Greek philosophers in 300 BC: Hey, so electoralism is a rigged game, because only wealthy and prestigious families have enough money to finance the popularity contest to get themselves or their puppet candidates elected.

Marxists in the 1800s: Electoralism is a rigged game. Capitalists stack every election with their puppets. Political power is subservient to economic power.

Liberals in the 2020s: No, electoralism has never worked. But it might work for us this time.
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[+] 17 points 1 year ago (3 children)
  • [–] 15 points 1 year ago

    I would argue the core issue is more fundamental. Liberalism holds the rights of private property as inviolable, thereby placing them beyond public debate. It's a system that establishes an economic structure where the critical decisions over resources and labor are made by the few who own the means of production. Such an arrangement is irreconcilable with any meaningful definition of democracy.

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  • [–] 11 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    I think I agree with you, but your messaging could use some work. I feel like most people who aren't already in the same groups as you might struggle with the terms you use. It might be simpler to say "capitalism corrupts democracy" because my original read of the post made it seem like its anti democracy.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago

    i suspect that "messaging" only works if you're sufficiently conservative.

    liberals and leftists alike agree (to different levels) that conservatives; especially maga; are less educated and entitled and that's why easy messaging slogans like "stop the steal" and "there are only 2 genders" works so well for them since it doesn't require them to get off their asses to do sufficientlyvigorous research to educate themselves on how that messaging oversimplifies the issue.

    also, liberals complain that the democratic party needs to improve it's messaging to broaden their appeal to american voters. the problem with this seems to be that that american voters share some degree of academic laziness when it comes to understanding the issues, but they're still generally more educated than maga so slogans don't work as well. you can see examples of this over and over again on social media when people complain that nobody "reads beyond the headlines."

    i'm learning that one of the key differences between leftists and liberals is the effort to self-educate with ANY kind of academic rigor (ie more than google searches) and doing so enables them to see past any sort of messaging and that most of the messaging that has been successfully adopted has been created by people with with a political agenda in mind.

    i think that pushing the democrats to improve their messaging is a misdirection because any messaging for liberals is going to automatically contradict the education any better educated crowd (compared to maga) has received.

    i also think that the biggest barrier for any liberal to understand why they're stuck in neo-liberal fascist late-stage capitalist world is doing their own research with SOME kind of academic rigor since it take A LOT of effort to not only change the way most of us have been taught to live, but also been educated and inculcated since birth.

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