jjjalljs

North Carolina already was a blood soaked stain on US legitimacy

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilmington_massacre

If the non-ramirez entity has any sort of offensive powers, trying to kill or restrain it might yield a worse outcome. Like, you try to tie up the one inside and it decides the cat is out of the bag, so it bursts out of its skin suit and strangles you.

They cannot do both! Time is finite.

So I guess they better not sleep or have other hobbies then, either, right? I don't think expecting maximum optimization is realistic.

It doesn’t matter because if we take direct action and prefigure mutual aid networks for improving our lives the state fucking collapses from its own contradictions.

Many people will suffer and die if the state collapses abruptly. Especially if it continues on the trajectory the right wing is aiming it right now. We should avoid the equivalent of an unsafe shutdown. We can do more than one thing at a time, especially when one of those things is "spend 15 minutes once a year voting against the store brand nazi". If you just forfeit on this front, people will be rounded up and disappeared because that's what won the election, and there are enough people that comply, and enough people that are eager for that. Voting won't magically fix everything, but it can act as harm reduction.

And yes even the little old ladies volunteering on food kitchens would be thousand times more valuable than doing election tables.

They can do both!

I’m not ignoring the real world at all. I’m saying that if we put the electioneering efforts into direct action, it won’t matter if someone else has the state.

In what way will it not matter if someone else controls the state?

It sounds like you're ignoring the real world when you say we should abandon elections and let our opponents take full control of the government. That will lead to incalculable tragedy.

I really don't think the little old ladies volunteering to run the tables are an untapped vanguard of the revolution, nor do I think that them spending an afternoon there is mutually exclusive with other activities.

You can't just ignore the world because you don't like it and expect it to conform to your desires. Laws and government exist. If you forfeit this front, the people who do put effort in will use these apparatuses to do real things in the real world. People on food stamps can't eat your idealism. (And programs like that are not mutually exclusive with mutual aid)

Oh maybe. I read that a long time ago but don't remember the details anymore.

I also get mad at people who drive cars instead of walking or taking mass transit, if that helps.

But someone smoking near you makes your day undeniably, immediately, worse.

If you're sitting in a room that smells uncomfortably of cheese, and someone rips a juicy fart on your face, it would be unreasonable to be like "who cares about my shart it smells like cheese in here"

Most people follow election results and those people's actions have real, discernable, effects. If you yield on this front, even if you think elections are flawed, you're letting your opponents have this power uncontested. That's a terrible strategy.

I'm not sure I follow. I was talking about what individuals should do: direct action and also voting. Voting is often just a few minutes for the end user.

I'm not talking about what the state should spend resources on.

People are emotional. They feel things, and then make up justifications for it afterwards. We all do this to some extent, in some contexts or others, but some people seem to do it the majority of the time.

Someone who smokes and has a choice between admitting they fucked up, they're hurting themselves and those around them, OR denying it so they're just a persecuted innocent? A lot of people will go for the latter. It's weakness and cowardice, but saying that won't change their mind. If results are wanted we have to do the very arduous task of massaging their emotions and I kind of resent that thankless, endless, work. Even though I almost certainly am the same way about other things.

Humans are a mess.

I meant the amount of effort it takes for the end user.

If we're going to talk about higher order levels of effort, then everything gets very expensive very quickly.

No single thing alone will fix the world. Voting alone won't fix it. Throwing a molotov alone won't fix it.

Voting (in many places, for many people) takes almost no effort. Go do it. But don't call it a day and think you've done everything you can do. Refusing to vote just yields one of the many fronts in this conflict without a fight.