There are no ethical choices under first-past-the-post voting. We must instead make a decision that reduces the most harm.

    • Cethin@lemmy.zip
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      6 months ago

      pro-state neoliberal propaganda

      Yeah, because only neiberals say to vote! Only a true leftist would be self-defeating! /s

      Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels stated in The Communist Manifesto and later works that “the first step in the revolution by the working class, is to raise the proletariat to the position of ruling class, to win the battle for democracy” and universal suffrage, being “one of the first and most important tasks of the militant proletariat”. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_in_Marxism)

      There is something to be said for the idea that you only have two choices, although that is a matter of fact because of the “[c]onstitution…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.” (Engels to Frederick Adolph Sorge, December 2, 1893, in Marx and Engels on the United States (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1979), p. 333.) We need to change how this works, but that needs to be done through a grassroots movement for local level elections at first. This requires voting and participation.

      A revolution almost certainly isn’t happening, and it’s not going to go the way you want. If it were to happen, it’d be bloody and brutal and you wouldn’t enjoy it. Also, it’s not exactly guaranteed that the leftists win. If anything, I’d bet against it because the other imperialist nations wouldn’t want that to happen.

      • LinkOpensChest.wav@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        6 months ago

        Good thing we’re off to a great start showing unity by calling allies “idiots” and discarding the lives of Palestinians and immigrants

        Solidarity means if they harm one of us, it harms us all. What they do to Palestinians, they do to me.

        I’d say the same about immigrants except I’ve actually had family deported under his fascist ass

        If voting is best, so be it, but fuck right off with being so callous as to refer to it as “harm reduction”

        • Cethin@lemmy.zip
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          6 months ago

          Good thing we’re off to a great start showing unity by calling allies “idiots”…

          Don’t be an asshole and seemingly purposefully misrepresent what people say. That’s far more harmful than anyone being called an idiot. Practice what your preach if you’re so high and mighty with speech.

          … and discarding the lives of Palestinians and immigrants

          Where am I discarding their lives? Please, point to it. I’ve only said things that say they need us to vote or things will be worse for them. Stop strawmaning me and sealioning. If Trump gets elected they’re going to be massacred. Trump will endorse the genocide and he’ll also ramp up anti-immigrant actions. Sure, Biden sucks but he does speak out against Israeli actions now and they are trying to limit some support.

          If voting is best, so be it, but fuck right off with being so callous as to refer to it as “harm reduction”

          I didn’t call it that, but what would you call it? Its something that decreases the amount of damage that’s being done while not fully resolving the issue. It’s reducing the effects of something harmful. It’s harm reduction.

          • LinkOpensChest.wav@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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            6 months ago

            That’s not what harm reduction is. That’s never how the term’s been applied. I know language can change, but abruptly fabricating an opposite meaning in an attempt to dodge consequences for one’s bad actions (potentially losing a campaign due to one’s undying dedication to genocide and fascism) is not an appropriate treatment of the term.