Wanting an end to needless slaughter, healthcare and working equipment sounds reasonable. I am glad there are reasonable voices on Lemmy.

I am probably missing a lot of information on Israel, but continued learning is important. I recently learned about the USS Liberty incident in 1967. I am not sure how Israeli’s could mess up that bad. There are still individuals maintaining the incident was deliberate. Who knows? Troubling history abounds.

People have different reasons for being on Lemmy. Examples are looking to feel validated or to pick a fight. I think these folk also existed in ye olde times. Maybe the attention economy is amplifying specific behaviors that would not have been amplified in the olde times.

Being fair, I usually come to Lemmy to argue. I am probably part of the problem.

The vote is worthless outside of swing states. May as well vote your conscience when fptp and Electoral College enshrine disenfranchisement.

Informative. Well written. Seems like the short version of my Intro to American Politics class at Uni. I classified myself as a social democrat back then. I was told I would get more conservative when I was older. Now I classify myself as an anarchist. Not sure what went wrong.

I am grateful local debates are posted online. Instead of listening to music at work I listened to the debates. Living in a one party state is unfortunate. The opposition tends to have similar political convictions to the incumbent.

Agreed. Voting shouldn’t be the only activism we are involved in. My comment was about solidarity against the oligarchs that can decide to make life harder for people they deem icky.

Republicans and Democrats were unable to stop legislation from the Judiciary with Roe v. Wade and later Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. Super PAC’s donate multiple lifetimes of dollars to Presidential candidates in a quid pro quo system protected by the first amendment under Citizens United v. FEC. Americans outside the oligarchy will never exhibit their influence.

If oligarchs find your existence icky, they have the power to remove your “right” to exist. You lack the power to prevent it. Instead of thanking anyone, I suggest we take the power back. Punch up.

Becoming familiar with other ideas is beneficial. There is nothing wrong with being a Democrat, Social Democrat or Libertarian. Real people hold these political ideas. My transition over years was Democrat since I opposed hawkish Republican imperialism, but I rejected corporate power, so Social Democrat, but I rejected hierarchical power, so Anarchist. Through reading I know Pacifism meshes with any of these ideas. I have never been a Pacifist, but I applaud anyone that takes the time to explore politics even if we do not agree.

Being able to have conversations with people around you is important. Reading theory from other politics helps. Most people around me consider themselves conservative. They say talking points like “I’m for small government”. Having read Libertarian texts like Nozick’s “Anarchy, State and Utopia”, I can discuss the minimal state as a Libertarian idea. I can then transition to “Nozick’s minimal state is not small enough”. In my area this approach opens conversation more than banging a drum about being a Democrat, Leftist, Communist or Anarchist.

Learning to explain math to a computer has been a major blessing.