#yall can act like throwing your vote away in protest is the same thing as a boycott all you want

[swiftiefirefighters]

tired of election discourse can we just vote already and be done with it

[biestcallisto]

Nobody here is saying that you shouldnt vote or fuck voting, but dont come here and act as if youre an expert on the subject when you yourself admitted you dont know enough about american politics, yet you choose and feel comfortable enough to give your 2 cents on that matter and to police others on how to organize in america, while being completely isolated from these issues all the way in germany. 3/

This is going to be the only one of your messages I am going to answer. Because in others you simply misquote me or are so agitated that you misunderstand me. Yes, people do say “dont vote” or “Fuck voting”. That is the entire point I disagree with. I did not say “Rioting doesn’t solve anything”. Let me make it more clear. Rioting is a fist. In order for the fist to be effective you also need a voice. Protesters are a voice. In order to be heard, you need an ear. Elected representatives are an ear. That’s why one should always ALSO use their other voice. The voice in the ballot box. At best: GET ELECTED. That’s even better, especially if there is no reasonable ear on the ballot box. I am not undervaluing protests or riots. If you ask nicely without showing you have a capable fist, no motherfucker in charge is going to listen. Those are important and should be kept up. Also important: Information. There is a great article about policing on medium called Confessions of a former Bastard Cop. Educating oneself and others is just as important as a protest. The protest doesn’t change anyone's mind if “anyone” isn’t provided with information about WHY you protest and what solutions you propose to solve the problem. A protest is saying “THIS is a problem”. That is important. Also important is finding a solution for the problem AND sharing the information about the solution so that others stand with you to solve the problem.

In short: Not only are there multiple ways to approach a large systemic problem. The people need to walk ALL the multiple ways.

*Multiple paths need to be walked in order to achieve progress.*

Multiple- like protests, riots, education (aka sharing information) and also voting.

You need the elected people to change legislation and laws. You also need people to protest, to say “this is a problem”. You also need people who provide solutions. You need people who share the solutions so that they’re widely known. And in some communities you need to burn down a police station. I never said “oh don’t burn down a police station”. YOU know YOUR community better than any outsider. I wouldn’t burn down MY police station, because in my country police (although ALSO with racism and brutality problems, US ain’t that special, we are not free and totally separated from your problems. It’s just less bad) is vastly different from the police in the US. But if my police would start killing people every year without consequence I would reconsider my stance about MY police station. I won’t tell YOU what to do with yours. Because YOU know YOUR police in YOUR community. With community I mean your neighbourhood, not your whole country (though it seems more problematic the bigger the city is)

The problem with American elections is imho that yall are so focused on the presidential election. That’s just one guy in a whole system though. You should vote for your senators, governors, mayors and fucking school board. You should always always always vote. As long as you’re able. I get it might be hard depending on your socio-economic status and I wouldn’t judge you if you’re poor and going to an election would mean losing a paycheck. That’s pretty shitty of America but not the fault of an individual. (I wouldn’t judge anyone for not voting. I just think it’s a mistake to NOT use this tool) Let’s take a look at Obama. Oh wow, a black president, racism solved. Meanwhile he was a shitty president who either couldn’t do good things because congress and senators or whatev was Republican dominated. These Republicans could stop everything and simply because he was black, they stopped as many good things as they could. On the same time he WAS passing bad legislations as well. These the Republicans let happen. If back then all of you would have voted a different congress in, with progressives in like AOC or Ilhan Omar (sorry if that name is wrong) and less Reps, Obama might have done more good things and less bad things. I remember yall used to have a term for presidents with their hands tied because of congress: lame duck. Why was Trump able to do so many shitty things? Because congress and whatev is still dominated by the Reps. Please, keep putting the pressure on. But *also*: VOTE. And btw, if you don’t like the two party system? Build the Third party via ALL minor elections. Put the Third party in mayor offices and then you have a chance to break the two party system. ONLY then. Not by only voting for a president. Vote always WHILE protesting and sharing information.

And fucking abolish ICE too.

PS: A large problem is only solved with multiple diverse tools. One tool is a protest. One tool is a riot. One tool is burning down a police station. One tool is sharing education. One tool is elections. Do not throw any of these tools away just because you think another tool is more effective. Yes, protests ARE effective. But yall.... Americans are always acting as if the people in elected positions are different from yall. They’re not. They are supposed to REPRESENT YALL. They often don’t and they themselves think they’re different and better than yall cause they got money. There are initiatives to get money out of politics. I’m sure there are also initiatives to make lobbyism for transparent or even stop it. For fucks sake, abolish and defund police and ICE. But also get money out of politics and fucking vote whenever you’re allowed.

They made LAWS to forbid people from voting. You get in prison and are not allowed to vote anymore. You get out of prison and still are not allowed to vote and most of these are BLACK people or other people of color. Why? Because they want YOU to NOT vote. Imho it should be your moral duty to vote for anyone who isn’t allowed anymore. They hate minorities voting. That’s why they target black people and poor people.

So there’s the system basically stopping as many black and poor people from voting as it can. And then there’s you ALSO telling black and poor people to not vote. Great.

If you can, DO BOTH. Protest and vote. Riot and vote. Educate and vote.