Incrementalist policies could have worked if we started decades ago. We’re now at the point where it’s become a catastrophe in progress. The best we’re hoping for at this point is mitigating the disaster if we were to make big changes starting now. It’s kind of all or nothing at this point. Either we do what’s necessary or we don’t.
The article acknowledges the administrations failures and says that activists need to “hold his feet to the fire” … by voting for him unconditionally? People who take this stance have no concept of power. They think that they can get the government to do what they want simply by writing strongly worded letters and going to the occasional conflict-free protest to hold up signs and then go home.
If you’re not serious enough about the problem to break away from civil politics and lesser evilism,then we’re doomed. At some point people need to start breaking things.
If you want to break the system, you have to built an organization strong enough to do that. Right now that just does not exist in the US. However Biden does some good work and even more importantly he is much less likely to actually fight the build up of such an organization. So in a swing state he is worth voting for. However in none swing states that is a different matter. There voting for say the Green Party is an option.
One thing is also extremely important. Climate change does not have a single tipping point. Reducing emissions is always a good idea, even if the policy is too slow. It does hurt the fossil fuel industry, which makes it easier to fight them. It also reduces the harm.
However this idea of everything but a revolution is not worth doing is just plain and simply ignorant of history. Revolutions do not create something new, the change the balance of power. So you need the bones of the next system to be ready and the strength to have a revolution. Both of those are much much much easier to do under Biden.
I agree we need to get organized to make this happen, but I’d push back on the idea that Biden/Democrats would be somehow more amenable to the development of movements that have genuine power to change things.
Just some of the concerning things to have happened with Democratic support in recent history:
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They’ve continued to expand the military, which aside from being one of the major sources of pollutants is also a tool to secure more oil/resources and when needed, push back against the protests of the masses and any of the other consequences of climate change like mass migration.
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They’ve continued to expand the surveillance state, both in capabilities and by eroding legal protections to privacy/security such as attempts to get companies to give them back door access to people’s secure devices, attacks on encryption, etc.
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When faced with a choice about how to respond to police violence, they decided to support the police.
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They’ve labeled left wing activists, including climate activists, as potential domestic terrorists.
People talk about how electing someone like Trump would slide us into fascism as if they can’t see the infrastructure of fascism being built before our eyes. It’s not really a matter of revolution being easier or harder under democrats or republicans. The establishment will push back against challenges to the system with violence regardless.
Admittedly I’m less familiar with the specifics on the gradual climate change argument, but to my understanding, it seems like there are some things that would make it very difficult to go back from once we let them happen. Various positive feedback loops. Major shortages of water, arable land, and food causing mass displacement. More frequent and intense disasters like storms and wild fires will present major disruptions to organized human life that will make it more difficult for us to build the infrastructure we need to solve our problems. Etc.
If we do a few small things, but ultimately fail to stop the world from getting to that point in time, are we not still doomed? Scientists have been sounding the alarm bells about this my whole lifetime. Through 2 republican and democratic administrations. And the problem has only gotten worse. It’s borderline suicidal to put any faith in the system that has continued to fail to address the greatest crisis of our time for that long.
Even if want to pretend that things get better under democrats and worse under republicans, the very fact that our system is built in such a way that allows for such frequent and profound losses of progress is a critical failure of it. To consider this another way: What would you do if Trump wins? Let him do what he wants for 2-4 years and hope you’ll be able to do something next election? Adhering to the rules of the system is killing us. You can’t play nice when the stakes are this high.
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If you want to break the system, you have to built an organization strong enough to do that. Right now that just does not exist in the US.
Sure it does. What do you think Republicans are actively doing right fucking now?
Oh, you meant break the system for a positive outcome…?
Yes. You can’t seriously say that “Biden is the genocide candidate but that’s better than the uber genocide candidate” and then say that you’re happy with the system. A system that offers you those choices is already broken, the only thing that remains is to build the best successor you can.
The problem with this ‘break the system’ accelerationist idea is that none of y’all have ever seen what really happens when the system breaks. I’ve known someone that lived through the genocide in Bosnia; that’s what happens when a system has a total breakdown. It’s not people suddenly joining hands and singing Kumbaya around a camp fire.
Rojava.
EZLN.
Cheran, Mexico.
I could go on.
The project of building the new in the shell of the old is not accelerationist, it is decelerationist.
Edit: also bold to try to scare me with the prospect of a genocide. Our functioning society would never do a genocide am I right? Or maybe the scary prospect is a genocide at home, but Foucault’s boomerang means that’s coming anyway. My interest is in making structures that will keep society functioning whilst the empire crumbles.
Good job naming small cities.
Now try naming any country of more than 10M people where this idea of burning it all down and starting over has worked without also creating 50+ years of deep civil unrest and violence.
Bosnia and Herzegovina’s population is about 3.2 million, Rojava is estimated at around 2 million and the EZLN’s region has over 5 million, but now according to you I need a single contiguous example bigger than 10 million, which is more than most countries.
Why? I assume because you’re so scared of change that you’d rather content yourself with voting for slightly less genocide than consider the alternatives, and the best way to do that is to grab the goalposts and walk off with them.
And again, I’m not talking about burning things down, I’m talking about building alternatives. Let me know if you’re at all curious to understand what I mean by that.
Also, please keep downvoting all my comments. It makes your argument look so superior, it’s devastating.
If you’re not serious enough about the problem to break away from civil politics and lesser evilism,then we’re doomed. At some point people need to start breaking things.
I agree, although my concept of breaking things is working outside the system to undermine it and render it irrelevant, and to build something better now in spite of it.
I don’t know if voting or not voting for dems even matters at this point, because the worse their opponents get the more they use that as an excuse not to try. I don’t think they even care to win, so I don’t think threatening not to vote for them works.In about a decade the dem approach shifted from “hope & change” to “get a load of this idiot”. I think they’re basically saying the quiet part loud now, that electoral politics doesn’t represent regular people so it doesn’t have to appeal to them.
(Edit because libs are gonna get mad that I said voting isn’t important. Here libs: vote as far left as you realistically can, which in the US means voting for Biden. I vote for my preferred enemy and giving the Dems more opportunities to disappoint people will radicalise them further left. Are you happy? I said vote for Biden. No of course you’re not happy because I didn’t say to vote for the reasons you like even though that literally doesn’t matter which is the point of forcing people to vote strategically.)
So this is really where we’re at. Team Biden is really going to take the HRC 16 strat of just fucking giving up on promising anything meaningful and going “what are you going to do, vote for that Bozo?”
That’s a bold strategy, Cotton.
They haven’t done that though. What I’ve seem instead is a steady and ongoing rollout of good policy, even if it’s not yet enough.
Thanks for sharing that. Biden’s done a lot of things I agree with, I was actually pretty impressed with him until the Palestinian genocide. I wish that this is what the Biden camp was talking about. Instead, all of the messaging seems to be “the economy is fine, actually, you’re complaining about nothing” or “well, at least he’s not Trump”, and I don’t think that kind of messaging will carry the day.
That’s absolutely not what they are doing. Biden has delivered on a lot of his promises and done a great job.
If you are still bOtH sIdInG after you’ve seen the damage Trump had done, you are beyond reason.
I’m not both siding. I’m in disbelief that in an election as important is this one, the democrats have decided that the best strategy they can use is “you don’t really have a choice, you have to vote for me because I’m not Trump.” Which, at best, has a track record of a 50% success rate, and arguably has a 0% success rate. I say 0% because, the way I remember it, that wasn’t the strategy the Biden camp ran with in '20; they hadn’t forgot that people actually did vote for Trump before. This was basically HRC’s messaging in 16, “suck it up, vote blue no matter who, because, I mean, are you really going to vote for that Bozo?” And they found out the answer to that question the hard way. I don’t want the democrats to learn already learned lessons at the expense of the entire country. It just feels like they’re playing stupid games for themselves to win stupid prizes for everyone.
- Genocide in Gaza.
Really don’t have to keep giving reasons for not voting for Biden after that. That is a full-stop so not vote for this guy type of thing.
You do realize that Joe Biden isn’t president of Israel?
You do realize we are supplying weapons for Israel to continue its genocide, right?
You do realize we sell weapons to most of the world? Is Joe responsible for every gun fired ever?
I don’t even know why I’m engaging with this, you’re clearly either a troll or a bad faith actor.
Keep with the absurd arguments. 👍
And then call me a troll. 🙄
troll
So you’ll vote for trump, who will worsen the outlook in Palestine and Gaza in LITERALLY EVERY SINGLE WAY he can?
Biden’s fighting with Bibi, trump will encourage him. It’s not the binary you think it is.
No, you dumbass, I will not vote for Trump. Is reading comprehension entirely gone? Tell me where I said I was going to vote for Trump.
It is possible to vote for someone else.
Biden is fighting Bibi is patiently untrue. The weapons keep getting sent.
so…? you won’t vote biden, and you say you won’t vote trump. why are you pissing and moaning about it all so much if you’re just gonna sit around with your thumb up your ass DOING NOTHING?
jfc get a grip
Your dumb ass replied to me. I was talking to someone else. Why are you wasting my time?
you piss and moan about how bad it is and only want to make things worse.
Do you know anyone with diabetes? Statistically speaking, you do, even if you don’t know you know.
Biden’s capped their insulin at $35, instead of the unlimited bullshit americans were struggling with FOR THEIR VERY LIVES.
Happy to enumerate a bunch of others but that alone should make anyone feel better about choosing biden because trump literally doesn’t believe there’s a climate emergency - he’s said on record day one he will open up drilling to everyone.
I’m not asking you to like Biden, I’m asking you to admit, there are a number of issues where it’s STARK which options we face when we choose who we vote for.
Sure this is a piece of shit, but that other piece of shit is worse!
Democracy is not dying, it was dead when this kind of thinking became the norm.
Kick all these geriatric fucks out and let people vote for someone they want, not a party.
On the contrary, I would suggest it’s voting for people that’s the problem. People should vote for parties and their policies, not some face you like or dislike.
Consider that anything short of great means the end of human life on earth.
Vote for Democrats = ehh they could clearly do a lot more but at least they aren’t constantly making things worse.
Vote for republicans = constantly making things worse for some inexplicable reason.
The explication is it makes a handful of influential people very rich, and they think they’ll die before the direst consequences of their actions manifest.
Ah, the race to the bottom
We’ve got 6 years left before it gets to the point where the climate crisis is all we talk about.
I’ve seen it before and it goes a little something like…
Yeah, just thinking about it gives me nightmares
Oil and gas protects us from the environment.
Removed by mod
Ah, great, another vote for the piece of shit because the other guy is worse. Winning move, Democrats!
Every citizen has a minimum quota of coal they have to burn or pay a tax
Quantify that.
Then we can talk.
