I simply couldn’t bring myself to vote for anyone enabling a genocide, while having very direct power not to. That is simply not something I could in good consciousness do.
Luckily I do not have to, since I do not live in the us. But it is just boggling me how this is a hill someone is willing to die on. I live somewhere with a sensible system already in place, and I can’t thank my ancestors and those that came after them, especially the labour movements and very vocal activists and activism in general, enough.
The problem out there is in the system, it seems to me, and even if we accept that the system is something unchangeable, the actual “better” candidate is still a huge problem.
It makes no sense to vote for someone you do not endorse or want to vote. That is just a waste of your voice and your vote.
Nothing ever changes, if nothing ever hurts. This is the very core logic of labor action too. Halting production is costly and causes problems nation and/or industry-wide, but why would anyone change the status quo if there isn’t an incentive to do so? Why give the workforce sensible salary, when all the production lines run just fine without doing that?
Now, with the two-party system, I get the logic that if one does not vote for the democratic candidate, it lowers the threshold for the opposing forces to win. And that is bad, but mostly in the short, immediate term of a turn in office.
But why on earth would the other side, democrats, ever dish out a good candidate, if they can rally people and get support with genocidal, spineless ones too? Why change, if everything works great without change?
The only way you guys get actually sensible representation, and preferably even a change in the whole system, is if enough people actually feel the hurt. The horrible side to it is that those worst off will feel the hurt the most, but as things stand, those in power, even in democratic side, feel nothing, really, for the most part. So why change anything?
If their candidate loses to fucking Trump, after everything, knowing all everyone should know by now, it should open at least some of their eyes to the fact that there are nothing but bad fucking choices, and they do not win with bad fucking candidates. Maybe Trump goes ahead and wrecks the system and goes full-ass fascist or whatever, that should finally get people to the barricades and do something about the dumb fucking system everyone keeps complaining about, but not causing enough pain for those that have any power, for them to initiate any meaningful change.
Not voting Biden hurts, but voting for him just keeps the current fucked up status quo at play, gaining ever tighter grip, becoming harder to shake up each term. Do something. Change things. Fuck the people who keep things tasting like shit. Vote to change things. Be the revolution, or at least some meaningful change, if not that.
Otherwise you are just allowing the Trumps of the world to play the system and keep getting away with the most ridiculous shit.
Just my thoughts, as someone who’s always voting for my ideal candidate, but not getting fucked in the ass by doing so, because our system formed in time into something sensible via peoples’ actions, labour movements, just progress in general, instead of having to fucking compromise all ideals just to get the slightly less horrible guy to the top of the ivory tower…