The Overwhelming Whiteguyness of Clinton/Trump Equivalency
I just got back from casting my early vote – and despite my longstanding loathing for her war hawkishness, her punitive opposition to drug legalization, her support for the surveillance state and sundry other things, I metaphorically held my nose and literally voted for Hillary Clinton. Which in turn inspired some outraged outbursts from some of my online acquaintances: how can you vote to maintain the corrupt status quo? Support the two-party duopoly? Continue a Clinton dynasty? Back the continuation of America's endless drone warfare? And other things which a President Hillary Clinton would undoubtedly do.
Granted, my own political leanings are softcore libertarian, so what I see and read on social media are somewhat outside the norm. With that outlier status in mind – and also remembering that “the plural of 'anecdote' is not 'data'” – here's an interesting anecdote I've noticed this presidential election: of the many people who say “Trump and Clinton are equally bad, and thus the only moral voting options this year are to either vote third party or not vote at all,” they're all white and overwhelmingly male -- i.e., NOT members of any ethnic, racial, religious or gender group whom a President Trump would seek to legally discriminate against.
There are many, MANY things I dislike about Hillary Clinton -- none of the conspiratorial whargarble, but I greatly dislike her war hawkishness, her punitive views on drug legalization, and many other things -- but there's zero evidence Trump would be any improvement there. And there's one way HRC is hands-down better than Trump: she does NOT want to, for example, deport all Muslims from the country, she has NOT said that American-born citizens of Mexican ancestry are too untrustworthy to be federal judges, and so forth.
If the bigot with the bad Oompa-Loompa spray-tan were to win, and I had to say good-bye to certain dear friends (and naturalized American citizens) who are being deported because they pray to the wrong version of the Abrahamic God, I don't think those friends of mine would be much comforted by the reassurance “See this hand I'm using to wave good-bye? You'll be glad to know it's a CLEAN hand, unsullied by pulling the lever for any corrupt establishment-type.”
And that — combined with my first-time status of “voter in a battleground state” — is why I did not vote for Gary Johnson this year, as I did in 2012.
Granted, my own political leanings are softcore libertarian, so what I see and read on social media are somewhat outside the norm. With that outlier status in mind – and also remembering that “the plural of 'anecdote' is not 'data'” – here's an interesting anecdote I've noticed this presidential election: of the many people who say “Trump and Clinton are equally bad, and thus the only moral voting options this year are to either vote third party or not vote at all,” they're all white and overwhelmingly male -- i.e., NOT members of any ethnic, racial, religious or gender group whom a President Trump would seek to legally discriminate against.
There are many, MANY things I dislike about Hillary Clinton -- none of the conspiratorial whargarble, but I greatly dislike her war hawkishness, her punitive views on drug legalization, and many other things -- but there's zero evidence Trump would be any improvement there. And there's one way HRC is hands-down better than Trump: she does NOT want to, for example, deport all Muslims from the country, she has NOT said that American-born citizens of Mexican ancestry are too untrustworthy to be federal judges, and so forth.
If the bigot with the bad Oompa-Loompa spray-tan were to win, and I had to say good-bye to certain dear friends (and naturalized American citizens) who are being deported because they pray to the wrong version of the Abrahamic God, I don't think those friends of mine would be much comforted by the reassurance “See this hand I'm using to wave good-bye? You'll be glad to know it's a CLEAN hand, unsullied by pulling the lever for any corrupt establishment-type.”
And that — combined with my first-time status of “voter in a battleground state” — is why I did not vote for Gary Johnson this year, as I did in 2012.
posted by Jennifer Abel at 2:51 PM
1 Comments:
Third Party candidates are able to be "pure" for the same reason that their policies will never work: They aren't worried about public support. In the real world, if you want to win, then you have to convince voters that there is something more than a 0.0% chance of getting your policies adopted.
In order to do that, they would have to moderate their policies, and therefore give up on being ideologically pure.
Many people have taken the trouble to repeat the tired old lie that "Voting for the lesser of two evils is still evil." It simply is not true. Neither major candidate is evil, they are both simply mixed bags. Each one has made mistakes, (and each one will continue to make mistakes in the future.)
The trick in this election, as in any, is to pick the one whose mistakes are least likely to destroy the planet, the environment, world peace, and any parts of the Constitution you have grown fond of.
By that definition, there is actually a logical reason to support Trump. He understands so little about anything that it is not likely to get many of his worst ideas past Congress. Certainly they will destroy Obamacare, but that is one consequence of voting for 3rd party candidate.
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