It’s a situation that I have been expecting for a while, but I wasn’t fully ready to accept it. Specifically it’s one of my LGBTQ friends who honestly believes in the democrats will protect them and their partner. I have tried to make the point that both parties are eroding any sort of civility towards all marginalized groups, but fear seems to drive them more than logical observations. They make the excuse that change doesn’t happen over night and that the left continues to grow and will have meaningful affects down the road. I fundamentally just don’t agree with that idea and vocalize it regularly. More and more it is ending up in a circular argument where I am painted as unrealistic and my rhetoric (leftist rhetoric) is doing more harm than good because it promotes distrust in the only system we have to work with. I try to tell them it’s kind of the whole point. We gotta start somewhere if we want to see a better, more representative system, but they are so hung up on the immediate future while simultaneously saying that my idealistic feelings are shortsighted and I cant expect change in the immediate future… The double-talk is wild, I know.
I am trying my hardest to stop from engaging at this point because on the most basic level we agree on a lot of stuff, but they are just way to wrapped up in the fear mongering of the democratic party. They know that the two party system is broken, they know that something drastic needs to change, but they also think that they are powerless to do anything except choose the lesser evil. It pains me because I am watching them do the same shit past generations have done, where they give up on their ideals for the sake of preserving the current status quo that they benefit from. I am legitimately watching them imply “fuck you, got mine” under the guise of civic duty and I hate it. I want nothing more than to be able to finally say “I told you so” without being a smug asshole about it and ruining our friendship.
Thanks for reading my rant. It’s probably a bit disjointed, but the frustration is boiling over and I needed to vent to the only group of people that seems to understand the hopelessness of being a disenfranchised leftist.
I am proably gonna get banned for writing this, but be fucking realistic. I know it isn’t perfect, I know other parties exist, and I know the system is corrupt, but man up and deal with it.
The election is near, Trump has a very high chance of winning, and the whole country is on the tipping point of becoming a fascist regime.
Can you please use your brain and think for even just a little bit? Kamala isn’t perfect, but in the meantime it’s gonna hold together the country, and then you have 4 years to organize and vote for a better party, but in the meanwhile, voting anyone who isn’t kamala is voting for Trump.
Go on with the downvotes, I don’t care
man up
Trump has a very high chance of winning, and the whole country is on the tipping point of becoming a fascist regime.
Check
Can you please use your brain
Check
I can’t believe you just came in here and roleplayed the exact lib mentality that the thread has been about…
Libs really don’t have any self awareness.
Go on with the downvotes, I don’t care
For what it’s worth, Hexbear doesn’t have downvotes, so peddle your Reddit tripes somewhere else please. Also, you do care otherwise you wouldn’t mention it.
man up
Kamala isn’t perfect
Kamala is happily enabling a genocide and wants the American armed forces to be “the most lethal” in the world.
and then you have 4 years to organize and vote for a better party
I heard this before 2012. And before 2016. And before 2020. I no longer buy the argument.
Go on with the downvotes, I don’t care
We here at hexbear can’t downvote. You probably will get/have gotten some downvotes, but they haven’t been from hexbear.
I heard this before 2012. And before 2016. And before 2020. I no longer buy the argument.
You failed to organize. The 4 years were given to you, and you (as in the commies living in the US) failed. Time to practice harm reduction and avoid Trump. I’m not from the US nor do I live there, so there’s not much I can do.
Kamala is happily enabling a genocide and wants the American armed forces to be “the most lethal” in the world.
And Trump wants to do both that AND a genocide inside the country towards LGBTQ people, women, and black/Hispanic people in general.
Which do you prefer?
EDIT: just now, browsing Lemmy, I came across this article to further prove my point https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2024/oct/17/trump-wins-elections-outcomes-stakes
We here at hexbear can’t downvote.
And that’s my bad for not knowing it. Sorry.
If it’s because of the implied gender, I’m also sorry and should have chosen a better expression. If it’s for the meaning, think again. Not everything is perfect in life and sometimes you need to make compromises. Learn now before it’s too late
I’m sick of arguing with people about electoral politics, so let me just ignore most of your response and address only the end, because maybe I can make a positive difference to your worldview there.
The issue with the phrase “man up” is not only that it implies your interlocutor is a certain gender. That’s a bit of an issue, sure, because assuming men are the default humans is pretty misogynist. However, the real misogyny of the phrase is much more insidious than just assuming everyone is a man. What the phrase “man up” does is inextricably tie strength of character to manhood and masculinity. And that’s misogynist tripe. Womanhood and femininity have as much strength inherent in them as manhood and masculinity. Men are not morally stronger than women, so exhorting someone to moral strength by telling them to be more like a man is full on misogyny. Yes, it’s the type that’s so normalized in our culture that you can be forgiven for not seeing it, especially if you yourself are a man (which you may or may not be, I don’t know). But please, excise the phrase “man up” from your vocabulary.
but in the meantime it’s gonna hold together the country
Have you considered that Kamala’s worthless neo liberal economic policy, racist border policy, and hawkish right wing foreign policy will ensure fascism? A vote for for Kamala is a vote for 4 years of stagnant decline and imperial embarrassment that brought about trump in the first place, ripe for a competent fascist to step in
Go on with the downvotes, I don’t care
Libs consider this bravery
Racist border policy?
By voting third party you’re helping the man who built a fucking wall next to Mexico, and you are also helping him deregulate every single industry that’s willing to give him money, creating an economic policy that’s far worse then you could ever imagine. Your vote for a third party isn’t showing any support to anyone whatsoever right now, it’s just helping Trump.
By supporting Dems you’re helping the party that literally helped build a fucking wall next to Mexico, proposed hundreds of millions for expanding it, deregulate every single industry that’s willing to give them money, oversaw the destruction of Roe v Wade, and countless billions on funding genocide and overseas war. The Democrats are trying to create a whole new border agency dedicated to ripping people out of their homes, just to prove how hard they are on immigration. Your support for Dems isn’t showing any support to anyone whatsoever right now, it’s just helping genocide and oppression.
People have been making your argument for decades. Every single fucking election it’s widely claimed we’re on the “tipping point”, people everywhere said it last time with Trump, and what did he do when he got into power? Largely just continued the status quo of making everything gradually worse.
If anyone thinks voting remotely matters and they want change, they should vote third party. But as always, I don’t think voting will change anything no matter what.
Take half the fucking effort you put into this “Vote for genociders or get fascism” shit and put it into organising or direct action.
people constantly claim we’re on the tipping point because we are. Project 2025 has planned out every single step to ruin the country for everyone but the 1%, and if Trump can’t make it, someone else will. Last time Trump was unorganized and still caused massive chaos (Jan 6? Mexico wall anyone?). Republicans need to only win once to turn everything for the worse, and you are literally helping them. You had 4 years to get people to vote third party, and you failed. Now is time for harm reduction. Vote blue, especially if you’re in one of the swing states, and help everyone out like a true commie.
Take half the fucking effort you put into this “Vote for genociders or get fascism” shit and put it into organising or direct action.
I don’t live in the US, it was your (as in the commie people living there) job to organize, I just care about people’s well-being in general and recognize Trump’s distopian hellscape.
Kamala isn’t perfect, nobody is, not even you, but it’s currently the best chance America has.
people constantly claim we’re on the tipping point because we are.
That’s what they said the last time and the time before that and that and that and that and that and that. There’s alwys something that makes it so we just have to accept this rotten dog of a candidate. If the rule you followed has brought you to this, of what use was the rule?
Furthermore whenever the dems do win, what is said of the left? “Oh turns out we didn’t need them at all!” What happens when they lose? Then it is the fault of the left. We were on the tipping point last time as well and the dems have had 4 years to do something about it, you failed. Why should we vote for someone who will do nothing to take us back from the alleged brink we’re at?
You had 4 years to get people to vote third party, and you failed.
The country was on the precipice of destruction last election and the one before that and so on. The dems have had decades to pull us back from the alleged brink. They have now had 4 years in power, yet here we are once again. You failed. The dems are looking to lose to Donald Trump, yet somehow we failed? The dems lost a massive lead to Donald Trump, you failed. If you are a realist, then accept reality.
Why should people vote for a party that constantly cries wolf, yet never does anything about the wolf apart from copying the wolfs’ policies, working with the wolf, calling for bipartisanship with the wolf party, bragging about how much more wolf-like they are than the wolf party and so on?
There’s plenty of people voting third party or voting uncommited or abstaining from voting. Seems to me it has worked out completely well. I can imagine it’s hard to understand when you are only ever thinking about the current election and never what happened in the past or what the future brings, but most things aren’t done in a few years. I’m honestly impressed with how these movements are developing, considering the amount of ratfucking they’ve been subjected to.
Vote blue, especially if you’re in one of the swing states, and help everyone out like a true commie.
You really do not understand politics, do you?
Kamala isn’t perfect, nobody is, not even you, but it’s currently the best chance America has.
Did you think you had something here? “Nobody is perfect” is the dems ole-faithful. You can’t go pobodys nerfect about genocide.
Trump did bad things. So have the Dems. And sincerely describing someone who actively supports genocide as “not perfect” just shows what a disingenuous lib you are. Your version of “harm reduction” has, for decades, done nothing but emphasize and prolong the harm.
I don’t live in the US either. I just care about people’s wellbeing in general. You should recognise that literally wherever on the planet you live, that organising and doing direct action would be more productive than telling people anywhere that voting matters. What a fucking waste of political energy.
nice counter arguments
Jesus fucking christ you are dumber than a doorknob. Go back to reddit where they pretend to give a shit about civility. An ad hominem isn’t “when someone insults you” you massive dumbass. Go back to school. An ad homimen is when you tie the character of a person (in your case that would be “poor”) to the quality of their argument (in your case your arguments are also poor) as a way to discredit them instead of refuting them. “You are an idiot and therefore your argument is idiotic” <- That’s an ad hominem!
In case you’re wondering this also isn’t an ad hominem, though it’s a fallacy of some kind. Insulting you is just an insult, you hollow log of a person. Learn what fallacies are and eat shit and die
and the whole country is on the tipping point of becoming a fascist regime.
Why would I, a red fascist hate this?
I recently heard ‘genocide is a good option because it will promote long term peace’
I know people say not to cut off the lib friends and I’m trying not to lose connections that have mattered to me, but it is hard to make myself bother with most of them anymore. I feel like they are just demonstrating they can’t be relied upon.
What am I saying, their complete return to “normal” and pretending covid isn’t dangerous is 100% demonstrating they can’t be trusted
people say not to cut off the lib friends
I think this is honestly just a big cope from people. I know how seriously they take their convictions when they say stuff like this because my militant masking and insistence on accomodations as an immunocompromised person since January 2020 has utterly destroyed my social life and I don’t just get to turn the other cheek about that, lol. So yeah, I’m with you. Fuck em. Your world will become far smaller, but what world? A world of people who will abandon you for this? For genocide? For an evening at Applebees? Kill the liberalism in your soul that makes you want to poison yourself in the company of these people and you can begin to figure out how to live.
their complete return to “normal” and pretending covid isn’t dangerous
“Trust the science” liberals like when the “science” is skewed so it sounds like wine is a health and longevity supplement (it’s not; those old studies were bullshit ignored the other material conditions of the healthy and long lived people) and that covid is “over.” Basically, trust in the “science” that says more treats.
It’s maddening how many “trust the science” liberals – many of them tech and science nerds and professionals! – just ignore when I point out he science of airborne transmission, the science of long covid, the science that says the only way to be pretty safe is if we all mask the fuck up in respirators.
Because respirators somehow ruin the vibe and that’s what mattera most, even though they didn’t ruin the vibe earlier in the pandemic.
Most confusing of all are the ones who post about updated vaccines and free rapid tests being sent out – they act like they don’t know covid is worth caring about but then occasionally they say shit that demonstrates they know it’s still around, and go right back to gathering without masking
Covid has a peculiar connection to climate change for me: in both cases, the crisis didn’t go anywhere, it’s getting worse all the time, but “I fucking love science” bazingas in both cases want to look at hyped up “good news” then return to whatever they were already doing, trying to silence people for caring too much about either.
That is a completely different, but totally valid topic that I wasn’t even thinking about in this moment. Because I also find that I cant be honest about that either. All my liberal friends know my stance and many of them have accepted it by just not including me in their plans anymore. Which I’m fine with, I hate public gatherings anyway, but yeah, most of them just shrug and say, “it’s endemic at this point”. As if that is a form of fucking protection. UUUUUUUGH!
Honesty I’ve learned to just shut the fuck up about politics when talking to PoC or LGBTQ friends. For some reason a straight white guy saying “ACTUALLY YOU WILL LIKELY NEVER BE TRULY SAFE IN OUR LIFETIME” is not received well.
Yeah I genuinely feel bad talking about politics with people I know in the community, there’s nothing positive to say really.
Like, you could point out that the Dems were appealing to pro-immigrant sentiments 4 years ago as their humane line, and in the space of a toddler’s lifetime have decided to throw them under the bus. But what does it actually accomplish to make it plain that they’re just kinda screwed, I dunno.
Yeah, I specifically avoid that sentiment because I cannot control the way things I say will be interpreted. I would much rather keep my mouth shut because I’m not in the business of unintentionally offending people I care about.
Instead I try to convey it through the lens of my own experience to talk about the fears I have that lead me to feel how I do. Like how concerned I am about what is the next evil thing we are okay with now that we as a society have effectively given a pass to genocide enablers again.
The Matrix is a system, Neo. That system is our enemy. But when you’re inside, you look around, what do you see? Businessmen, teachers, lawyers, carpenters. The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system and that makes them our enemy. You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it.
It’s actually so good. All the matrix movies are despite what some would have you believe.
Agreed. The original is the best for many reasons, but every Matrix movie is just very good sci-fi with poignant themes way ahead of their time. The Animatrix is especially incredible, imo. Per a letterboxd review of Reloaded from 2021:
i was lied to for many years this movie fucks
