this post was submitted on 06 Nov 2024
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I'm physically ill by this result, but this isn't an option. You can't save democracy by discarding democracy.
Trump could do it because he's a fascist - he wants to discard democracy. A healthy system would have checked him not just then, but barred him from running again. We haven't had a healthy system in a long time.
Trump himself isn't fascist. Though he's surrounded by them and I do fear them.
At a minimum, we need to discard useless language. "Fascist" failed to work in this election. Its been overused and/or the Republicans have built up mental defenses against it. It always was a bit of a stretch argument as the NeoNazi group is constantly berated even by Republicans.
The correct word is likely Authoritarian Social Darwinists (which is close to fascism in many important ways, including racism, superiority, smugness, purity of gene pools, etc. etc.). But I'm thinking its time we discarded "Fascist" and seriously moved forward and try to advance our linguistic political tools.
It doesn't matter what you call them, they'll take that and wear it proudly. They have to publicly swear their allegiance to the in-group.
Hillary was right to call them deplorables.
Biden was right to call them garbage.
Godwin was right to call them Nazis.
Everyone was right to call them fascists.
They do not care.
This is a pretty naive take. The remaining dregs that passed for democracy here were extinguished a few hours ago. There's nothing even resembling a democracy left here. The only elections we'll have now will be show elections, if even that. Therefore, definitionally, we can no longer save democracy through democracy.
But if I'm being honest saving democracy in the US isn't really all that high up on my list of priorities at this point. We're facing down an exacerbated Gaza genocide, another in Ukraine, then Moldova, and domestically, the genocide LGBT people in general, and trans women in particular. Not to mention the inevitable murder of Trump's political opponents and journalists critical of his regime. We're pretty firmly into the "any means necessary" zone.
E: minor word choice change to reduce repetition.
E2: Fix typos and spelling errors
Egos as big as Elon, Trump, RFK Jr. and others cannot work together for long.
The infighting will absolutely happen. The reigns of power only allow one grifter to be king above all others.
The Republican Party now needs to reward Crypto, Tech, Military-Industrial complex, Trump's teams, Religious vote and more. It's easier to keep unified before you have power, but inevitably now that the Democrats are defeated.... Their egotistical selves are setting their eyes onto their next prizes.
They will be satisfied with various positions of power for a few months at best. RFK Jr. Really doesn't want to run the CDC, Musk doesn't want to make the bureaucracy efficient. They will grow bored of their positions.
Sure and while they play around, those genocides I mentioned will still happen. And when their regime collapses, the chaos will kill even more people. This must be prevented.
Too late to prevent now.
Democrats refusing to give power now will forever destroy Democracy. The only hope we have is to give power to Trump and hope he doesn't break it too much.
As others noted: it's a one sided risk. Trump doesn't care about the future of Democracy. Democrats do care.
I expect that most Republicans, despite voting for Trump stupidly, also care about Democracy.
We have likely lost not only the electoral college vote this time around, but even the Popular Vote. It's a blowout. There's no excuses on a Democracy perspective.
I am a major Ukraine supporter. I was for Harris and everything. But now I'm worried about far more local issues. This is a resounding defeat of my trust of my fellow Americans, my coworkers, etc etc.
But we are not the ones in power. The election was a blowout in the wrong direction. Even if Jack Smith arrests Trump tomorrow what is that supposed to accomplish??
Wow, someone more cynical than I am.
That's historically not true. Many interim governments do dissolve successfully after fulfilling their purpose. I'd expect such an interim government to last a decade, two tops while the constitution and judiciary is unfucked.
As I said upchain, democracy really isn't at the top of my priority list right now. Preventing 3-4 additional genocides is.
Yeah no. The median republican voter only cares about furthering their hate, and seeing the people hey don't like hurt. Remember "He's hurting the wrong people!"?
I don't think a non-Democracy or otherwise forced interim government can stand today. There's no legal basis and you're basically asking for Biden to just perform a coup and hand the reigns of power to someone.
I mean, I guess I appreciate your gusto but that's not gonna work.
There's rarely, if ever, a legal basis for an interim government. Just like there's no provision in the constitution for replacing it, this is basically how it's done. And honestly I'd rather Biden keep the reigns for a little while at least. Harris is the obvious choice there, but she's a too right wing for my tastes.
You're missing an ego: Putin. He has Kompromat on all of them. See Unger's book American Kompromat.
Look I'm desperate for some cope right now, but the best the left has ever been was in resisting Trump in the streets from 2016 to 2020.
The issue was that after four tiring years of struggle, we handed responsibility over to the electoral process. And as is tradition, the Democrats fucking blew it.
Build back better? what a fucking joke. Pass literally any bill that makes a material impact to people's lives and this election result doesn't happen.
Yeah leftists really aren't going to help here. There will never be a leftist revolution in the US. Hell I doubt there'll ever be a serious leftist political movement at all. The only remaining hope I have is that the democrats will decide that preventing Trump is more important than high-roadism. But even that is an exceedingly slim hope.
I mean, maybe if Harris would have appealed to the left, we would be having a different conversation today. Biden making in roads to the left out him over the top in 2020; Harris blew those bridges up in 2024 to campaign with Liz Cheney.
There is a real left movement in this country that started at occupy Wall Street and has been here ever since. It's not big, but it's sufficient to make important differences here and there. BLM/ antifacsism/ progressivism, all threads of the same strand.
I guess you're probably right, but honestly I'm not sure I can put my faith in a group that can't even hold their nose over an elementary application of the trolley problem.
You just don't get who or why people are advocating for those positions.
Leftists asking for better from the candidate are doing so because they perceive issues like genocide, money in politics as deeply unpopular, and issues like M4A and paid family leave as popular. Your blaming the wrong group.
It's Harris apologists saying you just have to plug your nose this election who lost the game for all of us, because that gave Harris cover for staying out on some deeply unpopular issues.
You (and others, not trying to single you out) think you know what you are doing with your 'trolley problem' perception/ analysis of this issue, but you are wrong to the point of self deception. You might consider why that is.
Multiple groups can be at fault. (As a mostly unrelated aside, if I were to blame a single entity, it would be Rutherford B. Hayes). And TBH, Leftists who failed to hold their nose are probably the least to blame, they're just the last ones in the line of responsibility. Ultimately Harris bears the most responsibility (at least recently) for her failure of a campaign.
Care to enlighten me? I've never been the brightest tool in the shed, so from where I'm sitting it's a pretty easy case of less genocide vs. more genocide.
I think this comment that I offered @Jordan_Lund makes the point well:
https://lemmy.world/comment/13236115
and reposted here:
If you can't put out the effort to understand why people think the things that they do, if you can't empathize with people you don't agree with, you'll never understand them sufficiently to change their minds.
Hooh boy that''s a lotta text, but I think I more or less get what you're getting at, so I'm going to have to try real hard not to breach the civility rules here.
I get that the Gaza genocide is terrible, I get the feeling of powerlessness over it, I really do, I'm feeling it right now, I also get wanting to do something about it, but in regards to this particular election, there was nothing that could be done, especially not by the time Biden dropped. The options in this election were simple: More genocide, or less genocide. There wasn't a no genocide option, unfortunately. If there was, I have full confidence that option would've won. But there wasn't. Harris was never going to change her stance. So: More genocide or less. If one didn't vote? More genocide. If one voted third party? More genocide. If, god forbid, one voted for trump? Believe it or not, more genocide. The only way to get less genocide was to vote for Harris. After that is a long and hard road: Running progressive local and eventually state candidates, organizing community awareness events, protests, etc. all with the express purpose of redirecting democrats to the left.
You should go back and read the whole thread that this comment originated from. The other responses in that thread break down precisely why your rhetorical approach
Because she felt no pressure to do so. She had apologists here, there, everywhere saying precisely what you are saying right now. That gave her the cover she needed to feel like she didn't have to move on this issue. And it didn't work.
You really should read the entire thread I linked, because you are doing precisely what @[email protected] did in that thread. And if you are not curious as to why this rhetorical approach failed (when people like me were telling you, @Jordan, everyone, that this approach would fail), then you are part of the very problem you suppose to solve.
Every one who can be convinced by the "both-sidesing" of the issue you choose to do has been convinced. Now what are you going to do to convince those for whom genocide was a bridge too far? If you can't understand people for whom the rhetorical approach that worked on you, didn't work on them, and continue to refuse to even try and understand them, how do you expect to change their minds?
I'm not. Because, generally speaking, people don't really change their minds. They just look to confirm their own biases. Its the big reason republicans have such strong support despite being the worst party by every metric except hate. It's also the reason Harris was never going to back down on her support for Israel. Well that and AIPAC, with them around even I wouldn't wholly denounce Israel no matter how much I'd like to. Besides if genocide is "a bridge too far," then why, pray tell, do they support more genocide?
Well then I would argue, that by offering the rhetoric you did, you were never really interested in winning this election through the use of this rhetorical technique. This kind of bad-faith approach (whether its acknowledged or not), is what lost the Democrats this election. If you aren't actually trying to change anyone's mind with that point, then why are you making it? Who do you expect it to work on? It seems to me that its mostly a virtue signal; an effort to wash your hands of responsibility.
Democrats fundamental thesis this election cycle was "Trump bad and or worse". It's now in the books that this approach to rhetoric lost them the election. You can't continue to pretend it was in good faith.
Honestly I often wonder that my self. Well, I know the answer in this particular instance of me, in this thread. I saw something I had an opinion on, so I shared it. The ensuing "argument" is basically more of the same, with the added bonus of being a sort of emotional pressure release valve.
But in general, why do we (as human beings) bother with the verbal arguments and rhetorical sparring? People changing their minds on something is rare, so logically speaking it's a waste of time. Some sort of emotional fulfillment? Vain hope? Because the alternative is violence and we're supposed to be better than that? I certainly don't know.
I'm using you as an example, so don't take this overly personal, but I think you owe yourself, and if or any one else reading this, made the argument that you are relying on here, they owe this community some serious introspection.
I've been trying to communicate to this for the community for literally months, that the rhetorical approach that they are insisting on is/ was/ and has now been documented, to have done serious damage to the best shot we had at stopping Trump. Providing cover and excuses for bad Democratic candidates and policies does material damage to the chances of Democrats to win at the polls because it selects for less popular, more vulnerable, weaker Democrats. If you are not working to hold Democrats accountable and trying to defend them from criticism, this election loss is on you.
As I mentioned upchain, multiple groups can be at fault, and chronologically the buck ended with the voters. The voters failed to hold their noses and work with the lesser of two evils, so now we're stuck with the greater one until that orange fatass croaks and we have to deal with the post-collapse chaos.
Again and again and again: you have an intentional block that you are keeping in place that is preventing you from understanding why this happened. I just want you to notice it at this point. Its already done enough damage to mortally wound the democratic project. Just please notice this blind spot of yours.