this post was submitted on 20 Sep 2024
1 points (100.0% liked)

MeanwhileOnGrad

1346 readers
1 users here now

"Oh, this is calamity! Calamity! Oh no, he's on the floor!"

Welcome to MoG!


Meanwhile On Grad


Documenting hate speech, conspiracy theories, apologia/revisionism, and general tankie behaviour across the fediverse. Memes are welcome!


What is a Tankie?


Alternatively, a detailed blog post about Tankies.

(caution of biased source)


Basic Rules:

Sh.itjust.works Instance rules apply! If you are from other instances, please be mindful of the rules. — Basically, don't be a dick.

Hate-Speech — You should be familiar with this one already; practically all instances have the same rules on hate speech.

Apologia(Using the Modern terminology for Apologia) No Defending, Denying, Justifying, Bolstering, or Differentiating authoritarian acts or endeavours, whether be a Pro-CCP viewpoint, Stalinism, Islamic Terrorism or any variation of Tankie Ideology.

Revisionism — No downplaying or denying atrocities past and present. Calling Tankies shills, foreign/federal agents, or bots also falls under this rule. Extremists exist. They are real. Do not call them shills or fake users as it handwaves their extremism.

Tankies can explain their views but may be criticised or attacked for them. Any slight infraction on the rules above will immediately earn a warning and possibly a ban.

Off-topic Discussion — Do not discuss unrelated topics to the point of derailing the thread. Stay focused on the direct content of the post as opposed to arguing.

You'll be warned if you're violating the instance and community rules. Continuing poor behaviour after being warned will result in a ban or removal of your comments. Bans typically only last 24 hours, but each subsequent infraction will double the amount. Depending on the content, the ban time may be increased. You may request an unban at any time.


founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

While I strongly disagree with the dogwhistles here, it's true. If your state voted for Trump or Clinton/Biden with >10% margin in the last two elections, there's almost zero chance the Trump/Harris election will go any differently.

I personally dislike both major party candidates (but dislike Trump more) and since my state (Utah) voted for Trump with ~20% margin in both prior elections (even in 2016 w/ McMullin taking >20% of the vote), I feel comfortable voting my conscience. I even voted for Biden last election on the off-chance that people here hated Trump enough to matter, but no, >20% spread.

So I'm back to voting third party. Even if every third party vote went to Harris, my state would still elect Trump with something like 15-25% spread. The only way that changes is if Kamala converts to my state's predominant religion and Trump literally outs himself as worshipping Satan, and even then we'd probably still go with Trump for some stupid reason.

So I vote for the next most popular third party, and in this case, that's Chase Oliver from the Libertarian Party. I'm also registered Libertarian, mostly because I think they have the best chance to actually get a message out about voting reform, but also because I'm probably closest to their views (though I disagree with the LP on a ton of issues, especially recently, and especially the local UT LP). He'll probably get 2-3% of the vote, perhaps less this year because he's gay. If that instead were the Green Party, I'd vote for them (even though I have even less in common), because my goal here is to send a message that the 2-party system sucks.

If your state is that polarized, there's really no point in voting for the minority party candidate, go third party and make a statement.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I'm glad you're sending a message about the two-party system in a way that actually matters. Voting third party in a state that will never change is like, the one time it's safe and effective to do that.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Exactly, yet I get so much pushback on that.

Yes, if your state has any chance of flipping, choose the lesser of two evils. And don't just look at the last election, look at the last 5 or so. If any of them were anywhere near close, vote for the lesser of two evils. Or if your state is trending toward being competitive, vote for the lesser of two evils. If you're not willing to check, vote for the lesser of two evils.

But if your state consistently votes a certain way with a huge margin, then vote your conscience. For me, that's the most popular third party.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago (2 children)

believing your state is hard locked in one party is exactly the mindset that makes it hard locked. My state is 'hard red' but it wasn't always like that. California was a solid red state but no longer is. Until we have ranked voting, we're stuck with two parties at the federal level. Voting 3rd is only serves to signal to the majority parties where to not waste their energy.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Voting 3rd is only serves to signal to the majority parties where to not waste their energy.

No, voting 3rd shows that voters are more willing to "throw their vote away" than support either major party candidate. If the minority candidate wants to snap up some of those votes, they'll need to adjust their policies to at least bring in some of the top third party candidate's views. The closer they get to those third parties, the more of those votes they'll get.

If my state gets within a 10% spread, I'll probably start voting for the lesser of two evils (in this case Harris). But when the spread is going to be something like 4x the total votes for all third parties combined (something like 5%; vote spread for major party candidates is typically >20%), there's literally no value in supporting either major party candidate.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Donald Trump actually showed up to the Libertarian National Convention, I don't think such an arrogant dickwad would have bothered if he didn't think it was important to appeal to third party voters. They already spend less time in their 'safe' states.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago (2 children)

He got booed almost the entire time, except for the two statements he made that were libertarian-friendly (free Ross Ulbright and put a Libertarian in his cabinet). Libertarians sure aren't voting for that clown, especially this year since he ditched pretty much everything that libertarians actually care about and added on an extra helping of tariffs and closed borders (both of which libertarians hate).

Biden was invited, he just decided not to show, which was probably for the best because he would've been booed as well.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago
[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Oh he totally had it coming... must felt odd to him considering how most of his audiences are MAGA true believers

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago

Yeah, echo chambers will do that to you.