this post was submitted on 07 Nov 2024
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No Stupid Questions

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No such thing. Ask away!

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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?

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[–] TokenBoomer@lemmy.world 1 points 14 minutes ago
[–] Sam_Bass@lemmy.world 2 points 45 minutes ago

when you are laser focused on a single thing, anything else just slides past you. making life changing decisions with limited information is a uniquely american trait

[–] niktemadur@lemmy.world 22 points 5 hours ago (3 children)

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.

[–] gi1242@lemmy.world 13 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

I know one of those people. they are now angry the left lost... 🙄

[–] KombatWombat@lemmy.world -1 points 1 hour ago

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.

[–] WrenFeathers@lemmy.world 1 points 4 hours ago

This is all that needs to be said on the subject.

[–] huquad@lemmy.ml 20 points 8 hours ago (2 children)

It's the trolley problem. You see a trolley about to kill 5 people. You can pull a lever (vote) and make the trolley only kill 1. In this case, that 1 person is also in the lineup of 5. This distinction makes it obvious the only option is to pull the lever (vote).

[–] KombatWombat@lemmy.world 1 points 1 hour ago

This is actually a very good comparison, thank you.

[–] Draegur@lemm.ee 6 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

They mistakenly believe that by pulling the lever they are complicit in the trolley. That by interacting with the trolley on the trolley's terms, they are consenting to the trolley's actions.

I used to believe that too once... Once.

I was disabused of that notion before 2012, but sadly not enough people were.

[–] huquad@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 hour ago

Inaction is also an action. You're always playing the game, might as well learn the rules.

[–] RandomVideos@programming.dev 21 points 9 hours ago (4 children)

The arguments against voting in the USA sound similar to the trolley problem

Some people wouldnt choose to be the reason of the death of one person even if doing nothing causes the death of multiple people

[–] SlothMama@lemmy.world 1 points 52 minutes ago (1 children)

Yes, this is how I felt. I would rather not choose to vote for the 'lesser of two evils' and pretend that's good. It's not just Gaza though, it's corporatism, war profiteering, and terrible policy.

I would rather see the system collapse and possibly die in the process than support another shitty government even if it's the less shitty one.

[–] TopRamenBinLaden@sh.itjust.works 2 points 33 minutes ago* (last edited 31 minutes ago)

That's a horrible outlook, and I'm sorry you've been driven to that point. I understand, as I have been there before.

Now that I'm older, I realize that pulling the lever is the right thing to do as much as it hurts. I don't think letting apathy win and watching the government go full Fash was the correct choice, but I don't blame you, or others who decided the same. The system isn't going to collapse, though, it's just going to get a lot shittier for awhile.

This is very american - these Gaza supporters protest the suffering of people thousands of miles away and yet think it is okay to bring suffering to everyone in his/her own street

[–] Ultraviolet@lemmy.world 16 points 7 hours ago

That just means you value your own ability to evade blame over the lives of real people.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

Yeah but also they all die anyway. Nobody is "saved" in this situation. In fact, it's way worse now.

What's going to happen in Gaza is going to be horrifying.

[–] TheFriar@lemm.ee 11 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

Think of voting this way:

Signing your name to a candidate/psrty and what they’ve done/signaled they will do.

A lot of people can’t stomach a candidate who has been courting the neocons and softening their previous mildly progressive stances from the last time dems had a primary and the progressives were showing up in numbers. Everyone got in line and the debates were about M4A, erasing federally held student debt, raising the minimum wage, etc. Sanders single handedly dragged the party to the center (technically more “left” than they were) in 2016/2020 and the dems responded by po’mouthing like they cared about those issues, but then circled the wagons and kicked those voters to the curb.

The party has shown over and over again that they don’t give a shit about working class people, those of us that want real change. They want to maintain the status quo. Which is progressively more hostile capitalism.

Signing your name to that constant move rightward is unthinkable for some. And understandably so.

And that’s before we even discuss the ongoing genocide in Gaza funded and armed by the US. While this administrations representatives in the UN and in any official capacity constantly run defense for the genocide.

Plenty of people could not fathom putting their name on that tragedy.

None of this means that republicans aren’t fuckin neofascist shits. But…how many times have the voters left of the dems been told to eat shit and vote blue because the other guy is worse? WHILE CONSTANTLY COURTING THE RIGHTWING VOTERS WHO MAY HAVE FINALLY GOTTEN SICK OF IT?! Kamala literally said she would be different from Biden by having a Republican in her cabinet. WHAT.

With everything going on, this party said, “yeah, fuck all that. Let’s see if we can grab anyone to the right of us.”

I got sidetracked, but this is the thing. It’s not binary, because geopolitics isn’t binary. The worlds issues aren’t binary. But a binary choice is all we’re given to make.

Just…what. And neither of those two choices was actually going to solve the problems. One was maintaining the problems while one was the problems plus more problems. That’s not an attractive choice.

We all get that trump is much worse. But everyone else needs to understand how sickening that shitty choice was for anyone with a conscience about what’s going on in Gaza, what’s going on with their neighbors. Signing on for more of the same was completely unthinkable for some. That has to be understandable if we are ever going to change things.

We’ve been on the road we’re being forced down now as long as I’ve been around. And the road just keeps going forward. The dems’ proposal is “maintain the course.” The republicans’ was “mash the gas.”

Some people couldn’t stomach going any further down this road. That’s not making a choice to mash the gas. Because the world is not binary.

But you and everyone else posing similar questions is saying “how could you vote for mashing the gas by not wanting to continue down this road?? :(“

[–] inv3r510n@lemmy.world 3 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

I love your road / mash the gas analogy. Great work I’m gonna steal it!

[–] TheFriar@lemm.ee 2 points 4 hours ago

Hah please do!

[–] Maggoty@lemmy.world 10 points 9 hours ago* (last edited 9 hours ago)

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-

  • 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.

  • Trump will commit human rights violations, voting for Harris is the moral action.

  • 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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