In my country here's how it works:

0. Parties provides free food and transport to unemployed masses they know will vote for them
1. Wait 3-4 hours in queue at polling station to receive ballot in person
2. Drop ballot in secure box
3. Go back to work for a few days
4. See on election day that the party that spent the most on voter courting wins

How would you propose we deal with this when people who are working (and can't take a day off to go vote) would come out in much smaller numbers than ones that have nothing else to do (and get free lunch and transit to and from the polling stations) and even when voting happens on a weekend you have to trade your only time off to go and vote out of the goodness of your heart.

I think this is one of the reasons for digital voting - I'd much rather be able to vote from work or home or anywhere when I don't have the time to sit on a queue for 5 hours just to have my vote diminished by a group that isn't politically active but loves a free lunch and something to do

I mean you could have asked why Israel attacks refugee camps in the first place (even before Hamas)?

Or do you think that atrocities like "women and children were stripped, lined up, photographed and then slaughtered by automatic fire" doesn't breed resentment? (not that Hamas didn't do the same on 7.11 but let's not pretend Israel isn't at least as complicit as Hamas in the overall conflict)

I'll admit using civilians as shields is indeed dreadful - but my main point is acknowledging that violence only breeds more violence and that the first step to preventing more deaths is dismantling the current terror state form of Israel, not killing more and more civilians as some form of extirpation..

I'll leave you with this - if there's no oppressor to rally against, what would give Hamas power?

I mean you came in swinging with the whole "but why is Hamas holding hostages in a refugee camp" line which is actual whataboutism when the thread is about the IDF killing over 200 people.

Why not ask why the IDF doesn't have procedures in place to prevent civilian casualties? Why not ask why is it impossible to send ground troops instead of carpet bombing Gaza? Why not ask why does Hamas exist in the first place? Is there a single thing you'll admit the IDF/Israel has done wrong that isn't somehow the fault of Hamas?

Your lack of humanity was already showing, but I didn't think you'd be so unable to retort that you'd just forfeit the debate..

You accuse me of whataboutism then you just use it yourself.

Yes, I don't think Hamas should be using human shields but I also don't think Israel should be settling land even before the partitioning of Palestine. (I mean the idea of a foreign state partitioning land they don't inhabit is insane, but let's ignore that for the sake of argument)

How do you not see using civilian encampments as a makeshift human wall just as immoral?

And we can play the whole who started it first game as much as we want but it doesn't negate the fact that even after unfavorable borders for Palestine were established - settlers continued to take over land with the support of the IDF - where is the defense in burning homes and expelling Palestinians from land not even within the borders of Israel?? (oh but it was contested territory you see so that gives us the right to massacre people, yes I am very intelligent...)

Saying Hamas is the reason the IDF is killing civilians completely misses the history of the struggle - what's next the Nakba was also Hamas' fault then?

So then would you hold Israel to the same standard of using human shields that you do Hamas?

If so would you claim the Hamas attacks on the 7th were justified because they attacked settler towns like Be'eri, whose ideological purpose of existing this close to Gaza was specifically to create a civilian border (literal large scale human shield)?

Using civilians to protect any military objective (including the land you've settled by force) is appalling - but let's not pretend only one side is doing it.

If you really care about peace - petition your leaders for a one state solution where both Israelis and Palestinians (no matter their religion) are allowed to coexist and are equal in the eyes of the law and the people.

I really shouldn't have to keep justifying myself to you but I do own personal property to have a place to live..

Here we're not talking about kicking your grandma out of her single bed flat and onto the street - the main argument is that individuals that already have disproportionately more than others - should distribute it instead of hoarding more and more (especially to ones impacted by historic land grabs) - as in do you genuinely think it's fair for one individual to own 250,000 times more land than the average person?

Land should be shared as much as possible not being an "investment" to hoard. That's why I'm also against inheritance and have been looking into how to give away the land I'm supposed to inherit (as nobody should ever really own more than one property)

If someone asked you to give back the land you own for free, you'd fight tooth and nail to prevent it.

As these are words you are trying to put in my mouth - I can only assume it's your stance on the issue, in which case if you claim to not be hypocritical then you have to admit to also supporting Palestine's right to land sovereignty, right? And one could argue their claim is more valid as they weren't the ones that explicitly took the decision to appropriate somebody else's land by force.

Also I'm not even from the US but because like most countries, mine has had a history of both being occupied and occupying other people's land - I am a supporter of a no borders policy, inheritance abolishment and wealth redistribution, starting from the ones that have extracted the most and giving to the ones that have been exploited the most (and I'm more than willing to distribute my fair share)

Which is why I am actively doing everything in my power to "fix a wrong" both domestically (supporting immigrants and locals and fighting for land reform policies) and internationally (pressuring governments to stop engaging in colonial practices)

So "If you won't deal with it, they shouldn't have to either." doesn't even apply here but I'd still warn against that kind of thinking as a certain "nationalist" used very similar rhetoric to claim that if the US were allowed to put native Americans in internment camps, so was he...

Nah - i want both the west and Israel to pay reparations and return as much of the land as possible (not just some nature reserves as pittance) while also apologizing and commemorating the ones that have been displaced.

I wasn't around when the native American genocide was happening to "disallow" the outcome - but i sure can do something about the one going on right now instead of throwing my hands up and going "well same thing happened with slavery, so I guess we should just sit around and do nothing" while crying "hypocrisy!" - just because bad things occurred in the past isn't an excuse to keep doing bad things in the future...

Yes.

That's the main issue with colonial-settler states - they colonize the land (via terror and extermination) and then settle either in borders they've drawn up (or even outside if there's not enough resistance)

Using past native American genocide to justify the current native Levant genocide isn't the trump card you think it is...

And we can go on a whole debate around "oh but other states got to establish their borders this way in the past - why doesn't Israel get to do the same?" - because we're supposed to be more civilized by now and understand that killing people to take their land is an extremely inhumane and reductionist point of view.

The whole phrasing around "a land without people for people without a land" is the same native population erasing shit the European settlers used to colonize the Americas.

If Israel wants to be a brutal colonial state - it gets to decide that - but at least be honest and don't pretend it has some sort of divine right to do so while expecting to not be met with resistance.

If Israel really wanted a land for its people (while not infringing on the rights of Arabs already living there) they could have assimilated into the already existing population where they are just one of the people living on that territory and not gone for the nuclear option of total dominion over everyone else.

Which is why Israel is so afraid of Hamas and the general resistance - because it understands the world from a dominator-dominee perspective - they cannot envision a world where somebody doesn't try and take over Israel in return for them doing the same. Since if "every country exists because of terrorism" then the Arabs have as much right to terror and conquest as anyone else - but I doubt you would you defend their rights to do as fervently as Israel's....

So instead a much less bloody way forward would be to work on dismantling borders for the benefit of everyone instead of stockpiling more and more guns while waiting for the inevitable boom...

isn't it weird how the internet just went "mj fox has a debilitating brain disease?" - "Le lol"

nobody is cheering for the "good guys" - but when one side is actively displacing the other and your response is to just let it happen because of both sides being bad it loses the nuance of the conflict and the people just living there. especially when we're on a thread about one side asking about a military ceasefire in exchange for the only leverage it has - while the other refuses and actively chooses to continue it's current onslaught.

if you actually care about lives you wouldn't argue pedantic points about which side commits war crimes but instead influence policy towards there being less war crimes in general. (maybe starting from the ones causing the most damage..)

mf you say this:

Russia can end this war tomorrow. Any and all deaths are on them. Hell, if Russia would just stay out of their neighbours business, there would have been no civil war in the first place.

but then blame Palestinians for defending themselves - so kidnapping settlers is a war crime - but ethnically cleansing and bombing children isn't?

so if I came into your house, squatted in your living room and locked you up in your closet - it's your fault if you break out and attack me? most sane warcock guzzler ever...

Also by saying the only option in case of systematic collapse is the emergence of right wing authoritarianism what you're implying is that you'd much rather wait for that to happen than to create a left wing environment now that can establish itself in the power vacuum - to me this shows that you have so little faith in yourself that you would much rather do nothing and just let the right wingers trample you over and over - no wonder things keep sliding right when even so called leftists think they're such massive losers.

The famous change within the system - please tell me more about where that has led us - surely in the direction of more transparency and democracy right? definitely and not just pushing the needle further and further right.

But hey keep swimming in the pot and telling the other frogs that the water may be getting warmer but you know at least the cook hasn't burned us alive yet...

That's why you should start building an alternative system that isn't right-wing instead of just voting for Hitler^lite - by choosing the lesser of two evils election after election you will always be actively choosing evil - that may be fine for you but it sure isn't fine by me - and saying that any alternative is too idealistic means that you've already given up.

Trump is truly awful but let's not pretend that police haven't arrested students at pro-Palestine encampments without solid grounds under Biden either - sure vote for Biden now to mitigate the biggest calamity that is Trump - but it just signals to the dems that so long as they're a smidge left of neo-Hitler they'll get voted for.

And if you really think Joe will listen to protestors about the genocide after he's in office, that's what I call naïve idealistic thinking....

even if joe wins this time - next time it's gonna be worse - that's why the lib dems nowadays are holding policy views similar to moderate conservatives of the past - like fucking Reagan of all people signed the immigration reform act to give 3 million immigrants legal status - and now we've got joey being hounded by conservatives for trying to do something similar..

don't take this as an excuse to call me a russian/chinese/4chan or w/e else "bot" for trying to get people to think rationally about the trajectory of US politics - fucking vote for biden for all I care - but more importantly - take to the streets, toss a fucking shoe at his head - just don't think you're "doing your part" by voting once every 4 years for the marginally less genocidal power tripping fuckwit - like how can you expect them to do anything if they know you'll vote for them no matter what? how is that any different than the maga zealots?

it's not about one-topic voting - its about the very obvious slow slide into authoritarianism - because nobody is willing to do anything to disrupt the status quo - and frankly it's kind of disgusting to say the more "ethical" choice is letting a proxy state massacre children because the opposition will massacre them more. that's not progress, that's just pretending to wash you hands off the blood you'll never have to experience firsthand...

What if it was so small and light it was only electrons? And what if it accrues its value from the energy expended to create it? Maybe using some sort of cypher to ensure anyone could verify it? Idk maybe we're onto something..

then again it still syphons value to the top so maybe not...

Mf that's why I'm saying both are forms of capitalism - you're the one claiming Russia isn't a capitalist state...

So a state and oligarchs amassing capital isn't capitalism but monopolic corporations amassing capital is?

that's why OP was suggesting we subsidize home (and I'd add allotment) gardens - give people money to plant food and flowers and they'll be better of f both physically and mentally.