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this post was submitted on 30 May 2024
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Both Democrats and Republicans have a vested interest in keeping the system as it is. They won't change it unless citizens make them change it.
Honestly I'm kind of losing hope that it's even possible at this point.
Positive change in the American system usually comes from the bottom up. If you're interested in fixing the system, the first step is to switch your local elections to Approval Voting, probably through a referendum. There's a whole bunch of reasons, and lots of second and third steps, but that's the first one.
Whenever people come up with these solutions I'm reminded that it took Jon Stewart over a decade to get money for 9/11 first responders.
If it takes that long to do something so universally desired, it's going to take a thousand years to change our voting system.
But it's nice to dream.
Things never seem to change, until they do. And then you're amazed they were ever the old way at all. As someone who remembers walking through an airport pre-9/11, in a state that put Ann Richards in the governor's office, its funny to think about what was "normal" 30 years ago. Hell, its funny to think about what was normal 20 years ago, under Bush. Or 10 years ago, under Obama.
I'm old enough to remember when a black President was telling the country he could settle race tensions between a Harvard Professor and a city cop by having a beer with them.
Flying planes into buildings probably won't help change our voting system.
Historically speaking, I have to disagree. One of the most transformative moments of our history since Pearl Harbor. It gave birth to wave after wave of right-wing election wins and a subsequent hard-right shift in voting rights, election policy, and court composition.
Right: It would make things even worse.
Maybe I'm just cynical. I still vote every chance I get, even for local stuff. I'm a big supporter of approval voting, but I'm not hopeful that it'll become the norm in the US.
I mean, you can't just hope it'll happen, you have to decide to be the person that switches your local elections. I would have done mine already but I'm too disabled to do work, so this is one of the ways that I try to help instead.
I'm still mad that the ballot initiative to move away from FPTP failed in Massachusetts 😢
It is impossible. Most people don't see a problem with this. Especially the trolls who have more power than they should.
The only time things have even marginally changed in the US there's been violence. Civil rights, suffrage, the labor movement, ending slavery: All of them required thugs cracking skulls before they could happen.
So unless we have about 10% of the population willing to put themselves in harm's way we're stuck like this.
Do you really believe that nothing has changed over the decades? That seems like a very privileged stance.
Well yeah, plenty has changed. I'm talking about fixing our voting system. That would give lasting change, where we don't have to worry so much about losing all that progress that people before us fought so hard for.
In regards to America's voting system, nothing has changed for nearly a century. We're just now starting to see support for ranked choice, but it will take a few decades of people pushing it constantly for it to go anywhere, and all of that time will have to be under a Democrat.
Sort of. On one side, they already benefit when the system is more fair, while the other side does everything in their power to rig the system in their favor, trying to lock their opponents out of ever having a chance.
Look at what Texas is trying to do. They're trying to lock statewide office behind the barrier of number of counties voting for them instead of population. That way Democrats will never again have a statewide office as all the tiny counties with almost no population are Republican-leaning.
So while one side is happy with the status quo, the other side is fighting tooth and nail to make the rules less fair.
They'll send a fucking SWAT team to the house of any citizen tries to change it.
At some point, "we just need to vote for the most right-wing Democrat and then blame the leftists any time we lose" is not a productive long term strategy.
You need to study the two parties closely, from honest and reliable news resources. The parties are worlds apart. You will find corruption in any system unfortunately.
No you really don't. It's pretty fucking obvious that Republicans are awful. They'll come right out and say it.
The problem is that Democrats also get me further from my political goals, and will continue all of the bullshit that I hate because they either don't see a problem with it or they're hamstrung by the structure of government.
There isn't an option to vote for better. Only less worse.
Better almost always routes through less worse.
Well Better should hurry the fuck up because it's been getting more or less worse my entire life.
Voting is for harm reduction, action is for positive change. You need both.
That's exactly my philosophy: You don't vote for better. You vote for less worse.
If you want better you gotta work for it. And probably get your skull cracked in.
Except, as far as I can tell, the system is designed such that citizens can't make them change it-- what are you going to do, vote for nobody and force the government to fix it's shit before electing a new president? I mean, you could revolt but I think we all know how quickly the government would act to squash any meaningful attempt to. And if Project 2025 is allowed to play out, then military can be dispatched to handle simple protests instead of the police, so good luck pressuring the government to do anything at that point.
They already put snipers on rooftops at every University for the Palestine protests. Supposedly this was for public safety as there was intel that things would turn violent, but who really knows the truthfulness of such intel or where the order came down from? When the military becomes your police, this act would pale in comparison.
Remember this when you go to the polls, or when you are considering not to.
Need to stop looking at the big picture first. There's more than just the presidential or senatorial or even Congressional elections. There are local elections that have a much bigger impact on how your life goes than you realize. Do you know who your mayor is? Do you know who your state senator or alderman is? Most people know who their governor is but do you know who your lieutenant Governor is? Who is your state's attorney general? Generally speaking the Secretary of State administers your electoral process in your state, do you know who your secretary of state is? Did you vote for your secretary of state? Did you bother to find out who was running against them in the primary election?
These are the questions most people don't ask don't even think to ask, and these are the questions that have the largest impact on how our country is actually run. In the long run the presidential election doesn't matter as much as these because these are what determine how the president ends up actually getting elected. I almost lament the 17th amendment changing the way senators are chosen. Because when senators were chosen by the legislatures in the state people had to pay more attention to what their state legislature looked like.
The military, among both officers and enlisted, is actually pretty split politically, and a good number can and will refuse to obey an order they perceive to be unconstitutional, or outright commit mutiny. For all that the military warns about insider threats, it is also woefully unprepared to deal with them as well. Military servicemembers are also significantly stricter with the use of deadly force than police from my experience, although that may simply be due to my having served in the SSBN force.
Sure. I agree it won't change unless citizens push for a change. But choosing to not participate is not pushing for a change. That's just capitulation. Choosing to not vote is not a signal of protest. It's a signal of someone who doesn't care what the outcome is.
Voting is the first and most basic step in pushing for change. Doing more is good, but you definitely can't skip that step.
We live in a society…. yaaawn….. zzzz