this post was submitted on 14 Feb 2024
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Political Memes

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The fundamental tenet of a working democracy is voting. Everyone should have a vote and everyone should exercise their right to vote. To that end we have been seeing posts attempting to shame/mock or otherwise influence people not to vote. While this is a meme community, the idea that people shouldn’t vote goes against the fundamentals of a democracy by the people and for the people. To that end, we are adding a new rule that disallows posts that discourage or shame people from voting. This doesn’t mean that you can’t address how people vote, but even those who don’t agree with you and your political views should still vote. We all should. Everyone. Part of the reason we are in the mess we are in now is because participation in democracy is abysmal. Posts discouraging people from voting are essentially propaganda and will be removed.

PoliticalMemes is a community for having fun at the expense of our political hellscape we find ourselves in. People not voting is a big part of why.

We are taking feedback on this change, please let us know if you agree or disagree in the comments and why.

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[–] ptz@dubvee.org 24 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Agree wholeheartedly. There's no good-faith reason you would ever try to convince someone to not vote. None.

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[–] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 19 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Centrist Democrats love to interpret any dissatisfaction with the Democratic Party as encouragement to not vote at best and overt support for Trump at worst.

I have every expectation that this will be the standard by which this rule is implemented.

[–] Grayox@lemmy.ml 7 points 10 months ago (1 children)

You can criticize and make jokes about 46 without discouraging voter turnout. They are just alot harder than making em about 45 who jokes write themselves.

[–] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 8 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Of course I can. That doesn't stop centrist Democrats from making accusations in bad faith because they want to silence criticism.

[–] Pan_Ziemniak@midwest.social 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Funny, i see much more bitching about nonexistent centrist dems than actual centrist dems on here. What i do see a lot of is apologists expaining why discussing the merits of not voting is actually for the best and not playing directly into the kremlins plans.

[–] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 0 points 10 months ago

Thank you for the demonstration.

[–] TokenBoomer@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

This rule will result in a slippery slope where any post critical of Biden will be be removed, resulting in an echo chamber of like-minded individuals with little engagement and discourse. It has the potential to stifle and eventually kill the community.

[–] Spiralvortexisalie@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago

Seriously any criticism of Biden and the clowns come out to tell me I should fear Trump is gonna accomplish everything he wants on day one, but Biden can’t do most of what he promised because? You ask for a third party and get accused of dissuading voters from voting. I see Biden “supporters” calling him Hitler lite, and asking well if not Biden then who? Like believing the DNC tale is exactly how these clowns can make someone as unpalatable as Biden seem decent. And the best part is they will always say its no competition and I should be happy for the crumbs of the promises Biden kept because in contrast you better believe Trump is gonna keep all his promises 🙄🤣🤣🤣

[–] Katana314@lemmy.world 15 points 10 months ago

It’s certainly easy to support this move when it applies to “discouraging voting”, but it gets murkier for posts about “discouraging voting for a certain candidate”.

The example given was one seemingly implying “X is bad - but you think Y is better??” If the net implication is “don’t vote”, then the concern is valid, but if it’s “Vote for a third party, likelihood be damned”, it does sound more valid. That said, I have yet to see memes positively highlighting a valid third party from front runners.

I’d definitely like a return to elections where we decide which candidate is best, not which is least worse.

[–] TokenBoomer@lemmy.world 12 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Not voting is a vote of no confidence.

similar deliberative body indicate that they no longer support a leader, government,etc.

Voting is a choice. Not voting is a choice. If you take away the choice of not voting, while only allowing two candidates that a vast majority of Americans don’t want, then can you really call it a democracy?

If voting is important to you, then it would serve the community better if the suggestion of not voting was discussed and denounced in the community itself. That is the purpose of social forums, to discuss ideas.

A forum is a public meeting place for open discussions. This rule is the policing of thought, and the antithesis of a forum.

[–] ElectroVagrant@lemmy.world 6 points 10 months ago (3 children)

If voting is important to you, then it would serve the community better if the suggestion of not voting was discussed and denounced in the community itself.

...It would be kind of interesting if the amount of people voting plummeted so much so that it removed almost any sense of considering the results legitimate and representative of the populace whatsoever. So far as I'm aware I don't know of any democracies that have a sort of minimal threshold explicitly set to account for and address such a situation...They all seem to presume sufficient civic participation and confidence in their institutions that their citizens wouldn't simply not participate/vote en masse.

I think part of the reasoning for that being that if things have gotten that bad, surely the citizenry wouldn't simply not vote, they'd actively be overthrowing the institutions they had lost confidence in.

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[–] Pan_Ziemniak@midwest.social 1 points 10 months ago (9 children)

Oh yes, of course! Its why antifazcist groups should welcome fascist speakers to engage in open, honest debate.

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[–] Sterile_Technique@lemmy.world 12 points 10 months ago (7 children)

Informed voting is what's important. Voting in-and-of-itself doesn't contribute to a healthy democracy. To the contrary, mindless voting almost killed democracy multiple times recently.

To that end, I disagree with the notion that everyone should vote: filling your ballot on name recognition or in accordance with some preacher's orders or some shit is dangerous, and if that's you, then you absolutely should not vote!

Dig. Get at least some basic info on the people on your ballot. Consider the secondary and tertiary effects of any proposed policy; consider how it could back fire, etc. Once you actually understand what you're voting on, THEN vote. But if you won't take the time to do that, just showing up isn't doing any kind of civic duty.

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[–] ghostdoggtv@lemmy.world 9 points 10 months ago

I support the change

[–] federatingIsTooHard@lemmy.world 9 points 10 months ago (5 children)

can you give an example of the kind of post you are talking about?

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[–] Pan_Ziemniak@midwest.social 7 points 10 months ago

Super in favor of this one! Barely just got on lemmy and all ive done is engage the bad faith actors in hopes of leaving some trace of sanity for the more impressionable to find.

This very thread is full of, "but cant you see how this rule change could turn authoritarian," and "what u claim to have witnessed isnt real, its all just butthurt democrats and no one is actually actively trying to suppress voting." To the lurkers, take note of the accounts that seem to do nothing but post about why voting is useless, why any complaints about biden are as relevant as complaints about dorito mussolini, or why russian imperial interests arent actually imeperial bc the west only ever lies, a fact unique to the west exclusively.

[–] probablynaked@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago

In favor of this rule

[–] betterdeadthanreddit@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Objection!

The fundamental tenant...

See: Tenet (the word, not the movie).

[–] Tenthrow@lemmy.world 6 points 10 months ago
[–] needthosepylons@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago (7 children)

I fundamentally disagree with the underlying assumptions of this change, but understand its rationale, especially during an election year.

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