Yeah. I’m not shocked or anything, but there’s a very nonzero chance that I’ll be vomiting blood on the floor of my kitchen in the coming years until I exsanguinate.

At least I won’t be a drain on the taxpayers anymore. Thanks, abstainers, for saving a poor wretch like me the immense burden of continuing life.

Brick on the pedal.

I really don’t understand the issue people have with individuals who are in safe red or blue states voting in protest

It’s less problematic, but still not great. Elections maintain legitimacy on the perception of democracy - the more the democratic result is at variance with the results of the system, the greater the ‘winning’ candidate is undermined. A clear vote against the fascist discourages cooperation from various fence-sitting ghouls who, nonetheless, retain significant power to hinder the incoming administration. A significant enough disconnect between the democratic result and the result of the system can, and historically has in other countries, led to mass unrest and the overthrow of ‘illegitimate’ victors, though in the US the difference between winner and loser in this area has never been above statistical noise.

By contrast, a victory of the plurality of the vote is seen as legitimizing, encouraging careerist middle-of-the-road ghouls, both politicians and bureaucrats, to cooperate with and enable the regime to a greater degree.

Put less verbosely:

It’s best to deny fascists victory. However, if the circumstances (of the nation or your vote specifically) do not allow for that, it’s best to deny fascists the perception of a democratic mandate.

Protest voting in a safe state is better than non-voting, but it still has a negative effect in the case of a fascist victory.

Don’t worry, plenty of non-Russians think Ukrainian lives are an acceptable price to pay for…

… not really sure what they think they’re getting out of it. But it’s very important that Russian fascists get to genocide all the Ukrainians they want, apparently.

Yeah. We should keep running more milk toast politicians with vague policies like “affordability” or “abundance” (I think that’s their new term for more neoliberalism now) that’ll show em!

Fuck no. I’m a Bernie supporter, man. I’m probably further left than Bernie, depending on how you want to count it. That’s not the same as saying “A politician in a left-leaning area of the country that has been able to run on a left-wing platform, so far successfully, is a blueprint for the entire, much further-right-leaning country’s national strategy.”

Going to the right isn’t the answer. Staying the course isn’t the answer. Going left is the answer. But that’s not the same as saying that New York City is just a microcosm of American national politics.

Tell me this - if Mamdani loses in the general - genuinely, god forbid - because there’s still significant support for his right-wing ghoul opponents, would this change your mind, or would you just double down and say that Mamdani hadn’t gone left enough to win?

Dude, free busses, rent control, and public grocery stores are not some “far left” policy.

In the US they are, unfortunately.

The Democratic party is the failure that it is today BECAUSE they tried to convince you that democratic socialist policies would not win. They do.

You’re absolutely right, that’s why progressive candidates have been sweeping elections for the past 40 years. We’re all just trapped in a nightmare machine that makes us think elections have turned out otherwise.

One one hand harm reduction is nice, but on the other I have seen exactly nothing from Western politics these past few years to convince me that any harm is being reduced.

For fuck’s sake, have you not looked around to see what’s happened these past six fucking months?

The principle of harm reduction requires serious, productive action (so not canvassing and voter drives, for the love of God stop doing voter drives)

“Stop performing one of the core functions of harm reduction that attempts to reduce harm!”

…

to be taken during the period when the harm is reduced to push democracy off its collision course with fascism.

Pointed out below. But I guess it’s not fast enough for your tastes, so let’s do nothing and usher in the fascists to power instead. After all, politics are like a magical pendulum, where one side winning means the other side must get an equivalent win eventually!

When progressives don’t take that serious action—or worse, actively shut down said action—

When the fuck are progressives shutting down serious action?

they’re simply kicking the can down the road, turning harm “reduction” from a credible strategy to a farce.

You’re absolutely right. In the wise words of a political party canvassing for seemingly everything a good fucking third of the ‘left’ commenters here have come to adore, we’re all going to die someday. So why not as soon as possible?

Critical support for harm acceleration! Fuck those minorities anyway.

I don’t disagree with the principle, but where’s the action necessary for any of this to make sense? Because as far as I can see, harm reduction in America was the farce version.

“We’ve managed to make ‘socialism’ into an acceptable word in politics and almost got a democratic socialist into a major party’s nomination twice in the past ten years, in a country which has been immensely hostile to any socialist ideas for at least 70 years, and in an intensified period of anti-government right-wing insanity since 1980.”

“Clearly you haven’t been making any progress, shitlib! Time to abandon all levers of power to the fascists.”

That’s QUITTER talk! I’m voting for Rocky Road.

Sorry, but if you blame the people we need to help and work with, things will never get better.

You’re absolutely right, let’s absolve fascist voters for voting for fascism. They were just economically anxious ‘disillusioned’.

Blaming an electorally apathetic working class convinced that the system is corrupt is wasted energy.

“Blaming people for voting for fascists is wasted energy”

Of course. People are never responsible for their own votes. The People™ are always ontologically good, unlike the closed caste of Capitalist Lizardmen Elites.

The rich capitalists standing in the way of popular left wing policies are why people didn’t think they needed to vote.

Oh, right, the rich capitalists vetoed the popular left wing policies that the people turned out to support in their parties.

What’s that? No? This bullshit is a result of the votes of the electorate and not a shadow cabal of capitalist puppetmasters?

The system was too corrupt to think it was worth upholding, even if things are far worse now as a result.

I’m so glad accelerationism is all the rage now.

I don’t blame people for thinking electoralism didn’t matter or didn’t help, because the system gave them every reason to think that.

Is this the same system that has seen massive changes in accordance with changing popular opinion in the past 30 years alone, including massive gains for LGBT rights?

, why they dont embrace the popular policies that won Mamdani his primary

Mamdani is running for mayor of NYC. Urban areas are overwhelmingly more left-leaning.

The national party apparatus should embrace more left policies, but pretending that Mamdani is a blueprint for a national campaign is not realistic.

It was not Trump voters who earned us our future, but the billionaires who made the Democrats so shit that fascism seemed like a good idea.

Jesus fucking Chirst.

Not only are we at the point of absolving nonvoters, now we’re absolving literal fascist voters, in exchange for blaming the Dems.

Arrest is different from imprisonment, it must be noted.

Washington: “For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens, in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.”

America: “Got it, sanction bigotry, assist persecution, require those who live under our protection to demean themselves.”

The top three are Shoestring, Curly, and Wedges, though not necessarily in that order. I still have not managed to figure out how the fuck restaurants make their shoestring (and steak) fries so fucking good.

Next are waffle fries and onion rings. They’re okay.

Sweet Potato fries and tots after that. Just not my thing.

Whoever likes zigzag/crinkle-cut fries is a monster. May god have mercy on their twisted souls.

The secret winner though is zucchini fries, which are mana from the heavens.

Fuck’s sake, not this braindead take again.

Puberty blockers are an overwhelmingly safe way to buy time for a patient, fuck’s sake.

Another example is transition care for children. I believe that at a young age making an irreversible choice is dangerous and we should be careful.

… do you think transition care for minors is just handed out at the grocery store checkout or something?

“We need to be cautious!” would be much more compelling if the standard medical approach to trans minors was not already immensely cautious.

But unfortunately there’s a group of loud people who are honestly behaving like psychopaths who are making it hard to stay sympathetic. Wake up.

I dread to think of how quickly your sympathy would’ve been sapped for Black rights in the 1950s and 60s.

In a roundtable carried by Uzbek TV on 18 March, three Uzbek political commentators made the case for war by claiming to have concrete information that Baghdad possessed weapons of mass destruction and had direct links with terrorists. “It is a well-known fact that Iraq possesses weapons of mass destruction. Its Al-Sumud and Al-Fatah ballistic missiles are capable of causing unspeakable disaster for humankind. Just imagine this dictator and despot, Saddam Hussein, passing on such weapons to Osama bin Laden or his henchmen!” said one Qobilbek Karimbekov. He continued: “It is Saddam Hussein’s regime that is currently sheltering those members of the Taliban and Al-Qaeda who fled Afghanistan… Incidentally, there is ample proof that dozens of suicide bombers in the Middle East are receiving financial aid from Iraq.”

Golly gee I can’t believe a news source would quote Central Asian commentators when discussing Central Asian politics towards Iraq. It’s a good thing no one would be intellectually bankrupt enough to try to take that out of context and claim the news source was trying to push that point themselves.

New And Reformed Floridaman, or Old Floridaman? Because honestly I can parse that as a good deed or a bad one depending on how you want to frame it

The book he wants you to buy: