And waste my vote in a de-facto two party, first-past-the-post system, thereby accelerating the downfall of democracy? No, thank you.
They might both be pieces of shit, but one is significantly less so than the other.
The democrats are blue fascists and the republicans are red fascists. They are both fascists. They are both anti-democracy. Or do you think that people voted for genocide?
Calling them fascists is a little far-fetched. Do you have evidence to back up that claim? Linking a screenshot does not prove your point, it’s just more rhetoric.
Yes, we have reached that point, because it’s a first-past-the-post system. We need to increase political engagement rather than stoking political apathy. We are in the mess that we are because less than 50% people vote in the first place.
That’s a strawman argument and a very big logical leap.
If 100% of the people voted, maybe we could get candidates that actually represent us and our interests. The political makeup of this country would change and somehow you think they would still act the same.
The NDP in Canada is a good example. Even though they also have a first-past-the-post system of voting, they still have a thriving progressive party. If more people were politically engaged, a lot more would be inclined towards progressive politics.
I think the Red Scare might have a lot to do with it. The generation that was subjected to the propaganda of the Cold War is still alive and they’ve passed down a lot of that thought and bias, even among so called “liberals”.
Canada was somewhat (but not completely ) culturally isolated from it.
We cannot remediate the American political zeitgeist without addressing this first.
The Red Scare wasn't really mass-brainwashing, though. Ultimately, the Red Scare was popularly accepted because in the aftermath of WWII, the US was the rising Imperialist power, and was a thriving Social Democracy profiting off of the aftermath of war. The material conditions of the US supported the ideas held within, if that makes sense.
The Red Scare is weakening among younger generations because Capitalism is decaying. There is a revival of the Red Scare with respect to China, which is a demonstrably rising power in the East, but the Material Conditions of the US speak for itself.
I agree with your point about the material conditions in post war US and how they helped propagate the idea of American exceptionalism but the Red Scare was actually mass brainwashing/propaganda. This is a good look at the media of the time: Anti-communist politics of the red scare
While there was a true threat in terms of espionage, it was overblown by McCarthy for political gain.
The US hegemony was being threatened by a rising communist bloc. The capitalists had seen the impact of progressive policies such as the New Deal and were scared of losing their influence. The establishment of the PRC in 1949 stoked the fears further. It go so bad that the Communist Control Act was passed in 1954. It prohibited members of the Communist party, who were otherwise American citizens, from holding office in labour unions. McCarthy had used anticommunist propaganda as a partisan tool and it is still being used by the right.
What’s interesting to me though, is that American right-wing media had managed to push the Overton window so far to the right that they decry the policies of the Democratic Party as being communist.
The problem is that humans are the representatives, and they represent their interests first and foremost. You could get A.I. as our overlords, but they will represent the interests of those that program them. If that day ever arrives, I'm investing in Pepsico and Frito-Lays
They are literally funding doing a genocide. Using police force to beat to a pulp and kill student protestors and banning media speaking against the genocide.