A Vote for Agency
Electoral politics, fascism, and harm reduction.
There is much to unpack around COVID denialism, abuse apologism, and fascism. We need to talk about it. Oppressors want us to be silent, to shut the fuck up about genocides.
In the year 2024, there are people along the spectrum who swear that voting will be our salvation or that the “lesser of two evils” is still better than not voting at all.
I fundamentally disagree.
People know that I am an anarchist and still want to have conversations with me about why they consider voting to be harm reduction, even after being provided with arguments of why that notion is contradictory, and nearly incalculable.
It is as if these people are incapable of processing the word “no.” Some will chalk it up to a disagreement, but this is far beyond that. This is not honoring my ability to self-determine. This is refusing to acknowledge that those who have been systemically disenfranchised have any right to self-determination.
If you want to vote, I am not trying to convince you otherwise. Why that is not understood, is beyond me. If you believe in the rehabilitation of this nation-state, then say that. Voting in any presidential election is not “strategically choosing your opponent.” Someone told me, “under Trump, we may not have libraries anymore.” While the threat of censorship is legitimate, that threat exists regardless of who is the head of this empire.
“An electoral choice of ten different fascists is like choosing which way one wishes to die.”
-George Jackson
Biden could have codified abortion rights and he didn’t. Biden didn’t have to extend the border wall that Trump stood on, but he did. Biden didn’t have to repeatedly gaslight us about the end of the pandemic, but in May 2023, he convinced americans that the pandemic had magically ended. Biden could have strengthened FDA regulations, but he didn’t. We are seeing the government keep human to human transmission of bird flu quiet, and it seems like there are food recalls every other week. Not to mention the massive superspreaders that in-person voting will bring to our communities. We are currently seeing about 3 million new COVID cases per week as mitigation layers and disease surveillance continues to dwindle. As new vaccines targeting the J.N.1 variant begin rolling out, even nastier subvariants – like XEC – will become dominant, before inevitably being replaced by far worse mutations.
Forget anything of substance, the Democratic Party has done absolutely nothing to make their platform, policies, or campaign inviting. Nothing at all. What people romanticize and find appealing is something reminiscent of the Obama-era. I personally do not find Black fascists (or any fascists) appealing, but maybe that’s just me.
Must you be reminded that dozens of white supremacist groups popped up as a response to this Black man getting elected?? If Kamala becomes president, what exactly do you think will happen next?
Voting is not harm reduction. Throwing support behind an imperial nation-state to have a more diverse authoritarian leader, is not “progress,” it’s neoliberalism. As much as we don’t want to give more energy into this election, I believe that it is important to declare where we are. I know that it is exhausting having to engage with people who have moved so far right, that they don’t even realize, or care.
Hopefully, none of you know me for this, but my experience with organizing began in electoral politics. I’ve worked on several Democratic campaigns at nearly every level — state senate, city council, congressional primary, gubernatorial, court appellate judgeship, etc. I am stating this to name that I have experience, and I only speak to what I know and observe. At some point, maybe I will go more in-depth about being disillusioned by the Democratic Party first hand but I truly dislike talking about electoral politics and all of the horrible people that I’ve taken pictures with before I understood who they truly were. Moments that I wish didn’t exist, but grateful to have grown away from, moving towards more radical politics.
Folks love the idea of Black madness in theory, just not in practice. We are romanticized and desecrated in death but in the flesh? Various contingents align themselves with the sole purpose of accelerating our deaths. Vote, don’t vote, make your own decisions around how you choose to engage with the state. But don’t you dare force it down my throat, disregard my agency, and then tell me you have my best interest in mind. I don’t fuck with paternalism, and there is nothing liberatory about treating disenfranchised folks like shit. National elections are the epitome of abuse apology… “Don’t talk about Kamala keeping people imprisoned so that California can retain its firefighters (40% of which are super exploited prisoners, earning .60 cents an hour). “Don’t talk about Tim Walz sending in the national guard to quell the 2020 uprisings in Minnesota.”
Why can’t we be angry about state repression? Why is this something we are being told to swallow?
Something has got to give, and it sure as hell won’t be me.
If you ascribe to the principles of disability justice, ask yourself: “why do anti-imperialist politics in movement spaces seem to begin and end with Palestine?” It is time to publicly agitate and challenge anti-Blackness that shows up in our movement and community spaces. Black people across the diaspora are witnessing and mourning multiple co-occuring genocides, including ones still happening on Turtle Island. And we are still committed to building new worlds that transcend borders and the desire for nationalism.
It is time to reassess. It is time to escalate. Pay attention to what is happening during this time. Regardless of next week’s presidential election results, we have a massive amount of work to do. You don’t have to join an organization to do meaningful work.
It is perfectly okay to form an autonomous group comprised of individuals offering material interventions:
Finding others who are value-aligned, getting clear about your values, and making interventions that reduce harm in our communities are required building blocks towards any liberation efforts. Liberation looks like supporting and exercising agency, refusing paternalism, and challenging the conditions that further marginalize us. We won’t arrive at these by negotiating with the state. We never have and never will.
Some references:
Why I Won’t Vote by W.E.B Dubois
Vote for me and I’ll Set You Free by Lorenzo Kom’boa Ervin
We Need Harm Reduction with a Liberatory Vision by Kelly Hayes from Truthout
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