I did the thing. I made my voice heard in our democracy, others in my community did the same. But nothing fucking changed and the system of electoralism remains ever rotten to the core.
Lol but now I’m being told that “they’re scared of us because they say how frustrated we were.” Bull fucking shit. Why the hell do people equate mean words and insults with violence? This is the exact same song and dance that’s been happening for decades in American politics. “You must work within the system to get the change you want” or whatever other nonsense. “Be sure not to damage any potential relationships with liberals or scare off any potential voters!”
I guess the most absurd part about all of this is that liberalism has a track record of producing zero systemic change (or hell even challenges for that matter). So what am I fucking doing with my life at this point? What the hell can you even do without doing something that addresses the root cause of a serious problem?
It is as exhausting as it is frustrating. I've been listening back to Hell of Presidents, and I keep returning to the thought that this system was built - half intentionally, half blindly - to be unable to respond to whatever given set of conditions it finds itself in. The two largest political shifts, the end the southern slave economy and the New Deal nearly a century later, seem like they were only possible because war broke out and the institutional norms were suspended. Even then, the ruling class was quick to reestablish norms and move things as close to the previous status quo as possible.
Federal politics looks over-determined. That could change, but not from the inside. Some external force, like a shift in the global economy or our ability to maintain empire, is going to crack that open and allow for new possibilities. But there's no way to know exactly how or when. Until then, I think state and local governments present a more actionable goal -- with the added benefit that growth in these smaller institutions becomes another advantageous inroad for if and when federal politics changes.
...that's obviously easier said than done; each state has it's own set of conditions and it's hard enough to draw local attention away from the national spectacle -- let alone doing it while also combating Red Scare brainworms.