Pre-empting this to ask everyone to please remain civil.
We know that caffeine is poisonous to deer and that this is a sensitive topic. The Onion has great tips and tricks to help you remain calm in the moment.
But then I remembered he’s [deer]. Just like me. He has a family that loves him. And that’s an exploitable weakness!
lemmy when you talk about killing politicians 👌
lemmy when you mention third parties 😤
Which of the two major parties stands against capitalism again?
One of them is the “Openly advocates for billionaires” party and the other is the “Discretely advocates for billionaires” party.
Neither, unfortunately, but we have a two-party system, and one side is openly fascist, so I would advise that anyone who doesn’t like fascism vote for the other non-fascist (arguably less-fascist) party.
I don’t like voting for the “lesser evil” and wish things were better, but voting for unviable candidates out of a sense of blind idealism is worse, because it empowers the most regressive movements to succeed.
We don’t currently live in a real democracy, but we have a chance to turn things around. If you decide to give up and let the fascists win, you’re one of the bad guys.
We need Ranked Choice Voting and Mixed Member Proportional districting to reduce the need for strategic voting.
Sure, that’s obvious to you and me, as seasoned internet users. But we can’t expect lawyers and career politicians to understand such things. They must be ignoring it by accident.
did you even comprehend what they said?
If the choice is fascist or less fascist then neither is worth voting for.
People will hold a vote to see if everyone gets punched in the face three times or once. Would you not vote for only one punch?
Your outcomes are between the candidate who will hurt you and yours less vs the candidate who will hurt you and yours most.
If you’re lucky, choosing to not vote will still lead to the candidate that will hurt you and yours less.
Be as pedantic as you want: this is the reality of it.
Do whatever outside of the election season to change that but once the final polls happen, those are the only choices you have.
It’s like when you get beat up and you’re on the ground. You try to protect your vitals and hope you’ll survive to fight another day.
Not voting is idiotic and lazy.
I never said anything about not voting.
The reality is choosing between the two major parties is choosing hurting now or hurting later. Neither will actually do any good. It’s pointless to vote for anyone other than a 3rd party, at least then you’re not voting for evil.
The reality is choosing between the two major parties is choosing hurting now or hurting later.
False.
- They’ll both hurt now but one will clearly hurt less.
- One will also do more good than the other.
- 3rd party during the final election won’t get anything accomplished, because that third party literally has no representation in lower positions of government.
Which third party has a chance to actually win or do something and isn’t just throwing your vote out?
Part of building a viable alternative is getting enough votes for consistant ballot access and other resources that are afforded by default to the two primary parties. Winning comes in degrees.
Yet Jill Stein vanishes for four years between Presidential elections and does absolutely nothing to support a third party coalition at the state and local level.
And she somehow deserves your vote for simply not being a D or R? Yeah nah.
She basically works for Russia.
If that was really the strategy they would start with local elections.
Idk about your state, but that is the case here in MD with Greens and the Working Class Party. Also true for the Working Families Party in other states. Presidential elections have a purpose in generating attention, though.
All of them, complain about non-voters not voters.
Okay let’s see. We have a large part of the population who just won’t vote. Voter apathy is real.
Of the Democrats and Republicans, you have about 2/3 of each party that are voting like it’s a sports team. They’ll never change and they’ll never think.
The thinking people who vote for each party understand that the third party has no chance and they’re trying to sway things generally in their direction.
So the third party victory plan, if I have it correct, is to overcome voter apathy, and also to sway some people who are voting like a sports team from both parties.
If that’s your plan for victory, then you don’t have a plan for victory. And you’re just wasting your vote.
Call me cynical, but I think third parties are funded by people outside the country to sway the election. Just like they only thaw out Jill Stein every 4 years to steal votes from the Democrats, and then they park her in a Russian freezer somewhere for the rest of the time.
“They won’t actually fix anything but they might win” is an unbelievably terrible argument
No. It’s “which of these two horrible choices might we influence to make some progress”
You don’t get a third choice for the big things. It’s mathematically and literally impossible.
Social reality isn’t tethered to logic. A mind virus can open the possibility for a third party victory, math be damned.
We’re already past the first step where the general population is tired of the two current options.
Yeah, but hope is not a strategy. What’s the path to making that happen?
…are you trying to say that it’s mathematically impossible for a third party to be viable?
Because wow, the entire western world outside the US would like to have a word.
The ONLY chance the US had for a third party was back when Teddy Roosevelt ran in the Bull Moose party. He was already a president with a major party and wanted another run but the party didn’t like his socialist agenda. (I’m simplifying)
If he would have won, we probably would still have a 2 party system. 1 of the parties would have adapted to the Bull Moose party.
We need to elect people that will support the change to RCV. Dems seem more favorable to this.
Dems seem more favorable to this.
The problem is that you’re relying on “vote blue and hope they give us electoral reform out of the kindness of their hearts.” It’s not a real strategy. Dems have a clear incentive to not enact voting reform, because they survive off of being the lesser evil and effectively coercing people into voting for them. And if you say that we should vote for Dems conditionally to them (genuinely) supporting RCV, that’s one thing, but if you’re just supporting them regardless then any ideas you have about RCV are meaningless because in practice those ideas aren’t affecting your actions in any way.
It’s like seeing that your car won’t to start and thinking the solution is to drive it to the mechanic. The whole problem is that you can’t drive it anywhere. In the same way, the whole reason we need electoral reform is the same thing that prevents it from happening, that we don’t have any mechanism for advancing policy goals in the current system. You can’t rely on a broken system to fix itself.
What we need is to realize that the current system is FUBAR and organize non-electoral strategies (for example, strikes and demonstrations) to advance policy positions, and we need a dedicated party that’s focused on that strategy and able to lay out a clear platform to that end.
You mean where they have ranked choice and a completely different voting system which changes the math?
You got me to learn something new today!
I’m not sure I fully understood that . But the first step in any change is ranked choice voting. If we had that then we could do three parties or more.
As it stands, we’ve devolved into a two-party system and neither party will give up control.
Oh is it time for “Both Sides” already? Forgot to mark my calendar
It’s always time for bOtH sIdEs, because BoTh keep bOtHiNg.
Yes, i know one is pro-church and the other is pro-trans.
My problem is that they are BoTh anti-union and pro-Epstein. That’s the rub.
Sorry if reality offends you
If you have a path to change the system of governance, that could be worth pursuing. But voting isn’t a path to that - just a form of harm reduction within the system.
You still buy groceries - even though you may hate the process of handing over your net worth for something that helps sustain your life and want to change that.
Voting is still worth doing, but certainly not all one should do.
Man that pissed me off. He said it right as early voting started. Choose third party because every side’s bad. How would you fucking know Matthew? This is Texas. There’s only been one side for 35 years. How the fuck would you know both sides are bad? Like I’m not saying he’s wrong necessarily I just don’t think he has that information.
And if you’re going to sit there and blather about voting third party pick a fucking third party. Which third party Matthew McConaughey? Who you backing? Are you saying vote libertarian? You picking up the green party? I don’t even remember seeing them on the ballot. Pick a candidate you bongo playing lunatic. Fucking coward.
It’s not about “which third party”, that doesn’t matter. You can change that per issue (I do).
You don’t vote third party to win, that would be stupid. You won’t win.
You vote third party to put pressure on the major parties to change their platform, you’re working from within the system to change the system. It’s a “protest vote”… and major parties want those votes.
Third party issues become major party issues with enough voter support.
For example, weed legalization was Libertarian, Green, and Socialist party cause since the 1970s, working with NORMAL (National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws). Over the years, the grass roots (get it?) support grew and grew, even though the major parties were dead set against it.
Those third parties affected change on that issue in many states, and it continues. All thanks to third parties.
Most of their success is locally, not federally, which is in my opinion a lost cause, but again it’s not about the party, it’s about the issues.
Then why doesn’t he do that? What’s his issue? Which party this time? You see my point? He’s not picking a third party. Because frankly there’s not one. Not in Texas. Not this year.
There’s not an issue he’s backing. There’s not a candidate he’s backing. There’s not a change he’s trying to force. After all it’s Texas the change would be not Republican. 35 years of the same party controlling the state top to bottom if you want change you’d want that to change. But that’s not what he wants. He’s not trying to get you to vote for third party. He’s trying to get you to not vote Democrat. Him and his friend Greg Abbott don’t want that.
By the way just as an aside, the Texas green party is a fucking travesty. They are simply the worst. They don’t stand for anything anymore. In my local elections the best environmentally conscious candidate by a mile wouldn’t even run under their ticket because was so disgusted with them.
it’s commentary on matthew mcconaughey’s statement.
As a trans person, please dont let the face eating leopards burn our democracy down. I know the rabid horses aren’t much better, but they at least dont explicitly promise to eat our faces.
I do mean that, btw
But on lemmy.ml, they told me voting for Democrats means you don’t care about trans people
Yup, cause letting Republicans win=trans victory!/s
Well you have to accelerate miserable conditions if you want the workers to rise up. People might die, but they’re just little trash people, so the ends justify the means.
Virtually no one thinks this way. It’s entirely a straw man.
They’re literally asses, but somehow still the obvious choice.
Yep, voting is as meaningless as blowing on your coffee.
To other commenters reading: please be aware that this person lives in Russia, so that’s why they don’t understand the point of voting.
Sigh… I was that guy in my 20s, voted for Ross Perot twice. Didn’t expect him to win but I wanted to send a message to Washington that I wasn’t happy with either party. He got 20% in '92 and 8% in 96.
THIS IS NOT THE TIME FOR SUCH SHENANIGANS.
Except if one would’ve voted GOP. Then a third party is an amazing choice.
Dunno if that tracks in the current climate. Even Libertarians seem to be a bit pissed off at Trump.
Perhaps the deer introduced (bi)proportional representation and are living the good life now?
That’s what allows me to vote 6th party without making my vote useless.
I’d love it if people just voted, period.
Republicans can vote third party all day long. You will hear no complaints from me. If you are a Republican, please vote third party if you can’t vote for anyone else.
Or just stay home. Consider not voting if you are a republican.
*nervously looks around for people who would shoot me for having magnificent horns or voting ninth party*
“Voting ninth-party” sounds like a level of abstraction that describes writing in a termite mound in the Gondswana Rainforests.
All the candidates are Johnny Depp’s characters
Why so abstract? We have 5 parties that have seats in parliament and 9 other registered parties that don’t.
“Third-party” in the context of US politics (I think that’s where it comes from and is most widely used, owing to its major structural problems that almost inherently create only two major parties federally) is an abstract term referring to any minor political party, not specifically the third-most-popular. There’s no such thing as “voting fourth-party”, so an nth level of abstraction beyond that becomes absurdist.
We know and disapprove
with the coalition-building and last-minute allegiance changes that goes on in this country it might as well be
America is fucked and voting for anything other than the big two is throwing away your vote.
Or we could have rank choice voting! Some places do!
Yeah I live in Australia where we have preferential voting.
I have always voted left of our major parties, because like the rest of the world, our major “left wing” party is centre right and our right wing is way too far to the right. Everyone right if that is extremely racist or a billionaire. Usually both.
But we have options, and even if the major party wins they have to negotiate with the smaller parties if we’ve won them seats in parliament. Voting for the minor parties and independents first based on policy sends a message that these are the things that matter to us. If they want to win the next election they’ll have to support them or we’ll continue voting for the minor parties.
The liberals (our right wing party) handled covid and the following months so poorly that they were essentially ousted in western Australia. They are so small now that they hold the same amount of power as the minor parties. Labor (the “left wing” major party) won 46 of the possible 59 seats and the liberals only got 7. They’ve had to form a coalition with the slightly more right wing minor party to have any voting power. Which has caused them to slip even further right and lose even more votes in the following local elections.
or… representative democracy. where nobody “wins”, and the percentage of votes decides the percentage of representatives in parliament.
This one would require more reworking of our Legislative Branch. There are 435? Representatives currently, so the country is broken up into 435 house districts, with each district/ community voting for a single person to represent them. So you have a quantization problem; you can’t really split a single person.
I’m not saying I can’t imagine a world where we do it (whole states vote for all the Representatives from their state?), only that meaningful change is an uphill battle against 250 years of coagulated inertia + notably bad actors now diffuse through the system.
here voting for a representative is optional. you vote separately for what party you want to govern locally and nationally, and they get that percentage of the seats (with a lower bound of 4%) to assign members to. if you want a specific person in a seat, you mark their name, and they’ll get a guaranteed seat if a certain number of people mark them (and there’s enough seats).
we’re actually in the middle of an election fraud investigation right now because a relatively unknown member of a party got enough personal votes to get a national seat, and all of them came from the area where he lives. it sounds less serious when you learn that the total number of votes needed for him to get in was about 800, and that was split over three districts.
I just want to highlight, despite the guffaw this post gave me…
The account is 6 days old. 1 comment and 33 posts.
Gasp. But. The status quo!
You will get progress at the doctor prescribed rate. How dare you think you know your own wants better than some random person on the internet
Wait does this have something to do with that thing with Joe Manchin and Matthew McConaughey?
Can you link me? I didn’t understand the post title at all.
The other day right as early voting was getting going in Texas Matthew McConaughey gives this rambling nonsense spiel about how everybody’s bad we should all vote third party. Didn’t pick a fucking party to vote for, didn’t pick a candidate to vote for, just vomited a nonsense opinion all over everybody. Now he does this while hobnobbing with Greg Abbott on the sidelines of UT games, a school Republicans are in the current process of overrunning and undermining.
Hobnobbing with Abbott is always gross.
Still, with my parents dyed-in-the-wool Texas Republicans who were at least enjoying parroting “Talarico wants to make everyone trans” whether or not they earnestly believed it, the best I’m hoping for is that they are disgusted enough with Paxton to stay home or vote third party. My mom was disgusted enough with Trump the second time to write in Condolezza Rice (Dad is still a fan), so that’s about where the bar is. People like them will never think Democrats are anything but bad, so giving them social permission to abandon Republicans seems useful.
