I'm suddenly reminded of how the Hegseth administration has implemented a policy of double-tapping unarmed civilian boats and purging the US military of anyone who objects.

Here's the thing. If you read what I rant about, you'll know I suggest plenty of positive shit. Depending on my mood, okay, I'm not perfect 😆

Frankly, I believe that surviving and thriving in the future of the West is going to mean building community networks, building mutual aid groups, building resilient non-governmental structures to meet people's needs in the absence, neglect, or open hostility, of government structures.

I believe everyone's time and energy is best spent on that work.

I believe every dollar and every minute spent on trying to reform government through the electoral process is wasted time and money at best and actively contributing to the collapse of civil society at worst.

And I think every driven, passionate activist, every person who sees the problems with society and tries to fix them by putting the right candidates in office, could do so much more good for the people around them by unionizing workplaces, or fundraising for community organizations, or a hundred other things - hell, if I walked out and picked up one piece of litter off the street, I'd have more of an impact on my community than every vote you've ever cast in your life put together has had on yours.

And honestly, I know a lot of those people, and it hurts to see all these amazing people pissing their time and energy away trying to help one billionaire win a popularity contest against another.

Trying to reform democracy from within is like walking into a crooked casino and imagining you can win if you pick the right machine to play and spend enough money playing it. All the machines are rigged. The only winner is the house.

And that's completely independent of my moral objections to a system based on, essentially, the tyranny of the majority.

So yeah, I'm going to come here, to a community called "notvoting", and talk about not voting and what people could do instead. Because it hurts to see so many good people's efforts go to waste.

So the thing about accelerationism, when it comes to voting, is: in order to deliberately vote to make things worse, you have to believe your vote matters.

I don't believe my vote matters.

I'm not an accelerationist. I don't think it's a good idea to deliberately drive the United States into the ground, hoping to trigger collapse and revolution, in the belief that something better might rise from the ashes. The history of revolutions is ugly and bloody and very rarely beneficial to the majority of human beings involved.

But frankly? I think a collapse and a revolution is coming. I think if we avoid it, it'll be because the American government employs tools of repression, surveillance, and social control more extensive than any in previous history. I think both of those options are horrible. And I don't think anything I do is going to make one damn bit of difference to the outcome.

I'm in the United States. I'm not going to bullshit about politics in other countries when I don't know the facts on the ground on more than a surface level.

Should I quit posting until someone comes along who can knowledgeably post about other countries?

Or confine myself to discussions about electoralism in theory instead of ranting about the examples that I know and hate in practice?

Not being sarcastic. These are not rhetorical questions. I can rant about political bullshit anywhere - you're the host here and it's polite to follow your rules. What do you want me to do to make this community more like what you want it to be?