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‘They will vote against Harris’: Arab Americans in Michigan desert Democrats over Gaza
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 14 Oct 2024
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I guess that just doesn't make sense to me in the current political landscape. We know the third party isn't going to get the votes, and we also know that Trump is not only not going to save Gaza, he's going to do everything in his power to make this country worse as well. Currently, voting third party is throwing your vote away. I'm not saying I'm in love with the system or that it isn't fucked, but we have two options this election. Neither of them is going to save Gaza, but I don't see why damming the whole country, as well as yourself, to a worse existence, is the more sane option.
The right already has everything they need for "damning the whole country" with or without Trump - Roe V. Wade being overturned, all this trans panic bullshit, immigration suddenly being everyone's uncle's top issue, utter climate inaction, etc. - it's all happening under Biden's administration. What makes you think the Democrats are suddenly going to turn heel and do something about it? If they had any interest in doing anything about it, why wouldn't they be running on that? If we can't move them on the highest crime against humanity - genocide - by threatening their power in choosing not to support their campaign, what makes you think you'll be able to move them on anything else by protesting in ways that they can easily ignore and let their opposition stamp down with police response and media circus, just as long as you come back to vote for them in 4 years?
What makes you think your protests won't just end up like BLM, with the media smearing you and cops descending upon you with military vehicles, riot shields, and rubber bullets as soon as the protests become disruptive; as democrats stand by and grand stand out of one side of their mouth while out of the other they are refusing to defend you and going so far in the opposite direction of answering your demands that they put the very kind of person you're protesting against - a cop in this case - up for the highest offices in the land?
Neither of them is going to save gaza, and neither of them is going to save us either. One of them is just more annoying than the other and I personally am going to need a much more compelling reason to vote Democrat than that. By voting third party I am showing them that I am engaged in politics and my vote is on the table but only if they come and meet me where I am, as I have hit a wall in what I'm willing to support. They will either get the message and adopt more popular policy - realizing that the right will never trade Republicans for Republicans-lite and they need the left to win - or they will keep disengaging their base from their party and have a much harder time winning elections. That's their choice to make, not ours.
One side is way more than just "more annoying." You're throwing away your vote, period. We cannot be single issue voters, because there isn't only a single issue at stake. The right will vote against their own self interests every time it the right says they hate the right people.These elections are how they get their players in place. This is how we got here. The players the right have placed in courthouses, congress, the senate, and the supreme court are there reasons we lost Roe v Wade in the first fucking place.
I'm not going to sit here and think that the dems are going to fix every single problem, but I know for a fact Trump would make it worse. People pulled this same shit last election, and the one before. Thinking that, "Oh, well, they'll see that I'm not gonna vote and then they'll change." Magats will vote against their own self interest because they're damn near a cult. We vote against our own self interests to, what, prove ourselves a point? Teach our politicians a lesson? Make it harder for the Bernies and AOCs to have even a ice cubes chance of hell of even discussing change? For some reason, we can't see the forest through the trees. It's so frustrating. People like you want to make it seem like a vote for Harris is a vote for genocide knowing damn well is the only sane option we have. Because you mean to tell me you really fucking think the Republicans are going to handle Gaza with care? Or that they'll be just a little worse to work with? You genuinely believe that?
So tell me, at the end of this "protest," what's the plan? We absolutely know that the third party is going to lose, so it's either Trump or Harris who have any reasonable odds of winning. So Harris loses, are you happy in this situation? The Republicans will actively block anything to help anyone, but I guess no one getting help is better than anyone getting help in your world. I'm not happy with my choices, but I'm a fucking adult, and adults have to make tough decisions. Adults have to weigh the options. Adults have to look ahead. I know right now I have no feasible candidate to vote for that can assist with Gaza right now, but I know one of those candidates is not going to go on live television and stir a race war by claiming Haitian immigrants are eating fucking cats and dogs. I know one of those candidates doesn't believe that there are active abortions going on at nine months. I know one of those candidates isn't going to continue to restrict the rights of citizens in their own country that they don't like. I know one candidate isn't going too be too busy sucking Putin's dick for money and compliments to govern.
Right now, let's say you and your family are poisoned (not because of what you believe, but go with me here). We give you two cups. One will not only do nothing for you, it will actually make your condition worse and much more painful. Another one may help you, it could even have the antidote, but all you know is that it will not make your condition worse and will at the very least slow the spread, giving you time to think of a plan should it fail. Whatever you pick, your family has to pick too. Your choice in this scenario is to stare at both cups, willing one to change into the antidote with inaction while you continue to succumb to poison. Your family pleades to at least not make their deaths worse, to at least take the possible antidote, or at least give them time, but you're like, "no, no, no, I think these cups are starting to get that I'm not easily swayed!"
I am sorry that we're in this situation, but we are. Voting for third party is throwing away your vote. If that's what you wanna do, I can only hope that the rest of us have more sense to make up for it.
All of that text and you didn't address a single thing that I said.
You don't need to explain your line of thinking to me. I've been beaten over the head with it. I used to have the same line of thinking. It does not hold up to reasoned criticism and it simply is not possible to defend at this moment without minimizing genocide. Try it. Try having this conversation with someone that is watching their loved ones be murdered indiscriminately by our tax dollars. Go tell them how your chosen social issue is more important than Palestinian lives, that it justifies supporting with your vote and tax dollars a country that is bombing and starving living human beings, who are mostly children, and see if you feel so righteous at the end of it.
The Democrats do not care about any of your issues. They care about winning, and they care about fundraising. When their fundraising is actively threatened by your issues, the only way to get them to move on anything is to threaten their ability to win elections. Look: Biden just fucking did it, a legitimate threat to cut off aid (still only a threat but it's a start), and I guarantee you it would not have happened if this election was smooth sailing for Kamala. No thanks to you and all of you screeching about the end of the world if Trump wins.
Both of your cups are poisoned, so call their bluff. Refuse to drink the poison and demand an option without poison. The cups did not just materialize there as immutable objects, they were put there by politicians that need us more than we need them and have the power to change what goes in the cup. Do not for a second let them deceive you into thinking otherwise.
If they see they cannot win without you, they will move mountains to come meet you. Lesser evil voting does not allow for that exchange to happen. In fact it actively undermines it. That is how we got here, that is how we keep ratcheting to the right. Not any of your bullshit about unelected judges.
Gotcha. Thanks.