I still can’t get over how they were essentially presented with a simplified version of the trolley problem and chose to not pull the lever.
By their own narrative that “the democrats are complicit in a genocide in Gaza”, they were aware that Palestinians were metaphorically tied to both tracks, yet decided to not pull the lever when America itself and every marginalized person living within was also on the track the trolley barreled towards.
Calling it simplified does a disservice of the real world impacts of the “trolley” - especially since unlike a thought experiment - this trolley problem is physically constructed by people to achieve imperialistic goals - so expending energy blaming random lemmings for this - instead of figuring out who built, maintains and presents the trolley as the only option and how to dismantle it seems useless.
I believe we should avoid infighting and actually organize to do something so we don’t have to choose if we pull the lever or not every 4 years (if there even is another election…)
Why the fuck did the democrats leave Palestinians to their tracks?
This didn’t have to be a difficult problem where we’re forced to vote for genocide. The only people at fault for the democrats doing something as wildly unpopular as genocide, silencing anyone who said “You need to stop this if you want to win”, and reaping the effects of that policy being unpopular are the democrats.
Not having a choice and being fine with with the choice you have are drastically different situations, and it’s concerning how many people are incapable of unwilling to tell the difference between the two.
I would argue the entire problem is the self-defeating mentality that the D vs R choice is the only choice. It’s in fact the population believing that - in itself - that results in the poor election outcomes for third parties. Something which was not true as recently as 30 years ago.
The population, in fact, has the option to vote for any candidate on the ballot, or even write in candidates. The so-called “viability” of third party candidates is a mental fiction. The “viability” only has to do with people’s willingness to vote for them, which, in a massive circular logic, is based on their perception that the rest of the population will not vote for them. That is the actual mechanism at play here (besides the truly brainwashed, faithful supporters of the two major parties, at least).
In fact, the entire U.S. constitutional system is only a tradition/custom, that we have the option to up and abandon when it no longer serves us. The reason we get stuck with it is the various state actors (cops, military) who do not understand that it’s not some sacred inviolable thing, or actually support it, and are willing to use violence on the population to enforce its implementation. What actually happens if the indoctrination of the entire population - Trump and Harris supporters and all - is undone, and we come up with a different, better vision for our society?
I would argue the entire problem is the self-defeating mentality that the D vs R choice is the only choice. It’s in fact the population believing that - in itself - that results in the poor election outcomes for third parties.
I’m not going to read the rest of your response, because you might as well be telling me that the person with the most points isn’t the one who wins the superbowl. Between that and what little I read of your second paragraph tells me you either don’t understand the system, or you don’t understand game theory when one side is always going to vote for their guy regardless of how criminal or openly fascistic he is.
It isn’t a self defeating choice that got us here it’s literally how the system was designed. You say it wasn’t like this 30 years ago, but I question how much you remember of the bush elections, because it’s worse, but this was the natural progression with a party who is pathologically against actual governance.
or you don’t understand game theory when one side is always going to vote for their guy regardless of how criminal or openly fascistic he is.
Humans are not robots. Anyone can vote for anyone. Their mindset at the time of voting is the only thing that determines their vote. Do notice how fixated people are on attacking third party voters with almost no influence over the election, instead of… 77 million? Trump voters, who decided the election. Have you tried unbrainwashing them at all? Like, tally up all the time you spent trying to influence people’s votes - what percent was aimed at Trump voters?
It isn’t a self defeating choice that got us here it’s literally how the system was designed.
It resulted from the design of the system + our society, but those two things are not mutually exclusive. Logical error.
No sane people were fine with it, but sane people have to live in the real world and not believe some fucking fantasy that there was another option at the time.
Let’s start with the very basic logic here. Let’s say 80, 90 million people come out and vote for, say, De la Cruz. Accounting for the electoral college and all that, enough to secure a victory. Is it not true that virtually all of us had the option to put a check next to her name, or write that name in? It is true. Is it true that we would have had a better outcome for the society with De la Cruz, than we would have with Harris or Trump? That is also true. So what - SPECIFICALLY - stopped this from happening.
Because I’ve never heard of De la Cruz, or any of the other third-party candidates that people keep espousing. And even if I had, my vote would be split among the other dozen candidates. That’s the fundamental problem with anyone left of the Democrat party - they’re not unified. Everyone seems to have a different idea of what would be best, everyone seems to have a different favorite candidate. Now all the votes that might have gone D are lost in the noise, while the R’s just fall in line like they always do.
How is it that I had heard of them months before the election, and you’re still catching up?
Back to the point I made elsewhere - the population is abdicating their responsibility to vote responsibly, that is the core problem here. Election came and went, and you didn’t even research the non-D/R candidates. As the saying goes, politics isn’t a spectator sport. Your approach is basically like going to a car dealership and asking them nicely to give the best deal. You gave up all your power at the door. You didn’t fight them on the random fees they threw into the price, you just went, well, at least it’s not the RAM dealership across the street. You didn’t look on Craigslist for used cars listed by sellers, you didn’t ask a mechanic what brand to get, nothing.
I still can’t get over how they were essentially presented with a simplified version of the trolley problem and chose to not pull the lever.
By their own narrative that “the democrats are complicit in a genocide in Gaza”, they were aware that Palestinians were metaphorically tied to both tracks, yet decided to not pull the lever when America itself and every marginalized person living within was also on the track the trolley barreled towards.
Calling it simplified does a disservice of the real world impacts of the “trolley” - especially since unlike a thought experiment - this trolley problem is physically constructed by people to achieve imperialistic goals - so expending energy blaming random lemmings for this - instead of figuring out who built, maintains and presents the trolley as the only option and how to dismantle it seems useless.
I believe we should avoid infighting and actually organize to do something so we don’t have to choose if we pull the lever or not every 4 years (if there even is another election…)
Why the fuck did the democrats leave Palestinians to their tracks?
This didn’t have to be a difficult problem where we’re forced to vote for genocide. The only people at fault for the democrats doing something as wildly unpopular as genocide, silencing anyone who said “You need to stop this if you want to win”, and reaping the effects of that policy being unpopular are the democrats.
I find it scary how easily people where fine with having genocide on both sides of the ticket.
Not having a choice and being fine with with the choice you have are drastically different situations, and it’s concerning how many people are incapable of unwilling to tell the difference between the two.
I would argue the entire problem is the self-defeating mentality that the D vs R choice is the only choice. It’s in fact the population believing that - in itself - that results in the poor election outcomes for third parties. Something which was not true as recently as 30 years ago.
The population, in fact, has the option to vote for any candidate on the ballot, or even write in candidates. The so-called “viability” of third party candidates is a mental fiction. The “viability” only has to do with people’s willingness to vote for them, which, in a massive circular logic, is based on their perception that the rest of the population will not vote for them. That is the actual mechanism at play here (besides the truly brainwashed, faithful supporters of the two major parties, at least).
In fact, the entire U.S. constitutional system is only a tradition/custom, that we have the option to up and abandon when it no longer serves us. The reason we get stuck with it is the various state actors (cops, military) who do not understand that it’s not some sacred inviolable thing, or actually support it, and are willing to use violence on the population to enforce its implementation. What actually happens if the indoctrination of the entire population - Trump and Harris supporters and all - is undone, and we come up with a different, better vision for our society?
I’m not going to read the rest of your response, because you might as well be telling me that the person with the most points isn’t the one who wins the superbowl. Between that and what little I read of your second paragraph tells me you either don’t understand the system, or you don’t understand game theory when one side is always going to vote for their guy regardless of how criminal or openly fascistic he is.
It isn’t a self defeating choice that got us here it’s literally how the system was designed. You say it wasn’t like this 30 years ago, but I question how much you remember of the bush elections, because it’s worse, but this was the natural progression with a party who is pathologically against actual governance.
Then don’t reply.
Humans are not robots. Anyone can vote for anyone. Their mindset at the time of voting is the only thing that determines their vote. Do notice how fixated people are on attacking third party voters with almost no influence over the election, instead of… 77 million? Trump voters, who decided the election. Have you tried unbrainwashing them at all? Like, tally up all the time you spent trying to influence people’s votes - what percent was aimed at Trump voters?
It resulted from the design of the system + our society, but those two things are not mutually exclusive. Logical error.
No sane people were fine with it, but sane people have to live in the real world and not believe some fucking fantasy that there was another option at the time.
The democrats did have another option at the time.
We all did.
Let’s start with the very basic logic here. Let’s say 80, 90 million people come out and vote for, say, De la Cruz. Accounting for the electoral college and all that, enough to secure a victory. Is it not true that virtually all of us had the option to put a check next to her name, or write that name in? It is true. Is it true that we would have had a better outcome for the society with De la Cruz, than we would have with Harris or Trump? That is also true. So what - SPECIFICALLY - stopped this from happening.
Because I’ve never heard of De la Cruz, or any of the other third-party candidates that people keep espousing. And even if I had, my vote would be split among the other dozen candidates. That’s the fundamental problem with anyone left of the Democrat party - they’re not unified. Everyone seems to have a different idea of what would be best, everyone seems to have a different favorite candidate. Now all the votes that might have gone D are lost in the noise, while the R’s just fall in line like they always do.
How is it that I had heard of them months before the election, and you’re still catching up?
Back to the point I made elsewhere - the population is abdicating their responsibility to vote responsibly, that is the core problem here. Election came and went, and you didn’t even research the non-D/R candidates. As the saying goes, politics isn’t a spectator sport. Your approach is basically like going to a car dealership and asking them nicely to give the best deal. You gave up all your power at the door. You didn’t fight them on the random fees they threw into the price, you just went, well, at least it’s not the RAM dealership across the street. You didn’t look on Craigslist for used cars listed by sellers, you didn’t ask a mechanic what brand to get, nothing.
If everyone who had voted for Harris had voted for De la Cruz instead she still wouldn’t have won.
There are no serious third party options in the US currently.
And?
As assessed by you, based on arbitrary criteria and questionable analysis.
I just gave you the results of a poll called the 2024 election.
Is that based on arbitrary criteria and questionable analysis?
For the ten thousandth time in this thread, it’s circular logic for a population not to vote for someone because they think no one will vote for them.
That’s why I voted for myself.
If I don’t then I will never win!
It’s almost like single-issue voters aren’t very good at logic problems…
The trolley problem is not a logic problem JFC. Every one of you gets an F in philosophy 101.