I understand that wholeheartedly. But I personally refuse to be one of those people that sit back while everything deteriorates. When Hitler was elected a majority did nothing, but many chose resistance. I refuse to be the majority who live as cowards under fascism, so if that means I die resisting then so be it.
Comment on For my fellow Americans, when is enough enough?
swordgeek@lemmy.ca 1 month ago
I’m not an American, but I can’t help but notice something:
A clear majority elected Trump. Over 71 million Americans went out of their way to vote for him, saying “I am proud to be a Nazi.”
If you are going to fight (either figuratively or physically), then understand that a majority of the USA supports a fascist state.
erev@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Asafum@feddit.nl 1 month ago
I personally wish I could just leave, but most countries won’t accept a useless factory worker like myself… I’m quickly realizing this isn’t my country. This is a country of Nazis.
These are the people that hear complaints that the entire yard is covered in rakes, but until they step on one and have it smack them in the face then it isn’t a problem. I’m sick of living with selfish Nazis.
superkret@feddit.org 1 month ago
Hitler never even got close to a majority in any election. That’s the scary part about this: Trump didn’t even have to seize power, the population just handed it to him.
swordgeek@lemmy.ca 1 month ago
I don’t think you actually did get my point.
The fascists are the majority. The majority will do nothing because they chose this, and you - the people fighting fascism - are in the minority.
I’m not saying I disagree with you, but it is important to understand that your revolution is actually going against the will of the American people.
erev@lemmy.world 1 month ago
You’re right, but resistance is more than just revolution and even if everyone else is ok with living in 1984, I’m not. I know plenty of people who aren’t and I have a feeling the majority of the people where I live aren’t either (especially based on the voting data). Resistance to tyranny and injustice itself is just, and it can take many forms. Ideally yes there would be a revolution to remove the fascists from power and build something better, but that’s mostly lip service. I won’t lie, i was very frustrated when I wrote the post but in cooling down I am remembering that the resistance will have to start small and will have to grow. You’re welcome to see some of my other comments for what I’m talking about that isn’t revolution.
expr@programming.dev 1 month ago
In absolute terms, they aren’t the majority. 73m voted for him out of the 161m eligible voters in the US, or ~45% (Harris has ~43%). Still a frighteningly high number, but it also means it’s possible to find support for resistance, at least if things start to get bad enough. Unfortunately, there are a lot of Americans that like to think that politics don’t concern them and that we should just be apolitical. So they’re going to need a wake-up call first before they would lend their support. Trump will likely give it to them in short order as his fascist policies start to directly affect them.
Also, keep in mind that the total population (~334m as of 2023) is much larger than the population that is eligible to vote. There are many young people that are too young to vote now but still old enough to fight tyranny, former felons who are ineligible to vote but eager to fight oppressive systems, not to mention the scores of people not counted among eligible voters due to not being registered to vote, either through complacency/disillusionment (see above) or active sabotage and disenfranchisement by Republicans (and in many ways, you could say these are one in the same).
Fascists may have power and have won the popular vote, but it doesn’t mean it’s the will of the people. It means they’ve successfully gamed our very broken system. But real, average people living their lives will fight when the oppression comes to them. Maybe it will be too late, but maybe not. Revolution only needs a single spark.
Hildegarde@lemmy.world 1 month ago
71 million in a country of 262 million adults. 27% voted for fascism. 74 million voted for trump in 2020. This wasn’t a shit towards fascism, but the opposition party utterly failing to win voters.
The country has never been majority rule. Every modern election has split the country in thirds, about a third votes one way, a third votes the other and a third choses not to vote.
Over 70% of voting aged americans did not vote for trump.
superkret@feddit.org 1 month ago
And ~70% of eligible voters didn’t vote against Trump.
Goun@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
Wait, did Trump win with 27% of votes!? How do you still use this system?
superkret@feddit.org 1 month ago
No, he got >50% of all votes that were cast. The voting system wasn’t the problem this time, the voters were.
Hildegarde@lemmy.world 1 month ago
If the voters are the problem every time, the problem probably isn’t the voters, it’s probably the system. The US always has bad turnout.
swordgeek@lemmy.ca 1 month ago
No, that’s a misleading number.
27% of the entire eligible population voted for him. Less than that voted for Harris. About 45% of eligible voters didn’t bother.
So Trump got more than 50% of the popular vote, as well as the majority of seats. First past the poll is a terrible system, but it’s not the system that’s at fault here, it’s the voters.
HawlSera@lemm.ee 1 month ago
HE won the fucking Popular vote!?!?!
thesohoriots@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Tradition dear boy
GBU_28@lemm.ee 1 month ago
This isn’t even a system issue (FPTP, electoral college).
What you’re remarking on is the need for mandatory voting and a federal holiday on voting day
swordgeek@lemmy.ca 1 month ago
Unless you make voting mandatory, that will always be the case. Regardless, the split amongst non-voters is statistically likely to be the same as the people who actually voted. Consider the election to be an information poll, with a sample size of ~65% of the entire eligible population.
So with updated numbers, Trump got 72.5M out of ~240M eligible voters, so yeah you could say that 70% of the population didn’t vote for him. But then to be clear, you should also look at Harris’s 68M votes, and say that 72% of the population didn’t vote for her.
The people who mark and deposit their ballots are the only measure we have of the nation’s opinion, and in that contest a majority of the votes went to Trump.
Shanedino@lemmy.world 1 month ago
If literally everyone is forced to vote things actually lean more left. The way you force people to vote though can affected different socioeconomic groups differently so can have a wide range of effects.
normal_user@lemmy.one 1 month ago
You solution to people not voting is not to appeal more to those people but to force them ? lol
That would not move anything to the left. Democrats would feel free to go as right as they want knowing that the are the only big party that is not the Republicans.
I can already see it, they would spend sooooo much money to make any actual left party unable to compete, then they would shift as much to the right as possible, and then loose.
Dragonstaff@leminal.space 1 month ago
This is meaningless though.
You said “a clear majority voted for Trump”. In fact: a majority of Americans didn’t vote for a fascist. That is a good thing.
Neither did a majority of Americans vote for a milquetoast centrist, but I don’t expect anyone to take a great deal of comfort or pain in that fact.
db2@lemmy.world 1 month ago
It’s disappeared ballots and a bought electoral college.
DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 1 month ago
Not twenty million of them.
asdfasdfasdf@lemmy.world 1 month ago
We should give people tax breaks if they vote.
Hildegarde@lemmy.world 1 month ago
republicans do voter suppression and purge voter roles. victims of either of these practices would be punished with a larger tax burden. not ideal.
voting should be compulsory