It's a situation that I have been expecting for a while, but I wasn't fully ready to accept it. Specifically it's one of my LGBTQ friends who honestly believes in the democrats will protect them and their partner. I have tried to make the point that both parties are eroding any sort of civility towards all marginalized groups, but fear seems to drive them more than logical observations. They make the excuse that change doesn't happen over night and that the left continues to grow and will have meaningful affects down the road. I fundamentally just don't agree with that idea and vocalize it regularly. More and more it is ending up in a circular argument where I am painted as unrealistic and my rhetoric (leftist rhetoric) is doing more harm than good because it promotes distrust in the only system we have to work with. I try to tell them it's kind of the whole point. We gotta start somewhere if we want to see a better, more representative system, but they are so hung up on the immediate future while simultaneously saying that my idealistic feelings are shortsighted and I cant expect change in the immediate future... The double-talk is wild, I know.

I am trying my hardest to stop from engaging at this point because on the most basic level we agree on a lot of stuff, but they are just way to wrapped up in the fear mongering of the democratic party. They know that the two party system is broken, they know that something drastic needs to change, but they also think that they are powerless to do anything except choose the lesser evil. It pains me because I am watching them do the same shit past generations have done, where they give up on their ideals for the sake of preserving the current status quo that they benefit from. I am legitimately watching them imply "fuck you, got mine" under the guise of civic duty and I hate it. I want nothing more than to be able to finally say "I told you so" without being a smug asshole about it and ruining our friendship.

Thanks for reading my rant. It's probably a bit disjointed, but the frustration is boiling over and I needed to vent to the only group of people that seems to understand the hopelessness of being a disenfranchised leftist.

  • REgon [they/them]
    ·
    1 month ago

    Yeah and trump is still better than electing a dog with rabies. If your baseline is "here's a worse candidate" then you can clap for anything. It's also completely debateable wether he'll be worse. You are handwaving away several things as being insignificant, that aren't.

    and yet it's still better then what Trump wants to do.

    They deported more people.

    Yes, they oversaw the destruction of Roe V Wade, and yet it's still nothing compared to the anti-lgbtq, anti-women laws that trump will pass once elected

    Bills that will pass anyway because the dems don't give a shit about any of it. At least with Trump people like you went out to fight against it.

    Yes, they sent billions abroad for war and you'll never guess what Trump sent just as much

    Do you think this is an argument for the dems? Yes they are just as bad, glad we agree.
    Trump also oversaw the agreement to finally pull out of Afghanistan. The Biden regime decided the best way to help afghanis were to freeze all foreign assets. I'm sure the people being ruled over by taleban are grateful they also get to starve and their state has no money to finance renovations.

    to my knowledge, there wasn't any major deregulation from the dems, much unlike what Trump wants to do

    Apart from the tariffs on cheap EVs and solar cells and the union busting and the decreased requirements for freight trains which have led to seceral catastrophies? There's definitely way more, I just can't be arsed to look them up for a person I know will come with some dumbshit smuglord response.

    so, choose your poison, and be realistic

    The realistic option is to not normalize genocide. Voting for someone who is actively commiting a genocide will make things far worse than electing a guy who is like all the others, just a bit more obvious about it. The realistic option is to not give legitimacy to rulers who do these things. The realistic option is not to do something that has only yielded terrible results. Your line of argument has been trotted out since Nixon for gods sakes, and even then it was old!

    "That's the real issue this time," he said."Beating Nixon. It's hard to even guess how much damage those bastards will do if they get in for another four years."
    The argument was familiar, I had even made it myself, here and there, but I was beginning to sense something very depressing about it. How many more of these goddamn elections are we going to have to write off as lame, but "regrettably necessary" holding actions? And how many more of these stinking double-downer sideshows will we have to go through before we can get ourselves straight enough to put together some kind of national election that will give me and the at least 20 million people I tend to agree with a chance to vote for something, instead of always being faced with that old familiar choice between the lesser of two evils?
    Now with another one of these big bogus showdowns looming down on us, I can already pick up the stench of another bummer. I understand, along with a lot of other people, that the big thing this year is Beating Nixon. But that was also the big thing, as I recall, twelve years ago in 1960 – and as far as I can tell, we've gone from bad to worse to rotten since then, and the outlook is for more of the same.*

    • Hunter S. Thompson Fear And Loathing: On The Campaign Trail '72
      • m532 [she/her]
        ·
        1 month ago

        They were starving either way because all of the frozen assets belonged to the rich 1% that controlled the country.

        Colonialist mindset. Worse than hitler

        "We killed and robbed them and now they are poor"

        ITS YOUR FAULT IMPERIALIST

        We should directly help the people in need

        Your "aid" comes in form of bombs and lectures. Fuck off imperialists

      • Are_Euclidding_Me [e/em/eir]
        ·
        1 month ago

        Hold on, I gotta ask a clarifying question. What do you think REgon means when they talk about tariffs on cheap EVs and solar cells? Because your response seems to suggest you think the tariffs are an attempt by Democrats to save the environment and my understanding is pretty much directly opposite of that. Could you please explain what you're talking about? Thanks

      • BeamBrain [he/him]
        ·
        1 month ago

        You have 2 choices that actually matter, and everything else is just "Trump" but indirectly

        Please explain how not choosing Kamala is choosing Trump, but not choosing Trump isn't choosing Kamala

      • REgon [they/them]
        ·
        1 month ago

        Didn't read after you failed to engage with the first three of my arguments. Quoting them and then just repeating yourself isn't really what normal people think of when they think of discussions and the like. To illustrate your shittiness.

        He will be.

        Oh okay then, glad we cleared that up, it's not like I illustrated how, but whatever. Have fun never learning anything.

        Edit: I saw someone else comment about the tariffs so I skipped down to read that bit... You're a fucking moron. Quit talking about things you don't understand.
        Those "damn libs" who want to save the planet have made electric vehiclesmore expensive and solar cells more expensive by putting tariffs on them. That's what tariffs do.
        Thank you for showing your ass and furthering my belief in that I was right not to waste my time reading the rest of your drivel. Do us all a favor and see for how long you can hold your breath at the bottom of a lake.
        Also Canadian healthcare is free, you should look into it.