Some of y'all are not ready to hear this...

I see your point, however, the Democratic party is not fascist. It does provide a clear difference from the GOP. Wether we like it or not, USA is a two party system. We need to be practical here, not ideological, or we just go fascist forever.

"We're only living under fascism because not enough people voted for the party that did absolutely nothing to stop it"

The Democrats used to be the racist pro slavery party. Then it got captured and turned into Roosevelts New Deal Democrats, which were obviously to the left of the Republicans. Not perfect, but they really did a lot of good.

This can be repeated, but it takes a lot of work.

Honestly, the worst of it all started with Clinton. He was the first of the corpo Democrats, and was a response to 12 year of Reagan and Bush telling the world that Greed was good.
The 60s and 70s were full of Democrats who were on the side of the people, and not the corporations.
Sadly we need to rebuild the community driven fundraising that Democrats used to rely on, while also weaning off the corporate teat.

ITT is some progressives who put more time, energy and anger into bullying other progressives not to vote for a genuinely progressive candidate, than they do into trying to sincerely convince Republican voters not to vote Republican.

There’s a logical fallacy at play in their minds where they think “Republican voters aren’t reasonable but progressives are, so I’ll spend my time trying to whip progressives into holding the Party line. Maybe cussing them out and accusing them of being complicit in the rise of fascism will help…”

This is a right-wing troll talking point. Don't listen to it.

Go to the Democratic primaries and move the party left. And then, no matter who gets the nomination, vote Dem in the general election. This is exactly what the nazis did to move the GOP to the right and it worked great for them, and it's something we can emulate.

Yeah, not listening to this defeatist garbage. The Democratic party has been changed before. It will be changed again. The party is not defined by some monolithic ideology. We need massive electoral reform in the US to ensure elections are actually fair. First past the post is problematic. House and Senate functions are problematic. We need a solution to the two party problem, but until then, our vehicle is the Democratic party. Best to make it do what we want it to rather than just give up because "they're corporatists".
- Yeah, not listening to this defeatist garbage.
  Defeatism is thinking the only option you have is playing by the rules the bourgeoisie instated, not "stop believing in a corrupt party"
no matter who gets the nomination, vote Dem in the general election
Its never worked before, but lets just try that again.
This is a right-wing troll talking point. Don’t listen to it. This is a far left anarchist talking point
Preach!

…you didn't say fascist…

Maybe you’re not ready to hear this: Both sides are not the same.

I checked my calculator, and according to this "capitalist + imperialist = fascist". Imagine that.

There's no way to win political power in the United States without the Democratic Party or the Republican Party.

Socialists and progressives will always have an easier time infiltrating the neoliberal Democratic Party over the fascist Republican Party.

The longer the fascists are in power the harder it will be remove them from power because they will change the rules to maintain power.

The optimal strategy remains to vote for neoliberals when the alternative is fascists because that is how to create time for socialists and progressives to primary neoliberals in the Democratic Party and win general elections.

This meme is a continuation of the accelerationism we saw during the 2024 election. It supports the fascist cause by attempting to sabotage leftist's best strategy and thus is pro-fascist. The user is prone to self-sabotage as they publicly admitted to not voting for Harris in 2024.

If a fascist drinks at your bar and you don't throw them out it's a fascist bar. If a fascist meme ends up in your community and you don't throw it your a fascist community.

I am reporting this meme. And you all should too. I'm sick of self-described leftists backstabing me and every other minority group they pretend to care about because they're mad about the 2016 election. I'm a trans, atheist, Jew. I'm close enough to the death camps for my liking thanks. You don't have to like the Democrats, I don't, but we do need to vote for them.

I refuse to go quietly. I refuse to tolerate memes that shrug at my right to exist and throw fuel to the fire in the hopes that the fascists kill everyone faster. That's not a real political position. It's black pilled bullshit and it can fuck off.

Hope that helps people stop tolerating this bullshit going forward.

people also ignore local elections, which is where the gop gets thier base of power from. once they take over things like school boards, and such they can work thier way into higher positions.
I am reporting this meme. And you all should too.
jfc. This isn't intended as a "fascists on both sides" argument, but you really need to take a moment and look at yourself there.
- Well, when you feel the need to preface your argument with
  jfc. This isn’t intended as a “fascists on both sides” argument, but
  then
  you really need to take a moment and look at yourself there.
  The fascists want to kill me and people I care about.
  Your argument is a pro-fascist accelerationist ad hominen. Accelerationism is self-defeating. We should ban accelerationist posts and comments.
Thank you for putting that out there. I still cannot see making any other choice when it came time to vote. The too-close death camps you refer to were a very predictable consequence of this administration. I’m just a straight white guy but I really prefer to not add death camps to the world, or to disappear peaceful productive people from their communities, or to significantly harm the lives of millions of young, old, poor, or disabled people. That includes the ones starving overseas because of recent changes.
“But genocide!” we expect to hear in response. And if any dear readers are already thinking that, I want you to take this one fact away from my comment:
The deeply flawed US voting system — the one which forces the two party system on us — is damned near impossible to change via normal legislation and votes.
It’s THE thing. It is that mechanism that lets the red/blue capitalist american machine continue to vacuum up the vast majority of american votes. Go look up just how much agreement there has to be to amend the constitution. And we’re going to ask the people already in charge to get together and agree to kneecap their future political power. You see the issue.
Sure, the media is complicit and most voters are ignorant of the fact that there are better systems in place around the world. It’s true that a lot can be done outside of elected positions. But when it comes to the actual voting ballot, since the system self-corrects (in a bad way) for significant third parties, the expected consequences of each choice were something like:
Status quo, including any US resources being used for genocide and other shit.
Genocide Max plan, with 4 free years of Death Camp Prime
Flip a coin between 1 & 2 above (stay home or vote for a third party hoping it will get them recognition and funding)
Revolution and replace the system, like right now!
And I want to add a caveat that I’m not trying to blame the people who chose #3 above. Before the election I would disagree with that choice, but now in retrospect we know those people weren’t the reason Trump and Republicans won. I guess it remains to be seen how much of it was the genuine love for Trump the maniacs in this place have, and how much of it was election rigging and cheating BS.
- Harris wanted to end the war. So option 1 is better than your argument has advertised. Harris was a huge improvement over Biden in that regard. But I digress.
  Every vote counts. The tighter the margins the better. We need the Democrats to do better, as in run better candidates, in order to win, but if they ever do that, there better be a leftist voting block who helped them get into office. Otherwise the Democrats will not feel safe enough to shift left.
  Leftists need to be voting in record numbers to shift the Democratic Party to the left. Part of the way we do that is to vote for Democrats consistently. This should be a mechanical choice of who to vote for in the general. It's hard to do that when posts disparaging fixing the Democratic Party as impossible or so hard it's not worth trying are going unchallenged on the internet, including Lemmy.
  Fixing the Democratic Party and this country will take time and a lot of work. Part of that work involves voting for Democrats.
In the 70s, people were making this argument about voting for the lesser of two evils, but it was between two Keynesians rather than two neoliberals. That was 50 years ago. Nixon was to the left of every president in my lifetime. 50 years from now, just how right wing will the Democrat we have to vote for be?
- With Gavin Newsom, a Charlie Kirk podcast guest, the choice in 2028 might be two fascists.
  We lost to Nixon and it got worse. We lost to Regan and it got worse. We lost to two different Bushes and it got worse. Now we've lost to Trump twice and it got worse.
  The throughline is that we keep losing to the greater evil and suffering the consequences of things getting worse as a result. That includes worse choices next time as the Democrats move to the right to chase the people who vote for the greater evil. As opposed to going for people who don't vote or throw away their vote to a third party.
  The Democratic Party is going to be rightwing until people learn we have to vote in addition to everything else to get Democrats to move to the left. They will only think about moving left if they win elections. And they only move left when they think they have enough voters to win when they do move.
  If we, leftists, want better choices in 50 years we have got to vote in records numbers, so if Democrats get their act together and get someone half-way decent they win. And when they do, they see a leftist voter block got them there.
- Guess what would have happened if Nixon and Reagan had lost
I agree and disagree.
Yes, we will have an easier time infiltrating the DNC, but we should never forget that they are not on our side and will fight against us getting in as much as they can. We should still try, but have our eyes open as well.
Yes, we definitely should practice harm reduction and vote for neoliberals when the alternative is fascists. The part we really need to focus on (short term) is actually getting people to pay attention to and care about the primaries. Too many of us feel hopeless and skip that step. It's just as important as elections, if not more so. But again- we absolutely have to realize that our enemy when it comes to the primaries is the DNC, not the GOP. They have swore under oath that they believe they have the right to influence and manipulate primaries to get Neolibs on the ballot and keep progressives/leftists off, and the court agreed they had that right. It's their policy to do so. We simply cannot rely on their help and need to come up with strategies to work around their meddling and interference.
This meme is a continuation of the accelerationism we saw during the 2024 election.
I don't believe it is. You can still believe in and practice harm reduction, while having a realistic understanding of the situation at the same time. The DNC and GOP literally control the elections. and while it is possible we can sneak a few progressives and leftists past them, we will very likely never be able to take it over completely. They will NEVER vote to end the two party system, it makes them too powerful.
Our best hope is to get as many leftists into the DNC as we possibly can, while at the same time building momentum and support for a viable 3rd party coalition of everyone on the left. It's also critical we focus on educating the public and combating the billionaire owned mainstream media. We also have to build a network of local mutual aid communities that can serve all of those goals, while showing people that an alternative is not only possible, but preferable to relying on the system.
Once a critical mass of support has been gained, all of the DNC infiltrators can exit for the Left party en masse, not only weakening the DNC, but truly highlighting the differences between the two. At that point the tables will have been turned and people who vote D will be taking away votes from the L's and allowing the fascists to win.
I believe that is the only way to get an actual viable alternative to the DNC. Like the meme says we will not be able to reform it. Our only hope is to get asses in seats in Congress and force through election reform. IF we can manage to get rid of the first past the post style voting, and end the electoral college, then we would never again have to worry about voting for the lesser evil. That should be our number 1 long term goal.
I think going from recognizing that the Democrats will never be reformed to that means we won't vote for them over fascists and even worse that makes us pro- fascist is a hell of a stretch- and reporting memes that point out the truth is madness.
- The OP publicly claimed to not have voted for Harris. Reform in the meme is referring to the kind of strategies we are proposing. Look at the OP's post and comment history if you don't believe me.
  I've been paying attention and OP worked tireless to sink Harris and Walz during the last election. It wasn't criticism, OP just wanted them to fail. The OP doesn't want the Democrats to improve. The OP wants us to hurry up and all die. That's the madness of accelerationism.
- getting people to pay attention to and care about the primaries
  Part of this needs to include running for office. Many many many demcratic primary ballots around the country are mostly if not entirely empty
You're right, and I like your advice. I reported the post
- Thank you!
The optimal strategy remains to vote for neoliberals when the alternative is fascists because that is how to create time for socialists and progressives to primary neoliberals in the Democratic Party and win general elections.
With all due respect, that strategy got us fascism. The terminology has changed, but I could tell close to 30 years ago that this would be the result. Is three decades not enough time for socialists and progressives to "primary" neoliberals? Apparently not, because socialsts/progressives/leftists are lazy, good-for-nothings who are simultaneously powerful enough to swing elections, but too inconsequential to talk about their issues or court their votes.
In other words, maybe these vaunted "centrists"/liberals should've stepped up to stop fascism. (And, it's not leftists who say that Harris "went too woke" and now want to throw trans people under the bus.)
- With all due respect, that strategy got us fascism.
  That argument is obviously false. We, people to the left of Republican voters, have been losing elections and Democrats since Clinton have been moving right as a result.
  Apparently not, because socialsts/progressives/leftists are lazy, good-for-nothings who are simultaneously powerful enough to swing elections, but too inconsequential to talk about their issues or court their votes.
  Of course we need more than just leftists to vote. We need to demonstrate a leftist voter block was part of what got Democratic candidates into office. So the Democrats feel they have voters to cover the ones on the right they think they could lose by shifting left.
  In other words, maybe these vaunted “centrists”/liberals should’ve stepped up to stop fascism.
  Yes. There can be more than one lesson to learn from an election. Democrats fucking up more than us doesn't mean we don't have a lesson to learn too. Obviously Democrats have to do better. But if they win without leftists when they do run a better candidate, they aren't going to shift left. They'll think they've hit the sweet spot and stay put on the political spectrum.

The Republican party was a party of radical abolitionists and it was captured by the capitalists. The Democratic party can likewise be changed to something it is not currently.

You can't convince me of what may be by talking about what is.

It's not the democratic party, it's the US itself that is rotten. The dem are just another manifestation of the issue.

If you mean our government, hard agree.

We need to get involved at the primary level, not lament the choices we are left with when primary election turnout is hilariously low. I'd be surprised if the average voter even knows what a primary election is.

I believe this is definitely a place to focus. In my area there isn't even enough candidates to fill the democratic party primary ballot, people on this platform bitching need to run for office instead of just whining about it (myself included)

Not true. It can be reformed the same way the republican party was deformed. By gutting it from the inside out and replacing all the dead weight.

Yes. It can be taken over like the rnc was by maga. The mentality of this post makes progressives lose before they try. That is what capitalism really wants. For you to not try and accept the bullshit.
- The useful idiots are loud on Lemmy. And for some reason it always seems to be the same handful of names.
the dead weight is.. most of it though. A lot of people just joined because it was the only alternative to republicans. And now its pretty much dead.
- Let's use that desperation to our advantage. People will be eager to accept a new direction

This is GOP propaganda

Absolutely.
It's Democrat propaganda too. OP is helping the dems lose, just like they want
- Since when do they need help to do that?

Roosevelt did great things for Americans while still being capitalist. The needle can be moved left without violent revolution.

"Both sides bad" is weak sauce.

Quick reminder that there were other things going on in the 20s and 30s. You know, the height of socialism in the West, a strong labor movement willing to burn down factories, stuff like that. The New Deal didn't come because leftists played nice.
- I feel like Western labour just doesn't have any leverage anymore. The rich simply do not need us. They have outsourced enough labour that they really don't care if we strike en masse. Like, shut down which factories? They're all overseas.
- A socialist movement independent from either of the major parties too!
- The coal wars threatening to kick off a second civil war, y'know small things.
- So there ARE conditions by which reform can occur, neat.
- Blue Morpho apparently never learned about the Battle of Blair Mountain or the Railway Strikes.
No, the new deal only came to be after violent protests, and was largely a betrayal of labor groups because it gave a much watered down version of what was actually demanded, all while Roosevelt broke the strike he promised to support while campaigning. Read "Labor's Giant Step Forward" by Art Preis if you want a more detailed accpunt
In addition to the points raised by some of the other comments I'd remind you of one uncomfortable truth. The business plot was attempted fascist takeover of America. That was thankfully put down because remarkably there was one honorable ex-marine they tried to involve the plot. That's Smedley Butler. In the wake of that that attempted fascist coup basically nobody was punished. In large part because Roosevelt told them as long as they kept their mouth shut and didn't block the New Deal he wouldn't go after them. That's basically the only reason it got through. Truncated as it was even then. Because most of the richest and most powerful people in the country we're looking down the barrel of a gun otherwise.
- Prescott Bush and his cronies should have been hanged.
  And Smedley Butler Day should be a national holiday.
Have fun wasting your time doing this. If they only fucked over Burnie once I might agree with you.
- Well, they will still try. They won't give it up. But it's not possible to win it against them, like the Tea Party won against less extreme establishment Republicans
If you had to go back almost a hundred years to find any kind of example, I'm just going to gesture broadly at the next hundred years and rest my case.
Both sides are varying degrees of the same ideology, give all the money to the economic elite so they bribe both parties into maintaining that policy above all other considerations.
One side shrugs and calls it free market forces(D) as you suffer under that policy goal, the other points and laughs at you and says you deserve it(R). That is the extent of our "freedom" under American democracy.
- One side appoints Justices that voted against Citizens United and one appoints Justices that voted for it. That's a huge distinction.
Roosevelt was the least bad president and was ruling during a time where the US ended up on the right side of a conflict. He still did not abolish capitalism or the American empire, nor did he have any intentions to.
But that doesn't make the democrats good, it doesn't make one side better, it doesn't make the US good.
- it doesn’t make one side better
  One side IS objectively better.
  That's proven by economic stats.
  That's proven by voting history.
  That's proven by criminal conviction history.
  There is no debate which side is better if you're even remotely interested in facts.
  You take the side that is better and you reform it by primarying the reps that won't play ball for their constituents., sending a clear message to the reps that remain. That is how democracy works in its most effective form.
can it be done again without another series of protests and pain the current era of capitalism?
With unintelligent comments like yours and all the discussions happening below meme threads, conflicts and violence is where we are heading to. I encourage you to learn more about the things you are talking about.
Yep.
All the keyboard warriors talking about revolution need to either pick up and gun and do it or get off their asses and help primary bad Dems to send a message and start the reformation process.
No one who made it out of high school should be saying "both sides" because it's a profoundly stupid and unproductive thing to say. Did we have masked squads disappearing people before January? Did our allies all hate us? Were we threatening fucking Canada? Were we paying tariff taxes?
Both sides are functionally the same when it comes to the world. There's barely a difference between domestic policy between the two American parties. One uses sweet nothing's to try assuage your fears and the other uses Force and strongman techniques.
Yeah the FDR Reformation came directly from FDR and we pushed through at his behest. According to my understanding of these politics at a time if The president hadn't been FDR we would not have gotten those Reformations. Besides they hardly matter nowadays when they're practically entirely Stripped Away. The last surviving one is social security and they're pretty gung-ho about getting rid of that too.
- Both sides
  Instant downvote. Lazy trash.

somebody said it nicely yesterday in a lemmy comment:

we need to capture the dems and turn them into a socialist party,
just like the fascists captured the reps and turned them into a nazi party

Dems will become the second nazi party before it becomes a socialist party. You saw the lip service to Bush.
Bingo.

Better not try then....

The only way the Democratic Party will return to the left is if they start losing votes to the left.
Their only guiding principle is winning elections, and to win elections they chase undecided centrist voters, and to chase the undecided centrist voters they lurch to the right whilst assuming that leftists just owe them their vote.
- Lol, if their guiding principles are winning elections they are failures. In my lifetime they've handed power over to the most idiotic unhinged people I've fortunately have never had to be around, and Ive been around very stupid people.
  Either way you are deflecting.
  Im just tired of people who the only thing they are good at is giving up constantly feel the psychopathic need to come at me with their bullshit.

Great way to logic. Let me try...

You cannot reform the United States of America because at it's core it is a capitalist and imperialist country that will always put corporate interests over human interests.

Oh shit, now the whole project is hopeless. Let me try again.

You cannot reform humanity because at it's core it is selfish and self-serving.

I guess we are all fucked. Or maybe we grow the fuck up and deal with the reality of what's in front of us and the work involved in making things better. If we can't reform the Democrats, then we have no chance in hell of shepherding a new party from nothing to national powerhouse without losing it to the same corrupting forces that hold the Democrats. Never-mind the realities of what it would take to take over the country with a third party in a first past the post system.

Let me borrow a quote (paraphrase) from Rumsfeld: You build a society with the people you have, not the people you wish you had or may have at some future time
(Feel free to credit that directly to Rumsfeld. It'd piss him off.)
All nations are peopled with selfish and self-serving apes. We've always depended on sociological tricks to get them to function within the social contract, but it does mean those with more power tend to try to hoard it, and the mechanisms we used to curb that were all captured and broken.
We can build a better society, but it will mean either violently seizing the property of those in power, or threatening them with an even greater violence that could ruin all they value. General strikes have been effective sometimes in Europe, but it's think-outside-the-box time.
Since we don't have a salted hydrogen bomb, I got nothing personally, but I haven't stopped thinking about it.
You cannot reform the United States of America because at it’s core it is a capitalist and imperialist country that will always put corporate interests over human interests.
I mean, did you ever reform the USA to be anything but that?
Yes, the USA is a capitalist and imperialist country at its core. Half the planet wants it dead, the other half look at it with disdain. Nothing short of going back to the drawing board will save a country built on genocide, land theft and staging coups and waging wars worldwide
- Be a lot easier to overthrow the USA if they're run by the meek and useless Democrats than the guy who turned ICE into the biggest law enforcement agency

Okay, one still should vote for a Democrat president. Because why would you vote for a more hostile government? Unless of course you want everything go-to shit but you should lead with your intention.

You claim to be a socialist in your other posts but you sure sound like a DNC centrist all the time.
- I see you're the one that responded with a page of why Dems suck when I said the Dems wield power differently but not against Capitalism. Maybe you live in a part of the world where there is no material difference between the two parties but that is not the lived reality for myself or my neighbors. This is not a centrist saying "well actually the Dems don't suck as much as you say", it is a Marxist saying you cannot build a coalition while ignoring the material conditions people are experiencing.
Okay, one still should vote for a Democrat president.
LOL, the last Democratic nominee saw tens of millions of voters saying 'hey, we'd like to be able to afford food and rent', and their response was 'just be joyful about how poor you are'.
If Dems want votes, they need to do more than make promises.
- She campaigned on fairly substantial changes, such as $25k downpayment assistance, $10k tax credit to first-time home buyers, and a lot of other housing reforms and subsidies. Not that I particularly liked her, but she did campaign on that kind of stuff (which people/media mostly ignored, IIRC).
- Dems don't want votes though, they are a fundraising organization.

What the fuck are you talking about I've heard it a million fucking times already. Its all anti-Harris lefties talk about.

Having fun with the fascism we've got instead? Thanks for that BTW. Real good. Really makes me motivated to fight for my rights when my follow lefties keep empowering fascists through inaction in the most simplistic and basic fucking democratic function of going to a polling place and voting once every 4 years for the lib that'll beat the fascist.

I really wanna go fight ICE in hand to hand combat and get shot in the fucking face knowing this probably could have been prevented.

Also if you are going to complain that I'm not bagging on the centrist/liberal dems for losing because they refused to budge left: I fucking hate them too, you can both suck shit directly out of my asshole.

Yeah, there are a lot of stupid fucking idiots out there, including on Lemmy, that are going to do the same stupid fucking thing they did last time and either not vote or vote for a 3rd party candidate that cannot, under any circumstance, win. And we'll descend even further into fascism.
Lot of stupids. But as I scroll down these comments, the majority are calling this meme out for the stupid fucking bullshit that it is. So I still have a little hope. I'm sure that'll get destroyed in the near future.
Progressives do vote for centrists. Centrists do not return the favor and vote for progressives. Harris didn't lose because the left staying home; the left held their nose and voted for her, even though that loyalty is a one-way street. She lost because she was such a dog shit candidate that she couldn't drive enough people who aren't highly politically engaged to the polls. The only reason she lost the election was because of her own poor decisions. Stop blaming the left for the failures of centrist democrats.
- This is the same frustrating conversation we had to have when people blamed Clinton’s loss on Bernie bros staying home.
  Even when we had concrete data that showed that a higher percentage of bernie voters voted for Clinton in 2016 than Clinton voters voted for Obama when he won the primaries.
  The data tells us over and over that progressive and demsoc voters show up in higher numbers for candidates they prefer less than centrists will when presented with someone ideologically further left.
  Are there people that wouldn’t vote for the centrist candidate, sure. But Mamdani is currently seeing how many centrists are happy to say “fuck strategy, I’m supporting cuomo!”
  I get why those that still have faith in the Democratic Party are upset about the defeat. But I also understand why leftists are tired of being told “vote for this compromise candidate” in every election and even when we do turn out getting scape goated for them running garbage candidates that fail to capture the further left elements AND tons of non-left voters who sat at home and didn’t bother to vote.
- Any American that isn't braindead stupid knew what was on the line this election.
  And any American that knew what was on the line voted for Harris.
  You can blame Democrats all day, and they do shoulder some blame, but the majority of the blame falls on stupid fucking Americans that couldn't rub some brain cells together, not a party that isn't great at messaging.
- She lost because Dems stayed home, low turnout in key Democratic areas. No matter how bad you think she was as a candidate you're not going to convince me that she was worse than the dog shit candidate that won, and that's on the people that stayed home.
- I'm blaming anyone who choose not to vote for her who were center or left of center. Anyone. As stated: if you are to my right or to my left and you explicitly choose not to vote for Harris and could have, you can suck shit.
  If you discouraged people from voting for her: you can suck shit. If you constantly criticized her and barely talked about how fucking dangerous Trump is in general political discourse: you can suck shit.
What the fuck are you talking about I’ve heard it a million fucking times already. Its all anti-Harris lefties talk about.
Uh, no. This anti-Harris lefty, like the vast majority of anti-Harris lefties, knows an outside strategy is insane and mostly right wing propaganda.
Having fun with the fascism we’ve got instead?
Maybe if there had been more anti-Harris lefties in the party, we would have had a viable candidate. The hardline centrists did this.
makes me motivated to fight for my rights when my follow lefties keep empowering fascists through inaction
Nope. The following is from a Pew Research study.
The typology groups at either end of the political spectrum, Faith and Flag Conservatives and Progressive Left, are also the most politically engaged – that is, they voted at the highest rates in the 2020 presidential election, and they are most likely to say they post about politics on social media and that they donated to campaigns. The groups in the middle of the ideological spectrum have much lower levels of political engagement.
So quit uncritically accepting the mainstream establishment excuses. Harris lost because she was a shitty candidate, not because the left doesn't vote.
you can both suck shit directly out of my asshole.
Gosh, were you out campaigning for Harris? I just can't understand how she didn't attract more voters. Scolding voters seems like such a solid strategy. /s
- Uh, no. This anti-Harris lefty, like the vast majority of anti-Harris lefties, knows an outside strategy is insane and mostly right wing propaganda.
  I meant anti-Harris lefties who actively wanted her to lose to Trump. (Which TBH, if they were vocally anti-Harris when it was clear it was her or Trump, they did)
  Maybe if there had been more anti-Harris lefties in the party, we would have had a viable candidate.
  How? How would you propose that could have realistically happened?
  Nope. The following is from a Pew Research study.
  So quit uncritically accepting the mainstream establishment excuses. Harris lost because she was a shitty candidate, not because the left doesn’t vote.
  Did I say it was specifically because "the left doesn't vote"? No.
  Its partially because more of them don't vote compared to the last election.
  https://www.commondreams.org/news/harris-gaza
  https://www.teenvogue.com/story/kamala-harris-moved-right-did-it-cost-her-the-election
  https://www.newsweek.com/kamala-harris-underperformed-three-demographics-1981222
  The ratios of progressives vs centrists who normally vote anyway is irrelevant. What is crucial is the percentage shift in voting behavior within groups election to election. Clearly this election centrist Democrats, Progressive Democrats, and left leaning indies failed to get out and vote compared to previous elections.
  Its not hard to figure out why but its not a singular reason.
  Now does some of the blame go to the Democratic establishment? ABSO-FUCKING-LUTELY. But not all of it.
  Fuck everyone even remotely responsible. Just fuck them. I legitimately hate them. (Including Harris and Biden themselves)
  Gosh, were you out campaigning for Harris? I just can’t understand how she didn’t attract more voters. Scolding voters seems like such a solid strategy. /s
  I did actually, I traveled 5 hours out of state to canvass for her in a swing state. I was a different person then.
  I can tell you, I'm done now. Political action is dead for me. I don't want to swim up a fucking waterfall anymore. I'm done spending my own time and money on this shit. Not enough people give a flying fuck. If it takes things getting critically apocalyptic-level bad for average people to move their dumb-fuck-asses and be politically conscious about what is going to happen to them when fascists win I can't bring myself to care about them anymore.
  So you can go ahead and choose to not vote next election. I don't care enough to argue with you on that now. Because now it wont be arguments convincing people, it'll be catastrophic damage done to the country and their ability to put 2 and 2 together.
  The time of bickering for positive change is over. Now we get to see some mass death and material suffering. I already tried. I not putting more of myself in for a ride I very much did not sign up for and in fact tried very hard to avoid.
  At this point I'm just screaming into brick wall for a sliver of catharsis.

What is the point of this meme? I feel like the only thing this can produce is people to not try to reform and improve the democratic party and take it over (like the tea party took over the republicans). Kind of like these "give up climate change it can't be stopped" posts that just benefits the big fossil fuels companies

That's the point, I've noticed a lot of the loudest, most active posters on Lemmy ultimately want one thing, which is progressives not to vote. Weird how that's what the conservatives have relied on for every presidential victory they've achieved in the past half century or more.
- Votes are earned not freely given. Your vote is your voice. Definitely vote at the local and state levels where your voice can be the loudest.
What is the point of this meme?
These memes communicate to Democrats and their supporters that we're sick and tired of their mask-off conservative rule when they promise us the world and do nothing once elected. You want praise? You want votes? Then do something.
Since, you know, not voting for them apparently isn't enough to inspire meaningful change. Just once in my life I want to see Democrats fight harder for the working class and poor as they do against socialists and third parties.
- You want praise? You want votes? Then do something.
  Time for you to educate yourself. Look up Dem's economic stats compared to Republicans. Look up the Dem's voting history.
  They aren't doing EVERYTHING, but they do a lot more than the other viable option.
  If you want them to do more, then stop wasting your time doing what you're doing and start focusing on getting people to primary Dems who aren't doing what we want, because that's how you get Democrat party reform.
  This meme is utter trash and only serves to fracture liberals and prevent the reform I just described.
  Just once I want liberals to come together and primary bad Dems to send a message instead of fucking whining and not voting or voting 3rd party so fascists can take over.
That's exactly it. This is the meme and attitude of tankies that are chomping at the bit for violence and doing everything they can to help push the country to the Right. This is because of their faith-based belief that it will magically create class consciousness and a revolution to overthrow the global bourgeoisie. They don't give two shits about the LGBTQ+, POC, medically vulnerable, etc people that they have to sacrifice in the process.
You are correct. The OP has an agenda and that agenda is to fracture liberals.
The answer is not to give up. The answer is not to vote for a worthless 3rd party with zero chance of winning. The answer is to reform the Democrat party and history has shown us, repeatedly, that it is completely possible. And it literally just happened with the Republican party in the last 2 decades.
Tankies. Do not engage.
- Smart. Having one's echo chamber and worldview contested can be terribly inconvenient.
You should not attempt to reform something which is not reformable. Instead start something new.
In general, you should not reform. Revolution is the way forward.
- You should not attempt to reform something which is not reformable.
  Pick up a fucking history book.
  Political party reform is entirely possible and has happened repeatedly in American history. Conservative voters just did it to the Republican party.
  Scrapping an established party with national sway for a 3rd party with NO clout and NO representatives in the House or Senate is fucking stupid. Especially when we have a national party in power currently attempting to dismantle our federal government to replace with an authoritarian one.
  Revolution is the way forward.
  Then do it. Big talk on the internet. If you think modern Americans are going to start a revolution, think again.
- Easy to say from your parents basement.
- China produces ~65% of global smartphones. At worst US companies simply re-brand products from overseas OEMs, at best they're using Chinese produced semiconductors and components to create original products.
  The rest of the consumer electronics market is pretty similar. If you believe modern China is communist then they are "doom-scrolling on their communist-produced smartphones" through a communist produced network infrastructure which you are, most likely, reading through a communist-produced screen.
  I would argue however that modern China largely split the difference between the USSR, which you are McCarthy-ing about, and the modern Russian Federation, which explicitly reformed into a liberal democracy with a capitalist market economy.

So let me guess. The solution is to vote for a 3rd party that has absolutely no presence in our federal government at all, hoping that magically one of their reps can become president and save the country, despite having absolutely no support within the federal government, at all? And we'll just all agree to pretend like they won't become susceptible to corporate interests as well so they can actually accrue enough money to start winning elections.

Ok, so enough of that stupid bullshit. Let's hop on back to reality.

In reality, we have to vote Democrat for the time being because WE JUST FOUND OUT WHAT FUCKING HAPPENS IF WE DON'T. Meanwhile, we hope that a 3rd party can get off its fucking ass and start winning local/state elections so they can start getting MORE THAN ZERO representatives in the House and Senate, so that someday they can actually have a real shot at running a candidate for president.

This meme is grade school level dogshit. It only serves to split the vote more on 3rd party candidates that can't win and ensure Republican control of our government for even longer. We don't live in fantasy land. 3rd parties can't recite magical incantations and gain control of our federal government. There's a really fucking long process for a road to the presidency for a 3rd party, and in the meantime, we fucking vote Democrat because HAVE WE FUCKING LEARNED NOTHING?

No, at the moment, we have to vote defensively. But we had to vote defensively in 2000 and couldn't and it got us here.
And to be fair there's a trillion-dollar far-right propaganda machine that sucks up the majority of viewership. So yes, in fact, a lot of influence is assuring we've learned nothing and will continue to do so until our own necks are in the mire.
It may be too late now. But it may have been too late in 2016. It may have been too late in 2000.
Fascist autocratic dissolution of the society is not the only great filter we are facing. An overwhelming amount of work must me done to reverse the FUBAR, and the people are not yet ready for it. Nor are they ready for the horrors of war, famine and pestilence (transmissible diseases like measles), all whose hounds have vaulted their slips.
The crux of the issue is that we voted for Democrats "for the time being" multiple times over the past 50 years, and this is still what fucking happened. But, ignoring that, the big idea here to save our hides is that a Democrat has to win every single election from now until the sun goes super-nova? That seems more than a little unrealistic.
- I voted for Kamala Harris in 2024 and now we have concentration camps! I'm not making that mistake again, I'll vote for Trump next time /s
WE JUST FOUND OUT WHAT FUCKING HAPPENS IF WE DON’T.
No, you just found out what happens when your only choices are either nazis or capitalistic corrupt "let's debate nazis" centrists
- And what's your plan to make it so those aren't our only options? Split the vote on a third party? Give up? Hope we can build a revolution while ICE are disappearing us? Your solutions suck.

Not saying capitalism is the best form, but which economic form is better given human greed and tendency for corruption?

The fact people are greedy is not the reason pure socialism/communism fails, there's a multitude of reasons it simply doesn't work well: a lack of market forces upending resource allocation, incentive problems, lack of consumer sovereignty, reduced innovation++
Best system IMO is a fusion model, publically owned industries where it matters (health, education, PT), and private where it doesn't (goods, foods etc).
We're not doing capitalism in the US anyway. You can argue it's state capitalism, but personally I don't see it. I'd say we're deep into full on monopolies and oligarchy. If you have enough money and you buy out it otherwise lock out competing business and create vertical integration, the government will subsidize your business, especially your payroll, and if you go bankrupt they will reward you with no taxes for life, or bail out money that you can 90% give yourself personally as a yearly bonus. None of that is capitalism, it doesn't fit that model. We're also letting corporations call themselves individuals with rights, which is absurd, and it's the argument for letting business openly bribe and sponsor politicians, on top of making it also legal to directly pay politicians to vote specific ways, as long as you pay them after the vote happens and not before. None of this fits the capitalist model. Monopolies are supposed to be illegal in capitalist models because it's known to break the model. Regulations are supposed to stop individual businesses from owning their own supply chain, distribution system, raw materials, manufacturing, all in one company. Because, again, it was always known this would break the model. We aren't capitalist. We're in an oligarchy. Might make rights, money is in charge, and there are only rules for the not owner class.

I think it can be ship of theseus'd, just replace all the key people in the party and keep the name.

FDR was a democrat, if it could go from that to what it is now, it can be turned back into a socialist party.

Parties can absolutely change with enough pressure.
I've been alive long enough to watch the Republican party almost completely change. Yeah, they were always stupid assholes. But they were not even close to THIS crazy and traitorous. Their base changed them. The liberal base can change the Democrat party.
The Democrat party is ESTABLISHED. No 3rd party is even remotely close to being established. It is not the time yet to vote for a 3rd party and won't be until a 3rd party actually gets serious and starts winning smaller elections.
This exactly. It's nonsense to say that the party can't change because it has changed.
I think it can be ship of theseus’d, just replace all the key people in the party and keep the name.
At this point it's easier to just nuke it
- What does that look like in practice, and what BS are you going to make up to differentiate it from giving up?

We just witnessed an internal party takeover in the Republican party. What dumbass thinks the same couldn't possibly happen in the Democratic party?

David Hogg won a legitimate party election to become vice chair because he was popular and then was removed by tje DNC for having the wrong ideology.
They have shown us many times they will not allow themselves to change
- If people start voting in primaries that can change.
  Am I optimistic that it will? No. But the problem is that people who want to see change aren't voting in primaries and then they complain that their choices suck.
- Because we haven't put enough pressure on them yet.
  Did you think this would end with David Hogg winning a vice chair position?
  Gonna take more than that to change a party. But it's better than everyone splitting the vote for various 3rd parties that have absolutely no presence at all, whatsoever.
  Let's see what happens with this NYC election. That's a bigger deal than David Hogg.
- Right. And trump didn't take over the rnc in one go. It takes constant pressure. Keep fighting.
Exactly. We need to fix the entrenchment, and we can fix this stupid two party system.

also like to point out that many of them are DINOs, and are republicans that wouldnt be electable otherwise in a GOP primary, so they have to put a democratic facade to just get elected.

you have no choice except this or violent revolt because your election system is garbage.

Have you paid attention to how european countries with various election systems (some non-garbage) are voting?
- yes. the numbers are roughly the same, in the 20-35% range of the population.
  but because our systems are generally more robust, it's easier to fight back, while the US has become completely captured because their system is antiquated and easily gamed.
don’t threaten me with a good time. (fully aware that a revolt is not a good time)
- haha yeah, i mean, whatever ppl want, i just want them to be realistic about this, rather than pretending suddenly a plurality of the American voting populace in enough states are going to start voting DSA. XD
Lol.
Americans are too pussy to violently revolt. If it was going to happen it would have already happened.
So the next, actually realistic option, is to change the Democrat party by primarying the shit out of the reps that won't get onboard with what liberals want.
How do I know this is possible? Because conservative voters just did it to the Republican party over the last decade or two.
- i agree that i don't think Americans have what it takes for an actual revolt.
  i also agree that the actual Left should stop clutching their pearls and take over the Democratic party.

While I mostly agree with this, I have one significant hurdle I am unable to overcome. What other choice do I have?

I can't stand most Democrats. They suck! But they are a far cry better than voting Republican. And voting for a third party feels like wasting my vote.

If there was a third party candidate that focused on climate change and social issues and had even the slightest chance of winning, I would vote for them in a second. Until then, I am stuck voting for the lesser of two evils.

But they are a far cry better than voting Republican. And voting for a third party feels like wasting my vote.
You just answered your own question.
Democrats are FAR, FAR, FAR better than Republicans. We know this because the data shows they are better for our economy. We know this because their voting record shows that they regularly vote in favor of the middle and lower classes. We know this because they never attempted to violently overturn an election or send masked squads into our towns to abduct people off the street.
No 3rd party is viable or will be viable anytime in the near future. It will take YEARS and YEARS for a 3rd party to start winning local/state elections and getting reps in the House and Senate. And that's IF a 3rd party actually starts putting in the work, which none are doing.
So if you want to be smart, and actually help protect our democracy, then you should vote Democrat in national elections and maybe vote 3rd party in local elections to help them gain some traction and see if they can do anything with it.
- We know this because the data shows they are better for our economy
  We know this because the data shows they are ~~better for our economy~~ rich people's money.
  FTFY.
  They're definitely not good for "our" money, meaning the 99% that works for a living, unless you're of the opinion that outright ignoring food and rent becoming cost-prohibitive is somehow good for "our" money.
You are giving consent when you vote. You are saying this choice is fine.
Maybe America is at a point where voting is not the solution. How are things now compared to when the American revolution happened?
Edit - people downvote this but 'voting for the lesser of two evils' is. What. Has. Got. You. Here.
- You are giving consent when you vote. You are saying this choice is fine.
  Actually, when you vote, you just vote.
  That's it. It's not a magic ritual, you don't telepathically send your message to the Holy Ghost of Democracy when you vote, Anubis isn't going to weigh your ballot against a feather before deciding on the fate of your soul.
  You circle something or you don't and then you deal with whatever happens however you want.
- They're all happy to gaslight themselves into thinking that they're the virtuous side, just like MAGA.
  Meanwhile tens of millions of Americans are working three jobs at 100 hours a week just to be able to rent a roach-infested studio, which in the minds of Democrats, is apparently a-okay because they did nothing meaningful about it.
  Also, everything you're seeing now, from normalized police brutality, to ICE raids, to black torture sites, to government-sponsored abductions ("extraordinary renditions"), to unilateral presidential warmaking... was all also done and supported by Democrats. Obama even killed an American with a drone strike. And, for more fun, go look up which president it was that appointed Tom Homan.
  The only difference is one side gives nicer speeches.
- How are things now compared to when the American revolution happened?
  hahahahaha!!!1!
  Yes, that's totally a meaningful comparison. Like, let me put on my trilby*, check on my slaves while I ride a horse to town, and discuss the broadsheet nailed to the side of the tavern with the other white land-owning men.
  *tricorn
- You are giving consent when you vote. You are saying this choice is fine.
  No, you are saying "Of the realistic choices I have I'm choosing what is BEST".
  Maybe America is at a point where voting is not the solution.
  Then do something about it. Talking about it on the internet is easy. You think modern Americans are going to revolt? Lol. Have fun with that.
  people downvote this but ‘voting for the lesser of two evils’ is. What. Has. Got. You. Here.
  No, what got us where we are right now is people crying about not wanting to vote for the lesser of two evils and allowing the real evil to waltz the fuck into power.

They had their chance in 2016 to include Bernie Sanders, Democrats blew their chance by ditching Bernie.

Bernie is too liberal for all those big donors who pump up the Democrats via Super PACs. He might get in the way of them profiting off the American people. Bernie would have been the best choice for this country at beating back the MAGA movement before it became what we have now.
- "Too liberal" for all the people who didn't vote for him. Because he's not as popular in real life as he is on the internet.
Bernie Sanders lost the primaries. This bullshit has to stop.
Imagine being so immature that you throw a decade-long temper tantrum allowing a FELON PEDOPHILE to be president because you didn't get your way once.
- The DNC are the ones who lost to the felon pedophile. Don't let them blame the left in order to avoid taking accountability.
- This isn't what happened. Centrists blame the left for all their failures, but the left keep showing up.
- No, Bernie was cheated out of winning the primaries by collusion between Hillary and Debbie Wasserman-Schultz.
  Never underestimate the ability of Democrats to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. They will find a way.
- Welcome to America. There are A LOT of those immature fools throwing decade-long temper tantrums.
  These same fools simply don't grasp that the guy lost primaries, both times, because not enough people were voting for him.
  Children.

Can there be another Whigs party

Whatever we call it, the only way a 3rd party will stand a chance is if everyone on the left picks a single 3rd party and supports it. The Progressives, the Socialists, the Democratic Socialists, the Communists, Anarchists*, Green Party people, everyone who want's to escape the two party system. If we ever manage to force through election reform, then we can split back up into individual parties. Otherwise it simply will not work.
I know it seems odd to expect Anarchists to participate in Elections, but we have to live with the consequence of elections just like everyone else. If I can reduce harm while waiting on people to get hip to Anarchism, I will happily do so.
- Anarchist checking in: I vote. I don't live in a communist utopia without money or borders or hierarchy, I live in THIS fucked up world, so yeah, voting is necessary.

If Zohran Mamdani gets elected and actually follows through with his campaign promises, this is factually incorrect. I am holding on to that last glimmer of hope.

actually follows through with his campaign promises
Don't count on it. Not for any bad reason, just that things are harder to implement than campaign promises, whether it's city council in the way or just practicality.
I'm just saying he can be a success without implementing all of his campaign ideas.
- If he legitimately tries, that is enough for me.
  I can almost guarantee you that both corporations and the right wing will try to stop or reverse anything he does. If he shows that the Republicans oppose these extremely popular initiatives, it might cause a massive swing of voters, who believed trump's campaign promises, to shift over to the left.
  https://gothamist.com/news/how-voters-in-trump-districts-helped-mamdani-win-the-democratic-primary
And you expect the party to simply follow suit and embrace his policies?
- This post is talking about co-opting the D party. Which is exactly what Mamdani would be doing if he follows through.
- No, I expect liberal voters to get off their asses and keep primarying establishment Dems that aren't serving their constituents so we can reform the Democrat party.
I wish I could.
I'm expecting Hope and Change 2.0. Mamdani is almost certainly going to quickly be informed of how wealthy he and his kids can be and turn his back on New Yorkers if he gets elected, just like Obama.

They've drifted so far right that I call them Republicrats, and y'all should too.

I mean the Republicans have been dragging the Overton window right for decades. They just happily went along with them.
- Yes because they want that money.
If no one from the far left votes, parties that want to win, will go where the voters are. The parties aren't Republicans, the voters are.
- No party cares about people that don't vote. Genuinely, they don't care at all. They're not going to find out what you wanted, because you didn't go against them. A non vote says "Yeah, whatever".
  If you want to look at an example of how to break into a two party system, you need to look at UKIP in the UK.
  The idea being not that you get enough votes to win (because that wouldn't happen), but attract enough votes to make the other parties steal your policies, so your voters go to them instead.
  So if you want actual socialist policies, you all need to bury your leftist differences (hard I know, some of them don't even use Linux), set up a party that represents more or less what you want, and vote for it. Maybe that party is the Green party. Maybe it's something else.

It may not be worth the effort to reform it, but claiming that it "can't" be reformed is asinine. A political party is not some higher order being, timeless and unchanging, nor even one with a fundamental permanent set of core tenants that all else springs from. It's a group of people with a bit of bureaucracy that influence and decide somewhat collectively on their shared goals. Of course that can change fundamentally.

In fact it has changed fundamentally in the not too distant past. Look at the Democratic party (and the Republican party) of the Jim Crow era compared to today. They essentially flipped to the other side of the political spectrum. It's absolutely not easy to change a party fundamentally and not quick to do so, either. Old minds are not easily swayed with the times. The primary way to change party ideals is through new minds and perspectives joining the party and the old ones leaving it. Generational change is slow AF but it does definitely happen. Concerted effort for young people with new ideals to join the party is the best way to induce this change. Again though, that is a lot of effort and takes times. The bigger he ship, the harder to steer. There are alternatives, all of which also take a ton of effort, probably a lot more effort really, but might be faster if it works out.

I don't know why we keep having to have this talk about why reformism doesn't work. Rosa Luxembourg addressed this pretty well.
We aren't likely to get Reformations, the problems with the Democratic party are baked directly in to the institution.
Anything offered as Reformation is a token to ensure that the masses don't revolt at least until the Reformation can be clawrd back by the powers that be.
- Want to watch the Democrat party change?
  Start primarying left and right.
  It'll change.
  We've watched conservative voters change the Republican party to the traitor party they are today in less than 2 decades. It's completely possible.
- We aren’t likely to get Reformations, the problems with the Democratic party are baked directly in to the institution.
  What's the difference between the Democratic party and the United States of America in this regard? If the Democrats can't be reformed, why can the USA be reformed? If the USA can't be reformed, then what's the point of this discussion?
Most people use "can't" for things that are impractical, not just strictly impossible. But yes, let's argue about phrasing rather than the issue. That ought to fix everything.
Yup.
There are so many Americans that don't grasp that this change can happen. Or understand the concept but outright refuse to have patience. And like you said, it's A LOT less effort, a LOT less time, and WAY more possible to primary and change the Democrat party than to cross our fingers for a random 3rd party to start actually doing something and winning some elections and getting reps in the House and Senate.
I've been alive for a while. I watched conservative voters change the Republican party to the fascist traitor party it is today. You can absolutely change political parties.
Problem is this - Dems are not a political party, they’re a fundraising organization.
- I know you're just being reductive, but that's a silly statement. They are objectively a political party. They also fundraise. They're not mutually exclusive.

"We'd rather have a convicted felon pedophile be president because the Democrats don't want to dismantle capitalism entirely and replace with... well we don't know what with".

Absolute fucking dumbasses.

Strawman? Like 3 separate strawman arguments?
- Strawgang.
Yeah, people generally want their politicians to help them.
And wealth inequality is the single biggest issue in human society.
We are at a point where if we want to help regular people, we need that to come at the expense of the rich.
- That’s literally the definition of taxes.
Why the new account? Did your last one get banned for this same bullshit trolling?
You're arguing against your own masturbatory fantasy.
The left came out and voted for Harris. They held their nose and voted for the shit pile centrist, as they always do. We've seen with Mamdani that this loyalty is a one way street. Progressives hold their nose and vote for centrists, but centrists do not return the favor.
Harris lost because she couldn't drive enough politically unaligned, low-engagement voters to the polls. The average person who isn't that involved in politics simply didn't think it was credible that Harris would improve their lives in any way.
Aside from a few performative tankies, the message I kept reading on lemmy was "I'm going to vote for Harris, but her dog shit policies are going to cost her the election." And those progressive voices were ignored. Their desperate warnings were drowned out by people like yourself, sticking their fingers in their ears and going, "BLAH BLAH BLAH CAN'T HEAR YOU, VOTE BLUE NO MATTER WHO! IT'S YOUR FAULT IF THE FASCISTS WIN, I HOLD NO RESPONSIBILITY HERE!"
- Harris lost because she couldn’t drive enough politically unaligned, low-engagement voters to the polls.
  If those low engagement voters couldn't make it to the polls to protect our democracy and prevent a felon rapist traitor from becoming President, then the problem lies primarily with those fucking fools, not Kamala Harris.
If Bernie Sanders doesn't want to dismantle the current Democrats then it's entirely Bernie's fault. He's to blame for capitalism.
- Bernie created capitalism, he can destroy it. He chooses not to!

You can do what the tea party did: capture a small enough portion of your voting base that covers the margin of victory (aka: the short hairs) and demand the party do your bidding.

If they cared about victory, you'd be right. But it's becoming pretty clear they care far more about money. If they're paid to lose anyway, this tactic is utterly useless.
That'd require progressives to have something resembling spine. Good fucking luck.
- Dumb doomer attitudes like this and the rest constantly plastered all over Lemmy (always by the same handful of users I've noticed) certainly isn't helping. "American" Lemmy is a small community, it's a lot smaller when you take out the bad faith "memelords" incessantly both-sides-ing and advocating for non-participation.
- That’d require progressives to have something resembling spine
  It would require progressives to actually vote in the primaries, which 90% of people on here discourage at every opportunity.

You also cannot replace it with a third party. So I guess we’re just fucked?

It's almost like the original assertion is bullshit!
- If you think that’s a large enough group that it had any impact whatsoever on the election, then you are insane.
  Or it's almost like the original assertion would push you to think that playing a game that was rigged from the start isn't the smartest choice and that you shouldn't stop at "voting for the less evil billionaire" as your only political option

Well the other option is reforming the Republican Party. That seems harder.

I think progressives could easily run in Republican primaries and just start harping on labor and unions since no one else in that party does and tons of Union members vote Republican. What the worst that could happen? Collusion of the national party against the most popular left leaning or presidential candidate in the US, oh wait, the DNC already did that.

Corporate interests are human interests. They are the interests of the few. Its class. The class of the wealthy - the class of the few. Its always class we need to break down. Nothing maters more.

While the new progressive "MAGA" forms, we have to get MAGA/GOP out. Look to the good Dem primaries and pick the more progressive Bernie Sanders types.

MAGA needs to go though, if most of the country turns on the GOP, could probably have enough seats to impeach and remove Trump. Then do the same to Vance, then a dem speaker of the house could take over.

I'll go further: It wouldn't be enough to simply reform one political party, anyway. The U.S. Constitution is a dead document, and its system of government is obsolete. The black hats have discovered the exploits, and everybody now knows how to game the system. We can't repair the system from inside the system, since it at the bottom line it runs on trust, and that trust in the system is gone. Just like in any relationship, it takes some material change to get people to trust again.

I can’t stand this faux leftist bullshit. There’s a reason why I call this right wing nonsense: it impedes the improvement of people’s material lives. We don’t have to like the Democrats in order to reject this absolute nonsense.

And your attitude in turn is why there’s no party who represents the views of most people. You’ve already decided it’s impossible without trying, even though the majority of democracies in the developed world today are not trapped in two-party systems.
- That’s the literal opposite of what I believe.
- Most modern democracies don't enforce First Past the Post by law, and don't have a winner-takes-all system. A better strategy is to primary democratic representatives as much as possible, and take over down-ballot positions as soon as possible. That way we can make steps towards dismatling Citizen's United, repealing all the laws that prevent moving away from FPTP, and implement RCV.
  I am more than willing to try, if not for the fact that splitting the left would cede electoral victories to the right for several cycles while people figure out what "the new left" is. If we do this in our current era, Republicans will actually kill us while we sit on our ass and convince ourselves to split our vote (as has been shown with the most recent administration)...
  This has been shown in history-- every time a third party tries to get made, the opposition party wins for several cycles. The most notable of which is (imo) Theodore Roosevelt's Progressive party in 1912. It got 27% of the vote (2nd in terms of popular vote and won several downstream races). But, the left vote was split by 27%, so the right won by a very large majority. They decided to ultimately dissolve and infiltrate the left wing party.
- Maybe we want a 3rd party to start actually doing something and winning local/state elections instead of randomly showing up every 4 years to try to win a national election.
  The smart move, which we just got a hard lesson on, is to vote Democrat until a 3rd party becomes viable, because the other option is Republican fascism, which is what we got.
- There are two paths, an inside and an outside strategy. The inside strategy is far simpler, has far greater potential for success, and will harm the least people along the way. Acknowledging that isn't "giving up", it's picking strategy like a grown-up, not some kid afraid to turn down a dare.
  without trying
  This is the most idiotic thing about third party advocates. There have been third parties running consistently for decades, and we are somehow supposed to pretend that that lengthy record of dismal failure doesn't exist. Meanwhile, inside strategists haven't won everything yet, so we are supposed to switch to a strategy with a far worse track record.

The Tea Party fundamentally and radically transformed the GOP. It can be done.

Unfortunately, the Democratic constituency is too impatient and too distractable and stupid to do it. The GOP has been playing the long game since Reagan, and they are good at messaging and good at being happy with incremental wins. Dem constituent groups are great at swinging for the fences every 4 years and failing, and great at circular firing squads of blame and purity testing. They suck at having allies that agree with them on 95% of the issues. They suck at getting on the bus come election time. They have been trained to be this way by the GOP.

Time was, unions were the counterweight to the capitalist forces, and were the effective counterweight. Everyone let GOP/Libertarian philosophy and talking points get a foothold, and that union power has disintegrated. Reagan made union-busting his first priority, and the air traffic controllers were the object lesson; now people think unions can't do shit. Now Dem blame the unions for shit, when really, they should be built back by anyone with a shred of liberal leaning, because that's where liberal power comes from. Liberals pout when their most favored candidate doesn't survive the primaries, and they complain about how The Man is keeping them down.

Naw, dawg. You're just easily played.

Reagan stared the dissolution of union power by firing all the air traffic controllers, an event from which we still haven't recovered from in 2025 since ATCs take a lot of training, so all the ones we have currently are overworked and pulling a lot of overtime along with their short pay, scant benefits and 1980s era equipment.
Actually, Reagan was the salted bomb that spelled the end of the United States, and it's just been dying of radiation poisoning since. Reagan was a product of television evangelists like Jerry Falwell organizing churches into a Republican voting bloc (with abortion access obstruction being their unifying issue). Why? Because they didn't like nonwhites in their religious academies.
...And before that, industrialists who were really sore about FDRs New Deal. (And to make the implication explicit, said industrialists were totally happy with Americans living in shantytowns, Hoovervilles and eating flour paste to survive while dying of malnutrition. This is the great that MAGAs want the US to return to.
So really, America and the rise of the fascist autocratic MAGA movement is a whole bunch of greed and bigotry all the way down, and if I were reading it in a fiction story, the society deserves to fall. But I'm in the middle of it and it sucks to be the little people while the high lords play their games of thrones.

The real battle is in the primaries.

Oh, I can't wait until you all find out what the OG Democratic party liked. IMO there's a reason Bernie doesn't put a (D) after his name

Because then he'd be Bernie Sanded?
- berniesandersd is a daemon process that runs in the background

this instigates infighting

Yes. It is a stupid meme that currently has 527 upvotes. We're fucked.

Samo for all political parties

Oh bullshit. Every bit of the Democratic Party is open to elections, including the DNC. Every one of those odious officials can be replaced. Reforming it won't happen because progressives are lazy and feckless and don't get involved in their local and state parties or vote in primaries and local elections.

Hey the DNC is a private org and the courts have affirned their right to run and rig their internal elections(which include primaries) anynway they want, including simpy ignoring the outcome. Idk why you think their self run elections are fair or free but thats a massive huff of copium.
I have zero idea how you can look at the democratic party's behavior, leadership and priorities over the past 20 years and believe this in good faith.
- The Democratic party is composed of people. If you replace all the people, it will be a new institution. It does not matter what it was previously.
Somebody doesn't know what a super delegate is. Or how the DNC is actually run. 🙄
- Then please enlighten me. How do you think the DNC is run? What do you think the DNC actually does? (hint: it's a lot less than the conspiracy theorists think)
- What about it? Even if every single "irregularity" had been a vote for Bernie (they weren't), he still would have lost. And if we had held some of those lower level positions, it wouldn't have been able to happen.

More people should re-watch house of cards

Only when they AI Spacey's performance into SpongeBob, someone's been working on that right?
- Spacey's performance was pretty great. He makes an excellent creep.
- That would be funny, still I'm talking about Republicans being just as utilitary as their oposite party

What would an anarchist party be named, that would not scare people who think "anarchy" is synonymous with "total chaos?"

Mutual aid party
Cooperation party
...

I gladly note, that maker of this propaganda meme is fuckin stupid xD

At this point we need to create a mechanism that allows public pressure on a party.

Switching from FPTP voting (one-person, one vote) to something else will allow for other parties to have a chance but that will take time to brew.

We're not ready for sortition (selection of officials by lottery) but that would end the career of politicians. And having barbers and coal miners govern is better than what we got now, even if they'll need a lot of handholding, and an institution to swat away lobbyist pests.

The voters really did a number breaking open Pandora's jar in November. It's a fine mess they've brought upon us, and one we may not survive to clean up.

Forward party checking in.

ITT: A Lemmy Classic. Where we all agree with each other very angrily based on which part of the stuff we agree on comes first and then declare these similarities irreconcilable.

I just want to point out that they are, including and especially the current pos, I mean Pota, business people, and businesses are, with one exception, authoritarian in nature. The exception? A co-op.

Orders are barked from the top, and that shit rolls down hill until it lands on someone with the skills necessary to execute on those orders.

Now take that, and build an entire political party on it, and for the likes and subscribes, throw in a religious element because the religious books can be "interpreted" whatever way we want to justify whatever we want to do, and that will garner some extra votes.

Yay!

Lemmy gearing up to sit out another election and then bitch about who gets elected while taking no accountability? Na.

No. You see, the Democratic Party was holding them at gun point to ensure that they didn't oppose fascism. /S

Gosh Lemmy is so refreshing after my Reddit marathon yesterday

The Republicans move politics to the right by passing bills, and the Democrats block movement to the left by losing on purpose.

Liberals are so fiesty these days. Like a crab in steam.

Ship's sailed. Dems are done. Good riddance.

Fascism fuck ya!
I wonder if the person celebrating the one party fascist regime is a leftist or a fascist

Same coin different sides, the policy is the same, dems have a bit more style and subtlety though, a bit more Thomas Shelby than Jesse James

But lesser evil!!!!

Evil is still evil.

Yawn.
Welcome to reality, where adults pick the BEST available option instead of crying about morality while they allow the least moral future to take place.

For the meme, in that scene he lies to her. That said, this community is ready for that message.

i see mostly pushback actually, but hey i am still scrolling

this is like going to a peaceful protest and there's a convenient pile of bricks lying around for no discernable reason

If all Democrats were members of the Democrats (party), then you could just have real elections inside the party. Then when the Democratic party wins against the fascist party, it could be democratic policy to make your country democratic.