I don’t like Biden either, but anyone with half a brain knows there are two choices in the 2020 election. If we had a sane voting system, voting third party might be worth it, but as it stands, no one but you knows your favorite candidate exists and unless you want to become their campaign manager that will still be true in November. Even if you did, and even if you convinced two thirds of the people who would otherwise have voted for Biden to vote for your chosen candidate instead, Trump would still win because half the country voted for him and your guy only got a third. If you vote third party you might as well stay home.

Not voting isn’t going to stop the genocide in Gaza. The US will continue to funnel them arms no matter which candidate wins this November. Trump practically campaigns on how much he hates the Jews and he’s publicly told Israel to “finish up their war”. He’ll also make life a living hell for anyone who isn’t a straight cisgender male back here at home.

A vote for a candidate is not an endorsement of them or their policies, it’s a statement that you like their policies more than the other guy’s, and “sticking it to liberals” and “refusing to support genocide” (that’s not what voting for Biden is doing, by the way – a vote for either candidate is a vote for genocide and a vote for neither is an endorsement of both) is not more important than keeping the furthest right politician America has ever seen out of office.

How incredibly privileged do you have to be to see an entire national election as what will happen in the Middle East and ignore Trump’s campaign promises to wipe transgender Americans off the map, and further, to not realize that the same thing will happen in the Middle East regardless of which candidate wins?

I hate Biden as much as every other leftist here. But I’ll still vote for him because Trump is worse. If there’s a single bone in your body that cares about the lives of your trans friends you will too.

  • LinkOpensChest.wav@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    181·
    8 months ago

    This is my question too. I’m old (Gen X), and I’ve never seen the Democrats acting progressive. The last time I had hope was in 08 when I volunteered for the Obama campaign, only for him to out himself as yet another conservative wearing progressive clothes once he took office.

    • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
      161·
      8 months ago

      The correct answer is that politicians are not simply groups of “good” and “evil” people, but people acting in the interests of the US state, and by extension the wealthy Capitalists that guide it.

      Democrats are not a party of positive, incremental change, even if that’s how they position themselves. They act swiftly in the direction of liberalism, and only make concessions to leftists and progressives when they become threatening, not when leftists cooperate.

      Waiting and voting harder for the least worst candidates just continues their existing trends, if the Dems had overwhelming support they would continue to do the bare minimum.

      It’s not a coincidence that the GOP is far more radically fascist, that’s where they get their votes! That’s why the GOP manages to do a lot of damage, because if they didn’t, they would get tossed aside for another party. They cling on with barely enough support to occasionally get elected despite Democrat majority.