociders lmao
The Democrats at least call for a ceasefire in Gaza, even though they send weapons to Israel. Trump openly admits that he would like Bibi to flatten the place with no regard for human life.
But I guess both parties are the same.
To the dead Palestinian children they are.
Are you a dead Palestinian Child? No.
Not voting is basically the same as giving Netanjahu Carte Blanche to kill more innocent palestinians.
While I understand not being happy with the Status Quo there’s also always a worse option. You now elected that “Worse Option™”.
Huh pretty sure YOU elected the worse option,
As I am not eligible to vote in the US I certainly didn’t.
Ah so you are an euro pretending you’re a yank
I accept my responsibility in how things have turned out. I would feel absolutely horrible and would be wrought with guilt for my entire life if it had come down to a single vote, but I would not have voted for either Kamala or Trump even if I had gone to the polls.
I understand that makes me responsible in a very small way for Trump winning and I don’t like it, but I accept that. It was a risk I was willing to take in February when I decided not to vote.
Gaza wasn’t why I decided not to vote at all, the disconnect between voter and politician and the way queer issues were completely abandoned this election were why I didn’t vote. If Kamala had said she would end our alliance with Israel if they didn’t stop killing civilians she still wouldn’t have gotten my vote because I wasn’t casting one to begin with.
Steelman:
The US is currently a fascist, imperialist state. It has brutalized the global south, indigenous people, and POCs generally since its founding and will continue to do so unless the status quo is disrupted and changed significantly.
The Democratic party supports the same militaristic policies and the same neoliberal economic system that the Republicans do. The primary difference between the parties are various social issues that may make life somewhat better or worse for US citizens, but will never address the core problems of fascism, imperialism, and capitalism. Both parties support and protect the status quo. This status quo only benefits the bourgeois class and rich white people and harms literally hundreds of millions of others around the world.
The Democratic party is the only one of the two major parties that the Left has any degree of leverage over since the Democrats want the Left to vote for them. So, organizing to essentially boycott the Democratic party is a powerful method of protest that could effect real policy change. It is possibly the only effective method of protest left since the US police & surveilance state is cracking down on protests and the Left has no chance protesting violently against the most powerful military the world has ever seen.
The only way to make that threat matter to the Democratic party is to follow through if the demands aren’t met, even - or especially - if it means a second Trump term.
The liberal establishment has ignored and abandoned the working class for decades while dangling the carrot of milktoast social democratic reforms that rarely come to pass, but they blame the same people they abandoned for not energetically voting for them. They say it is a moral imperative to vote for them, but they are incapable of bettering the lives of working class people.
Strawman:
It would hurt my feelings too much to vote for COPmala Harm-us. Plus, Trump would let Putin annex Ukraine. Also, I’d risk touching grass if I went outside to participate in bourgeois electoralism. Gross.
Reality:
You can, and should, do more than one thing. Voting for Kamala is effectively playing defense against outright, full-throated fascism a la Mussolini even if you’d still consider the US fascist - it is clearly worse under Republicans. So vote, play defense, AND organize to raise class consciousness, provide mutual aid, protest when possible, and contribute to socialist causes. Letting Trump win would be a bad move. But, ultimately it is not the Left’s fault that he won. He won the popular vole and the electoral college vote by a large margin - larger than all third party socialist/socialist-adjacent candidates’ votes combined.
its funny, because literally the next post after yours was this: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/07/trump-blank-check-netanyahu-war-iran-panetta
Late but here’s my model of the situation. Sort of a WIP and very new but a /gen effortpost, so I welcome thoughts:
It’s individualism versus collectivism. The collectivist understands intimately the function of working together for the protection and future of the group. There is no doubt in her mind about the practical nature of her actions because she can see them play out in her community. The individualist, by contrast, operates solo; everything for him is about your vote, your candidate. This leads to a divide between the individualist and the material outcomes of his actions. This gap—this absence of practicality, we might call it—leaves a vacuum where symbolism can enter. This becomes a problem not when symbolism is simply encountered by the individualist, but when the symbol becomes the act, when the vote becomes a kind of personal expression, and any thought for collective consequences falls by the wayside.
“Ordinarily,” if we imagine such a thing exists, these two identities intermix and act in a complex and altogether non-problematic way; I don’t wish to imply that individualism is simply “bad” while collective action is “good.” For example, concepts of individualism are fundamental to advancing human rights to consent and bodily autonomy.
However, the setting and background of your question is the USA, a country with deep, deep historical ties to white supremacist, capitalist, colonialist, even fascist values, all of which hold the individual as intrinsic over the collective. The result is that hyperindividualism is catastrophically rooted in the heart of U.S. society—even in progressive and leftist spaces!
So, when you see a pro-Palestinian proclaim abstention or that they voted third party, you are witnessing the complex outcome of genuine compassion intermingled with the values instilled by white supremacy and individualism. And so you hear the phrase, “I just can’t in good conscience vote for XYZ.” To degrees varying between people, the vote loses its material value and becomes nothing more than a symbolic moral statement.
This doesn’t mean the leftist non-voter is a white supremacist, of course! Rather, it’s that they have been deeply affected by the presence of those values in their cultural context and have not yet had the opportunity or experience with group frameworks to question their assumptions and reassert the significant importance of collectivism.
So, in conclusion, the unnuanced TLDR is “because America is a racist capitalist hellhole.” The good news I conclude from this, though, is that collectivism can be learned and promoted. Cultural values are definitely not static, and perhaps with education, support, and time, mindsets among leftists can be shifted to better support the whole of the community.
when you are laser focused on a single thing, anything else just slides past you. making life changing decisions with limited information is a uniquely american trait
I was born and raised Jewish, going to Hebrew school in addition to English school from preschool to 14. The horrors of the Holocaust and all it’s trauma was shoved down my throat at far too young of an age to be appropriate. Never again means so much to me, one of my deepest held beliefs. Never again isn’t just Jews but any group hunted down for their ethnicity (not to mention all the other undesirables murdered in the Holocaust, such as the disabled and queer).
What’s going on in Gaza is a Holocaust. I can’t live with myself and sleep at night if I vote for trump or Harris, because materially for Gaza they are the same. I voted third party. In 2020 I held my nose and voted for biden. I’m disgusted with myself for doing so. He managed to be worse than I could ever imagine. And the liberals were out to fucking brunch for the past four years.
I will drink liberal tears all damn day long. They can whine and cry and carry on like entitled spoiled rotten children all they want. They were warned that they would lose if they continued to pursue the path they were on and that’s exactly what happened and I have zero remorse for it. And for the record, I’m a visibly queer woman who’s experienced a lot of physical violence in my life for being queer.
so just to recap here, and I’ll put the facts in bullets.
- you’re Jewish
- refused to support literally the only candidate that had majority support
- installed a LITERAL NAZI as president through sheer incompetence
- did it all to make people suffer
- will take great enjoyment out of the suffering
you sound like a cool dude. I really hope you have a positive experience with the Nazis when they open those concentration camps.
oh you thought those camps were for them. no, those camps are for us.
You know Jews voted en masse for trump because they want to glass Palestine a little faster, right?
Also, go back to brunch you piece of shit liberal.
I didn’t vote for a fascist. The democrats ran a PIECE OF SHIT CANDIDATE THAT LOST IN A LANDSLIDE. Go fucking blame the party that REFUSES to hold a primary that they don’t fuck with since 2008.
So you voted to have it happen in the USA and Ukraine too as well as Gaza? 😅
It’s important to remember the Holocaust happened largely because people didn’t do enough to stop it. “First they came for the Communists…” and all that. The Nazis were a fairly minor party for years, but they were able to consolidate power because their opposition wouldn’t rally against them. Coalition requires compromise.
I am not happy with the Democrats either, but they were the better option. And abstaining from a decision between bad and worse doesn’t help anyone. By allowing Trump to take power again when we might have stopped it, we are all responsible for what comes next.
These next four years are for you.
Hahaha I bet you’re the type to report your latino neighbors who voted for trump to ICE.
Typical blue MAGA liberal bullshit.
Go be mad at the democrats instead of voters who refuse to vote for horrible genocidal candidates. They had a whole fucking presidency to pick a successor to biden and they still managed to lose in a landslide it’s so fucking pathetic it would be funny if their political malpractice and brainwashed blue no matter who voters weren’t so fucking dangerous.
If blue no matter who worked, the Democrats would have won. So that’s obviously not a thing.
It worked for some democratic voters, but not for the 14 million others.
The blue no matter who voters have no morals or ethics and consider this a team sport, and the democrats are their team. They don’t criticize their team or hold them accountable, when they lose, they blame everyone else but themselves for not having higher standards.
The democrats refused to hold a competitive primary and are now crying and carrying on like spoiled rotten children that they lost. Anyone paying any attention at all could of seen this coming from a mile away. Smug elites who think they know better than the people who’s votes they need to be elected. It’s not rocket science why they lost.
I voted.
So did OP.
But inversion didnt
I voted third party.
Read it again.
Intresting that we have 20+ different opinions and answers on this post alone, and many are subjectively right.
My answer would be that Kamala is just another pro-genocide lying ghoul who is bought by lobbyists from different sectors who don’t represent the left or working class. Trump is at least honest about being a bought pro-genocide ghoul, and that you can look at in the eyes and fight and protest against unlike genocide joe who still until this morning supports Israel with every war crime imagineable while letting Blinken and miller play mental gymnastics in hypocracy in confrences that “they’re trying their best” to end the “war” while sending $25+ billions in military weapons to an ethnostate genocidal aparthied.
With that given,1- It’s more exausting and fruitless to fight a murderous war criminal who keeps lying than one is honest about what they want. We just want a clear enemy and be aware of it because we have been fighting a hidden enemy all this time.
2- In short it’s the “let it all burn down” logic. You saw that viral clip of Kamala voter shouting at a kid “I don’t give a fuck about Gaza bitch!” ?
Emotions and psychology dictate that if I was unrepresented working class, or considered a single-issue voter because of genocide, or an Arab American whose family getting slaughtered by my government and with my tax money, then I wouldn’t to want help other issues and would want to see everyone suffers more on all other issues because Kamala would not change anything and probably help improve all other issues other than mine which in my and every fair and just reality is more important than all others.
It’s because the alternative is to suffer a slower and longer painful death while no one changing anything anyway.Because if it wasn’t Gaza, it would have been another excuse to not lift a lazy goddamned finger and still delude themselves into feeling "morally superior"while sitting on their fat mediocre asses at home.
Before Harris, they also leaned heavily on the “Sleepy Joe” bullshit and “two old white men up for election, who cares”. Once the old “Sleepy Joe” element was removed from the equation, they had to find a way to keep their goddamned stubbornly lazy and ignorant narrative intact.
Now that the election is over, most of these “concerned and outraged” deadweight assholes will never think about Gaza and the plight of its’ people again. And they will keep on feeling smug about themselves.
I said the same thing about people like you before the election, and I’ll repeat it again. The laser focus on single issue voters was and will always be mostly an excuse to blame someone else.
To look at it another way, if this one issue actually decided the election, why didn’t Harris change her strategy two months ago? … Maybe it’s because this wasn’t the determining issue. Or it was, and her staff was incompetent. Take your pick.
OP asked for a steelman but good try
It is rich to criticize the Democrats for claiming moral superiority while doing nothing, as a justification for not voting for the candidate who would at least try to put a leash on what Israel is doing to Gaza.
If you want what’s best for a suffering people, you should vote for the candidate not trying to give their oppressors a blank check. All of America is responsible for what the president we chose does next.
This is all that needs to be said on the subject.
I know one of those people. they are now angry the left lost… 🙄
You actively participate in the murder of people.
If enough people did not participate the murder would simply not happen.
Speaking as an engineer, I’ve contributed to the murder of more people than I can count.
Speaking as someone who has purchased goods on Amazon and at Walmart, I’ve contributed to the murder of more people than I can count.
We all kill people. Every single person in this thread has contributed to and benefited from death of another. You drive over a bridge, you benefit from the dead. You live in any extant country, you have benefited from murder. Our entire society is built on the lifelong suffering and deaths of millions, a tiny sliver of guilt at a time.
Electing Kamala is roughly the same level of moral failure.
Electing trump is giving an unlocked gun and 1000 rounds to a 7 year old with anger problems. The moral failure is several order of magnitude higher.
You are still participating by choosing to be a bystander to injustice. Abstaining when you can support something less bad only says to others that you do not care how bad it gets.
So… Palestine is safe now? Not voting or voting Trump leads to people not being murdered?
I’m pretty sure that’s not what’s going to happen, and I wish I was wrong.
It’s the trolley problem. You see a trolley about to kill 5 people. You can pull a lever (vote) and make the trolley only kill 1. In this case, that 1 person is also in the lineup of 5. This distinction makes it obvious the only option is to pull the lever (vote).
You have to be realistic and vote for biden and he’s two trolley problems and three bullshit metaphor to explain that you should vote for us
I agree that people should’ve voted, but I disagree with this one-dimensional line of thinking. I can see the argument that by voting for the democrats their current behaviour and this fucked up system as a whole is warranted. It’s not as simple as “why not vote, it costs you nothing”. By voting this horrible “democracy” is legitimised and the democrats and the system will not change their approach. The US deserves a democracy that actually allows for representation instead of this duopoly of garbage and more garbage
No it’s not. Both the trolley problem and the prisoners dilemma are individual event thought experiments.
Real life is different, it is continuous. The rational choice for an individual event can be very different than a continuous one.
Take the prisoner’s dilemma (or game theory) for instance, it is the rational decision (nash equilibrium) to rat your fellow prisoner out but if you have to do it again and again, then the best strategy is to NOT rat out your fellow prisoner (only rat when they ratted you out in the last round).
Reality is often like this, and elections are also like this. It gets complicated real fast.
This is actually a very good comparison, thank you.
They mistakenly believe that by pulling the lever they are complicit in the trolley. That by interacting with the trolley on the trolley’s terms, they are consenting to the trolley’s actions.
I used to believe that too once… Once.
I was disabused of that notion before 2012, but sadly not enough people were.
Inaction is also an action. You’re always playing the game, might as well learn the rules.
