The rest are the idiots that believe and agree with them.
Like any good conspiracy, it accounts for any possible contrary evidence one might encounter. If you find someone you disagree with irl, or someone online who doesn’t seems like a secret agent, then it’s simple - they’re just people who have been manipulated by secret agents! The secret agents are still surrounding you and influencing every aspect of your life, regardless of silly things like “evidence” or “falsifiability.” It’s completely indistinguishable from a schizophrenic convinced they’re surrounded by lizard people.
I’m still waiting for a good argument about how no voting or voting 3rd party gets better outcomes.
It’s pretty simple. In a negotiation, having a credible threat of not cooperating gives you more bargaining power than if you show up like, “I will accept any deal you give me, I need this!” Voting is a negotiation. If politicians know that you’ll vote for them no matter what you do, then they have no reason to listen to your concerns, whereas if you say, “I’ll only vote for you if you do this, otherwise I’ll vote third party” then they have an incentive to do the thing in order to earn your vote.
This means you know that your actions will have a greater chance of getting Trump elected, which means you value [whatever policy change you’re looking for] more than [the difference between Biden and Trump]
That’s not really true. Pretty much every system needs some buy-in from the masses. Even a king can be swayed by the threat of a peasant uprising.
Also, saying it’s not a democracy isn’t the same as saying that votes have no affect on the outcome. The Holy Roman Emperor was elected, but that doesn’t mean the empire was a democracy.
You’re allowing it to happen by choosing it, which is close to the same thing. To follow Godwin’s law, nobody cares that people who voted for Nazis did not physically commit atrocities, for example.
And don’t think that not voting is a solution. One of the two options will be chosen. I’m aware that the democrats are wrong about Israel, but is it really worth also being wrong about Ukraine and our own country?
I have no power to stop it and am using what little power I have to try to exert pressure to stop it.
I’m not the one firing the guns. I’m not the one giving the guns to the people firing the guns. I’m not the one giving votes to the person giving guns to the people firing the guns.
You are not going to convince me to vote for someone supporting genocide by trying to shift the blame onto me. I know full well that I’m not responsible and that you’re only saying that to try to get your preferred pro-genocide candidate elected.
you’re only saying that to try to get your preferred pro-genocide candidate elected
I mean, yeah, because despite him being pro-genocide I still believe he’s somehow the best option we have by a surprisingly large margin. We’d have a slightly less enthusiastic genocide, one less invasion, and a much more stable nation.
I have no interest in supporting a “less bad” pro-genocide person. I would sooner die, and there is nothing that anyone can say that would cause me to change that position.
Unlike Biden, when I draw a red line, I actually mean it. If that means we go to hell together, so be it. Genocide is fundamentally unacceptable.
“I’ll only vote for you if you do this, otherwise I’ll vote third party” then they have an incentive to do the thing in order to earn your vote.
Don’t they only have an incentive to do the thing if the third party you vote for instead has a chance to beat them? Which will never be the case unless we see voting reform.
No. If a third party gets, say 5%, it tells the candidate that they could potentially pick up that 5% by moving closer to that party’s positions.
Voting reform is great. It also goes directly against the self-interest of both major parties so they will only ever support it if they believe they have to in order to win.
That seems like an over-simplified or even naive example. Like, a candidate moving their platform has just as much chance to lose 5% of their base as it does picking up those third party votes.
Also, realistically, there isn’t one singular thing that people vote third party for - there’s lots of little “one things” that particular individuals vote third party over, so it’s a more difficult matter than simply “moving closer to those party’s positions” - it’s going out and figuring out what exact positions those votes left you for and trying to incorporate them piecemeal into your platform, all in a way that maintains your current base, or at least gains you more votes than you lose…
IDK man, I don’t see the draw there. Surely it’s much easier to find that 5% in centrists or undecided voters, rather than the very principled people that decide to vote third party.
Ok then, if they believe they can win without me and people like me, then they can go right ahead. But I’d better not hear anyone blame the left when the democrats move right and lose.
Voting is a negotiation? Since when? Voting is a privilege that the ruling class can take away from us at any time if they think they can get away with it. Something kind of like what Trump did after the last election. I remember Jan 6th.
It’s always been a choice between a shit cupcake and a poop cookie. The best thing you can do is minimize damages so you can keep trying to organize for 4 more years or at the very least, stay out of the camps.
Also, if you don’t vote or vote 3rd party, they don’t have to think or care about you anymore. Your not a vote they need to get, because your throwing your vote away. Its basic first past the post voting strategy. I don’t like first past the post for this reason.
If you are bot, “foreign spy”, or whatever, your post was good at muddying the water, keep it up, your master will be pleased. If your not, this argument was bad and unconvincing try again. Not even conservative voters are dumb enough to vote 3rd party.
Also, if you don’t vote or vote 3rd party, they don’t have to think or care about you anymore. Your not a vote they need to get, because your throwing your vote away.
And if you always vote for them no matter what they do, then they don’t have to think or care about you anymore, because they know you’ll vote for them regardless.
If you are bot, “foreign spy”, or whatever, your post was good at muddying the water, keep it up, your master will be pleased.
Oh thank you, I actually am a foreign spy. Do you think you could rate me 5 stars? I really need this job.
Ugh it’s really tiresome to keep coming up with bits to make fun of this conspiracy theory. Can’t y’all get into like flat earth stuff instead, so I can have some new material to work with? It’s all the same crap.
And if you always vote for them no matter what they do, then they don’t have to think or care about you anymore, because they know you’ll vote for them regardless.
You got it! That is the shit system in the US.
Oh thank you, I actually am a foreign spy. Do you think you could rate me 5 stars? I really need this job.
Lol, good sense of humor.
I sympathize, it gets depressing. That is why, I don’t blame anyone from no voting or 3rd party voting. I just wish people would do that without justifying it. Not make it out to be this big brained strategy. There are a lot of good meaning ignorant people who will read that stuff and think they are materially improving things by no voting or 3rd party voting. The progressive fight is super hard and a pain in the butt. If you need a rest King/Queen, take it.
The only real way to get change to happen is getting enough people educated and organized to turn the democrat or republican candidate into a 3rd party candidate by numbers, that is the only way they suffer. Until then we have to play their stupid game.
The only real way to get change to happen is getting enough people educated and organized to turn the democrat or republican candidate into a 3rd party candidate by numbers, that is the only way they suffer.
And how exactly do you envision that happening without anyone ever making the case for it or trying to justify that position?
What do you mean? A lot of people are doing that. It’s not like we get one progressive action every 4 years. Why do you think people organize and run for local government? Why do you think I am trying to spread leftist ideas on the internet? Even people who run as a 3rd party candidate are helping by spreading ideas. Bernie didn’t make it to the finish line, but in trying he did a lot of good work spreading ideas and making people think.
If we wake up enough people, the gears in the machine will start turning and we won’t need to vote 3rd party because we won’t be 3rd party by definition anymore.
I mean voting 3rd part or no-voting. If you want to do that, it is your right. The outcome of doing that is going against your interests. So, you don’t really have a political strategy argument for doing it.
I have found a few people that just didn’t want to feel bad about voting 3rd party. And that is fine, you don’t have feel bad. You can vote how you want. But they felt like they need to create a reason for why they are voting 3rd party or no voting. This is what I think is harming the community. Creating the reason or justifying it when there was no rationality backing it and spreading it like it is a good reason is what irks me. It’s spreading misinformation.
Like any good conspiracy, it accounts for any possible contrary evidence one might encounter. If you find someone you disagree with irl, or someone online who doesn’t seems like a secret agent, then it’s simple - they’re just people who have been manipulated by secret agents! The secret agents are still surrounding you and influencing every aspect of your life, regardless of silly things like “evidence” or “falsifiability.” It’s completely indistinguishable from a schizophrenic convinced they’re surrounded by lizard people.
It’s pretty simple. In a negotiation, having a credible threat of not cooperating gives you more bargaining power than if you show up like, “I will accept any deal you give me, I need this!” Voting is a negotiation. If politicians know that you’ll vote for them no matter what you do, then they have no reason to listen to your concerns, whereas if you say, “I’ll only vote for you if you do this, otherwise I’ll vote third party” then they have an incentive to do the thing in order to earn your vote.
This means you know that your actions will have a greater chance of getting Trump elected, which means you value [whatever policy change you’re looking for] more than [the difference between Biden and Trump]
That’s correct. When the policy change in question is “stopping genocide,” I consider that a completely valid position, tyvm.
Even if it means the break down of democracy in your own country so you will never be able to use voting as negotiation in the future?
The US doesn’t have a democracy and never has.
Trump was already president once and we didn’t have “a complete breakdown of democracy.”
If the US doesn’t have democracy then “negotiation voting” will do nothing either.
That’s not really true. Pretty much every system needs some buy-in from the masses. Even a king can be swayed by the threat of a peasant uprising.
Also, saying it’s not a democracy isn’t the same as saying that votes have no affect on the outcome. The Holy Roman Emperor was elected, but that doesn’t mean the empire was a democracy.
You aren’t actually stopping it though, you’re continuing it and making things worse for everyone else
I’m not doing any of that. The people who are doing it are.
You’re allowing it to happen by choosing it, which is close to the same thing. To follow Godwin’s law, nobody cares that people who voted for Nazis did not physically commit atrocities, for example.
And don’t think that not voting is a solution. One of the two options will be chosen. I’m aware that the democrats are wrong about Israel, but is it really worth also being wrong about Ukraine and our own country?
I have no power to stop it and am using what little power I have to try to exert pressure to stop it.
I’m not the one firing the guns. I’m not the one giving the guns to the people firing the guns. I’m not the one giving votes to the person giving guns to the people firing the guns.
You are not going to convince me to vote for someone supporting genocide by trying to shift the blame onto me. I know full well that I’m not responsible and that you’re only saying that to try to get your preferred pro-genocide candidate elected.
I mean, yeah, because despite him being pro-genocide I still believe he’s somehow the best option we have by a surprisingly large margin. We’d have a slightly less enthusiastic genocide, one less invasion, and a much more stable nation.
I have no interest in supporting a “less bad” pro-genocide person. I would sooner die, and there is nothing that anyone can say that would cause me to change that position.
Unlike Biden, when I draw a red line, I actually mean it. If that means we go to hell together, so be it. Genocide is fundamentally unacceptable.
Don’t they only have an incentive to do the thing if the third party you vote for instead has a chance to beat them? Which will never be the case unless we see voting reform.
No. If a third party gets, say 5%, it tells the candidate that they could potentially pick up that 5% by moving closer to that party’s positions.
Voting reform is great. It also goes directly against the self-interest of both major parties so they will only ever support it if they believe they have to in order to win.
That seems like an over-simplified or even naive example. Like, a candidate moving their platform has just as much chance to lose 5% of their base as it does picking up those third party votes.
Also, realistically, there isn’t one singular thing that people vote third party for - there’s lots of little “one things” that particular individuals vote third party over, so it’s a more difficult matter than simply “moving closer to those party’s positions” - it’s going out and figuring out what exact positions those votes left you for and trying to incorporate them piecemeal into your platform, all in a way that maintains your current base, or at least gains you more votes than you lose…
IDK man, I don’t see the draw there. Surely it’s much easier to find that 5% in centrists or undecided voters, rather than the very principled people that decide to vote third party.
Ok then, if they believe they can win without me and people like me, then they can go right ahead. But I’d better not hear anyone blame the left when the democrats move right and lose.
I won’t be blaming the left. I’ll be blaming a lack of voting reform, because I don’t think voting for a third party is an effective solution.
Getting 5% is also important because it qualifies the party to get millions of dollars in federal grant money.
Voting is a negotiation? Since when? Voting is a privilege that the ruling class can take away from us at any time if they think they can get away with it. Something kind of like what Trump did after the last election. I remember Jan 6th.
It’s always been a choice between a shit cupcake and a poop cookie. The best thing you can do is minimize damages so you can keep trying to organize for 4 more years or at the very least, stay out of the camps.
Also, if you don’t vote or vote 3rd party, they don’t have to think or care about you anymore. Your not a vote they need to get, because your throwing your vote away. Its basic first past the post voting strategy. I don’t like first past the post for this reason.
If you are bot, “foreign spy”, or whatever, your post was good at muddying the water, keep it up, your master will be pleased. If your not, this argument was bad and unconvincing try again. Not even conservative voters are dumb enough to vote 3rd party.
And if you always vote for them no matter what they do, then they don’t have to think or care about you anymore, because they know you’ll vote for them regardless.
Oh thank you, I actually am a foreign spy. Do you think you could rate me 5 stars? I really need this job.
Ugh it’s really tiresome to keep coming up with bits to make fun of this conspiracy theory. Can’t y’all get into like flat earth stuff instead, so I can have some new material to work with? It’s all the same crap.
You got it! That is the shit system in the US.
Lol, good sense of humor.
I sympathize, it gets depressing. That is why, I don’t blame anyone from no voting or 3rd party voting. I just wish people would do that without justifying it. Not make it out to be this big brained strategy. There are a lot of good meaning ignorant people who will read that stuff and think they are materially improving things by no voting or 3rd party voting. The progressive fight is super hard and a pain in the butt. If you need a rest King/Queen, take it.
The only real way to get change to happen is getting enough people educated and organized to turn the democrat or republican candidate into a 3rd party candidate by numbers, that is the only way they suffer. Until then we have to play their stupid game.
And how exactly do you envision that happening without anyone ever making the case for it or trying to justify that position?
What do you mean? A lot of people are doing that. It’s not like we get one progressive action every 4 years. Why do you think people organize and run for local government? Why do you think I am trying to spread leftist ideas on the internet? Even people who run as a 3rd party candidate are helping by spreading ideas. Bernie didn’t make it to the finish line, but in trying he did a lot of good work spreading ideas and making people think.
If we wake up enough people, the gears in the machine will start turning and we won’t need to vote 3rd party because we won’t be 3rd party by definition anymore.
I guess I just don’t understand how to square that position with:
I mean voting 3rd part or no-voting. If you want to do that, it is your right. The outcome of doing that is going against your interests. So, you don’t really have a political strategy argument for doing it.
I have found a few people that just didn’t want to feel bad about voting 3rd party. And that is fine, you don’t have feel bad. You can vote how you want. But they felt like they need to create a reason for why they are voting 3rd party or no voting. This is what I think is harming the community. Creating the reason or justifying it when there was no rationality backing it and spreading it like it is a good reason is what irks me. It’s spreading misinformation.
I’m so confused by your position.