Political Memes

Not voting is a vote of no confidence.

similar deliberative body indicate that they no longer support a leader, government,etc.

Voting is a choice. Not voting is a choice. If you take away the choice of not voting, while only allowing two candidates that a vast majority of Americans don’t want, then can you really call it a democracy?

If voting is important to you, then it would serve the community better if the suggestion of not voting was discussed and denounced in the community itself. That is the purpose of social forums, to discuss ideas.

A forum is a public meeting place for open discussions. This rule is the policing of thought, and the antithesis of a forum.

I support the change

Centrist Democrats love to interpret any dissatisfaction with the Democratic Party as encouragement to not vote at best and overt support for Trump at worst.

I have every expectation that this will be the standard by which this rule is implemented.

Good. Apathy is a tool of the oppressors utilized on those who think they're being 'rebellious'.

Part of the reason we are in the mess we are in now is because participation in democracy is abysmal

No, the reason for the mess is a system deliberately designed to benefit a handful of people at the expense of the rest. Blaming those who don't participate in the system for the system is an absurd little act of mental gymnastics (as well as a service to the aforementioned handful of people, by buying in to the division they sow for the sake of distracting us from them, who are actually responsible).

Should people vote? If they want to. Will it change anything? No. Because the choice is an illusion, as is "democracy".

Perhaps if you actually let people have the conversation instead of shutting it down because confronting the actual depth of the problem makes you too uncomfortable, we might reach a point where we can be rid of this rigged system and build one that is actually "by the people, for the people", because that sure as fuck isn't the case at the moment. Maybe the real issue here is for you to consider with yourself why you're so invested in defending the status quo..

https://web.archive.org/web/20230803021951/https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/08/22/american-democracy-was-never-designed-to-be-democratic

https://libcom.org/article/capitalist-democracy-illusion-choice

https://truthout.org/articles/fascism-is-possible-not-in-spite-of-liberal-capitalism-but-because-of-it/

https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/10/14/liberalism-and-fascism-partners-in-crime/

E: having seen the example you've given, I'm outa here anyway, new rule or not, would love to know if you mod any other communities so that I can block those too. 👍

It’s certainly easy to support this move when it applies to “discouraging voting”, but it gets murkier for posts about “discouraging voting for a certain candidate”.

The example given was one seemingly implying “X is bad - but you think Y is better??” If the net implication is “don’t vote”, then the concern is valid, but if it’s “Vote for a third party, likelihood be damned”, it does sound more valid. That said, I have yet to see memes positively highlighting a valid third party from front runners.

I’d definitely like a return to elections where we decide which candidate is best, not which is least worse.

Objection!

The fundamental tenant...

See: Tenet (the word, not the movie).

can you give an example of the kind of post you are talking about?

In favor of this rule

Agree wholeheartedly. There's no good-faith reason you would ever try to convince someone to not vote. None.