It’s educate, AGITATE, organize
edit: putting this at the top so people understand the basis for this:
You may well ask: “Why direct action? Why sit ins, marches and so forth? Isn’t negotiation a better path?” You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent resister may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word “tension.” I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.
Except foreign affairs, it would seem.
Damn, you want us to go to war with Hamas AND Israel? I thought we were done with nation-building.
Or is what you mean “We should make a show of opposing fascism in Gaza”? In which case the only difference between your position and Biden’s is one of degrees.
We we certainly shouldn’t be supplying material support for an active genocide, that seems like a pretty obvious red flag to most people. Going to war ourselves is a stretch, but not obstructing an ICC arrest warrant and recognizing Palestinian statehood at the UN seem like other common-sense positions that fall well short of going to war, but what do I know about what it is you think?
So material support for an active genocide (a lot of qualifiers there) is your absolute line? If any presidential candidate crosses that line, you won’t work with them against literal fascists?
Why are you posing this as a binary? I can BOTH work with them against literal fascists AND agitate them to drop support for a literal fascist. Voting is such a small part of this picture, and it’s also the only part of it that’s binary.
That’s what I’m doing. But you’ve openly stated that your position’s purpose is to create a crisis in Biden’s election which will force him to either capitulate to your demands or lose.
That’s nothing less than a statement that failure to capitulate to your demands is worth condemning all of us to fascism.
Voting is an IMPORTANT part of this picture, and the key to stop fascism from taking over in the next six months. There’s so much else that needs to be done - but right now, fascism is banging on the door.
I’ve also openly stated that I think Biden can’t win with this position (his polling is at least not evidence against that theory), regardless of what I’m doing here. I think his only route to victory is about-facing (I also think it’s an extremely important issue in its own right that deserves agitation over).
He has 6 months to win and the convention is still a few months away, fingers crossed that he gets the message.
I think you overestimate the importance of this issue to the electorate, and you overestimate how left-wing the American electorate is.
I think you under-estimate how unpopular supporting the genocide would be, if only Biden wasn’t actively denying it happening and that message wasn’t being suppressed (let alone being communicated from Biden and congress themselves)
I think we have a pretty good cross-section of where we disagree.
Because his arguments fall apart instantly if you don’t accept the false dichotomy upon which they rest.