And I’m being serious. I feel like there might be an argument there, I just don’t understand it. Can someone please “steelman” that argument for me?
A lot of people did in fact set aside Gaza until Trump was stopped. As for those that didn’t, they should have listened to Bernie Sanders. I did months ago and went all-in on Dem support. There were multiple times when I wrote up an angry post about US support of Israel and then didn’t post it because I didn’t want to turn a voter into a non-voter or worse a Trump supporter.
I understand their position of never rewarding ethnic cleansing and war crimes though. They chose to make sure the Dems know they would never “settle” for the illegal killing of civilians. The support for Israel made it especially hard for Arab Americans to vote Dem. It’s difficult to support a party that has been in power during the whole conflict yet gives unconditional support for the internationally condemned murder of Arabs.
I’m sure a lot also felt disenfranchised by the bipartisan protest suppression and condemnation. Even in Dem states peaceful protesters were punished, and sometimes pro-Israeli protesters who attacked got away with it. Then there was the whole “vote with us or else” pressure that went on for months. Dissenters like the “uncommitted” voters were insulted by the party that wanted their unconditional support.
So it’s not like it’s completely insane. But as Sanders points out that position only makes things worse and has done so.
Many people gave up the “vote blue no matter who” sentiment after seeing the results of blue politicians in 2016 and 2020. It’s no surprise people are voting with their hearts more than settling for less now.
What’s interesting is that the Republican party welcomed in these neglected voters. Can you blame them? The Democratic party doesn’t even promote progressive policies anymore. The Democratic party is now the pro-war party too.
I’m not surprised that Trump won. Hilary, Harris, and Biden were all terrible choices
Personally I think people like Tulsa Gabbard and Andrew Yang are playing the long game within the Republican party as the Democrats shut down any chance for change.
It’s simple, for a voter that doesn’t have other important things or believes the candidates to be equal in other things, like the economy, it becomes a moral choice to not vote for genocide.
If they believe there will be human rights violations elsewhere, like in the US, but one candidate and not the other, then the moral choice becomes to limit harm.
Much of this argument stems from different base assumptions, as follows-
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Neither Trump nor Harris will commit other human rights violations, and they are materially the same to my family; staying home is the moral action.
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Trump will commit human rights violations, voting for Harris is the moral action.
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They will both commit more human rights violations; staying home is the moral action.
The people who were saying to stay home and not vote fell into camps 1 or 3. If you’re unsure of why someone would believe in number 3 you should know we have illegal debtor’s prisons that are ignored by the federal government, LGBTQ abuse that has gone unchecked by the federal government, illegal denial of asylum directly by the federal government, … the list goes on. But rest assured there are reasons people would see them both as committing human rights violations in the US. This is not some Russian info op like the DNC fanboys would have you believe.
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Only if you don’t recognize that Trump would be much, much, much worse. And what we see from the election, many can’t seem to see that (in any way).
Do you have one reason to not vote for Harris, or Many reasons not to vote? Lets say in this Trolley like problem scenario that Flipping the lever to run over one is voting for Harris, flipping it to roll over the list is voting for trump - and rejecting making the choice is walking away.
Thing is - this gets complicated: Just because someone publicly says they aren’t voting because of Gaza does not mean 1. they didn’t vote, and 2. doesn’t mean they don’t see all the other problems - because left organizations/groups have a tendency of vilifying anyone that opposes their view points excessively - because they have the moral high ground supposedly - the end result is: People won’t speak up about the real reasons, they will stick to the socially acceptable one and move on. It’s far easier, simpler.
So: What is on the long list of problems?
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Biden ending the “Stay in Mexico” Agreement.
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Tax payer dollars being sent to illegal immigrants in various ways.
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The way deaths were assigned to Covid - even when the person had stage 4 cancer, and covid was maybe a contributing factor.
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Catch and Release policies found in a number of Democrat stronghold cities - to a point that stores are giving up trying to operate in the regions. And I’m not talking small locations - I’m talking big businesses. Small ones end up going belly up because they can’t eat the costs, insurance premiums for protecting your inventory in the areas have gone up and that means small businesses can’t afford to insure, and that raises their risks.
Should I continue?
Trumps anti-sanctuary city, record on putting in effective policy to deal with the southern boarder problem, and take on the fact that US cities should be sanctuaries for US citizens - well: That resonates with people. It resonates in California (where voter support from previous years to today went up ~8%), it resonates in New york (comparing previous years to today is ~+7% over previous years), even in Texas (~3% uptick). Trump WON the popular vote with fairly high voter turn out.
The Truth is
No person struggling in their own life, cares all that much about people in another country. When the government can find money to fund a foreign war - people are going to start wondering why they can’t find money to fix roads, law enforcement, housing, and other issues back home: It would be far cheaper over all.
In a world where crime has gone up since 2020, while being down from 2013: People are going to see it. And if you live in Seattle, or New York it’s difficult to ignore massive stores closing locations and a growing number of vacant store fronts. And should that problem continue - it’s going to cause further knock on effects. After all: Blank store fronts are not attractive, and if you make them look full - those looking for space are going to presume it’s filled. And these buildings are often times leveraged - and if they reduce lease rates to draw in interest, they may very well have debts called in: And that will hurt the current owners. Worse yet - without revenue coming in, it’s very likely that SOME of the maintenance needed is being avoided.
So while some the Gaza issue is JUST the Gaza issue - my bet, is that to a lot of people, it’s just the socially acceptable excuse. But honestly - it has some legitimacy as well. After all: Supporting the war effort with a lot now, or a smaller amount over a bit of time nets the same result.
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I think there are no right or wrong. It became clear that both Democrats and Republic pushing the same exact support for Israel. When it comes to Palestine there are no lesser Evil.
Leading to this election, Israel burned hospitals and people in tent alive in Jabalia, barely any internet access, no water or food enters for almost 50 days now.
They carpet bomb gaza, attack UN bases, and finally declare UNRAWA can no longer work, another UN agency.
This is under Democrats. They already finishing the job.
Now what exactly Trump or republic will do is going to be the same. nothing will change because we are at the worst and there is nothing more they can do to make the situation even worse.
So if they are the same, and the government is not listening then what is the point of participation in election?
R is pushing more support for Israel so D is the lesser evil. There’s a reason Netanyahu wanted Trump. If you think it couldn’t get worse than D level support, stay tuned
Obviously you can’t go back in time but you should of voted for the down ballot candidates that are pertinent to your day to day life where you live, and then voted third party or even left it blank for the president.
Your local candidates at the state and lower level have nothing to do with Gaza but do decide if your schools are properly staffed and if your potholes are filled, etc.
You are citing one subject here, Palestine. Yes, maybe under Harris nothing would have been different in regards to this. But it is pretty obvious, that under the orange shitstain’s regime, many people all over the world will suffer a lot. The point in participating in this election was to prevent that. You didn’t vote the special representativefor Palestine or some shit, but the president of the most influencial country in the world. Your actions have consequences. All Americans who voted for Trump or did not participate fucked not only themselves, but also so many millions of other people over, so I really thing, they should go fuck themselves.
The democrats’ hands are not clean. They didn’t fight for human rights even while red states and ICE were busy annihilating them. They had four years to do so, a trifecta in the start, and we watched as red state after red state made being trans illegal. They have been transparent about going after gay and inter racial marriage next. The democrats at the national level haven’t offered anything in response. We also still have illegal debtor’s prisons, child lunch debt, increasing rates of homelessness and abuse of homeless people.
The democrats can’t just sit there doing nothing and expect people to vote for them.
And your playing whataboutisms. Those other issues are directly related to gaza.
The military industrial complex loves israel/Palestine conflicts makes them oodles of money. Hence both parties support israel and killing Palestinians.
The capital class loves suppressing wages and benefits. Hence no pro labor policies from the dems/reps.
The MIC loves the Ukraine war, see israel above.
Capital loves monopolies, less competition for workers, easier to raise prices, etc. again reason behind no labor policies.
LGBT? Same deal. Corporate doesnt care, hence policies generally go through.
The only difference between dems and repubs is one are religious fanatics. People in currently blue states are safe from them, those who are not, are not.
All the issues you think just got fucked are going to be mostly unchanged regardless whom won this election. Shitty states going to get shittier. All the lesser evil people will be laser focused on trump now and as a result the representatives will have to do real work.
The genocide and everything else are one and the same. One is just easier to articulate to people who have some morals, though some will continue the lesser evil nonsense.
In the meantime find the real progressives in your area and encourage them to run
The *only* difference between dems and repubs is one are religious fanatics. People in currently blue states are safe from them, those who are not, are not.
This is definitely something serious that we shouldn’t downplay. I’m of the belief (in agreement with you) that the parties are mostly the same, and the dems just talk a whole lot of talk on domestic stuff and then do worse than nothing. But the christofascists backing trump are far more terrifying than trump himself and they’re not going anywhere, they vastly predate his political career. But in the past they were a weird loud minority, they still are but they’re not such a small minority anymore and THAT is fucking terrifying.
In no way am I downplaying the religious fanatic dangers.
Sorry not meaning that accusatory I mean all of us should not downplay it
All good friend.
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thats quitter talk soldier. =)
its funny, because literally the next post after yours was this: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/07/trump-blank-check-netanyahu-war-iran-panetta
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Because if it wasn’t Gaza, it would have been another excuse to not lift a lazy goddamned finger and still delude themselves into feeling "morally superior"while sitting on their fat mediocre asses at home.
Before Harris, they also leaned heavily on the “Sleepy Joe” bullshit and “two old white men up for election, who cares”. Once the old “Sleepy Joe” element was removed from the equation, they had to find a way to keep their goddamned stubbornly lazy and ignorant narrative intact.
Now that the election is over, most of these “concerned and outraged” deadweight assholes will never think about Gaza and the plight of its’ people again. And they will keep on feeling smug about themselves.
This is all that needs to be said on the subject.
It is rich to criticize the Democrats for claiming moral superiority while doing nothing, as a justification for not voting for the candidate who would at least try to put a leash on what Israel is doing to Gaza.
If you want what’s best for a suffering people, you should vote for the candidate not trying to give their oppressors a blank check. All of America is responsible for what the president we chose does next.
I know one of those people. they are now angry the left lost… 🙄
This is fucking rich lmao.
You know who I always see busting their ass protesting, striking, aiding their fellow worker? Not fucking democrats, I’ll tell you that. It’s always third parties who get demonized for not voting for a fascist and then told they get what they deserve when they’re out there serving as a shield against the worst of fascist violence. Americans are so politically illiterate it’d be funny if y’all would go down alone and not threaten to burn the rest of us down with you.
OP asked for a steelman but good try
I said the same thing about people like you before the election, and I’ll repeat it again. The laser focus on single issue voters was and will always be mostly an excuse to blame someone else.
To look at it another way, if this one issue actually decided the election, why didn’t Harris change her strategy two months ago? … Maybe it’s because this wasn’t the determining issue. Or it was, and her staff was incompetent. Take your pick.
I’m not American, and I don’t agree with these people either, but I don’t think that calling them lazy and ignorant makes any sense. In the fucked up democracy of the US it’s clear that the only way to get what you want for the coming 4 years is to vote for the least bad candidate. At the same time I can definitely understand that if you view both candidates was horrible, though one way more horrible than the other, you would feel conflicted about voting for either of them.
Let’s do a thought experiment. Assuming both candidates are still roughly equally “popular”. If both candidates wanted to start a genocide, but one would want to kill only 50% of the amount of innocents that the other would kill, how would you vote? Would you vote for the one who is overall the less bad option, which will in turn make you give your vote for something horrible. Or would you abstain and signal that the democracy as it currently stands has lost your confidence entirely, even if it means that on the short term the consequences might be way worse?
Not voting actually costs the democrats something, and should (if they want to win next time) force them to think how to better represent you next time.
It’s fucked up that your democracy came to this. It has become an annoying game theory dilemma instead of voting for the candidate that you actually believe in. Our system here in the Netherlands is certainly also not perfect, since we have too many parties and too long coalition negotiations, but at least I feel like it represents people way better. Anyone can start a party and capture seat if they represent a large enough niche.
They believe it because that’s what people have been told to believe.
It should be glaringly obvious that trump’s implied policy that he will let Israel “finish the job” is far worse than the dems poor attempts at negotiating cease-fires or any other moderation on Israel’s aggression.
All the propaganda has focused on the democrat (in)action regarding Israel. Zero on trump’s plans.
That’s what the propaganda machine has been pushing.
That’s because nobody believes biden/Harris and for good reason. They’re lying, they have just as much of a plan to turn Gaza into prime oceanfront real estate for wealthy NYC metro area zionists with dual citizenship as the republicans. They’ll just paint the bombs with progress pride and blm flags while lying to your face about their intentions and speaking out of both sides of their mouth depending on their audience. It’s sickening. They’re both going to genocide Palestinians, does it really matter if they’re turned to glass in days or in weeks?
That’s what the propaganda machine has been pushing.
And there was a strong push from the Russians.
what moderation ? biden literally told everyone that ukraine is not even getting a paperclip unless we give israel 20 billion as well. he continued saying israel has unconditional support while we were getting footage of pregnant women & kids getting shot at by idf or burning alive in hospital from use of incendiary shells. then harris repeated the same statement on live tv. all this while the working class has been struggling to survive, layoffs everywhere, and price of everything getting doubled.
its not something that can be washed with but that guy will do worse. you can look otherway but dnc basically threatened their voters base with more genocide if not elected. the fact we are even fighting over this instead mass protesting for biden and his administration to be prosecuted shows just how hollow & pathetic the dnc base has become.
There you go again.
Dems bad, who cares if trump is worse.
Well, you’ll get what you wanted when Israel finishes off Gaza and everything else, or starts WWIII when they can’t keep the bombs inside their extermination camp.
yes the 15 millions or so didn’t care that trump is worse because dnc has become bad enough and its not just the genocide in gaza. threatening people make them do irrational things, specially true for us americans.
there is solid basis that harris would have done nothing to reign netanyahu same as trump. she had accepted even larger donation from aipac than biden who was basically emptying our emergency stockpile faster than we can replenish. if anything there’s chance that trumps narcissism clashes with that stooge and he actually does something good for gaza out of his ego.
Uh, I don’t have anything against America as a whole, but saying y’all don’t like irrational things rings pretty fucking false in my ears atm.
It only took 90 years until the majority apparently forgot 1935-1945 completely.
You’re out of your mind if you think the israel / Palestine conflict stays local to that area under either administration. This is going to literally and figuratively blow up in our faces. Research the concept of “blowback”.
At no point did I suggest otherwise. In fact , I clearly stated WWIII was on the table. Go make up something else I said.
Arguably WW3 started when Russia invaded Ukraine.
You know there’s an entire rest of the world that exists right? A rest of the world that has already started preparing sanctions against Israel if the conflict continues to escalate?
Realistically, we’ve seen this all beat for beat before. Israel treats Palestine as an apartheid state, eventually a group forms to try and resist Israel, Israel crushes that group’s bones into dust for a few years, and then once they can offer no more resistance, Israel returns Palestine to an apartheid state. The pattern has repeated itself several times now.
🇷🇺🇷🇺🇷🇺 🇷🇺🇷🇺🇷🇺 🇷🇺🇷🇺🇷🇺
I believe that Harris had indicated her policy on Biden would’ve been different but I wasn’t entirely sure how.
She could’ve probably said something like “October 7th WAS a terrorist attack and Israel has a right to defend itself. However, there is a difference between defense and suppression” and likely not pissed any sensible people on any side off too much.
That said; My opinion matters very little as I do t have a meaningful connection to the conflict other than hating to see un necessary suffering.
You actively participate in the murder of people.
If enough people did not participate the murder would simply not happen.
You are still participating by choosing to be a bystander to injustice. Abstaining when you can support something less bad only says to others that you do not care how bad it gets.
So… Palestine is safe now? Not voting or voting Trump leads to people not being murdered?
I’m pretty sure that’s not what’s going to happen, and I wish I was wrong.
Speaking as an engineer, I’ve contributed to the murder of more people than I can count.
Speaking as someone who has purchased goods on Amazon and at Walmart, I’ve contributed to the murder of more people than I can count.
We all kill people. Every single person in this thread has contributed to and benefited from death of another. You drive over a bridge, you benefit from the dead. You live in any extant country, you have benefited from murder. Our entire society is built on the lifelong suffering and deaths of millions, a tiny sliver of guilt at a time.
Electing Kamala is roughly the same level of moral failure.
Electing trump is giving an unlocked gun and 1000 rounds to a 7 year old with anger problems. The moral failure is several order of magnitude higher.
The best argument I came across went something like this: if we show the Democratic Party that we’ll accept something as horrible as genocide as long as the Republicans are worse, then we’ve completely surrendered our agency as voters.
Powerful statement. It was the most coherent, rational, well thought out explanation I’d seen. It didn’t come off as a condescending lecture on morality, either. I actually considered their argument for a couple days, but ultimately, I decided it wasn’t strong enough to risk another Trump administration.
It is a stupid fucking statement. “If you aren’t perfect on every single issue, then we won’t vote for you.”
- Step 1: take a conflict your nation did not start
- Step 2: tear your party apart over a conflict your nation did not start
- Step 3: lose the electoral fight in your nation to trump
- Step 4: ensure the war in that other nation is decided in the way your side did not want it to go
- Step 5: call Joe Biden a genocidal maniac
Maybe I don’t want the people who think this is a valid course of action on my side, since they will sabotage my side. If there is a next election, I want these folks ejected from the party and gone. They can vote for trump if they want, because that’s essentially what they did.
Israel is an arm of the US, Gaza is a proxy war. American presidents bear direct responsibility for the genocide
Maybe if they are young. Its comes up again and again. I voted for ross perot but was lucky it did not effect the election. I mean just the 50 cent gas tax would have been great for the environment given it would have gone into effect in the 90’s as a federal tax. Electronic direct democracy. Increase in education and infrastructure. It was hard not to like his proposals.
To start, we have to understand that the genocide of Palestine started before the October 7th attacks. Israel’s rampant illegal settlements in the Gaza strip may have been the final straw that provoked Hamas to make a move, but Palestinians have been abused, forced into ghettos, and murdered by private citizens for decades. All of this, and nobody in the West ever really batted an eye at the suffering except for a handful of informed leftists.
If Harris had won, the most likely outcome is that the immediate conflict would eventually be paused, just like it paused after the second intifadas. No land would be returned, no settlements removed, but Hamas’ forces would be decimated to the point they could not fight back and Israel would return to their quiet slow genocide until the stars align to renew their attack once more.
Now that Trump has won, the most likely outcome is…that the immediate conflict will eventually pause, just like it paused after the second intifadas. Israel isn’t an island, if they ramp up their aggression ever further, eventually other parts of the world will push for sanctions on Israel. A Trump win doesn’t suddenly give Israel carte blanch to build the gas chambers, they still have to pay lip service to international law. Israel will inflict a grievous wound on Hamas, deep enough that it will take another generation before conflict resumes, and go back to expanding their settlements.
This genocide has been happening since before I was born, and multiple Democrat presidents have had an opportunity to say something or work towards curbing Israeli aggression. They’ve all vaguely promised to work towards a two-state solution, knowing that the current two states are what they want. If Kamala Harris couldn’t even call it a genocide, then she was no different, and it would be foolish to think she would actually take any steps towards meaningfully stopping Israel.
