“They have to do that stuff first to earn my vote! I don’t care if they never had the power to do so!”
-Morons
“They’ve had 4 years to do something!”
Ughh… Learn how it works people. We had 2 conservative “Democrat” (golly gee look how Manchild is not a Democrat anymore literally…) senators deny everything from 2020-2022, then we lost the house to Republicans who’s idea of bipartisanship is to give Democrats the finger all the time from 2022-2024… Sooo what exactly could we do?
Then there’s the extra special people who want to “balance” by voting D president and R representatives… Ffs… That shit died when Gingrich started his “my way or go fuck yourself” brand of politics…
Lol I can understand the confusion, but I really am an American in America. I came over from the reddit exodus last year and lemmy.world couldn’t handle all the new people for a time so I swapped over to a smaller instance that happens to be from the Netherlands.
I hope you don’t mind me squatting here feddit.nl :P
i’m just here for the yOuUuUuU sUpPoRt GeNoCiDe!!! chuds to get triggered and provide entertainment
Except I keep voting and they still don’t care what I think because I’m on the left.
The only reason I’m a registered Democrat is so I can vote in the primaries in my state. And I do so as often as possible.
Decisions are made by those who show up, it’s as simple as that.
You may hate it, but the Republicans are definitely better at getting people in line, both literally and figuratively. They turn up and vote even if they don’t like the candidate because… that’s their party. And it’s the only one that they feel represents them.
Meanwhile a lot of Democrats stay home because the candidate isn’t the one they wanted, doesn’t support everything they want, is too old/young, etc. There’s this attitude of ‘if I can’t have my perfect candidate, I’m staying home out of protest.’
I get it. Every voter wants a perfect candidate. But perfect is the enemy of good, as the saying goes.
I always look at it like this: if I vote, I might not always get the outcome that I want, but at the very least I’m nullifying the vote of a person on the other side.
If the other guy shows up and you don’t? That’s how you lose rights.
Be someone who shows the fuck up.
I show up every time and it feels like people still make decisions for me.
What keeps me voting is realizing that real life is disappointing and I’ll never be happy.
I know it’s tough, but try not to give in to pessimism. A better life is possible. It seems far and out of reach now, but it can be done. When people get too pessimistic, that’s when they don’t do anything.
I disagree. Voting with no expectation of it doing anything stops me from being disappointed when it doesn’t do anything. Back when I thought it would help I considered giving up because it wasn’t doing anything.
Then again, I have doubts that I’m actually a human so maybe for real humans it doesn’t work that way.
Republicans are definitely better at getting people in line
That’s also really really strongly due to their efforts at voter suppression for the dems. It’s so much easier to show up to vote if you can just hop over to the local polling station, go right in, stand in line for like 5 minutes and leave while many urban voters in blue or especially black areas have to stand in line for hours and might still get turned away because their names have recently been purged from the voter rolls.
Every voter wants a perfect candidate.
I’m so tired of this line, as if progressives don’t like the Democratic Party because of a 5% difference in policy opinions.
Our options for President for the past 30-40 years have been fascist capitalist or capitalist willing to compromise with fascists. To those who actually care about worker’s rights or the environment of the planet we live on, it’s a difference between a candidate who agrees with you on 0%, or one who agrees with you on 2%, but only the policies that don’t hurt capitalism.
It’s not a case of letting perfect be the enemy of the good, it’s a case of the lesser evil IS STILL FUCKING EVIL. Fascism now and fascism in 4-8 years still results in fascism; how are we supposed to be excited to vote when those are the only options we are ever allowed to pick between?
Jesus Christ. Do you know how the Republicans have turned America into a right-wing hellscape?
Incrementally.
They inched the Overton Window right every time they won. Every time some egg said “If nobody’s offering universal healthcare I’m not voting” they get to set the terms.
They’ve been doing it for decades now.
Time to start inching it back.
The Democrats have helped incrementally, too, by not winding back their policies and generally giving in to their rhetoric. It’s insane that there’s no way to vote against genocide in this election, that they just removed the death penalty from their platform, that she is no longer for the Green New Deal or M4A, that they signed the crime bill, etc. The Democrats have been complicit in this ratchet effect as well.
I get it; the entire system sucks. Even here in the Netherlands with a dozen political parties, you rarely get the government you want. But there’s still things you can do even if you really don’t want to vote in this particular election.
You can support groups that promote voting reform, like ranked choice voting. You can and should vote in all local elections. You can even RUN in many local elections, since candidates frequently run unopposed. You can help inform others about the voting process and get poorly represented groups to vote. If all else fails, there’s always the option of shooting your least favorite politician or doing an Oklahoma City. But try those other things first, OK?
Don’t believe the naysayers. No matter which state you are in, your vote is important. Extreme Conservatives have been taking over school boards and imposing their agenda on kids.
Offices like Sheriff, Coroner, Secretary of State, Lt Governor, State Representatives, City and County Councils etc. are all important.
Every Vote Counts!!!
Edit: Many important local races will be decided by less votes than updoots I received for this comment.
Offices like Sheriff, Coroner, Secretary of State, Lt Governor, State Representatives, City and County Councils etc. are all important.
Not only are they important, it’s exactly how the freaks running the GOP took control of the party. They’ve been grinding 2 things consistently for decades: down ballot races and the judiciary. It’s been wildly successful for them. We are going to have to match if not duplicate that effort.
force fed the bible.
Dude…I was talking to my 5yo today. They’ve learned the pledge of allegiance in kindergarten.
He recited it, perfectly, verbatim.
I cringed slightly at the “under God” part, as I’m a devout atheist (though we’ve barely mentioned religion at all to the kids).
Once he was done I asked him if he knows what any of it means.
“No. But I can say the whole thing!”
Smh.
I cringed at the part “pledge of allegiance” and then again at “kindergarten”.
Americans don’t realise how north Korea style that is.
Couple of years back i stumbled over this video, which i as a german think is absolutely fucked up: https://youtu.be/DjX7zoFrd7g?si=6BtMIxqTxtdAYHvi
Quote from the Wiki about the “Young Marines”
The creed that every Young Marine lives by is:
- Obey my parents and all others in charge of me whether young or old.
- Keep myself neat at all times without other people telling me to.
- Keep myself clean in mind by attending the church of my faith.
- Keep my mind alert to learn in school, at home, or at play.
- Remember that having self-discipline will enable me to control my body and mind in case of an emergency.
Its absolute insane what they do to this kids: https://www.instagram.com/means_tv/reel/C7T93trOtg3/
Oh we do. We often recognize it while still in school. But you learn quickly you are not allowed to question it. If you don’t follow orders, you will be disciplined.
I was, um, gently informed by a teacher once that you can say the pledge without “under God” and it sounds natural as it was originally intended. This blew my mind as a young atheist and made me realize how pervasive religion is.
I would consider the daily fascist flag ritual the pervasive thing here. If someone wants to swear by his faith that seems much smaller of an issue to me.
Incidently it seems fascist nationalism and other totalitarian political ideologies to have been at odds with religion in their times and places. See Hitler and Stalins regimes as examples.
Reminds me of when I had to have a meeting with the school about some additional speech therapy for my daughter. It was in the morning and cut to the Canadian Anthem playing. Everyone stopped what they were doing and stood up for the anthem. Fucking weirded the shit out of me. I’m 47 and born and raised Canadian. Standing or reciting anything blindly as a group is fucking weird.
Meanwhile my 3yo stepdaughter in kindergarten spends the day painting with watercolors, singing, dancing, playing with others and apparently learning common courtesy (The other day she told me that in kindergarten they’re supposed to say “please” when asking for something).
Much as I’ve wanted to move to the US for the significantly higher salary ceiling as a software engineer, I don’t think I could do it to her.
Well, the much higher salary ceiling might look nice on paper, but let me tell you from experience that it is eaten up quickly by higher cost of living. I have been fortunate enough to work for short (one to three year) stints in the US, most of that in the SF bay area. A few years after returning (more or less for good) to my EU home country where I now have a government job (which does not pay as well as industry jobs), one of my former SF bosses asked how much he’d need to pay me in order for me to come work for him long term. It was quite tempting, and I did the math back and forth and in the end arrived at 2.5x of what I’m making now, and that is on the low end. I have a few colleagues and friends in similar situations, and the 2x-3x figure is what we generally agree on. Between health insurance, child care, retirement savings and housing, your cost will be dramatically higher than in most EU countries, and this does not factor in differences in Labor rights and potential visa issues.
The SF bay area of course is extreme, but a low six figure salary puts you just above the poverty line there (so people say). Working remotely living in some low COL state might be an option, but then again you will live in East armpit nowhere Kansas…
Drag thinks you should explain that children shouldn’t say things they don’t understand.
Thank you, but drag actually has person independent pronouns. Drag is talking about dragself in the first person. And drag’s pronouns work the same way when someone else is talking about drag, no matter if it’s second or third person.
Every time the Dems lose, they go to the center to find voters. Want them to stop going to the center? Then give them overwhelming and consistent victories.
If you think you can change their platform by not voting or voting 3rd party, you’re dead wrong. They will just go to the center voter even more. This is not a Mexican standoff that you can win, because they have an out which is worth double (a center voter is both a vote for them and vote taken away from the other party).
How are we supposed to change their platform? Because rewarding them with victories when all they do is go to the center hasn’t been working.
You change their policy by giving them consistent and overwhelming victories.
Rewarding them with victories? They never have victories. They have had control of all 3 of presidency, House of Reps, and Senate for 4 of the last 24 years. Or 6 of the last 32 years. Or 6 of the last 44 fucking years. They need all 3 to do much of anything and they basically never have it. So they go to the center to find voters. So try something new and give them actual victories.
Every time any politician gets into office is a victory for them. That’s all they care about.
If a centre vote is worth double, then it doesn’t make any difference if the left are mobilised to vote or not.
With a mobilised left it’s left-vote=1 centre-vote=2
With an apathetic left it’s left-vote=0 centre-vote=2
Either way the centre vote is worth more so the party moves to the centre.
But if this is wrong, and the left vote is indeed worth more, then why change policies to court the centre, why not have openly leftist policies to attract this game-changing leftist vote?
You can’t have it both ways. You can’t claim that the democrats have to hide their leftist agenda to gain votes and also claim that the leftist voting block is the make or break of electoral success.
You have this all twisted around in who knows what. They move to the center when they lose. They don’t move just because.
Right now the left never shows up. Occasionally the Dems run on a left platform and they lose. Think Gore, think Hilary saying she’ll have a map room. After they lose they go to the center to find voters. Now imagine they don’t lose every time they run on a left policy? Because the left never shows up.
Occasionally the Dems enact a left policy. Think of Obama’s ACA. Thank Biden green energy. Their thanks for this is Obama lost the House of Reps, then lost the house of reps again, then lost both the house of reps and the Senate. Biden lost the house of reps, and polls shows Biden was going to lose. Now imagine they won after enacting left policy. They’re probably enact more. But the left never shows up.
If the left wants things to change They. Have. To. Show. Up.
Hide their agenda? They adopt what the people voters (the ones that show up) vote for. If the left voters show up, then guess what? More left policies will be adopted. C’mon this is civics for kindergartners. You have this so twisted around to justify not voting.
Oh. And whilst I’ve got such a golden opportunity to have “kindergarten” level civics so patiently explained to me…
How do the Democrats find out the political leanings of the voters who won them the vote in order to reward? them next time with policies they like? Is there some magic poll they can access, but only after an election? Because any poll which they could access before an election would obviously tell them in advance what a willing and committed set of voters they’d have if only they put in some more left wing policies.
You’re suggesting polling subtle enough to determine policy preferences among different demographics, but somehow incapable of determining voting commitment/apathy. Apparently an actual election is the only way anyone can find that information out. But once done they magically know exactly why everyone voted the way they did.
If the left voters show up, then guess what? More left policies will be adopted.
Why? A left vote is worth 1 (because they wouldn’t have otherwise voted right), a centre vote is worth 2 (because it’s also a vote away from the other party). So it doesn’t matter how many on the left “show up” their votes simply aren’t worth as much as centre voters.
That’s the argument given. Centre votes are worth double. The corollary is that they’ll always be the target demographic.
They win the last election and they are still moving to the center. They only aim for the center because they know the left has nowhere else to go.
The reality is the majority of the USA is in the center. It’s why we usually don’t have run away elections.
This is the answer. Us weirdos on a weird social network made by literal communists are not the majority and should stop acting like we are.
Every time I see a campaign ad for Harris I feel like I’m worthless to her because it’s all “yay America” and I know too much history to feel that way.
It’s bad that I want her to win… because she’s not trump and she’s not going to hand Ukraine over to putin…
