In every election “left-leaning” neoliberals always try to guilt-trip Marxists into voting for their candidates with the usual schpiel: “Your party doesn't have enough votes to win. You are just letting conservatives win”. What do you tell these people?
They lied about ending concentration camps for migrants and I will absolutely never vote for a Democrat again because of that
Did they even say they were going to get rid of them or just that they would go back to locking up families together?
For sure AOC hasn't been to one for a press visit since Biden took over
in the elections they claimed they'd end the camps, it was one of their major lines against Trump.
All they did was keep kids from being separated from parents, then suppressed the whole thing.
I don’t recall the specifics of what they said but either way, it’s still running and they are evil and liars
"Your side isn't entitled to my vote. If your side wants my vote, they have to earn it."
Tell them if they want my vote they can have it by just seriously embracing two (only two) of the following:
Drug legalization
Vacancy control
Massive increase in funding non-profit housing
Massive increase in train infrastructure
Free public transit
Significant reduction in military budget
Withdraw from NATO
End fossil fuel subsidies
China-style expansion of solar and wind farming
House the homeless in permanent housing
Criminalize corporate lobbying
Complete provision of free health care for all including mental health and dentistry
Debt jubilee
Climate reparations to global south countiesSure. I mean my point in selecting these is they're all bare minimum responsible policy choices that are obviously needed, that an informed lib should agree to (maybe not the NATO one but still). Like this is not a list of things I actually believe should happen that list is much more expansive, but these are policies chosen to hopefully provoke cognitive dissonance.
You'll get the fist one soon just so the frontier expands just a wee bit. Same with sex work.
From the W. E. B. Du Bois article:
In 1956, I shall not go to the polls. I have not registered. I believe that democracy has so far disappeared in the United States that no “two evils” exist. There is but one evil party with two names, and it will be elected despite all I can do or say. There is no third party. On the Presidential ballot in a few states (seventeen in 1952), a “Socialist” Party will appear. Few will hear its appeal because it will have almost no opportunity to take part in the campaign and explain its platform. If a voter organizes or advocates a real third-party movement, he may be accused of seeking to overthrow this government by “force and violence.”
...
The present Administration is carrying on the greatest preparation for war in the history of mankind. Stevenson promises to maintain or increase this effort. ... The “other” party has surrendered all party differences in foreign affairs, and foreign affairs are our most important affairs today and take most of our taxes.
...
Is the refusal to vote in this phony election a counsel of despair? No, it is dogged hope. It is hope that if twenty-five million voters refrain from voting in 1956 because of their own accord and not because of a sly wink from Khrushchev, this might make the American people ask how much longer this dumb farce can proceed without even a whimper of protest.
There's an election upcoming that Biden will be running in, I don't see what you mean
Only that it rightly implies that it's almost always relevant. I just loved the phrasing of it.
I tell them bluntly that only a couple dems have won my vote in the past decade, when they protest I bring up
Police reform (Biden: "fund the police")
Abortion (Obama promised to enshrine it in law, 111th congress dems had a supermajority, did nothing)
Supreme Court seats (at any point when the dems had the majority they could have forced it, instead we have today's bullshit)
Formerly student debt forgiveness (Bidens limp attemps have satisfied most of my lib friends)
Federal Marijuana Legalization (rescheduling Marijuana can be done any day by the president*)
Foreign policy failures (Iraq [Bush but dems supported], Libiya, Syria, Bolivia [Trump but dems supported], Yemen, Cuba)
Drone strikes/Whistleblowers
Capitulation towards republican tax ratcheting
General tendency towards bipartisanship, thereby stopping actual reform (looking at you ACA)
I point out that they make the false assumption that democrats are “less worse” than republicans. From a far left perspective, the difference is negligible.
I parrot an old Beijer article, and say it's fine for them to have that belief, but they should know it's heterodox among US historians and academics.
The impact of third parties on American politics extends far beyond their capacity to attract votes. Minor parties, historically, have been a source of important policy innovations. Women’s suffrage, the graduated income tax, and the direct election of senators, to name a few, were all issues that third parties espoused first.
John D. Hicks,
Let a third party once demonstrate that votes are to be made by adopting a certain demand, then one of the other parties can be trusted to absorb it. Ultimately, if the demand has merit, it will probably be translated into law or practice by the major party that has taken it up…The chronic supporter of third party tickets need not worry, therefore, when he is told, as he surely will be told, that he is “throwing away his vote.” [A] glance through American history would seem to indicate that his kind of vote is after all probably he most powerful vote that has ever been cast.
They wouldn't dare because they'd receive a long lecture on how electoralism is a game, a distraction created by the bourgeoisie to keep the proletariat from real power and how its one and only possible utility is in raising an explicitly communist, Marxist platform and getting it in the public eye and as there are no such candidates with backing of a vanguard party there is no purpose in participating in such charades on my part.
I would further point out there is no harm reduction for the evils of America's empire on the world. Biden escalated the Ukraine conflict into a war, prevented an early surrender and peace agreement, has the blood of thousands including children on his hands as does the whole party of murderous hooligans known as the Democrats.
I could go on and on with this but the point is to turn the tables on them and demand they account for the vile things the monsters they waste their breath supporting doing. But liberals are hypocrites and people who are explicit in being neo-liberals are fascists with the mask already half-slipped off their face so it's pointless to debate with them as they'd say all those problems I outlined are good and that such is what you get for resisting the US. The only thing to say to such people is that you will not save them if they are rightfully put up against a wall.
generally "no."
but if it's someone I actually like, and want to help come to better stances, I'll explain that it's useless to care who the president is. The Senate and the supreme court matter more in terms of policy, and every single "left" leaning president has still been behind some vile shit.
When they were telling us to "vote blue no matter who" back in 2019, I would calmly explain that Biden's politics aren't far off from Republican ones, and that his career spits in the face of what his supporters think of him.
as it seems to me, the lines like "you're just letting the conservatives win" and "if you don't participate in the system you're against the progress" are ultimately just things they tell themselves so they feel like they're in some way useful. I would posit that most of them know, on some level, that voting doesn't do anything of note. I would further posit that most of them know that they're wasting their time caring about who the president is, but do it out of fear for the future. they lack the theory and the understanding to know that the existing system doesn't include our voices, so like a person blinded by a dark room, they're swinging around wildly in the hopes that they'll hit something. A lot of them just need to be sat down and talked to in human terms, person to person. Enough of that and they'll come around on their stances.
Can we vote for members of the communist party? And you are saying that voting for the communist party makes no difference?
If you buy in to Lenin's philosophy, voting for a (non-electoralist) communist party is good because they can direct the support into other outlets which can actually do good (mutual aid, dual power, general propogandizing)
Voting in and of itself does nothing. At least as far as the presidential vote matters. Comrades should still be actively engaged in workers' parties, and should still vote in local elections to ensure that the best candidates get elected.
But voting for a communist in the presidential election is nothing more than a moral victory, they'd never let a communist win. They won't normally even put a communist on the ballot. If you want to go to your local voting booth in 2024 and write in Cornel West (or what have you) you're more than empowered to do so. But the two-headed party will still win.
The only way we're exacting any kind of meaningful change under the current system is through strikes and the whatnot. Otherwise, it's a waste of time. Not to come across as pessimistic, of course. If a communist was to get enough votes that MSM was forced to mention them, that would go a long way in bringing attention to our stances and bring some legitimacy to our parties. Of course, that would come with a lot of slander, and if McCarthy-era rhetoric ramps up, anyone who voted for the communist would be at risk of arrest. But the average liberal would be more aware of far-left parties, which I guess is a good thing.
I point out the long list of murders and war crimes committed by the 'progressive' party.
It depends on where you are. I would probably just wave in the air and say, 'all of them' if asked. If they push back, which they will, I turn it around and ask them: which murders and war crimes were explicitly opposed by the party you want me to vote for? They don't have many options other than to lie, make something up, or brush it off as a kind of 'realpolitik' necessity. If they do have a good answer, I'll ask them about the murders and war crimes that their party didn't oppose and ask for an explanation. Either way they will have revealed their character and reinforced the pointlessness of voting for their candidate.
Edit: I'm not suggesting this is the only way or my only response. It was a bit tongue in cheek. Depending on the person, I'll do a mixture of some of the other things suggested in this thread. For the people willing to listen, I might explain the commodity form and explain why neither of the main parties represent my interests. But mostly the people I talk to IRL already know what my views are and there's either no need to bore them because they agree already or there's no need to bore them because we both already know that we'll never agree.
It’s always the same “something something First Past The Post” spiel. You gotta vote for the opponent of who you hate. I just argue about how broken it is and I may get some nods in agreement here and there but everyone always says “that’s just how it is.” Anytime I bring up the possibility of the system needing to change, through whatever means necessary, I get shot down and condescended to.
I tell them I've voted for Yosemite Sam in the last ten elections and I'm not about to change that now.
I like how that implies that at minimum you are 58 years old lmao
Yes. I usually just walk away muttering to myself and shaking my head derisively after saying this, like they’re some kind of idiot, leaving them bewildered as they work out the math in their heads and start to wonder if perhaps I am significantly older than they thought.
I have no interest in talking to them. Their proper place is to keep their mouths shut and their wallets open for my perusal.
Based. If a neoliberal wants to talk at me about voting for their dumpsterfire candidates and expects me to not verbally assault them with theory in response, they gotta be payin me.
