OP, per Rule 4, for accessibility reasons, an image of text must either have alt text or a transcript in the post body.
Edit: Counting this as a warning for future posts, OP, but since you might not be here to address this, a transcript in a comment as a lesser substitute:
Bushra Shaikh (@Bushra1Shaikh): How TF did Americans vote the clown in, not once but TWICE.
Readers added context
This creator posted on Election Day 2024: "Punish the democrats for their passive response to the genocide in Palestine. If there ever was a party who should have stood firmly against it, we would’ve assumed the Dems. They proved otherwise. F Kamala Harris. Hope she loses.” [truncated URL to the post here]
Thank you for having and enforcing this rule. It’s appreciated!
I apologize if I’m just being stupid about this, but I take this opportunity to ask: how do we add alt-text to an image on Lemmy? I always add it on Mastodon, but I’ve never figured out how to do it on Lemmy (I use the web interface, maybe it requires a special app?). I’ve seen that others have done it, and I see that it’s a rule here for images of text, which is good. But HOW to do it?
Thanks!
Edit: Thanks everyone for the answers!
I think it might be fractured as a feature on Lemmy, which is why putting it in the body is also allowed.
On Voyager, once I upload an image, there’s a little stick figure button that lets me “Add an accessible caption” (the alt text). On desktop, there’s an “Alt Text” option that shows up once I’ve uploaded an image.
Since I have no clue if all UIs do this or if users know where it is, body posts are fine if slightly less(?) useful for accessibility.
images on lemmy are shaped like links, and alt text is supposed to fit in the description, so when completed it looks like this:
If you are posting directly on Lemmy, near the bottom of “Create a Post” there is a field called “Alt text”. It only appears if you upload an image. The alt text filed will be right above Community and underneath Language.
…but no link to the source, or anything actually useful? How did this format post become allowed on a news aggregation site–a platform literally designed for linking to outside sources.
I remember arguing for days, in 2024, that the whole “Democrats are bad because Palestine” thing was clearly a psyop by Russian bots trying to mess with the election. I really need to improve my persuasion skills. Like by a lot.
Pretty sure Democrats doing nothing to stop the genocide in gaza was a factor to their detriment in the election, bots aside
Even knowing that Trump was going to actively help Bibi? That’s the thing I didn’t understand: sure, the Democrats were not doing much to stop the slaughter, but from the previous Trump administration we knew Trump was going to actively help.
Ok, but you see how massively demoralizing this conversation is, right?
Making logical points weighing up two distinct yet similar stances on genocide is only going to suppress voter turnout.
It shouldn’t. It’s basic harm reduction.
One side probably won’t stop it, but they’re on our side so there’s a sliver of a cintilla of a chance we could pressure them into it.
The other side absolutely would not, vocally stated he would help accelerate it, and would laugh in our faces and do even more to accelerate it for no other reason than it made us mad.
The choice should have been obvious, even if I and everyone else would have preferred better options.
See people aren’t exclusively machines.
I know people who felt that both sides at least tacitly supporting the genocide was so depressing that for their mental health they basically checked out of politics.
No, that response isn’t helpful, but it’s a very real thing that happens to real people. They needed a candidate that cared that people’s lives were ending across the sea, and neither side offered that.
That hurt Kamala’s chances in a very real way, and might even be the deciding factor for Trump’s second term.
While you and I can look at this and go “Wow, that’s not logical, she’s way better than Trump”, the Democratic campaign should have had political scientists and psychologists that knew about this well-documented phenomenon. I imagine they did, and ignored it, because siding against Israel would’ve cost money.
So while it’s true that the choice was still objectively obvious, it’s also completely true that the Democratic campaign absolutely mishandled it, because this isn’t some new phenomenon, and group human psychology isn’t unpredictable. It’s also not the fault of those who didn’t vote because of that.
While you and I can look at this and go “Wow, that’s not logical, she’s way better than Trump”, the Democratic campaign should have had political scientists and psychologists that knew about this well-documented phenomenon. I imagine they did, and ignored it, because siding against Israel would’ve cost money.
D and R parties both need independent voters to win any election. For example, even if every D voted for a D, they would lose without independents voting for them in significant numbers. This has been a political fact for many years.
So… why did the Harris campaign target REPUBLICAN voters (instead of Ds and independents)? They wasted a lot of vital time on that (“He doesn’t need to know who you voted for” etc), and they knew that they would lose if they did so.
She knew it too, Harris isn’t stupid. She took a knee.
I’m not fully convinced the conspiracy is that deep, but also if hard evidence came out saying so, I wouldn’t be surprised.
yep, and the Dem leadership still support israel no matter what they do. They learned nothing and will try to set up the same voter hostage situation in every vote from now on.
Right? Makes that other comment under this seem more valid.
Just because humans are vulnerable to certain psychological effects, doesn’t mean it’s not the fault of those who were effected by them. Humans are also vulnerable to stress eating. That doesn’t remove the blame from fat asses with no self-control.
And this person absolutely should have better self-control, whoever the fuck, sorry, TF she is.
And some candidates should be able to take a stand against genocide. Too bad you got your way and none were on the ballot.
But we’ve got a bunch of supposed leftists in this very thread talking about how they wouldn’t vote for these types of democrats. These are people that obsensibly are self aware enough not to let their supposedly so well informed morality be determined by feeling bummed out about their options.
I don’t expect miracles from the average, barely informed voter. I do fucking expect supposed informed leftists to not actively campaign against voting. I expect them to fucking understand this “obvious” situation. THAT is my main sticking point.
Yes, and white people get depressed about racism, so they just ignore what bums them out. Insane that a defense of online leftists amounts to “they just such smol bean, they too bummed for voting sad face”.
While you and I can look at this and go “Wow, that’s not logical, she’s way better than Trump”, the Democratic campaign should have had political scientists and psychologists that knew about this well-documented phenomenon. I imagine they did, and ignored it, because siding against Israel would’ve cost money.
At the very least maybe the Dem party should have been smart enough lie publically that they would censor Israel and reevaluate US support of Israel (even if they wouldn’t actually follow through). It’s almost like losing is preferable to risking any AIPAC $.
I know people who felt that both sides at least tacitly supporting the genocide was so depressing that for their mental health they basically checked out of politics.
to do that in a democracy is beyond shameful.
You don’t have to be invested at the grass roots or debating magats but you can still turn up at a polling station on election day, or do a fucking postal vote
If every election is a decision between the lesser of two evils and both evils become more evil over time then harm isn’t actually reduced in the long run. This is why harm reduction is a failing long term electoral strategy.
People preaching harm reduction whose candidates only ever increase harm over the last offering know this. They’re arguing in bad faith.
It absolutely is the best option, IF these are the only options. You don’t get to constantly pretend that there’s some obvious other solution without ever naming AND campaigning it. Basically, this entire thread is filled to the brim with online leftists hating on every possible option, propose fiire bombing walmarts, and then NEVER ACTUALLY FIREBOMB A WALMART.
It requires immense amounts of privilege to campaign for waiting for a better option to magically manifest.
Imagine there’s an election with two candidates.
Both candidates have expressed that they will torture and kill you, specifically, r1veRRR.
One candidate will torture and kill you using environmentally friendly methods, the other will do so using fossil fuels.
Would you support the environmentalist candidate? Would you vote for them? Would you campaign for them?
It absolutely is the best option, IF these are the only options.
And you’re so happy that there were no other options.
We don’t live in a world of “should”, in the real world of course it is demoralizing and affects the vote turnout.
We all know the US government will back Israel no matter what… and the voters can only punish the incumbent party for doing so.
65% of Democrats don’t want to finance Israel. Two thirds of their own party, that’s massive!
Voter turnout will continue to fall; D and R parties will continue to lose voters (now down to 30% registered voters each) and the Independents will continue to grow (now up to 40% of voters).
Why? Because our major parties ignore what their constituents actually want, and we can only punish one party every term.
It shouldn’t be that way, but it is.
The same people in this thread blaming voters for how Kamala Harris ran their campaign were the same ones insisting we had to run Biden as the incumbent, and calling you a bit or a school if you said they needed to be replaced.
We wouldn’t have this outcome if the people who’ve made it their entire identity to blame voters had placed their frustrations with the party and demanded better, sooner, when it could have made a material difference.
The very fact that the Trolley Problem exists as a thought experiment and there is still active discourse over the correct solution should tell you why people didn’t all feel that they had a responsibility to vote for harm reduction. You can’t expect an election that resembles a famously divisive philosophical thought experiment to turn out with everyone arriving at the same conclusion, and it’s pointless to dwell on the fact that everyone didn’t fall in line with what you think is obvious rather than adjusting to the reality and acting accordingly. That means getting candidates elected in primaries that aren’t going to put us in the same trolley problem come time for the general.
That means getting candidates elected in primaries that aren’t going to put us in the same trolley problem
You can also put pressure on candidates mid-campaign to change posture.
I can tell you this, the Venn Diagram of the people itt blaming voters for the Democrats supporting a genocide in 2024, and the people who didn’t want Biden to step down is basically a perfect circle. Its also the same circle which shielded Harris from any critiques on her support for genocide.
It’s basic harm reduction.
Nonsense.
Absolute nonsense, and the Palestinian Americans who voted ‘undetermined’ en masse during the Democratic primaries to send a message to Biden/Harris knew it too. The party made their choice between the people and an unpopular genocide. They chose genocide.
It shouldn’t.
Perhaps. But that’s not the world we live in. Demanding an electorate to suddenly change in a way it never has and start behaving like Homo economicus is only going to lead to further loses.
Honestly, people behaving like Homo economicus is how you get MAGA.
Think about it. Isn’t Trump’s pitch to voters ultimately an argument in rational self-interest? It’s all “I’ll make an in group and an out group. You’ll be in the in group. I’ll pull up the in group while pushing down the out group.”
Racism and sexism are rational. Or at least they are rational from those that benefit from them. Think about a white male living in the Jim Crows South. Your life was made soooo much easier by racism and sexism. There were whole career fields where they were the only quarter of the population that were eligible for them. They were automatically in the top quarter of society, simply by their race and sex.
Anti-immigrant zealotry is rational. If you’re a native-born US citizen working in the construction industry? Every legal or illegal immigrant being deported would cause your standard of living to soar. Economists would tell you that on net it will harm the economy. But if suddenly the pool of construction workers is cut in half, any US citizen who knows how to swing a hammer is now rolling in dough. That’s the rational terror of fascism - every time another group in the “first they came for” poem is liquidated, someone ends up with their property, their jobs, their place in the social order, etc.
You NEED to have a respect for persons built into your ethical framework, or else you can end up justifying evils of all sorts, all in the name of the greater good. Hell, Dr. Mengele slept well every night, content in the knowledge that he was doing the greatest good for the greatest number.
they’re on our side
The side of genocide, oligarchy and fascism?
What is more the “Democrat are bad because Palestine” was the opposition’s framing. The argumeny was pretty unanimous that the policy on Palestine was going to cost the Democrats the election. The Democrats were bad because they knew full well they were going to choose to lose over changing that policy.
And that’s just tunnel visioning at only the Israeli policy.
Yeah, the choice was bad or worse, and people chose worse. Life sucks sometimes, they need to grow up.
If genocide is bipartisan, then the less bad choice is whatever collapses the US the fastest. You wouldn’t try to choose the leader of Nazi Germany based on who’s going to run the holocaust most effectively
But you can’t deny a progressive Führer wouldn’t be better for us.
Sure the Jews, gays, and other undesirables may suffer but the far-right Führer made it bad for us as well and that’s unacceptable.
exactly this. Trump is the weakest, least capable adversary the resistance could ever dream to have. Were you expecting the empire to fall without violence?
Yes, I can see that it would be demoralizing, and it was demoralizing. The Schumer/Biden wing of the Democrats deserves to be cast into the bonfire of the vanities, they are completely useless. And while this might sound sarcastic, I truly believe they have ended their usefulness, if they ever had much.
But we are talking about human beings and their lives. It may not make much of a philosophical difference to compare different stances on this senseless slaughter, but it makes eminently practical sense to save the lives you can. An American Presidential election was not going to produce much of a genocide-stopping president in 2024, and I hope 2028 does better, but there were distinct differences in approach and stance and collaboration with Bibi.
Case in point, look up “Gaza floating pier,” vs. “Trump Gaza resort.” it’s not about philosophical differences when you are starving.
The Gaza floating pier was used to do warcrimes, then dismantled.
As planned.
the floating pier from day one was to have israeli guards at the end of it. It was a pretend situation where Israel could have instead just opened one gate into gaza instead for the exact same effect. Its a transparent and idiotic PR game and always was, and evidently you fell for it. Or you’re pushing the same braindead propoganda narrative with a straight face. How was the pier any different than a gate on land?
If genocide is bipartisan, then the less bad choice is whatever collapses the US the fastest. You wouldn’t try to choose the leader of Nazi Germany based on who’s going to run the holocaust most effectively
Case in point, look up “Gaza floating pier,” vs. “Trump Gaza resort.” it’s not about philosophical differences when you are starving.
BlueMAGA is a parody of itself
Fuck demoralizing. People made a conscious choice to screw the United States for ar least 3 more years…all because they were “demoralized”. So how bad are they depressed right now? “I’M DEMORALIZED…SO I’LL DO SOMETHING THAT WILL MAKE IT EXPONENTIALLY WORSE.” Here in the south, we call that “short bus thinking”. Yeah, I called those people the terrible R word…maybe I’ll take it back when they stop acting that way. And I don’t give a fuck. They fucked up. They can own it or cry into their lattes. I REALLY don’t give a fuck about their whining.
Your shitty system will always produce fascism as long as you don’t hold the slightly less fascist party accountable. Last election the dems threw immigrants and palestinians under the bus in the name of ‘appeasing the center’ next election it will be trans people that will lose all political support and some time afterwards the dems will fold on womens rights in their stupid attempt to become the republicans lite edition.
I’m glad monsters like you are suffering
Palestine is where Leopards Ate My Face meets Meanwhile On Grad. The two extremes have a common goal of destroying the country. MAGAts are shocked that Republicans are getting us into another war in the Middle East and the country is going hell. Gradbots are so pissed off with the the Democrat’s (“blue maga”) lack of spine against Israel that they want to burn the country to the ground in vengeance.
If your memory can last more than seven seconds, burning America to the ground starts to seem pretty reasonable.
If opposing genocide is synonymous with “destroying the country” then the country deserves to be destroyed
Burning the US down would be doing the world a favor
Ironically, I use Blue MAGA to refer to people like those Grads. If they had hit 4chan before reading communist theory, they probably would’ve ended up on the other end of the spectrum.
Ironically, I use Blue MAGA to refer to people like those Grads.
Then you are using it wrong.
BlueMAGA is abwd/ Biden & Harris toe suckers.
Isn’t that just Dixiecrats/Dixie Dems then? AKA former Confederates.
I use it because of the extremism of the MAGA crowd, not the conservatism. Not like Horseshoe Theory, but that extremists on the leftist side could have fallen down the MAGA rabbit hole instead under different life circumstances, and that they can show similar behaviors in “purity test” attitudes, etc. Not that they’re terrorists like the MAGA crowd, but that they should probably log off and touch grass once and a while.
Not something to be used wildly, but towards those who show 4chan-like behavior.
Making logical points weighing up two distinct yet similar stances on genocide is only going to suppress voter turnout.
It’s the same as any other US election. We always have two shit sandwich options forced by the parties. There’s always some absolutely fucked position they’re both going to work towards and it is just a factor of which is less bad.
There have been other genocides the US has supported for decades elsewhere that go one gave a fuck about. The issues in Gaza aren’t new, they’re just more visible right now because of Israeli lobbying, one of the most powerful lobbying groups in the US.
We always have two shit sandwich options forced by the parties.
That stopped working in 2016. Biden only won because he lied and said he wanted to do a bunch of stuff the left wanted. Harris was a return to “we’re shitty, we love it, fuck you” politics.
Not doing much to stop it is a weird way of saying actively helping it.
I see you too are actively helping it then. It’s your own words!
Yeah buddy I wasn’t saying not actively working against it was helping it. I meant literally helping it. That Administration was actively arming the Israelis and aiding in the genocide. Super weird that you didn’t know that.
Ok then tell me this, did Bibi like Biden? Did he want Biden to win? Did he think Biden let him do all he wanted? What did Biden say about Bibi in return?
Then you can look at things like Republicans voting to force continued sales of weapons
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/16/us/politics/house-bill-reverse-israel-arms-pause.html
Meanwhile; https://thehill.com/policy/defense/5429072-sanders-resolution-fails-israel-military/
Tell me what Biden could’ve done that wouldn’t amount to starting a war?
You’re such a ghoul, actively helping people like Musk and Miller and ensuring Trump won’t put up obstacles for Israel murdering people in Lebanon and Iran. Because it’s more important to you that people get martyred against their will for your personal ideological purity. You knew the genocide would get worse if Trump won and you decided that would be better
Its illegal to send weapons or money to a country that is committing genocide. Biden could have simply said he cannot legally support Israel in any way and then just not. Instead Biden chose to lie for Israel aboiut 40 beheaded babies and provide unlimited diplomatic support, going so far as to bomb Yemen for resisting.
Democratic leadership knew this would decrease turnout, they prioritized unlimited support for Israel over winning the election.
Pretty trivially easy question. Biden could have done a lot of things – vetoed funding and stopped running interference for Israel in the UN. And he could have called it a genocide and illegal on the world stage. Biden refused to call it a genocide. He could have called for an international force to stop the killing. He also flew recon missions for the Israelis with US drones over Gaza didnt he.
And “starting a war”? with who, Israel? Are you stupid? That war would last 5 minutes. Biden took massive amounts of money from AIPAC his entire career, and called himself a zionist all the time. Your pretending he had no choice and was simply a victim of circumstance is pure lies. He was massively bribed. A corrupt peice of shit genocide supporter. He would absolutely lose his case and be imprisoned if the US had done the right thing and signed onto the ICC. He belongs in an orange jumpsuit, sharing a cell with trump.
Biden Administration Bypassed Congress on Weapons Sale to Israel
To start with, he could have, uh, not bypassed congress on weapons sales to Israel.
Ok then tell me this, did Bibi like Biden?
Who gives a fuck! You ghouls care more about your fucking parasocial kayfabe character drama than the lives of millions of people
Even knowing that Trump was going to actively help Bibi?
The US was doing it anyway before Trump2.0
actively help Bibi?
What would you call Genocide Joe keeping the WMD shipments flowing, on time, without end, even during a manufactured famine?
This is one issue where both parties are literally the same.
I mean, Trump at this time did say that he was going to put American boots on the ground in Gaza and pave it over to put up a luxury beach resort, so I wouldn’t say that they’re literally the same on this, but it’s a measure between actively supporting genocide and actively supporting and taking part in said genocide through direct military action.
Both parties love Israeli money, one just also happens to be run by a man who would love to wipe non-white ethnicities off the planet and build more towers to his inflated ego where they once lived.
American boots on the ground in Gaza and pave it over to put up a luxury beach resort,
Don’t see much difference apart from the jersey being worn by the
settlersmurderers and raiders, personally. The policy is ultimately the same.run by a man who would love to wipe non-white ethnicities off the planet and build more towers to his inflated ego where they once lived.
And I’m sure Joe ‘Fund the Police’ Biden and his sidekick Harris are super concerned about non-white ethnicities. His enthusiasm for keeping the WMD’s flowing mid-genocide and mid-famine really sells me on his supposed empathy for them too.
This isn’t a zero sum game and this isn’t about defending a president who can at best be said to have kept the ship afloat and recovered some of the economic damage caused by Trump’s COVID response, nor the shitty option B the Dems forced on us without a primary. All of the above can be terrible. That’s always an option.
You see one jersey or the other, I saw two jerseys with twice the players on the horizon. The policy is the same now, but in 2024 during the election? When the guy who idolizes war mongers like Putin and who used to read Hitler’s speeches before bed (according to the biography of an ex-wife), and who had previously said about the Middle East that he wanted to “nuke the sand into glass” said that he wanted to invade Gaza and put a carrier just off the coast, I fully believed that the strip would be gone and the people who lived there a footnote in the history books written by Israel and the US by now.
Both suck. Both support genocide. But one was talking about accelerating it by an order of magnitude that didn’t leave nukes off the table. If they hadn’t replaced the big red button in the Oval Office with one that orders a diet coke, he would’ve slammed it the first chance he got.
defending a president who can at best be said to have kept the ship afloat and recovered some of the economic damage
“Hitler made the trains run on time”
I see you’re determined to not give Joe Biden credit for his record.
And that’s okay. It’s much easier to ignore his support for genocide than to acknowledge you voted for it.
You’re happy that the genocidal afrikaaner Musk got to kill hundreds of thousands, you’re happy Netanyahu expanded into Lebanon, you’re happy Trump got to give Netanyahu a fake ceasefire under which killings continue, you’re happy innocent Iranians are dying, all so you can claim you’re a good person for opposing Biden.
It’s easier to pretend you’re not responsible for assisting genocide than acknowledge it.
Trump’s win made everything worse and you’re happy that it is worse.
Not at all.
I did not vote for Donald, but if it makes you feel better to presume, go for it. It doesn’t matter so you may as well find a coping mechanism.
deleted by creator
sure, the Democrats were not doing much to stop the slaughter
They were selling weapons to enable the genocide you’re downplaying by refusing to call it a genocide.
Answer the fucking core of their point, instead going on random tangents. How the fuck is Trump better for the palestinians you supposedly care about than the Democrats? How did NOT having a spineless democrat in office help them? What did all you moral purists do in those 4-ish hours once every 4 years where you didn’t vote? How many walmarts have been fire bombed?
I fucking voted. For harris. Genocidal shit like you loves to make the assumption that anyone who doesn’t love genocide and nothing else like you do must be a trumper or a nonvoter.
Or you don’t care how anyone voted because you got your only policy either way, and just can’t stand it when anyone has a problem with genocide.
You mean they were giving weapons for free
Yes. Because what so many folks can’t seem to get is that different people are different. And they have different ethics.
This is literally the entire point of the trolley problem. Yes, you can stick your fingers in your ears and say, “always pull the lever for the track with fewer people on it.” But that’s just not how ethics works. Utilitarian ethics is one way to live life, but utilitarians have this incredibly annoying habit of assuming that theirs is the only valid ethical system, and that you’re a complete moron if you follow any other school of thought.
You’re demonstrating a utilitarian sense of ethics. One who follows a respect-for-persons belief system would say that the ends don’t justify the means. That it’s not fine to pull the trolley lever, even if that would result in a net saving of lives. That it’s fine to vote to hold people accountable, even if that will objectively result in net material harm. It’s not always about the greatest good for the greatest number. Otherwise, for example, we would never put any research dollars into studying cures for rare diseases. Those dollars could always objectively do more good elsewhere.
Hell, even our criminal laws don’t follow a utilitarian sense of ethics. You can’t legally get out of consequences from killing someone by saying, “this on net saved lives.” Even if you can objectively prove it, you’re not legally allowed to kill people. It doesn’t matter if your murder on net saves lives, you’re still a murderer. If a gang kidnaps your two children and tells you, “you must go kill this other one person if you want them to live.” If you do that, if you go and kill that stranger to save your own kids? You will be charged and convicted of murder. You’re not allowed to kill one innocent person to save two innocent people.
Many people voted against or refused to vote for Kamala because they were trying to punish her and the Democratic Party. Voting is the only way we have of holding politicians and parties accountable. Millions of voters saw the horrific haughtiness and barbarity of how the Democrats acted around Gaza, and they wanted to punish them for it. It was about holding them accountable. It was about justice. Many voted against Kamala to punish her for supporting genocide. And if the likely thing came to pass, if Trump supported genocide as well? Well those voters would vote against him for the same reason. They vote to hold people accountable for past actions, not to speculate on future ones. Maybe not how you vote, but again, people are different and can use whatever ethical system they want in choosing their vote.
Again, you can argue greatest good for greatest number, but that isn’t the only system of ethics out there, and it’s not even the system that defines the foundation of our legal codes.
You’re demonstrating a utilitarian sense of ethics.
And even more specifically, act utilitarian ethics. This incredibly narrow focus on the immediate effects of actions on the individual level which they treat as the only possible way of looking at things with absolutely zero examination.
I’d describe myself as a rule utilitarian, and from that perspective, the rule of “Don’t support genocide, period” has a much stronger track record historically than, “Don’t support genocide, unless you have a really good reason.”
There is not one single time in all of human history that a stubborn refusal to support genocide has produced undesirable results. There are countless cases of people committing genocide because they see it as a “lesser evil” or “the only viable option.” “If we don’t kill them, they’ll kill us, so we have no choice, this is the lesser evil.” But not only are liberals utterly ignorant about moral philosophy, they’re also ignorant about history, or they refuse to learn from it.
Modern American liberals are the ideological inheritors of the people who took the more “progressive” approach to indigenous people of subjugating and forcibly assimilating them, killing any who resisted, as opposed to the people who simply wanted to exterminate them all (who now live on through republicans). It’s no wonder that they struggle to understand any perspective more progressive than “humane” genocide.
But this pretends that “not voting” is somehow a morally neutral inaction. It is a choice, the choice to support genocide EVEN HARDER.
This has very little to do with utilitarianism or deontology, and everything with retaining a feeling of moral superiority without having to actually do stuff.
You want a deontological take? Start bombing bridges or other infrastructure. Stop paying taxes, go to jail. Do literally anything that doesn’t amount to “not doing stuff makes me better, akshually”.
But this pretends that “not voting” is somehow a morally neutral inaction. It is a choice, the choice to support genocide EVEN HARDER.
I voted third party. Voting for someone who opposes genocide is not “supporting genocide eVeN hArDeR” than voting for someone who supports genocide.
This has very little to do with utilitarianism or deontology, and everything with retaining a feeling of moral superiority without having to actually do stuff.
I could just as easily say that your decision to vote for a genocidaire is just about retaining a feeling of moral superiority without having to do stuff. The difference is that I subscribe to a moral framework that says genocide is bad.
You want a deontological take? Start bombing bridges or other infrastructure. Stop paying taxes, go to jail.
The philosophy understander has logged on.
I’m not even a deontologist, dumbass. I literally just said that. Not that “bombing bridges” is remotely a “deontological take” to begin with.
The thing that really bugs me about y’all isn’t just the fact that you’re so ignorant, it’s that you’re so confident in your ignorance. You drop into intelligent conversations to not only spew a bunch of unexamined nonsense, but to tell everyone else how stupid and bad they are for not accepting your nonsense. It’s like talking to a MAGA person tuned down like 10%.
In terms of any actual metric, Biden was as bad if not worse than Trump in Gaza, but because BlueMAGA were engaging in mass genocide denial when it was their team doing it, they don’t realise.
Objectively wrong
Removed by mod
Tell me who was president for all but 27 days of 2025 you illiterate moron
The deaths WERE HIGHER IN THE YEAR TRUMP TOOK POWER
did you not think anybody would check your claims???
Imagine being so disingenuous that you actually believe (or at least want others to think you do) that we just didn’t know whether Trump would be worse than Harris on Palestine, Iran, and every other fucking thing possible for that matter. I never used to hold much creedence with the whole paid russian or chinese actors angle, even back in 2016. It is becoming more and more difficult to rationally explain how anybody actually living in the US could, with a straight face, make equivalency arguments between Trump and Clinton, Biden, or Harris. It does, however, seem like a perfectly rational act for foreign actors who just want to accelerate their replacement of the US as hegemon to take.
The demorcrats would also have gone to war with Iran, if Israel wanted it. Notice how almost none of the majour dems have really condemned the war in Iran, even though it would have been massively electorally advantageous for them?
Maybe they would have done the war more carefully / competently, but they are slaves to the exact same forces of capital, that pushed Trump towards the war.
Notice how almost none of the majour dems have really condemned the war in Iran, even though it would have been massively electorally advantageous for them?
in the recent election for MJTs seat, the D candidate lost. One of the reasons given for WHY was because he actively opposed the war, the winning R was all Fir the war.
looking at that, when offered a chance voters sided with the pro war ideologue. They don’t have to vote D next time but they could have this time.
Fundamentally a politician wants to win. As a voter, I get people being despondent when there’s no real choice but here voters had a choice. Democrat politicians would be stupid not to pay attention.
Doing nothing to stop it, cheering on Universities and police that beat and punished protesters, refusing to let Ruwa Romman or anyone else anti-genocide speak at their convention, etc.
Their policy was bad and they were assholes about it at every opportunity. It’s honestly amazing she got as many votes as she did.
It absolutely was.
They didn’t send Bill Clinton to give primary speeches wagging his finger at Palestinian Americans for nothing.
USians have been OK with crimes against humanity for decades. If Palestine had anything to do with Trump winning, then that’s due to propaganda, not them organically giving a fuck.
But why are we still pretending Trump even won when his senile rotting brain admitted they rigged the elections?
I mean, the democrats ARE bad because Palestine. But the Republicans are worse, by A LOT.
Harris saw a 6M vote undercount relative to Biden. You can argue all the reasons why, but you can’t deny Democrats would have won if they’d been as popular in 2020 as they were in 2024.
It’s bizarre to see people insist this collapse in support has nothing to do with the policies of the party people stopped liking.
In the same vein, there’s a real hard November coming for the GOP this year. Their incompetence is going to cost them.
Exactly. And frankly, any person who blames the voters rather than the politician is a deplorable. You have to be the biggest dumbass on Earth to think that trying to shame voters is a good electoral strategy. Kamala lost because she was a terrible candidate. Her loss is her fault. Not the voters.
That’s just one big problem with your take.
Except for being weak on Gaza, all of the democrats’ other policies were actually more popular and winning.
The problem is media lied and said their accomplishments belonged to Trump and that Trump’s failures belonged to them. He claimed he would deliver on the economy when his plan was to ruin it.
It’s bizarre to see people decide that the policies were unpopular when they always won as long as you removed the name from them. People wanted what democrats promised but trusted Trump would be the one who could deliver on the promises. That was all down due to lies and propaganda.
The big error made by Democrats is falling behind on outreach, and letting the corporate wing set the tone (fucking political consultants pushing them to “play nice”), all the other bullshit like telling them “they should’ve focused on the economy” is propaganda because the already did that and media refused to report on it
And now Trump no longer has people who can insulate him from consequences because he made too many much too big fuckups, so now average people know he actually never were a good businessman and never could deliver. But people are still not connecting the dots and directing the blame to the people who pushed the lies.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/11/democrats-defined-progressive-issues/680810/
https://www.levyinstitute.org/publications/trump-wins-while-americans-vote-for-progressive-policies/
https://edition.cnn.com/2019/04/07/politics/democratic-positions-majority
https://wisconsinexaminer.com/2022/12/13/progressive-issues-are-popular-issues/
https://www.forwardky.com/poll-voters-love-progressive-policies-despite-trump-win-tag-analysis/
People want to believe the Republicans are massively worse. They aren’t. It’s a 10-15% thing at most. Most mainstream Democrats still support Israel, and they support the war on Iran. Even JFK ordered terrorist attacks on Cuban civillians. Dems are just fascists wrapped in a rainbow flag. The base need to reckon with this and actually force the party to address it rather than just acting like it’s not happening. Voting blue no matter who on the basis of harm reduction just enables it.
Is there any possible way to disagree with you that you won’t read as a Russian bot trying to undermine democracy?
It’s such a thought-terminating cliche that anyone can use to dismiss any criticism. I could just as easily say that you’re a DNC bot. Like, fuck critical thinking, I guess.
Why, of course there is! I certainly went from an early stance of “Israel is just defending itself from a terrorist attack” to “Alright, what they are doing to the civilian population in Gaza is clearly genocidal.” Then I went on to include what the “settlers” are doing in the West Bank with tacit sanction of the government under the same genocidal umbrella.
If the thesis is, “There was no attempt by Russian bots to sway public support of Palestinian civilians against the Democrats,” you’d have a hard time convincing me.
If the thesis is, “GenZ was well-informed about the plight of Palestinians before TikTok told them to look into it and shaped their opinion,” also unlikely to convince me.
If the thesis is, “There was no attempt by Russian bots to sway public support of Palestinian civilians against the Democrats,” you’d have a hard time convincing me.
There are bots out there trying to convince everyone of everything. That in no way means that you get to dismiss everyone voicing a particular viewpoint as being a bot.
If the thesis is, “GenZ was well-informed about the plight of Palestinians before TikTok told them to look into it and shaped their opinion,” also unlikely to convince me.
And you believe that the thing that changed was bots and not video evidence of genocide?
And you believe that the thing that changed was bots and not video evidence of genocide?
I do not. GenZ reacted with horror to something horrific. The issue is that they didn’t react with the same horror to horrific stories from before 2022 - settlers murdering Palestinian kids, soldiers walking away from torturing Palestinians, administrative detention that ran into the decades without any form of process.
Note that I do not blame GenZ for this. American media has been silent on these things, and is largely silent to this day. What TikTok brought (and it scared Washington insiders) is a view of the world as it is, not as it is viewed through the interests of the USA.
But, while I am very grateful that people started seeing the world outside of the propaganda machinery, I also realize that the recent exposure to the new information made the same people vulnerable to more propaganda and disinformation.
The includes the idea that Democrats were worse or comparable to Republicans when it comes to the treatment of Muslims. Which is the point of the post.
Trump’s very first act in office in 2017 was to pass the Muslim ban executive order. He didn’t care it was blatantly unconstitutional: it signaled a set of priorities, and discrimination and hatred towards Muslims of all kinds was the core of it.
I think that the Democrats are comparable to Republicans on treatment of Muslims. Democrats have supported and armed the Palestinian genocide, as well as waging war elsewhere in the Middle East. I wouldn’t say (and have never said) that they’re worse than Republicans, but they’re certainly comparable. I don’t think that “materially supporting a genocide and forcibly silencing dissent, apologetically” and “materially supporting a genocide and forcibly silencing dissent, gleefully,” are “incomperable.”
Is there any way for me to defend that position, or am I just automatically a bot, logic and evidence be damned?
You don’t need my stamp of approval, but you definitely don’t sound like a bot.
I think the current situation in the Middle East, compared to two years ago, very clearly shows that the two parties are not in any way comparable as you claim. You seem to pick both reacting wrong to the same situation (the Gaza conflict/Palestinian genocide) as proof that they are the same and I find that claim disingenuous.
Really? So democratic presidents don’t wage war in the Middle East?
They also weren’t just “reacting wrong to a situation.” They (both Republicans and Democrats) have caused this situation. Who was it who said, “If Israel did not exist, the United States would have to invent an Israel to protect her interests in the region?”
There’s been a near-complete bipartisan consensus on conquering the Middle East since at least Bush. Obama had every opportunity to withdraw and chose instead to double down, as well as orchestrating regime change in Libya. Everyone’s also been quietly bombing Yemen for decades.
The difference between them is mostly how concerned they are with legality and propriety. But both are committed to the imperial project of conquering the Middle East. Bipartisan support for arms to Israel to conquer Palestine (and Lebanon) The overthrow of governments in Libya and Syria. Direct invasion and occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s simply untrue to claim that this project started under Trump. Of course, Trump has mostly forgone the usual pretense of inventing pretexts for the aggression and is much more mask off about everything. But the overall goal is the same, Republicans are just dumber and more brazen about persuing it.
Those bases aren’t just there because of Trump.
I can’t fathom how any of those people thought Trump would consider Palestine anything but a future golf course. It’s been annihilated as a country and a people under Trump.
under Trump.
Most of the genocide and leveling of Gaza happened under Biden. But yes it continued under trump. Israel owns both US political parties.
So I dont know why you say “under Trump” – its the exact same thing under both Trump and Biden. We let Israel do whatever they want, whenever they want, however they want, to whoever they want, funded by us.
Seems you want to pretend Dems are better about it but I dont see how you can contrive any difference between 100% enablement and support.
In terms of Palestine? I don’t know how you yanked that interpretation out. If it doesn’t change with either party then the only reason to vote Trump is spite, followed by a leopard eating your faces.
In terms of everything else? Yes and no. I do know we would not have:
- Further rollback of civil liberties of women
- a tax plan (impending) intended to trap women in marriage
- brown shirt army stalking people and performing street executions
- war with Iran
- gas prices that will continue to rise long after the war with Iran is done
- A rollback on all solar and wind programs / projects
- rollback of consumer protections re banks, credit cards, junk fees
- halt on internet being made an essential utility
- a tax plan that pushes billionaires toward becoming trillionaires
- NIOSH gutted, good luck with work safety gear manufactured from here on out
- Elections being gutted for midterms via the US postal service
- Speech, now, you can’t even protest Israel without being arrested or booted.
- Impending collapse of the dollar
- Cuba
- All those dead fishermen in South American waters
- Further privacy erosion in favor of Google, META, Microsoft, etc
- Disrespect and disenfranchising military vets, like Kelly and all the randomly expelled career generals in an attempt to make the military another brown shirt brigade
- And I’m sick of listing this crap.
Arguably, 9 & 16 would probably still happen, but in slower subtler ways. The rest? Every spite vote or lack thereof made it happen.
I don’t like our two party system. But unless you have an actual solution that fixes it at the time of an election, then the spite play does indeed hurt all.
I’ve given up on changing republicans. We should either change the dems, or burn our entire government to the ground without much delay. Those are our options. Changing Dems means setting boundaries and sticking to them. And boundaries cant be only around during the primary. Dems either adhere to universal human rights for all or they lose in every way I can make them lose, thats my deal with them, they can take it or leave it-- I dont care if they – or you like it. Its not asking for much. and I’m willing to burn the democratic party and our stupid governmental system to the ground to get it, just like the zionists and their creatures are willing to do.
You want to wave a stack of lesser causes and pretend they compare at all to genocide? stuff like:
halt on internet being made an essential utility
oh my. You weigh that list of comparatively trivial bullshit against genocide of hundreds of thousands of innocents, journalist, and doctors huh. Well I think they dont even begin to compare, and it doesnt speak well of you that you’d even try to compare them. Kind of disgusting and self centered. Oh no, your gas is more expensive? You poor dear. This is “killing” you, I can tell. You’re basically being “genocided” by high gas prices and the internet not being considered a public utility arent you. Why cant you just stand up firmly for universal human dignity and human rights? Would that be so bad?
I think most republicans aren’t as locked into their beliefs as we have been made to believe, tbh. If they can change their opinions to match that of their leader, they have a fairly pliable belief system. I feel they are more likely to realign themselves for a leader that they see as a populist is the thing. So even a populist on the other side of the aisle would sway many of the Right’s current followers, since they’d be making promises for getting things done and giving them a proverbial backpat about it.
I think the wind is already blowing for a changed Democratic Party, it’s a wind that’s been blowing since Bernie really, but the old guard Baby Boomers have been in power for quite a while now. Demographics have been slowly changing so that the Baby Boomers don’t make up as much of the majority of voters anymore, so more progressive stances can take root.
Changing Dems is about focusing electing politicians that mirror the values you have more than anything. Promoting a different voting system that enables these more progressive voices would go a long ways towards getting them in office as well.
Functionally, it’s not possible to ‘start over’ so it’s smart to work within the space that we do have and make real change where it is possible to do so. Convincing people to change their stances is hard work, and the way power is split in a country as big as the US complicates things even further. Educating newer generations about why changes matters is important, and educating them about logical things they can do to build a better system, which does put human rights for all as top priority, should be a top focus.
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It’s been annihilated as a country and a people under Trump.
That happened under Biden, you were just a genocide denying ghoul when your team was doing it
Or maybe we should demand politicians who aren’t genocidal? I’m not a Russian bot, I just refuse to follow the same bullshit “vote blue no matter who” harm reduction narrative that just leads to infinitely more harm in the long run.
The car is already skidding on the ice. Saying “we should have taken the subway” is not useful at that point in time.
We’ll still be skidding in 2028, and 2032, and 2036, and 2040, and so on. Picture yourself in 2044 making this same argument. Now we’re arguing about Hitler (D) who wants to put trans people in prison, and Hitler ® who wants to put trans people in death camps. Both candidates are willing to launch a nuclear weapon in behalf of Israel. The car is already skidding, it’s too late to change things. If you don’t vote for Hitler (D), then you’re letting Hitler ® win.
Flash back to 2026. “Vote blue no matter who” just means democrats don’t have to appeal to leftists at all. In order to win, they just need to appeal to the right. Let’s force them to appeal to the left instead.
“Don’t vote until they learn how important we are” is how you join the third+ of the country that doesn’t vote and is therefore ignored by politicians.
Seriously, why do these people think politicians feel chastised by non-voters.
I never said don’t vote. Vote in every election possible. If that >33% of Americans who don’t vote did, we would never have a republican president again.
And yet a large portion of them don’t vote because of what you said in your previous comment. They say that their vote won’t matter because nothing will change, and therefore don’t vote.
If we could convince them to vote out the Republicans and then hold the Democratic party over the fire until we can replace them with actually competent candidates (third party or not, we should remove parties period and enact ranked choice imo), then we might have a chance. But no conversation ever gets past the first hurdle of “vote blue no matter who won’t change anything.”
And yet a large portion of them don’t vote because of what you said in your previous comment.
Maybe. I wonder how many leftists don’t bother voting because of what I said, and how many don’t bother voting because democrats routinely fail to achieve anything. Biden had four years to put us on the path to getting healthcare, to raising the minimum wage, to seeing Trump tried for treason, to releasing the Epstein files, to ending that one genocide, and he just sat around with his dick in his hand for four years instead.
I won’t hold it against any leftist if they voted for Biden and feel burned. I did, and I do. Would Harris have been better? Obviously. Would she have done anything to mitigate the violence and misery the next republican would bring? Nope. The best she would do is delay some of it for a few more years before it came back worse, just like Biden did.
You can’t just vote out the Republicans. They’re going to keep running forever. As long as Democrats can get wins just by being slightly less evil than Republicans, there will never be a fire to hold them over.
They say that their vote won’t matter because nothing will change, and therefore don’t vote.
Maybe pretend they’re republicans and do what they want?
Republicans don’t vote for democrats, but democrats will abandon every last principle and every last vulnerable minority chasing their votes.
I can name a few vulnerable minorities that have been abandoned by people who allowed republicans to take power, can you name any the democrats abandoned?
Democrats who ignored all the warnings about how failing to represent their constituents would result in a loss allowed republicans to take power. Not that democrats ever wield it when they have it.
Undocumented immigrants, when democrats permanently adopted republican border policy for a stupid momentary gotcha.
Trans people, when democrats not only said nothing, they actually ran anti-trans hate in their own ads.
Palestinian Americans. This has to be obvious even to you.
Women, when democrats preferred to keep the filibuster over codifying Roe.
No. Voting in big elections is not the only action you take. This is a conflict with multiple fronts. You need to organize, talk to people, use every option.
Just abandoning the electoral front in this conflict is stupid
Voting in big elections is not the only action you take.
When did I say that it is? Please organize. Please vote in primaries. Do use every option. And also, force the Democratic party to understand that they have to appeal to leftists to get leftist votes, even when a conservative democrat wins a primary.
I’ve been warning people about what was coming as far back as 2010, when I was a teenager. I have been telling people that “vote blue no matter who” would lead here, and people just derided me, called me a troll, I have been told endlessly that I’m making a slippery slope argument.
When Bernie’s would-be victory was transmuted into Hillary’s defeat, that should have been a wake-up call for you. Your politicians are playing you like a fiddle. They would rather have fascism than even the mildest social democracy.
History has vindicated leftists, again and again and again and again. Liberals, centrists, democrats, they are either in denial, or they’re fully onboard with fascism.
Please, for once, listen to us. You need to help us stop this shit. We can’t just keep going on voting for the lesser evil forever.
Organize, protest and elect. Emphasis on organize and protest.
- Get as involved as you can with activist efforts locally.
- Organize, network, focus on building solidarity. Join or form a union. Join the IWW.
- Vote at primaries and elections for the best candidate, even if you doubt they can win.
- Don’t punch down.
- Don’t punch left.
- Educate yourself, politically.
- Push for voting reform and for anything that breaks the two-party system.
The advice was given with plenty of time to follow it, they chose not to
I think the question is, what is the best way to get politicians who aren’t genocidal. Which is a specific case of the question of how you get change implemented.
I have seen people advocate for incremental change, and I have seen people advocate for revolution. The problem with incrementalism is that it looks like too little, and it’s uncertain in direction and can be reversed. The problem with revolutionism is that absolutely nothing happens until a cataclysmic change occurs, and then it’s absolutely not clear that the change is what people wanted in the first place.
Conservatives have achieved the monumental changes they wanted over the course of five decades. I find their goals repulsive, their methods disgusting, and their personalities (people in power) revolting. But I begrudgingly admit that their approach worked. They got absolutely everything they ever wanted, and their problem right now is that they, too, can’t live in the world they decidedly thought they wanted.
The problem with incrementalism is that it looks like too little
The problem with incrementalism is that it’s often just a bullshit cover for doing nothing at all.
what is the best way to get politicians who aren’t genocidal
I can tell you with great certainty that voting for genocidal politicians is the worst way of getting politicians who aren’t genocidal.
My advice, as always, is to organize, protest, and elect, with a greater emphasis on organizing and protesting.
- Get as involved as you can with activist efforts locally.
- Organize, network, focus on building solidarity. Join or form a union. Join the IWW.
- Vote at primaries and elections for the best candidate, even if you doubt they can win.
- Don’t punch down.
- Don’t punch left.
- Educate yourself, politically.
- Push for voting reform and for anything that breaks the two-party system.
I don’t think people are saying you personally are a bot, but you’re falling for narratives pushed by bots. By allowing republicans to win this past election, infinitely more harm has been caused than even most people’s worst predictions and absolutely zero harm has been prevented. USAID is gone which will lead to millions of deaths abroad, crackpots like RFK Jr have been legitimized causing deaths to diseases which were effectively eliminated, disaster relief is being denied to blue states, and of course Israel has more freedom than ever before to do whatever they want to the Palestinian people.
Has any harm been reduced by allowing the republican party to have power? Can you acknowledge the harm that has already been caused by allowing them to have power?
And if the dems had won on their appeasement of the fascists strat they probably would have fumbled the bag one or two elections after that and all of the stuff you mentioned would happen anyways just now with even less of a chance for the dems to right things afterwards because they adopted the mindset the republicans had a few years ago.
Why are you libs so averse to the reality of the ratchet effect?
So it is worth letting the bad things happen now because they probably would have happened anyway a decade from now? And winning an election against the republicans would have convinced democrats to adopt the republican mindset, which won’t happen after that mindset is proven to win elections?
Democrats should have listened to people who were telling them they would lose if they kept supporting genocide.
They were warned. They knew. They wanted genocide so badly they were willing to botch the election to make sure it kept going.
I don’t think people are saying you personally are a bot, but you’re falling for narratives pushed by bots.
People call me a bot quite a bit, sometimes a shill too, or a Russian troll. In reality, I’m a gay autistic over-educated furry from Scotland with hot takes firmly backed by strongly held values - that we should always work to minimize suffering and maximize happiness for ourselves and for all living things.
I am not falling for anyone’s narratives. I arrive at all of my strongly held positions after a great deal of thought, consideration and evaluation. I am the person who speaks out against the popular narrative long before it becomes acceptable or even a matter of debate. I’m usually right years too early, sometimes decades. Maybe even centuries, on some topics, especially around youth liberation and anarchism. I have been an outspoken anti-zionist since 2010, for example.
I will never say that Trump winning was a good thing. It was a fucking tragedy. But if Kamala had won in 2024, she would have done nothing to prevent the material conditions which are responsible for the rise of fascism. Republicans, MAGA, and fascists would all see the continued failures of liberalism and the Democratic party to address massively growing inequality. They would become more and more reactionary, aggressive and extreme. What if, at that point, an intelligent, charismatic fascist leader appeared, and united that base? Someone who doesn’t say the quiet part out loud, who did all the shit that Trump did, but was able to convince Americans that it was necessary, or even good?
absolutely zero harm has been prevented
The full outcome of Trump’s premiership remains to be seen. Will the base of the Democratic party finally wake up and recognize that harm reduction narratives are a total and complete failure and demand more than the bare minimum from their electeds? Will an anti-zionist finally be elected in 2028? Or, dare I even dream it, an anti-imperialist? A socialist?
New York City got their first socialist muslim mayor, Zohran Mamdani, which one may argue was a leftist reaction to Trump.
We are also witnessing the collapse of the American Empire, massively accelerated by Trump.
We need to stop thinking in terms of harm reduction on an election-to-election basis, and start thinking in terms of the election after this one, at the very least. How can we use our vote not tactically, but strategically?
And remember, our vote is the weakest form of power we have. Our power comes from our connections and our labor.
Organize, protest and elect. Emphasis on organize and protest.
- Get as involved as you can with activist efforts locally.
- Organize, network, focus on building solidarity. Join or form a union. Join the IWW.
- Vote at primaries and elections for the best candidate, even if you doubt they can win.
- Don’t punch down.
- Don’t punch left.
- Educate yourself, politically.
- Push for voting reform and for anything that breaks the two-party system
I was fighting that battle right there alongside you, but yes the astroturfing was enormous. Sometimes I felt like I was the only sane person out there.
It helps to remember that there were hundreds of millions, potentially billions, of dollars going specifically to shilling for trump and putin and disparaging the democrats.
I tagged loads of accounts at the time, thinking they were just bots or plants, but a couple are still around and now I think maybe they’re just well-meaning morons who couldn’t quite figure out the implications…
Yes, some well-intentioned people may have been duped into spreading the propaganda. The goal of astroturfing is to convince ordinary people of what they’re shilling, ultimately getting others to repeat it.
The trolls only inject the mind virus, but once it’s accepted by an (un)critical mass, it kinds takes on a life of its own…
Damn, I wonder how you managed to lose the election with such compelling messages as “anyone who opposes us has been mind controlled by foreigners”
Centrists didn’t lose the election. They circumvented the only one they cared about winning: the primaries.
Indeed; their only objective is to suppress the left. The election was a huge win for them
It’s weird though. One of the accounts I tagged has just become more and more reasonable and I feel like. Idk. They certainly weren’t all bad or deceptive people – and being mean to and about them won’t really help them figure it out … OTOH fuck ppl who do stupid shit because they’re too proud to accept inherent complicity in the evils of the lesser.
The amount of that shit that was going on even here showed it worked. Pretty much all of those accounts are silent now. Shows you how the russian bots poisoned the election.
Some people still deny it, but it’s not like you need to wear a tinfoil hat to realize it. The kremlin openly admits to doing this shit.
“People who oppose genocide can’t possibly be human: they must be foreigners”
You guys I just as fascist as MAGA you know
Right? Having to deal with all those bots showing all the times the democrats supported Israel’s actions and refused to support Palestinians and refused to call or support any sanctions or supported BDS
Must have been exhausting particularly since you had zero evidence to the contrary. I can see how that would be an uphill battle when facts aren’t on your side.
You do realize your tactic here was literally the same tactic as when MAGAs call something “fake news,” right? Uncannily identical.
“People who oppose genocide can’t possibly be human: they must be foreigners”
You guys I just as fascist as MAGA you know
Or maybe I just don’t like genocide.
Or maybe I just don’t like genocide.
Liberals:
Tell that to the Lebanese.
Maybe all genocides are bad. Is that difficult to understand for some reason?
Who did you vote for in the 2024 US presidential election?
Harris. Why does that matter? Am I pure enough to think genocide is wrong?
Because it means you at least tried to mitigate the harm. Most people who took that stance said that people shouldn’t bother voting at all because voting for either was supporting genocide.
No, that only exists in your head because you are a crazed rabid party zombie. Normal human being progressives think genocide is bad. It’s really fucking weird that you don’t.
I mean, that’s certainly how pro-genocide centrists interpret all criticism.
So how’s that panning out for you now?
I don’t understand the question. I still don’t like genocide. Do you?
So in your opinion did you get less genocide?
It sure seems like you’re setting up for some bullshit gotcha that’s really clever in your head. The sheer quantity of assumptions you have made about me for saying that I think genocide is bad is baffling.
Genocide is bad. Say it with me.
Seems you can’t answer a simple question without feeling persecuted.
Blocked
Do you like genocide or not? Answer the question
Did your demands for fealty to netanyahu by proxy result in less genocide?
Blocked.
I blasphemed against the religion of every centrist, so he blocked me.
You’re losing and you know it, but you’re too stupid to understand why
‘Wouldn’t you have preferred the genocide with mock pearl clutching instead of glee’
No not really.
‘Wouldn’t you prefer a DNC and democratic establishment that believes it can win elections with genocidal conservative candidates that ignore the left wing of the party’
Also no.
Liberals: I can fix that voter, I just need to find the right logic combo in my persuasion.
Also Liberals: if voters were rational they would vote for the lesser evil.
Keep lecturing people, I am sure it will work this time around.
“People who oppose genocide can’t possibly be human: they must be foreigners”
You guys I just as fascist as MAGA you know
Because Trump was never going to wage a war? Lol. Everyone but R could see it clear as day that Trump would have no interest at all in stopping his Zionist friends from their favorite pastime hobby.
Did you reply to the wrong comment? Because none of that has any bearing on what I said
I guess I did. Sorry about that!
“Democrats are bad because Palestine” thing was clearly a psyop by Russian bots
By “Palestine” do you mean “supporting genocide in Palestine”?
Give up pursuing anyone of any argument these days. You’re better off calling them a dickhead and blocking them. That’s what I do now.
Fuck nonvoters and third party voters.
fuck you back, war crimes supporter. You should have made the dems do the right thing and you didnt lift a finger to do that during the entire campaign season. Dont come pretending you fought the good fight now. You didnt.
–the entire world
Who did you vote for? If it was not for Kamala Harris thenthen you’re responsible for the current globalshitshow.
And I’m going to block asshats like you. Keep screaming into a void.
Oh thank god, yes please dont ever reply to me again, thank you very much. Talking to people like yourself is not worth my time or energy.
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Good luck in 2028 lol
Perpetual loser
Well the reality isn’t much better. They put a candidate in that couldn’t beat anyone in the primaries, but was added because Biden wanted to run again.
If you are talking about Harris, then Biden did even worse: he pulled out way too late, refused to give her a chance to make a case (she probably preferred it that way, too), and then forbade her from straying even an inch from his party line.
and then forbade her from straying even an inch from his party line.
Not true. Moving to his right and promising to appoint a republican to her cabinet was just fine.
I mean thats basically what I was already saying…
You refuted the argument by providing all the evidence against it, I presume. You listed all the instances where leading Democrats supported Palestinians in the face of aggression, which are very numerous.
I mean, since that would be the way to remove any doubt
It’s a failure of our history classes. People thought the US was better than that but they never learned we really aren’t and light genocide and pretending to feel bad about it is the best we can do.
Both can be true. How TF we have 4 years to produce a candidate against trump, and the best we got was walking corpse Biden 2.0 and then Kamala “I’m speaking while your homeland is genocided” Harris.
I voted for her but if they put Gavin newsom, I don’t know if I can care anymore.
I hate that guy, but hate cannot make Me act against My own interests. Well it can a little bit, especially in fast moving situations. But it can’t do it with big decisions like My vote.
Yea, but from all his talks and bills I don’t trust him to not be against queer people. So in a way they both will be against my own interests.
He will be more against queer people than whoever the Republicans put forth? Really?
If candidate A wants you to hide your queerness and use the wrong bathroom, and candidate B wants to force you to be straight or go to jail or a conversion camp, are you really going to throw your hands up in the air and say it’s not worth voting?
Voting for someone does not mean you support everything they stand for. It just means you think they are the best option of what has been laid before you.
Voting for someone does not mean you support everything they stand for.
I’ve seen what centrists do when they don’t get their very first choice. They campaigned against Mamdani and formed a PAC to get McCain elected.
“Option A is really, really bad for me. But I’m not sure if option B wouldn’t be somewhat bad, too. So I will just watch and let option A happen.”
— You, and millions of other propaganda victims helping fascists win
I’m getting pretty tired of voting for the ‘slightly less bad’ blue fascists, though.
My actions and his actions are two very different things. If he primaries, I may tell people to vote for him against the R, having told people to vote against him in the primaries. In both cases I would be acting in alignment with My interests, for they are two very different choices. I will hope for the best and plan for the worst.
Single issue voting is how fascists win.
Voting is how fascists win.
This won’t be fixed by voting. It never could have been and it never will be.
Voting is how fascists win.
I’m just quoting the stupidest thing I’ve read this week for posterity.
Am I wrong?
Well, I don’t know here, let’s fucking use a brain cell or two.
Arguably, sure, facists win because people vote for them.
And do you know how facists lose? PEOPLE VOTE FOR NOT-FASCISTS.
So what you said was true and also the most useless fucking worthless statement I’ve read all week.
After all, the entire fucking point here is STOP VOTING FOR FASCISTS.
Peak BlueMAGA voter outreach
Your courage to do anything will help in the long run.
Please at least consider the option that helps some others.
It’s not even that. EVERYONE is harmed by fascists. Or, if you’d like to rephrase it this way: EVERYONE is harmed much more by fascists. Either way, in the general, vote blue. In the primaries, vote for the best option. And if you can run for office, run for office.
He’s against all people who aren’t Gavin Newsom. He’s clearly a snake
I hate that guy, but hate cannot make Me act against My own interests
If only everyone on Lemmy were this intelligent lol
If it was a race between Gavin Newsom and JD Vance I’d vote Newsom in an instant.
I agree but it’s like asking “where would you like to be stabbed?”
For any Democrat trying to “move to the center” I’d like to point towards Labour in UK and ask them how that’s going.
Thankfully 2028 is a political lifetime away and Newsom might not even be relevant.
Newsom would do good things for the country and the world just like Harris or even Biden 2.0 would have.
Newsom would tell the base to fuck off while funding ICE and war, guaranteeing republican victories in 2030 and 32. He would be a Biden 2.0.
Biden did a lot of great things during his time as president and it’s a testament to the failing american education system and the right-wing propaganda machine how people couldn’t see it.
He also enabled genocide in Palestine and set the stage for Trump to win
All in all, a net negative to the world.
Dumb shit americans voting Trump or third party brought Trump into power.
It’s also a testament to how bad the Biden administration failed at messaging.
Biden’s BBB and infrastructure spending was some of the best legislature of our lifetimes(yes BBB was watered down, corrupted, and did not meet the moment, but the bar is in hell).
Instead of doing full-court media blitz to advertise this victory to voters, they said almost nothing. Too afraid that Biden would reveal his dementia to the public, I guess. Fewest press conferences in modern presidential history, by far.
“Hitler made the trains run on time”
It’s not going to be JD. Mark my words, save my comment, it’s going to be Tucker Carlson. And if that happens and Dems haven’t changed their tune we are absolutely fucked.
If that happens and leftists are still their own biggest enemies with their pursuit of an ideologically pure candidate that doesn’t exist we’ll be fucked.
I don’t think most leftists are looking for an ideologically pure candidate, they’re looking for someone who will actually represent the people. The Israel issue is a great example of this disconnect; amongst Dem voters 90% are against supporting Israel, and yet there’s only a handful of Democrat politicians who have are agaimst sending Israel military aid. It’s really not a high bar for candidates to clear, and yet establishment Dems just keep SPRINTING to the right.
Leftists arent their own enemies, their enemies are neoliberals.
The only thing leftists do more than infighting is repeating right-wing propaganda.
Newsom is not left wing just because his interns make fun of Trump on twitter. Some people don’t want their options to be “fascist” or “neoliberal” and shills like you critizise them more than they do with the literal nazis keeping this system in place
I have friends and family getting their rights taken away and getting deported right now I need Trump gone.
If that makes me a shill so be it.
Start a party that has a chance then start lecturing about changing the system.
I don’t think people arguing against you get newsom he fundamentally has no real beliefs and will just do things to get more power. He throws the dem base under the bus at every opportunity and is somehow more pro billionaire that the average corp dem.
Yeah, I would rather have pritsker, at least he seems to have a backbone among the Democrat governors. I also think having conservative Democrats brings us further right so more evil Republicans can get in power.
Gavin running for president might flip California red lol. He is hated here across the political spectrum.
If Gavin Newsom is the dem candidate I will not be able to stomach voting for him, im a trans person and I refuse to vote for someone who would actively backstab me
The English language has an nice expression for that: “cut off your nose to spite your face”
This person is an idiot. The american public gave up on their one chance to influence the outcome of the presidency and fucked it up for everyone beyond comprehension, and are now still trying to push the blame on the establishment. Fuck every one of the sitouts and republican voters. You enabled the orange buffoon and couldnt see the threat he represented. Sometimes, when life gives you a choice between lemons and your way of life being destroyed in a childish tantrum, you swallow the fucking lemon.
Gaza and the world thanks you. Fuckers.
This was all over Lemmy, too, along with all the other social media platforms.
It pretty much disappeared everywhere the instant trump won, as well as the complaints about grocery prices and the lies about gas prices.
The exception was lemmy, prob thanks to hex, grad, and ml, where people still find the time to randomly inject democrat hate.
That this has over 700 upvotes on lemmy.world says everything you need to know about lemmy.world.
You see it turns out you can have more than 1 thought in your head at once. Trump can be a fascist who materially supports a genocide and the democrat party can also be materially supporting a genocide. Look at how little they’ve done to stop the Iran war. Why do you think that is?
It’s easy to critique and play both sides when you don’t live here
Same Americans that want others to revolt against oppressive govt.
This is what will keep happening if the Dems election strategy remains “if you don’t vote for us you get that asshole”. And use them as an excuse not to do anything.
Removed by mod
Okay, so:
- Voting Democrat in the general election is the choice with (edited in: the) least horrible consequences and
- Voting Democrat in the general election isn’t nearly enough to stop the ratchet-effecting into fascism, and a stand-for-nothing placeholder centrist Democrat president in 2028 will probably just lead to Trump-3/Vance/someone similarly horrible in 2032
are unfortunately both true.
Also, non-MAGA Americans - (EDIT: liberals, not the party leaders) and leftists alike - need better people skills. With infighting like this, Republicans hardly even need to lift a finger.
Arguing over who would have genocided people the nicest is fucked up on soooooooo many levels.
I mean, she’s right. Dems are supposed to represent the ideological opposite of Cons, both domestically and internationally.
Of course, US foreign policy has always been uni-party, so there was never a chance that the Dems were going to concede. Despairingly so.
I voted for Kamala, but she didn’t everything in her power to destroy the momentum she got after Biden dropped out.
