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As long as we understand a vote for Biden is the only vote NOT for Trump, it’s all good.
All you liberals have brain worms.
Says the person who doesn’t understand how the US election system works.
It’s unfortunately a bipartisan system with the shitty electoral system that needs reformation. It’s barely a democracy, but there is a clear option out of the two, and for now, ensuring Trump is not president again is a step in a better direction.
Wrong. Vote RFK.
🤢 I’d rather vote green
You are not in Europe my friend. Why do Americans not even understand their own voting system.
The Green Party is a thing in America.
Republican and Democrat are the two biggest parties by a large margin, but a few other smaller parties exist. Plus, some people run as an Independent. They’re not affiliated with any party at all.
Edit: I never meant to imply the other parties had any chance at winning an election in a meaningful way, which is what these replies seem to think I was saying. (They don’t have a chance, honestly.) But other parties do exist, including a party in which you can “vote green”. That is all I’m saying.
In a first past the post system of districts with single representative candidates, it almost always resolves to two viable parties. That’s the way it’s been for basically all of American history.
The parties can change, but the shape of the system remains constant: a vote is only effective when cast for the largest opponent of your least desired candidate. It’s unintuitive and discouraging.
The parliamentary systems used in much of Europe, for all their flaws, do allow for more robust and diverse representation.
Greens in America aren’t in a position to govern. Even if Stein got enough electoral votes through the work of 30-60 literal miracles, she’d be totally unable to govern effectively. You need a deep bench and more of a base in the other branches of government to form a party that can effect changes and run this country
There’s more to federal elections than winning. It’s always hilarious when people that don’t understand how fucked our system is try to teach others.
Teaching civics is part of the “a republic, if you can keep it” that Franklin was talking about
Despite there being more to federal election third party remains suppressed and will always be suppressed by first past the post.
100%. But ballot access, federal funding, and being able to actually run spoilers locally are pretty important.
There is no viable third party without voting reform.
If you really want smaller parties to have any chance, go help the people within the democratic party who are trying to make that happen.
I love how you exactly proved their point without realising. Please go look up the spoiler effect with first-past-the-post voting.
Then we can use third party candidates to determine who the power actually goes to. At the end of the day. America is so bipolar split tlboth parties are now completely at the mercy of anyone who can garner 10% support. RFK Jr at this point can literally be the decider or who becomes president and who doesn’t. Maybe we can use that as a tool of power to force the 2 parties to open the voting system up or have their power cockblocked from them every election cycle.
No, this is not how it works. Please look up the spoiler effect.
I can’t vote because I don’t live there, but am in the imperial core of countries, so it would be very nice to not have fascists in charge, considering we literally have prosecuted whistleblowers reporting on warcrimes at the behest of the US government. We’re your little bitches whether we like it or not.
Y’all really do need to be hyper-focused on pushing for sweeping electoral reform, for sure.
In the meantime though, voting for a 3rd party under your system is basically a vote for the person you don’t want.
Vote Biden if you would dislike having Trump more. If you don’t want to do that, then yeah, you’re basically admitting you’re cool with the outcome of Trump presidency.
Please don’t waste your vote, your vassals beg you.
I don’t want Biden OR trump. that’s why I’m voting for a so-called third party
Unfortunately, that would effectively be a vote for Trump.
What are you smoking
Wrong again. Your admitting we dont live in a democracy if thats the case. we dont live in a democracy the only solution is to oust the government.
No, they’re right but we live in a flawed democracy.
I believe it’s such a broken democracy that it doesn’t qualify as a proper democracy.
So, tell me, how does third party voting or abstaining from voting help oust the government?
Why drive to a polling location to throw your vote away then?
1984
I think in my country that’s called “Stemmespild”
which basically means wasted-vote.
if a political party wants to enter the parliament, they gotta get at least 2% of the votes. so if you vote for one of the very unpopular parties and they only get ~1.5% you’ve effectively wasted your vote completely (This is how it works in my country - of course things are different in the US)
Things are even worse in the US. For president you need to get a plurality of the votes (more than any other candidate) nationally (let’s ignore the EC for now) which means that any vote not for the two candidates who stand a chance is wasted.
But also in their congressional elections they set up the system so to get in you have to get a plurality in some district where only one representative will be sent each time (FPTP). So even if your party has 15% nationally, unless they can win a plurality in some districts, they won’t get any representation.
Thats why 3rd parties are pure vote wasters in presidential elections and in Congress you only have a handful of independent reps who somehow win their districts without party backing.
Cobtrast that with most of Europe (including Denmark(?)) where you have proportional voting for a parliament and then parliament forms a government. You can vote for your green party and while they might not get to be Prime Minister, they might be needed for the parliamentary majority to form a government and get the environment ministry. Win! Or they might just exert slight pressure in parliament directly, which is where laws are made. Not a loss!
The poor 'Mericans, meanwhile, are screwed. The only reasonable choice is between the two major parties at the elections. To turn that oil tanker they have to get involved in those parties and try to affect which candidates are put forth and then the party even skips that step entirely if they happened to have won the last presidential elections.
Nother reminder: not voting for biden isvoting for trump regardless if you support either of them
Another genocide supporter. Got it.
Well I’m not voting for Trump so I guess, by your logic, that means I’m voting for Biden. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Asserting this is obtusely ignoring the context that conservative voters have no qualms about voting for someone grossly immoral.
There aren’t conservatives out there saying “Yeah well I was gonna vote for Trump but he supports genociding Palestinians”.
The fact that conservatives don’t have this problem and everyone else does means that, yes, you are enabling Trump by not voting Biden. The “logic” necessarily does not work the other way around, even if you say it like some sort of clever gotcha with a complex emoji.
“Nooo you don’t understand I’m definitely going to defeat fascism by doing absolutely nothing ever. You just don’t understand the benefits of political apathy”
Something something accelerationism… surely if we let the fascists win now then they’ll let us win later!
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Why indeed? The fact is that not enough people vote for third parties for it to matter by an order of magnitude.
Conservatives don’t vote third party. When we do, we split our own vote in the face of a party that has their base on lock.
Because that logic is abundantly obvious, people don’t vote third party enough to make a difference. It’s a self fulfilling prophecy. And it’s so effective at actually splitting the vote that both parties have attempted running spoiler candidates in the past to do just that.
Why doesnt everyone just vote third party? Because enough people who could are afraid that it will mean degrading democracy by handing over the reigns if it doesn’t work, thereby creating the very problem that they are afraid of.
One day y’all will get the point that this entire ideology is in and of itself fascist.
“We aren’t fascist we just stripped you of all other choices and move the goalposts anytime someone gets close to inclusion then blame you for wanting another option while shrieking that only WE can save the country but also we won’t save it either cause we haven’t had a platform other than ‘slightly less right’ for over a decade or two now.”
One day you will get the point that the reality is that we as voters don’t make the rules.
Yeah, you’re right. We’re boxed into this shitty ass system. Grandstanding about how shitty it is doesn’t magically create a solution.
We vote for the least worst option and try to make progress towards a better situation in the future. It’s either that or we fall to actual fascists who would rather take the vote away.
“Actual fascists”
We already have “actual fascists.” Reread your comment, even by YALLS OWN EXPLANATION, our vote was taken away long before we were born. Nothing but performative bullshit so you can claim to be the “good guy” as we’re further and further clamped down on.
What you actually mean by “take the vote away” is “take your status quo” away. Biden and dems have been pushing legislation to take away all the hassle of nuking leftist organizations and to make ANY criticism of Israel something that let’s them strip a school of funding and accreditation if they allow it - but y’all don’t mind any of that “actual fascism” because it doesn’t affect your personal day to day life.
You can fly your pride flags all you want but you’re throwing Palestinians under the bus to protect your warmongering corporatist status quo, y’all are starting to throw trans people under the bus to protect it, and when the time comes you’ll do the same to gays and POC all while screaming about the “lesser of two evils.”
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Then how the hell did Trump win in 2016 and nearly win in 2020? He is literally antithetical to everything conservatives say they are, yet they still fucking turned out and voted for him instead of someone else.
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Only one explicitly right wing 3rd party was even an option in 2020, and Jorgensen ran libertarian, which is an ideology conservatives as a whole tend to reject. As evidenced by the ~1% of the vote she got.
this isn’t true
Are you sure about that?
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This is the stupidest thing I’ve read today.
They’re almost certainly a bot. Report them.
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Vote splitting is not a myth. It’s just math. Let me explain with an example:
1000 people at a conference are deciding where to order catering and hold a vote:
- 490 people want Mexican and do not want Asian
- 510 people want Asian:
- 480 people want Vietnamese, would be satisfied with Thai, and do not want Mexican
- 30 people want Thai, would be satisfied with Vietnamese, and do not want Mexican
The restaurants on the ballot are:
- A Mexican restaurant,
- A Vietnamese restaurant, and
- A Thai restaurant.
If the people who want Asian recognize the strength of their combined numbers, then they can tip the scales by all voting for the favorite between Vietnamese and Thai. In this situation, we get 490 votes Mexican, 510 votes Vietnamese, and 0 votes Thai. This time Vietnamese wins and the majority of people, the 510 who prefer Asian, are either happy or satisfied with the result while only 490 are disappointed.
If everyone votes for their favorite, then we get 490 votes Mexican, 480 votes Vietnamese, and 30 votes Thai. In this case, Mexican wins and the majority of people, the 510 who prefer Asian, are left disappointed while only 490 people are happy with the result. The vote has been split and the result is that the entire conference is worse off for it.
By the way, the ratio of 480 Vietnamese to 30 Thai is irrelevant as long as neither value is 0. That ratio can be fixed to any positive value and a situation can be described in which vote splitting occurs with that specific ratio of Vietnamese supporters to Thai supporters. That’s why vote splitting isn’t too uncommon - any number of people voting Thai has the potential to split the vote. The one caveat is if literally every Vietnamese supporter decides to vote Thai as well; in that scenario, no vote splitting can occur. Unfortunately, that doesn’t happen in practice because it’s easier to convert the Thai supporters who are smaller in number than it is to convert the Vietnamese supporters who have greater numbers.
If you want examples from history, there are plenty. Our electoral college amplifies the effect since it breaks one federal election down into a large number of state elections, any of which can exhibit vote splitting. Other people have linked to them in this discussion and you can find more elsewhere online.
Trump is leading the polls.
so if you currently think “im not gonna vote”, then you’re giving trump a head start
A majority of the non-voters are more likely to vote for the democrats. thats also why the republicans are making it as difficult as possible to vote. coz they know, the more who vote, the less likely they are at winning
Were you predisposed to vote for Trump? Then yes.
We can’t get through to these idiots. They are the fools that use literally to mean figuratively.
No one here WANTS to vote for Biden, but it’s literally the only way to make sure Trump isn’t president, unless you want to go ahead and change the national bipartisan system by November.
as long as you still vote for biden. hold your nose if you must. i know i will be…
That’s how I was voting for Hillary, and I almost actually vomited, for all the good that did me.
if more had also done that, we wouldn’t be here now
If she had bothered to campaign in the Midwest and had just generally been a much better candidate, more people would have.
It’s the job of a politician to earn votes and faithfully represent the priorities of the majority of the voters. People like Hillary, Biden, Schumer and the rest of the Dem leadership seldom do either.
It’s also the job of the electorate to educate themselves on the consequences of their vote (and non-vote). Don’t act like nobody knew who Trump was, what he had already done, or was listening to what he was saying.
Not job, DUTY. Otherwise I get your point. I’d like to add that it is also the duty of those more educated to try to educate others in a non-hostile, factual, and rhetorically effective way in order to bolster the numbers of people who can make informed/educated decisions on these things.
Again you are completely taking Biden out of his responsibility. Why do you want to vote for a guy that rather wants to lose to Trump, than provide decent policies around basic human rights, like the right not to get genocided?
Biden and the DNC rulers are a group of psychopaths. They will not care as long as they get the money form their rich donors, who don’t care if Biden or Trump is doing their bidding.
“I don’t like Biden’s support for Israel’s genocide so I’m going to make it more likely that the guy who would support Israel’s genocide even more gets into office.”
Incredibly dumb take.
“I am telling my politicians that they dont need to listen to me, they will get my vote no matter what. Oh why do they never listen to me?”
Incredible big brain take.
Again you are completely taking Biden out of his responsibility.
Ve done nothing of the sort. If you think anything I’ve said even comes close to that, you’re hallucinating. Or lying.
Why do you want to vote for a guy that rather wants to lose to Trump, than provide decent policies around basic human rights, like the right not to get genocided?
That’s such a loaded question and so absurdly fallacious on its face, I’m not going to even dignify it by answering it, but I will say that you clearly don’t care what I want, just to push an agenda.
But, since you didn’t ask, what I want is for Trump to lose, and that math is simple: any vote not for Biden helps Trump, and no matter how much you dislike Biden, Trump will be 1000x worse. We know, because Trump has promised that.
Biden and the DNC rulers are a group of psychopaths.
Compared to Trump, they’re saints, and if you can’t see that, you’re clearly incapable of rational discourse on the matter. Or you’re clearly here to feebly undermine confidence in Biden in support of Trump.
Either way, your argument is transparent, fact-free, and little more than Fox News fodder.
By voting Biden you declare your support of his policies. That is the fundamental way of how democracies work. You vote your representative because you think he is representing you.
By attacking anyone who says you shouldn’t approve of genocide as your representation you abolish your representative from his responsibility of not supporting genocide and instead blame it on the people who think that genocide is never an acceptable representation for them.
For you individually as a citizen there is only one legal way to hold a politician responsible. And that is by denying them further support in the next election. Now if it comes to group action through demonstrations, unions, lobbying etc. that is great and even better to do. But if it is down to you and the ballot the only direct thing is to declare before what your political demands are and vote accordingly. If your demand is “genocide is okay” then you will have to make that up with your consciousness, the victims and survivors and eventually towards future generations.
It’s also the job of the electorate to educate themselves on the consequences of their vote (and non-vote).
It actually isn’t, no. Nobody is paying them to do that and, in the case of millions if not tens of people who are amongst the working poor because of the kind of economic policy the Dems have been putting out ever since she and her husband remade the party in their own image in 1992, they aren’t realistically able to with neither candidates nor mainstream media helping them sort the wheat from the chaff.
When you’re already working 60 hours a week trying (and often failing) to make ends meet on top on whatever family commitments you may have, you can’t be expected to have energy left to fact check candidates and media outlets for free. It’s simply not that voter’s responsibility to keep powerful and well-paid people honest.
Don’t act like nobody knew who Trump was, what he had already done, or was listening to what he was saying.
Then maybe Hillary and the media shouldn’t shouldn’t have done all they could to make sure he became the candidate!
That the fascist ever got anywhere near the nomination, let alone the presidency itself, is hundreds of times more the fault of the rich and powerful people paid to prevent it than the people they failed to convince to vote for an evil, however lesser it would have been.
It actually isn’t, no. Nobody is paying them to do that
That is the worst and most entitled excuse for the abandonment for any and all personal responsibility since I heard my 3-year-old niece try to convince my brother she should never have to wipe her own butt because he will always be there to do it for her.
Wow. Shame on you.
People don’t take their citizenship seriously, it seems.
Clearly, you didn’t understand what I was trying to explain any better than your niece would have.
If anyone’s abandoning personal responsibility, it’s the awful candidates who don’t do their job and then blame people who suffer for it much more than the candidates ever will.
I’m not saying that it’s a good or even neutral thing to not vote for the lesser evil when only evils are available. Of course that’s had.
I’m saying that it’s the responsibility of the candidates to not be evil and to convince enough voters of it that the greater evil doesn’t win.
I honestly regret not voting for Hillary. I didn’t vote for Trump either, I voted third-party because I thought Hillary was going to win, and even if she didn’t win, what’s the worst Trump could do, huh? So I figured it wouldn’t hurt to vote for a third-party with the hope they’d get enough points to be on the debate stage during the next general election.
Granted, my vote probably wouldn’t have made a difference. Tbh, considering I live in a state with winner-takes-all voting, I’m not even sure my vote actually matters now; but I’m still going to vote for Biden. It’s better than assuming he’ll win and risking another Trump victory.
Yes, I know I’m not the main character and I’m only one person. I know that changing my vote alone won’t make a difference. However, what might make a difference is if I talk about my reasoning in a public forum. Then, people might stop, read my post, and change their minds. Now, it’s not one vote, it’s two. They might spread their view as well, and two votes becomes four. Four votes becomes eight; and eight becomes sixteen. As small as that sounds, sixteen votes can make all the difference in an election. There are elections that have come down to one or two votes.
I did the same thing, in a solidly blue state, with the same thought processes; I voted for Jill Stein. Even after Trump won, I figured he couldn’t fuck it up too badly. I even thought he might manage to get one thing right (I’m very solidly pro-2A), but nope, he couldn’t even do that.
Biden isn’t nearly far enough left for me. But I’ll vote for him without even a hint of hesitation, because he’s so much better than the only realistic possibility. And I live in a purple state now, so it might end up mattering.
*in certain states
She won the popular vote, she lost the electoral vote. Where you live MATTERS towards your vote in this country, by design, for situations like this
It sucks but yeah. I’ll be holding my nose this election even though Biden has no chance in my state.
Not voting for Biden is the same thing as voting for Trump.
Voting for Biden doesn’t mean supporting him. It means preventing Trump from becoming president.
The vote I cast in 2020 was against trump and not for Biden. I feel pretty good about that decision considering what happened afterwards. I’ll vote against Trump again as many times as it takes.
You mean you threw your ballot in the trash?
They clearly said they voted Biden. Biden won.
The vote I cast in 2020 was against trump and not for Biden.
Uh, no?
They meant that they begrudgingly voted for Biden, but it was too vote against Trump.
As the other person said. I think you misread it.
You misread it. It was pretty clear, but you managed it.
I really hope you’re not able to vote in this election if you can’t even parse this dead simple thought process.
You might as well burn your ballot. It’ll at least keep you warm for a minute or two.
I never liked Biden since the Obama years and I now hate him quite a bit. Sadly voting for him at this point is simply necessary, because if I am not in a good enough state to survive then I cannot support the Palestinians nor Ukrainians.
I don’t get this attitude. Obama was literally against gay marriage. Biden’s policies have been so much more progressive than Obama’s and yet nobody I know likes him more. I’m not a “fan” of Biden but that’s because it’s weird and creepy to be a “fan” of government officials. He does a lot I don’t like but if you literally hate Biden I don’t forsee any president ever meeting your criteria.
Obama was literally against gay marriage.
That’s just one more reason I didn’t like him.
Biden’s policies have been so much more progressive
He was a slightly better politician than Clinton so I didn’t hate him, now he’s still supporting Israel thus my aversion.
it’s weird and creepy to be a “fan” of government officials.
Tell that to all the people going to all the politicians rallies.
I don’t forsee any president ever meeting your criteria.
Bernie.
I don’t forsee any president ever meeting your criteria.
Contentment does not produce change.
This precise sentiment has gotten me told off a few times now. Usually with someone yelling the word “Genocide” over and over so I can’t get a word in. People are so fucking dumb it’s actually unbelievable.
Whatever my frustration, I just want us all to work together even after we get Biden a second term. The only reason, ONLY REASON, the GOP have their power is honestly because we can’t stop slap fighting long enough to plant a foot in their asses. This would also work for the Democrats. We do have two feet. Whatever our perspectives and opinions, there is a single neigh universal truth we can all accept:
This life sure could be a lot better.
This precise sentiment has gotten me told off a few times now.
This precise sentiment is based on the assumption that disliking Biden means not voting for him anyway.
The people yelling genocide over and over have an agenda, not an opinion.
So the genocide doesn’t exist and isn’t happening?
Yeah, that’s totally what I said. (Deep /s in case it isn’t obvious)
Is the agenda to stop the genocide?
I’d say they have an opinion implanted in them by someone on social media with an agenda.
Putlers troll farms are maximally amplifying the Gaza tragedy in order to divide the west. The tragedy that his Iranian friends probably started for him.
60% of Democrats want him to stop supporting Israel. This isn’t some info op. He could solve this tomorrow.
Or… hmm yes of course Putin trolls love the Palestinian genocide as it distracts from Ukraine but maybe just maybe tax payers are existentially fed up with the US committing a genocide with their money and lying straight faced to tax payers about the impossibility of doing anything about it?
Yes to all of that. The trolls are amplifying that sentiment is what I am saying. Like pouring petrol on a fire.
Exactly. This is what I cannot understand from all these “true hyper-leftist” people. You do realize that the future of the USA is at stake here, and that our system is fundamentally rigged to not allow any real alternative as a choice, right? Your brain-dead “BIDEN BAD VOTE THIRD PARTY” is just going to enable Trump and then you’ll never be able to vote for anyone ever again as you are forced to participate in alt-right Trump rallies every single day and post on the Trumpernet about how much you love Trump. This isn’t much of an exaggeration – this where they want to go if Trump wins.
You’re not supporting Biden. This isn’t how our vote works. You’re voting for the person less likely to fundamentally fuck our country up. And in case you still don’t quite understand who this is, that is Biden.
I’m not American dawg. I hate biden as much as I want. Let me hate.
Nah, everyone is free to hate. However, support from others on this planet against Trump is also important. To some degree we all affect one another and his rise into the seat again would directly impact a LOT of people, even outside the U.S.
BUT
I’m hoping that there is now enough anger and frustration for us to carry the momentum past the voting gates and straight into very strong pressure towards all politicians. This IS fixable. The message is there, even if it will result in violence from our militarized police force.
This is ignorant fear mongering. If thats the way the system works as you say? Then its our duty as citizens to destroy the system entirely. If thats America then this is not a democracy and its certainly not a democracy worthy of being preserved. IF that is the system you claim Joe biden stands to preserve? Then we SHOULD let trump come in and tear the whole thing down.
I think trump is a fundamentally morally detestable character. Butt iv lived thru 1 trump presidency. Hes backwards, hes an ass. Hes not a good leader. But hes not the end of everything as we know it. And I’m not giving more power to a corrupt party of beaurocrats who continue to lie to my fucking face while selling me out to corporate interests behind my back and completely hollowing out our countries economic capability all the while refusing to make good on any of their promises and funneling all my tax money to foreign wars while we bleed for healthcare. Fuck this countries “democracy” the fact you even believe we live in a democracy is hilarious. Congress has a 14% approval rating. Our representatives do not represent the will of the america people. They represent the will of their largest financial donors.
If you think that’s fear mongering then you clearly haven’t been paying attention for the past 8 years.
I get what you’re saying, but I’m trying to parse what is actual “things that can / will happen under a Trump presidency” vs “what the democrats and liberal media want us to think can / will happen under a Trump presidency”. I’m likely voting Biden simply because I saw what a shitshow the Supreme Court became (and will be for quite some time) under a Trump presidency. But I also notice Biden did fuck all about it so part of me wonders if the democrats are doing nothing for the simple fact that they have a fearmongering device setting the up for the next election. I mean, honestly the state of politics in the US is just pathetic.
I feel the frustration, and agree with it. But the choice you’re describing does not exist. The options aren’t “fucked up status quo” with Biden and “start over fresh” with Trump, though. The options are “fucked up status quo” with Biden and “way fucking worse corporatism, inequality, treatment of any marginalized/minority group, personal freedoms, bodily autonomy, religious liberty, foreign relations, healthcare, education, environment… oh and let’s just completely give up the little voice we have” with Trump.
All the stuff that pisses you off about the corrupt bureaucrats in the Democratic Party exists across the board in the Republican Party, but worse.
I could see somebody voting for Trump hoping that the world ends more quickly and rebuilds so that their great-grandkids, if they exist/survive, might live in a better system. But the price for placing that unlocke unlikely bet is to fuck up the system now and in the near future, negatively affecting tens of millions to billions of actual people.
Ignorant? Look up Project 2025. Then tell me I’m exaggerating. You are either laughably ignorant about our situation, or you’re a Trumper trying to convince people that everything will be fine when it will absolutely not be.
Vote blue in 2024, then push better agendas and vote true left next time. Because I can guarantee you if Trump wins, you won’t be voting any more.
By that logic, not voting for Trump is the same as voting for Biden.
Your point? If you have conservative values, then not supporting Trump does indeed help Biden to win.
Nope, because, and this will shock you, they are not the same
The meme does not mention voting. Why do centrists always make the leap from “dislike Biden” to “not vote” or “vote third party”?
Did you just call me a centrist? That’s hurtful.
Not voting doesn’t mean you support Trump.
Oh look aren’t declarative statements fun! Let’s do the color of the sky next!
Not voting doesn’t mean you support Trump.
You’re saying that if you did vote, it would be for Trump? Because that’s the only case in which not voting wouldn’t help Trump.
If not voting helps Trump then it helps Biden too. Trying to paint people who don’t like Biden as Trump supporters is a propaganda meme that’s trying to gaslight us all.
Voting for Biden means supporting Biden.
Biden is poised to heavily lose already in almost all polls. The faster people realize this and pick a different candidate the better.
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You have chosen…brain worm.
Right? “the only sane choice”? The antivaxxer? The “covid is a bioweapon” guy? The “I don’t think we need a ceasefire in Gaza” guy. That guy? What a fucking joke.
Might as well throw your vote in the trash. Your little protest won’t be heard by anyone who matters.
Psst…just let him, voting for Brainworm Jr. means most likely a vote less for Trump.
Until he picks RFK as his running mate.
I want to up vote you for the chuckle you gave me, but I did that once with Trump and too many people took it seriously, and he ended up being the president.
Do you understand that words have meaning? You are using words but at making zero sense.
it seems quite straightforward really. What are you having issues making sense?
Just stop being obtuse. You know that not voting for Biden is not the same as voting for Trump.
This particular vote is an “A\B” question. No matter what you do A or B will be chosen. All other “choices” will be ignored and will have 0 effect on the outcome. The only thing that matters in this vote is who wins.
Not voting at all, or even voting for C, both have the exact same results as voting for whoever wins.So if you choose not to vote, and Trump wins, then you created the same results as if you had voted for Trump.
If you wanted to vote against Biden but did not want to vote for Trump then you should have voted in the primaries to defeat Trump before he was the only alternative to Biden. In fact, of you had blocked Trump from being nominated again, Israel would not be doing what they are doing. Israel actively wants Trump in power, so that is why they are doing this now.
Yeah this isn’t even like a complicated idea; I don’t get why people have trouble with it.
As a practical real world example: in the 2000 election, Bush won Florida by 537 votes. (the exact number is questionable because of the recount and the bullshit that was Bush v. Gore. Which we can and should be very angry about but also doesn’t change the conclusion here).
97,488 Floridians voted for Ralph Nader.
Now, I’m gonna assume that people who voted green care about like. The environment. And I’m quite sure that Nader was more progressive on environmental issues than Gore was – Gore would probably have been a boring and relatively centrist democrat. But by voting for Nader over Gore we didn’t get Nader, we got Bush.
If even 1% of the green voters in Florida had held their noses and voted for the candidate who they maybe didn’t align quite as well with but had an actual shot at winning, we could have had a president who actually recognized climate change as a threat almost a fucking decade before we did,instead of a climate change denier. Would it have fixed everything? No! But we’d be a hell of a lot better off than we are now.
Oh, so you understood, you were just being obtuse. And now wrong.
I’m not going to tell anybody what to do or who to vote for but one of two things are very likely to happen at the end of this election:
- Biden is re-elected. We continue with the status quo. We have a chance to make small incremental steps toward a better future.
- Trump is elected. Two Supreme Court justices retire and Trump appoints two more. At that point he will have appointed FIVE of NINE Supreme Court justices. We have already seen what they’re willing to do. Imagine what they will do in the literal decades to come.
Choose what you want to do, but take responsibility for your choice. Vote in your local elections. Big changes can happen from the ground up.
It’s the federal judge appointments that matter and almost nothing else. Most of what he does can be undone except for that… It would cause a generation of damage.
"But take responsibility for your choices"strikes me as hilarious. Voting is not public. In a democracy with private polling,hardly anybody takes responsibility for their choices. Actually, zero percent. That is why the elected president is never popular for like the first year in office. Wouldn’t it be lovely if people assumed their responsibility for making choices, though? I would be on speaking terms with so many people from my past if they actually learned from their own stupidity.
You won’t get big changes voting for Biden or Trump. Just more of the same.
I’d say the changes from voting for Trump are pretty big.
Pretty big changes have resulted from the previous Trump presidency. Any reason why you think this one will be ineffectual?
Sorry, you will get big changes voting for Trump. becasue too much is already in place to make those types of changes happen. I dont agree with these changes, but to say they are the “same” is a dangerous opinion.
The person at the top is needed to green light policy… those lower down present such policy… While this can seem boring it is important, since while by definition the president will be at the center of their party. If the party you vote for is most interested in vetoing everything of the other party… even if they agree with the law in general, there is no progress.
Of course you must do more than just vote for the least bad president to make the change happen… However if you can’t at least do that you own the results os the OP said.
Are you familiar with Project 2025?
Roe v Wade being overturned was not “more of the same”
Sure, but if you can and don’t vote for Biden it means you’re at least ok with Trump.
No, it means I’m not ok with genocide but you are.
You have two options:
- Ok with genocide. Otherwise relatively progressive. Has passed major important legislation.
- Ok with genocide. Wants to be a dictator. Appointed half of the Supreme Court majority that took away women’s right to abortion. Will probably strip more rights if elected. Cut taxes on the wealthy and will probably do it again.
You can throw away your vote, but come inauguration, you will have a president who is ok with genocide.
But I will not have voted for one of them. But you will have and the blood will be on your hands.
You have an abysmally stupid sense of morality.
I think some of these people have to be trolls. We’re basically in the trolley problem where the trolley is headed for 100,000 people, and if you pull the lever it will only kill 1. You can’t abstain from pulling the lever and act like you’re completely innocent of the deaths of the masses.
the trolley problem tests you ethical framework, it does not have a prescribed solution. your answer to it helps you understand your own approach. deontologists never pull the lever.
That’s an awful lot of trolls.
If you truly oppose genocide. You should be plotting a coup against the US executive branch.
We don’t know they aren’t.
How is being against a genocide immoral?
If your morality prioritizes staunch adherence to standards over harm reduction, you have a stupid sense of morality.
It’s the kind of morality where someone would rather let a child die than push them out of the way of a speeding car, simply because pushing them would harm them.
Your morality should lead you to making decisions that result in the least harm. Look at it this way: if all of the people who voted third party instead of Hillary because Hillary wasn’t [insert moral standard here] enough had sucked it up and voted for Hillary, access to abortion would still be legal nationwide. (This assumes enough people to get her elected voted third party over moral objections.)
Trump is the worst president in my life time, by a huge margin, and he’s even more in favor of genocide than Biden, demonstrably. So if your sense of morality causes you to help put him in charge of our country again, in my mind, you’re a fucking moron.
Rebellion? I don’t like hearing such a word from you," Ivan said with feeling. “One cannot live by rebellion, and I want to live. Tell me straight out, I call on you–answer me: imagine that you yourself are building the edifice of human destiny with the object of making people happy in the finale, of giving them peace and rest at last, but for that you must inevitably and unavoidably torture just one tiny creature, that same child who was beating her chest with her little fist, and raise your edifice on the foundation of her unrequited tears–would you agree to be the architect on such conditions? Tell me the truth.”
“No, I would not agree,” Alyosha said softly.
“And can you admit the idea that the people for whom you are building would agree to accept their happiness on the unjustified blood of a tortured child, and having accepted it, to remain forever happy?”
"No, I cannot admit it.Fyodor Dostoyevsky — The Brothers Karamazov
voting isn’t harm reduction
I’ve asked folks who aren’t voting for Biden what they think the odds of their vote reducing genocide in the real world is, and all I’ve gotten is crickets.
Given that there doesn’t seem to be much confidence there, the real world results are likely trump or biden.
Trump has folks in his party alluding to nukes when saying Palestine has to be ended quickly, even trump himself has stated that Israel has to end the war quickly. Therefore I suggest that Trump will result in far more lives lost than Biden.
Folks on Lemmy are typically left-leaning.
This means that a Lemmy user voting third party could’ve been a vote for Biden, which in a binary choice results in less lives lost. Yes, I know, Biden centrist, etc etc, but he’s to the left of the absolute insanity that is the republican party.
However instead some folks value a clean conscience over real world results, and vote third party/abstain. If these votes would’ve otherwise gone to Biden, then they have made a trump presidency more likely, which has the real world effect of resulting in more lives lost.
I’m fine with people voting with their conscience, but I just want folks to acknowledge whether or not their vote makes a trump presidency (therefore more genocide) more likely. Most people just seem to think “I’m not voting for genocide so my hands are clean and I’m good!” and stick their head in the sand.
Voting third party right now also just perpetuates both parties. There are enough people in this country to elect anyone from the major parties, so a third party can’t win unless one of those parties collapses. The only way a party collapses is when it consistently loses elections.
The republicans won’t consistently lose elections as long as progressives don’t vote for democrats, so both parties will continue on. The majority of the people in this country are left of center, so the only way republicans win is by suppressing votes, and one of the ways they do that is by propping up progressive third party candidates.
If we truly want a progressive party, making sure republicans never win elections is the way to do it. Then either the Democratic Party will shift left and republicans will regroup under a new less extreme conservative party, or the Democratic Party will shift right as it absorbs all the republicans and a new progressive left party will rise. Both ways result in a more progressive set of major parties.
So, you’re okay with not having a clean conscience? Or, other voters should be okay with not having a clear conscience? If Biden winning is more important to you than having a clean conscience. Vote for him. But don’t pressure people that choose to have a clear conscience.
Unless thought police is on your bucket list.
a Lemmy user voting third party could’ve been a vote for Biden,
if he wanted to earn it
So… What do you think are the odds that your third party vote improves the situation in Palestine?
If your third party vote makes it more likely that Trump wins and results in more bloodshed, that is a choice you contributed to, and blood is still on your hands.
But then if Trump wins because you didn’t vote for either, then you’re ok with Genocide+ rather than Genocide light. Meaning you have to vote for the lesser of the two evils if no matter what you do the majority are voting for the only two who are likely to win.
You’re either incredibly stupid, a troll, or are being obstinate on purpose.
Small problem. A person who is against genocide would not be okay with a genocide under Trump either, so why should they be okay with a genocide under Biden?
Did you even read anything I wrote.
The outcome of the election is going to be Trump or Biden. NOBODY ELSE IS GOING TO WIN.
So given that you have to choose the person less likely to escalate the situation, the saner one of the two.
I’m not saying it’s good I think it’s fucking abhorrent, but there is no choice.
To be abundantly clear about my stance on Palestine. I am out every weekend protesting in solidarity with Palestine. I am spreading awareness of the issue wherever I can and I am taking direct action against the companies that support the genocide.
Let me ask you this. What do you think is going to happen if you don’t vote?
If a genocide is going to occur regardless of the vote, then the vote doesn’t matter.
Let me ask you this. What do you think is going to happen if you don’t vote?
In regards to what? The genocide? Project 2025? Healthcare?
If people want to vote for Joe Biden to preserve LGBT and minority rights, that’s their choice. If someone wants to not vote for Biden because he is aiding in a genocide, that’s their choice.
It’s egotistical to think that my priorities are more important than others.
Genocide light? Seriously?!? If the other guy is stupid, you are stupid+
There is no democracy if you are supporting genocide. There is no election worth voting on if the outcome is same fucking fascist, just with different colored flags. And don’t give me the lie how you’re gonna do something about a ‘genocide light’ if your guy is elected. Fuck off
This whole country needs to stop sucking Kissinger’s dick and change this bloodthirsty, greedy fascist system.
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Or republican politicans calling to end Palestine “as if” we nuked it.
Ask the people in Gaza what they think about “Roe got overturned”.
After all said and nothing done, we are paying for those bullets that murder their children by accepting and even promoting a system that gives us braindead mouthpieces for weapon manufacturers to vote for.
If you don’t vote against fascism, you allowed fascism.
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The argument for voting against left-wing or socialist candidates on the grounds that they can’t win and are therefore helping the right wing into power has, of course, been a time-worn argument in the United States against bucking the two-party system. Engels, in an 1893 letter to an American colleague, pointed out that in the United States, the formation of a workers’ party is hindered by the “Constitution…which makes it appear as though every vote were lost that is cast for a candidate not put up by one of the two governing parties.” isreview
virtue-signalling : the act or practice of conspicuously displaying one’s awareness of and attentiveness to political issues, matters of social and racial justice, etc., especially instead of taking effective action
Not voting is a vote for Trump.
That’s not logical. So, if my choices are pizza or nuggies, and I choose neither. Then I chose nuggies? Make it make sense.
I may be intermittent fasting to lose weight, or rejecting imperialist capitalism.
A tribe holds a vote to either cross a bridge to side A or stay on side B. Staying on side A means you won’t have much food. Going to side B means you still won’t have much food, but also most of the food is poisonous.
Part of the tribe (Group C) says “I don’t want to starve, I refuse to vote in a way that accepts malnourishment as a solution!” Group C also opposes eating poisonous food. This partial group votes to try and find a better source of food (option C).
48% of people vote A. 49% of people vote B. 3% of people vote C.
Surprise, surprise, Group C had 0 impact on the starving situation AND helped facilitate the eating of poisonous food.
Seems like more from the other Groups should have voted with C, or C shouldn’t have been given the option to find a better source for food.
Cool, I’ll give you a pass on the genocide, but you will still be as responsible as anyone who voted for Trump for all the other terrible things he said he will do that you are doing nothing to prevent.
If you’re not ok with genocide you should vote against Donald “just nuke them” Trump.
I am going to. Who said I’m not?
Voting for anyone but Biden is the same as voting for Trump.
I voted for Gary Johnson because Hillary sounded awful in 2016 and I 1000x regret it. Fuck this system for making me choose between bad and worse, but yes obviously I have to choose bad over worse.
Criticizing our leaders is one of the core principals of democracy.
Voting is also a core principal. So please stop encouraging non-participation.
How is the post encouraging anything
You clearly haven’t seen any of the replies from OP in the comments.
A large part of Lemmy including OP encourage political protest of the Democrats shortcomings by not voting.
Criticizing our leaders is one of the core principals of democracy.
Was that sarcasm I missed?
It’s not, it’s discouraging voting for the guy that counters the “boof bleach” incest loving fell who “only will be a dictator for a day”. You know, the unified Reich vibe that you totally are against lmao.
Then, why isn’t voting compulsory?
You misunderstand me, you should be allowed not to vote but encouraging it as a form of protest is misguided.
There’s a contradiction. If you are allowed not to vote in a democracy, and you don’t like any of the candidates, then, how can it be misguided to withhold your vote?
No it isn’t. You have the right not to vote but participation should be encouraged as it’s what gives everyone a say. Seems pretty simple to me. I’m not even saying they don’t have the right to discourage people but if you have lived through the last 8 years and do it, you’re a REALLY slow learner.
I am really slow, so thanks for taking the time. But, let’s say you’re a socialist, and both candidates are capitalists. So you decide that neither candidate upholds your interests. How would any “encouragement” to vote change your mind?
In the case where neither candidate represents your political positions, not voting is an act of rebellion.
I would say it’s wholely ineffective and only enables the worst actors
Then it is the fault of the electoral system and not the voters.
Most are referring to the way our current electoral system works. Voting 3rd party helps the Republicans even if its not intentional.
Yup, and the only way out of that is Ranked Choice Voting.
Go volunteer for your local RCV group, California’s is here: https://www.calrcv.org/
Obligatory: “Ranked Choice” is a specific use of ranked ballots. It’s subpar. It beats what we’re doing now, but anything beats what we’re doing now.
What you want is a Condorcet method like Ranked Pairs, where the winner is whoever beats everyone else. RCV just picks whoever can scrounge together 50% first. RCV would not elect a candidate who is literally everyone’s second choice. Ranked Pairs would.
The simple alternative is Approval Voting, where you let people check all the names they like. It matches Condorcet results… somehow. There is no good reason we’re not using it everywhere.
But ranked choice is easy to implement and in practice if everyone would put a candidate second they aren’t likely to be knocked out in the first round. There are very limited practical examples where it doesn’t provide the optimal outcome.
It also seems to have some level of support and momentum in the US and it seems to me like it’d be better not to get caught in the weeds fighting over which new voting system should be implemented there.
Approval is trivial.
Ranked Pairs has the same ballots as Ranked Choice and it works the way people think ranked ballots work.
RCV has momentum primarily because people keep using the name to mean “ranked ballots.”
Approval Voting seems to just dilute your vote the more candidates you vote for. Candidates will tell people people to only place one vote. What a silly system.
Your worst-case scenario is how things currently work.
Realistically, people will just ignore that shite advice, and vote for as many people as they feel like. It works out on average.
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Nobody thinks its a magic bullet, we’re all looking for the next rung that leads us closer to a happy democracy. None of us are looking for instant easy solutions, we’re trying to iterate and be better.
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In other words, It’s necessary but not sufficient for reforming the two party system.
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This is absurd. Take a look at the polls. There is only one 3rd-party candidate with double digit percentages. Do you really think JFK is taking more votes from Biden than Trump?
Taking the risk because you think you know something you can’t know is what’s absurd
I never made any indication on how I’m voting. I’m just tired of this baseless claim that voting 3rd party only helps Trump. Polls excluding 3rd-parties show Trump significantly further ahead than those with 3rd-parties. Therefore, Biden’s only chance of winning is due to JFK capturing conservative votes.
TIL “how America works” = “baseless claim”
What is “how America works” in this context? You seem to be trying to make the point that 3rd-party voting only hurts Biden. I’m pointing to recent polling that shows that, when 3rd-party options are included, Biden’s margins get closer to victory. You should be thanking 3rd-parties if you are hoping for a Biden victory.
So polling, that thing that told us trump couldn’t have won in 2016, makes another prediction, eh?
Maybe. A lot of folks only know him for his good environmental stance and see him as the rightful Democrat candidate.
They don’t see his antivax bullshit and leaky brain from WiFi.
A different way to think about it - most of the intended audience on Lemmy, and especially in this community, would’ve voted democrat instead of republican. So from the frame of reference of this post, most folks here claiming to vote third party did in fact have their vote “taken” from Biden.
Ok but what no leftie has yet explained is who has asked them to like Biden? Probably nobody who votes for Biden last time or this time around thinks he’s “teh awesome”, we’re simply grown ups who are able to tell which is the least bad option. Honestly lefties (if they aren’t just groipers posing as lefties) who think it’s a hot take to say Biden isn’t the optimal person to be President are all suffering from Captain Obvious syndrome while thinking they’re the cleverest people ever. It’s cringe.
Liberal democracy has to win every election, fascism only has to win one. Good job if you win in 2024, now do it again every 4 years
Evil will always triumph, because good is dumb.
Good gets lazy. It has too much hope in others also being good.
We have been doing it for over 200 years now though
Ehhhh, things are looking a little dicey…
Yeah, but… Oftentimes criticizing Biden helps trump. I’d rather not even risk it at this point.
Can we spend more energy celebrating that trump is NOT the president and how bad it would be if he comes back?
Criticizing Biden is totally fine. It’s the pressure from these posters to not vote for Biden out of principle that’s the problem.
Biden is flubbing the Gaza situation hard but he’s still (unfortunately) our only chance to keep Trump out of office.
This post should really say “Just because we dislike Biden doesn’t mean we shouldn’t vote for him”
Gaza situation
Sorry, call it how it is, the Palestinian genocide
‘Dislike’ and ‘support’ are immaterial. Votes are all that matter. Sorry in reality no one cares about your super nuanced political position but if you’re not voting for Biden in 2024 you’re either useless or an actively opposing my civil and human rights.
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Critiques are necessary. We don’t owe electors loyalty. They owe us representation.
With that being said, when it comes to voting, inaction is action.
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I’m sorry if my comment implied disagreement. It was meant to support and reinforce your point, not counter it.
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No worries. I wrote with conviction. I see how that can come across as argumentative.
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You owe it to the country to not hand our government over to fascism. Voting for the immediate alternative isn’t a blood pact.
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It’s an idiot trying to make a terrible point.
Fuck your analogy.
One of two people is going to be in charge of the country seven months from now. You can have the boring liberal with an awful allegiance to a questionable ally run by a power-hungry bastard… or you can have our very own power-hungry bastard, who is also going to give the aforementioned bastard everything he wants.
Don’t choose more evil.
A group holds a vote to either cross a bridge to side A or stay on side B. Staying on side A means you won’t have much food. Going to side B means you still won’t have much food, but also most of the food is poisonous.
Part of the group says “I don’t want to starve, I refuse to vote in a way that accepts malnourishment as a solution!” Group C also opposes eating poisonous food. This partial group votes to try and find a better source of food (option C).
48% of people vote A. 49% of people vote B. 3% of people vote C.
Surprise, surprise, Group C had 0 impact on the starving situation AND helped facilitate the eating of poisonous food.
Fuck Biden, and FUCK Trump. But if you think voting for a leftist party or abstaining from voting will change anything in a system entirely designed around having only two candidates, you are just as okay with Trump as you are with Biden. At the very least, you are saying that they are equally as bad, showing that you clearly don’t understand the dynamic.
