Did we all collectively forget that Mamdani has defined his campaign by being laser focused on lowering cost of living and improving quality of life for working class New Yorkers? Ofc I’m bitterly disappointed by this, especially with how weak he has been in his antizionism after it was hyped up so much, but if I lived in NYC I’d still vote for him in a heartbeat. Actual change will not come from an elected politician, but from a proletarian revolution. If come November it seems like he is the candidate whose election will allow the working class the most breathing room to live and organize then please just fucking vote for the guy. Unlike Kamala there is actually a decent case for harm reduction with this one I think.
but if I lived in NYC I’d still vote for him in a heartbeat.
why do you think someone who will allow genocidal fascists in his administration, who are currently in the process of committing a genocide, would ever truly care about you? Like the person has already shown he doesn’t give a shit about human life and is fine with people who want to destroy it being on his administration. Would you trust someone like this with your life?
What else is social democracy but defending and strengthening imperialism while redistributing the wealth generated by imperialism to placate the workers and prevent radicalization? It’s basically what New Deal Democrats did.
If Mamdani fulfills his promises it’ll prevent New Yorkers from forming a workers’ party, demobilize anti Zionism, and foster class collaboration and labor peace.
But that’s all you have, theory. It’s literally impossible in practice because of the ‘prisoners dilemma’ of working, living, and labor. This is why I’m convinced all communists who smear the leftmost american politicians are delusional and not worth collaborating with. No one is far left enough. No one is pure enough. Not AoC, not Mamdani, not Sanders, it’s impossible to actually present a candidate who would be accepted by ya’ll.
No one on the far left can put together a tent of any number of people, and therefore participate meaningfully in political society, because Full Communism is so ideologically pure as to be impossible to implement. You reject the “perfect is the enemy of good” argument and instead propose accelerationist revolution, which nearly always results in a Junta instead of your ideal political system.
It makes me believe you have no desire to actual productive results, and instead would rather lob critisims without ever participating in meaningful change. That you actually prefer if we all destroy ourselves rather than build a coalition of the willing.
We’ll be arguing about who was unelectable all the way up to the gallows.
But that’s all you have, theory. It’s literally impossible in practice
At the moment you’re not even a leftist because you believe a better world oriented towards proletarian dictatorship is “impossible in practice”. Why should anyone here care about anything you have to say about “leftmost american politicians” or “muh actual productive results”? You’ve explicitly identified yourself as someone with an irreconcilably different ideology and thus have fundamentally different goals to the left. Thinking that your opinions should be taken seriously here in any capacity as an ally or someone worth listening to just does not make sense at all. It is a testament to the patience and goodwill of the other users here who took you seriously and provided educational responses.
No one is far left enough. No one is pure enough. Not AoC, not Mamdani, not Sanders
What an insane thing to say. It is moreso a fundamental humanitarian issue of being a normal person with a working moral compass and refusing to allow genocidal ethnonationalist fascist filth in your administration as your country currently helps the zionist entity commit a genocide against the people of Palestine that they aid and abet.
Its about not being complicit in a genocide, a basic, bare minimum requirement for every human being on earth, let alone some supposedly leftist mayoral candidate.
Painting “not helping your country commit genocide” as some petty esoteric sectarian squabble in effect distracts from this fact and minimizes the evils of zionism, a fascist ethnonationalist cult, and the genocide the zionist entity, america, and the west are committing against the Palestinians. Disgusting, fucked up behaviour.
does nobody know what prisoners dilemma means anymore? what are you talking about?
You subscribe to the “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs” communism Marx put forward, right? That model is a post-scarcity, Star Trek style communism system. The issue is there will always be a stratification of work. Statesman and Janitors. Artists and Engineers. Some individuals will be compelled to drive the trash truck. Will we have enough people that just love dirty jobs to do every dirty job out there? Will we be able to automate every undesirable task? No. Someone makes the post-scarcity world run on time, and Patriotism + Civic Duty sadly only takes us so far. Your model assumes that humans will let themselves fall into a system were some people get ground down as cogs, and others get to spend their day painting by the sea, and everyone will subscribe to the model because of the needs of the many.
I argue that you end up with a Prisoners Dilemma where individuals will subvert that system and avoid contributions to their ability, while continuing to take according to their need. That enforcement of the political system will push you out of it. It’s not attainable because of the inherent nature of humans to eventually betray each other in the Prisoner’s dilemma. Someone will claim “I can only paint. I cannot harvest grain” and when others in the fields see the painter, your model disintegrates.
yes because the point is not to present a candidate, the point is to build a workers party.
Your party is unable to recruit membership of any significant slice of the population because of purity tests, so this isn’t going to happen with your current outlook. I personally believe the Far Left has no actual desire to organize because that would require a real defense of their platform, vs. lobbing purity tests at others.
Don’t get me wrong. I want to live in the Star Trek society. I just accept we will never get there. So I want to get as close as possible. I think a key difference is my willingness to iterate over the flawed system rather than attempt a full re-creation of our society from whole cloth. Because I can read a history book and see the risk level with power vacuums. Maybe that’s cowardice. Maybe it’s pragmatism. I guess that’s why I’m not a hexbear or .ml user :)
It’s not attainable because of the inherent nature of humans to eventually betray each other in the Prisoner’s dilemma.
If you had any idea about dialectical materialism, you would know that humans have no inherent nature. This is a reactionary talking point.
I personally believe the Far Left has no actual desire to organize because that would require a real defense of their platform
You have not seen communist organising. I recommend you look into it. Outside of the US would be good too (not to mention countries with communist parties in power).
I want to live in the Star Trek society.
I don’t particularly care what US tv show you want to live in. Go to a cosplay event I guess.
As funkystuff said, you are just projecting what you think communism is (based on you watching Star Trek apparently), dismiss it with reactionary opinions, then say that organising doesn’t work. If you stepped outside (the US) for two seconds you would see the contrary.
It’s very arrogant to impose your misunderstanding of socialism and communism on us, then because that misunderstood version doesn’t work you assume we aren’t serious people.
It’s very arrogant to start from the position that your platform is correct and sensible, and then be completely unable to dismantle arguments to the contrary.
Again, I support the ideal of communism as a model government. However I simultaneously believe that Full Communism is not workable. So I remain hopeful of seeing pragmatic plans to adopt the closest achievable, stable system.
The fact that you’re trying to find an electoral candidate that would please us, when we couldn’t be clearer about how we think the electoralist strategy is a trap, shows you either aren’t listening or you think we’re little babies who can be convinced by someone jingling keys in front of our face. Yes, we aren’t satisfied by any candidate, that’s the point. That doesn’t mean we hope they lose because they are insufficient, it means we are working to make other people can see that even if you win with a “good enough” candidate capitalism is still capitalism. The July 26th movement wasn’t voted into office. Ho Chi Minh didn’t beat the various imperialists at the ballot box. To dismantle imperialism you need a military strategy, not just throwing your time and energy away supporting electoral campaigns.
The “don’t vote for social democrats because the revolution is just around the corner” logic doesn’t work for me. It’s just accelerationism.
every time communists have been constructively opposed to social democrats, it has been when the communist party is sufficiently strong to offer an alternative. Right now we’re not members of an alternative political group, we’re randoms on the internet.
Sure, I’m just pointing out that there’s reasons to believe Mamdani will try to fulfill his promises. The real limitations he’ll face are from the decline of the US empire; as superprofits run out there’s less wealth to redistribute in the first place. The material base for social democracy actually isn’t there anymore, that’s why social democracies in Europe are all doing austerity now.
why do you think someone who will allow genocidal fascists in his administration, who are currently in the process of committing a genocide, would ever truly care about you?
Because why else would he be doing any of this instead of taking the easy route like Hakeem Jeffries and just getting in bed with AIPAC? I don’t think he would be saying this if he didn’t think he had to, which is sad and I think misguided but what do I know? And I don’t even understand the point of this question either? Ofc he cares but that shouldn’t be a good metric for a politician since that should be given, even though obviously it’s novel here. I think AOC cares a lot about the working class too but clearly that’s not enough.
Like the person has already shown he doesn’t give a shit about human life and is fine with people who want to destroy it being on his administration. Would you trust someone like this with your life?
No I wouldn’t and don’t. And like I said, electing a single harm reduction candidate to a single position in government isn’t going to fix things. I’d vote for him because I think he can make things a bit less desperate for the working class in NYC, and maybe even drum up broader support for left-populism. And given the position he is going for (Mayor of NYC and not Secretary of State), I understand the compromise he is making. even if I don’t like it.
Like I said, I think there is a case for harm reduction with Mamdani, especially when contrasted with his competitors. I don’t trust him with my life but I do have some trust and a bit of hope that we will not make it as difficult to exist and survive and organize for leftists and particularly those who are already marginalized by their identities.
Because why else would he be doing any of this instead of taking the easy route like Hakeem Jeffries and just getting in bed with AIPAC?
Getting in bed with AIPAC and being an open zionist leads to a loss in popularity given how many people understandably hate pissrael and open zionism now. Especially among what I am going to assume are his voting base (younger people).
And I don’t even understand the point of this question either?
If someone is willing to have genocidal fascist ethnonationalists in his administration, who are currently aiding and abetting a genocide, they are basically signalling to everyone that they don’t give a damn about the marginalized, the oppressed, the working class, or just human life in general really lets be honest.
There is no good reason for having genocidal fascists in your government, period. They belong in jail or in the ground.
My point is, that if this person can’t for whatever insufficient reason take a hardline stance against a genocide that their country is basically committing and its supporters, then what makes you think they can take a principled stand for anything else?
I think AOC cares a lot about the working class too
Her numerous betrayals say otherwise.
I’d vote for him because I think he can make things a bit less desperate for the working class in NYC, and maybe even drum up broader support for left-populism.
If you as a leftist candidate can’t take a firm stand against genocide then you are not going to “make things a bit less desperate for the working class” anywhere. Its bare minimum stuff. Its like saying a computer that can’t even turn on for more than 5 seconds is capable of running Cyberpunk 2077.
The role of people like him, social democrats, is to weaken left-populist movements so they won’t be as much of a danger to the bourgeois. History has shown this time and time again. Watch how any left-populist momentum just fades into liberalism and fascism when he either fails to gain office or gains office but fails to deliver on his promises.
He is not the harm reduction candidate, he is the harm candidate.
I don’t trust him with my life but I do have some trust and a bit of hope that we will not make it as difficult to exist and survive and organize for leftists and particularly those who are already marginalized by their identities.
Well he’s basically just given a big middle finger to any Pro-Palestine organization in NYC because now he will have violent genocidal ethnonationalists in his administration who are going to be hellbent at using whatever means necessary to suppress any and all dissent against the zionist entity. A few bad apples spoil the bunch. They will also probably try their best to use their positions of power to make life hell for Muslims and Palestinians too.
And this is especially bad because america, as the imperialist world superpower, is the number 1 blood vessel to its cancerous zionist military base. Therefore, any action to disrupt and prevent this in america will be even more effective than anywhere else. And now mamdani has gone ahead and said he will put exactly the type of fascist crooks who don’t want the genocide to end into positions of power.
Also don’t you think its a bit fucked up to say you’d vote for a guy who said he will have genocidal maniacs in his administration, in a country currently committing the genocide they support, just because he promises to support the working class? Wasn’t that kinda like the nazi party’s whole thing?
“oh you know I’m fine with genocide but vote for me because i will help the german worker”
Tbh we don’t even need to go back to the nazis because for fucks sake there is a genocide against the Palestinian people at the moment that needs to desperately be stopped. Lives are being cruelly destroyed en masse by the zionist entity and its western backers (primarily america) as you are reading this. Why would you ever want to vote for someone who says that he will have fascist scum in his administration who are currently aiding and abetting this fucking demonic act of genocide, just because he pinky promises to help the working class of NYC? I mean come the fuck on, really? Is this where we are at?
You should read the other comment left under the comment you replied to *by queermunist. Really sums everything up well.
I agree with queermunist and her comment, and I also agree with Carl’s reply to her. I’d much rather talk about it in real time on a faster medium than hb comments since this is a lot, but I’ll do my best responding:
Getting in bed with AIPAC and being an open zionist leads to a loss in popularity given how many people understandably hate pissrael and open zionism now. Especially among what I am going to assume are his voting base (younger people).
Fair point, I don’t get the impression that that’s necessarily what happened but that’s my own read.
If someone is willing to have genocidal fascist ethnonationalists in his administration, who are currently aiding and abetting a genocide, they are basically signalling to everyone that they don’t give a damn about the marginalized, the oppressed, the working class, or just human life in general really lets be honest.
It’s a big mistep imo but I doubt that he thinks allowing Zionists to work in sanitation per this example will put the oppressed or human life in danger. His campaign is really focused on local issues and local politics and pretty much just that, so while this is a big blind spot, it would be a false equivalence to assume he doesn’t care about the marginalized when the marginalized are the people his campaign is most focused on protecting. Just locally. Which again, I don’t agree with.
My point is, that if this person can’t for whatever insufficient reason take a hardline stance against a genocide that their country is basically committing and its supporters, then what makes you think they can take a principled stand for anything else?
Similar to my point before, I think he can take a principled stance on other issues and particularly those where he has power because that seems to be he’s been doing. The big exception to this is softening his stance on the NYPD which I think is a tactical one but also disappoints me to see.
I think AOC cares a lot about the working class too
Her numerous betrayals say otherwise.
Again similar, which I think it kinda hinting at the source of our misunderstanding. I said I think she cares, I also said that caring isn’t enough. You can care about someone and still not do right by them. Humans are flawed. We fuck up, we we betray those we care for, we lose hope and revolutionary optimism, and in many cases just have a flawed understanding.
If you as a leftist candidate can’t take a firm stand against genocide then you are not going to “make things a bit less desperate for the working class” anywhere. Its bare minimum stuff. Its like saying a computer that can’t even turn on for more than 5 seconds is capable of running Cyberpunk 2077.
Keeping Libraries well funded, increasing healthcare availability and affordability, protecting gender affirming care, expanding childcare, funding education, etc. All of these would help a lot. If you want an actual revolution, you’re gonna need literate and reasonably healthy comrades.
The role of people like him, social democrats, is to weaken left-populist movements so they won’t be as much of a danger to the bourgeois. History has shown this time and time again. Watch how any left-populist momentum just fades into liberalism and fascism when he either fails to gain office or gains office but fails to deliver on his promises.
I agree with Carl in the comment above here, this is just accelerationism. I do believe the US left would be in a much better place today if Bernie had been elected despite all his flaws. And I’ll happily drop every vote for a socdem the second that PSL has alternatives in these races. Until them, I know what I need to do, and 99.99% of the year that involves organizing, and the other 0.01% I’d vote for Mamdani if I had the option.
Well he’s basically just given a big middle finger to any Pro-Palestine organization in NYC because now he will have violent genocidal ethnonationalists in his administration who are going to be hellbent at using whatever means necessary to suppress any and all dissent against the zionist entity. A few bad apples spoil the bunch. They will also probably try their best to use their positions of power to make life hell for Muslims and Palestinians too.
And this is especially bad because america, as the imperialist world superpower, is the number 1 blood vessel to its cancerous zionist military base. Therefore, any action to disrupt and prevent this in america will be even more effective than anywhere else. And now mamdani has gone ahead and said he will put exactly the type of fascist crooks who don’t want the genocide to end into positions of power.
This one hurts because it’s true. But the alternatives are far from better and if anything worse as they will probably have zionists in much higher positions of power than Mamdani and are actually zionists themselves.
Also don’t you think its a bit fucked up to say you’d vote for a guy who said he will have genocidal maniacs in his administration, in a country currently committing the genocide they support, just because he promises to support the working class? Wasn’t that kinda like the nazi party’s whole thing?
Yes this whole situation and country is fucked up. But that wasn’t the Nazi party’s whole thing. Their whole thing was being the genocidal maniacs. This would be more like voting for the SPD IF the KPD didn’t exist at all, though it’s far from a perfect analogy.
“oh you know I’m fine with genocide but vote for me because i will help the german worker”
I don’t believe he is fine with genocide, the Nazis didn’t actually care about the German worker (actually reading this again wtf??? I’m actually mad at this characterization), and there is no candidate who will keep all Zionists out of public positions but I do hope Mamdani will keep them out of positions where they have a chance to act on their deranged ideology.
Tbh we don’t even need to go back to the nazis because for fucks sake there is a genocide against the Palestinian people at the moment that needs to desperately be stopped. Lives are being cruelly destroyed en masse by the zionist entity and its western backers (primarily america) as you are reading this. Why would you ever want to vote for someone who says that he will have fascist scum in his administration who are currently aiding and abetting this fucking demonic act of genocide, just because he pinky promises to help the working class of NYC? I mean come the fuck on, really? Is this where we are at?
Sadly yes, this is where we’re at. Hopefully you understand why I said what I said better now.
i don’t even see him as a harm reduction candidate. they use that phrase to position somebody running against republicans who has nothing good to offer so they fall on “well at least we’re not those other guys”. Mamdani, for all his embarrassment and self-own, is still promising something positive for new yorkers rather than running on not being Silwa or not being Cuomo the way e.g. Biden ran on not being Trump.
You’re right if that’s what harm reduction means. I was thinking about it in the context of the situation nationally getting so much worse that Mamdani’s otherwise helpful policies will mostly be working at shielding NYC from some or hopefully most of that harm.
Did we all collectively forget that Mamdani has defined his campaign by being laser focused on lowering cost of living and improving quality of life for working class New Yorkers? Ofc I’m bitterly disappointed by this, especially with how weak he has been in his antizionism after it was hyped up so much, but if I lived in NYC I’d still vote for him in a heartbeat. Actual change will not come from an elected politician, but from a proletarian revolution. If come November it seems like he is the candidate whose election will allow the working class the most breathing room to live and organize then please just fucking vote for the guy. Unlike Kamala there is actually a decent case for harm reduction with this one I think.
why do you think someone who will allow genocidal fascists in his administration, who are currently in the process of committing a genocide, would ever truly care about you? Like the person has already shown he doesn’t give a shit about human life and is fine with people who want to destroy it being on his administration. Would you trust someone like this with your life?
What else is social democracy but defending and strengthening imperialism while redistributing the wealth generated by imperialism to placate the workers and prevent radicalization? It’s basically what New Deal Democrats did.
If Mamdani fulfills his promises it’ll prevent New Yorkers from forming a workers’ party, demobilize anti Zionism, and foster class collaboration and labor peace.
But that’s all you have, theory. It’s literally impossible in practice because of the ‘prisoners dilemma’ of working, living, and labor. This is why I’m convinced all communists who smear the leftmost american politicians are delusional and not worth collaborating with. No one is far left enough. No one is pure enough. Not AoC, not Mamdani, not Sanders, it’s impossible to actually present a candidate who would be accepted by ya’ll.
No one on the far left can put together a tent of any number of people, and therefore participate meaningfully in political society, because Full Communism is so ideologically pure as to be impossible to implement. You reject the “perfect is the enemy of good” argument and instead propose accelerationist revolution, which nearly always results in a Junta instead of your ideal political system.
It makes me believe you have no desire to actual productive results, and instead would rather lob critisims without ever participating in meaningful change. That you actually prefer if we all destroy ourselves rather than build a coalition of the willing.
We’ll be arguing about who was unelectable all the way up to the gallows.
At the moment you’re not even a leftist because you believe a better world oriented towards proletarian dictatorship is “impossible in practice”. Why should anyone here care about anything you have to say about “leftmost american politicians” or “muh actual productive results”? You’ve explicitly identified yourself as someone with an irreconcilably different ideology and thus have fundamentally different goals to the left. Thinking that your opinions should be taken seriously here in any capacity as an ally or someone worth listening to just does not make sense at all. It is a testament to the patience and goodwill of the other users here who took you seriously and provided educational responses.
What an insane thing to say. It is moreso a fundamental humanitarian issue of being a normal person with a working moral compass and refusing to allow genocidal ethnonationalist fascist filth in your administration as your country currently helps the zionist entity commit a genocide against the people of Palestine that they aid and abet.
Its about not being complicit in a genocide, a basic, bare minimum requirement for every human being on earth, let alone some supposedly leftist mayoral candidate.
Painting “not helping your country commit genocide” as some petty esoteric sectarian squabble in effect distracts from this fact and minimizes the evils of zionism, a fascist ethnonationalist cult, and the genocide the zionist entity, america, and the west are committing against the Palestinians. Disgusting, fucked up behaviour.
does nobody know what prisoners dilemma means anymore? what are you talking about?
yes because the point is not to present a candidate, the point is to build a workers party.
You subscribe to the “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs” communism Marx put forward, right? That model is a post-scarcity, Star Trek style communism system. The issue is there will always be a stratification of work. Statesman and Janitors. Artists and Engineers. Some individuals will be compelled to drive the trash truck. Will we have enough people that just love dirty jobs to do every dirty job out there? Will we be able to automate every undesirable task? No. Someone makes the post-scarcity world run on time, and Patriotism + Civic Duty sadly only takes us so far. Your model assumes that humans will let themselves fall into a system were some people get ground down as cogs, and others get to spend their day painting by the sea, and everyone will subscribe to the model because of the needs of the many.
I argue that you end up with a Prisoners Dilemma where individuals will subvert that system and avoid contributions to their ability, while continuing to take according to their need. That enforcement of the political system will push you out of it. It’s not attainable because of the inherent nature of humans to eventually betray each other in the Prisoner’s dilemma. Someone will claim “I can only paint. I cannot harvest grain” and when others in the fields see the painter, your model disintegrates.
Your party is unable to recruit membership of any significant slice of the population because of purity tests, so this isn’t going to happen with your current outlook. I personally believe the Far Left has no actual desire to organize because that would require a real defense of their platform, vs. lobbing purity tests at others.
Don’t get me wrong. I want to live in the Star Trek society. I just accept we will never get there. So I want to get as close as possible. I think a key difference is my willingness to iterate over the flawed system rather than attempt a full re-creation of our society from whole cloth. Because I can read a history book and see the risk level with power vacuums. Maybe that’s cowardice. Maybe it’s pragmatism. I guess that’s why I’m not a hexbear or .ml user :)
If you had any idea about dialectical materialism, you would know that humans have no inherent nature. This is a reactionary talking point.
You have not seen communist organising. I recommend you look into it. Outside of the US would be good too (not to mention countries with communist parties in power).
I don’t particularly care what US tv show you want to live in. Go to a cosplay event I guess.
As funkystuff said, you are just projecting what you think communism is (based on you watching Star Trek apparently), dismiss it with reactionary opinions, then say that organising doesn’t work. If you stepped outside (the US) for two seconds you would see the contrary.
It’s very arrogant to impose your misunderstanding of socialism and communism on us, then because that misunderstood version doesn’t work you assume we aren’t serious people.
It’s very arrogant to start from the position that your platform is correct and sensible, and then be completely unable to dismantle arguments to the contrary.
Again, I support the ideal of communism as a model government. However I simultaneously believe that Full Communism is not workable. So I remain hopeful of seeing pragmatic plans to adopt the closest achievable, stable system.
The fact that you’re trying to find an electoral candidate that would please us, when we couldn’t be clearer about how we think the electoralist strategy is a trap, shows you either aren’t listening or you think we’re little babies who can be convinced by someone jingling keys in front of our face. Yes, we aren’t satisfied by any candidate, that’s the point. That doesn’t mean we hope they lose because they are insufficient, it means we are working to make other people can see that even if you win with a “good enough” candidate capitalism is still capitalism. The July 26th movement wasn’t voted into office. Ho Chi Minh didn’t beat the various imperialists at the ballot box. To dismantle imperialism you need a military strategy, not just throwing your time and energy away supporting electoral campaigns.
So… What do you have? Did you win?
The “don’t vote for social democrats because the revolution is just around the corner” logic doesn’t work for me. It’s just accelerationism.
every time communists have been constructively opposed to social democrats, it has been when the communist party is sufficiently strong to offer an alternative. Right now we’re not members of an alternative political group, we’re randoms on the internet.
Sure, I’m just pointing out that there’s reasons to believe Mamdani will try to fulfill his promises. The real limitations he’ll face are from the decline of the US empire; as superprofits run out there’s less wealth to redistribute in the first place. The material base for social democracy actually isn’t there anymore, that’s why social democracies in Europe are all doing austerity now.
Because why else would he be doing any of this instead of taking the easy route like Hakeem Jeffries and just getting in bed with AIPAC? I don’t think he would be saying this if he didn’t think he had to, which is sad and I think misguided but what do I know? And I don’t even understand the point of this question either? Ofc he cares but that shouldn’t be a good metric for a politician since that should be given, even though obviously it’s novel here. I think AOC cares a lot about the working class too but clearly that’s not enough.
No I wouldn’t and don’t. And like I said, electing a single harm reduction candidate to a single position in government isn’t going to fix things. I’d vote for him because I think he can make things a bit less desperate for the working class in NYC, and maybe even drum up broader support for left-populism. And given the position he is going for (Mayor of NYC and not Secretary of State), I understand the compromise he is making. even if I don’t like it.
Like I said, I think there is a case for harm reduction with Mamdani, especially when contrasted with his competitors. I don’t trust him with my life but I do have some trust and a bit of hope that we will not make it as difficult to exist and survive and organize for leftists and particularly those who are already marginalized by their identities.
Getting in bed with AIPAC and being an open zionist leads to a loss in popularity given how many people understandably hate pissrael and open zionism now. Especially among what I am going to assume are his voting base (younger people).
If someone is willing to have genocidal fascist ethnonationalists in his administration, who are currently aiding and abetting a genocide, they are basically signalling to everyone that they don’t give a damn about the marginalized, the oppressed, the working class, or just human life in general really lets be honest.
There is no good reason for having genocidal fascists in your government, period. They belong in jail or in the ground.
My point is, that if this person can’t for whatever insufficient reason take a hardline stance against a genocide that their country is basically committing and its supporters, then what makes you think they can take a principled stand for anything else?
Her numerous betrayals say otherwise.
He is not the harm reduction candidate, he is the harm candidate.
Well he’s basically just given a big middle finger to any Pro-Palestine organization in NYC because now he will have violent genocidal ethnonationalists in his administration who are going to be hellbent at using whatever means necessary to suppress any and all dissent against the zionist entity. A few bad apples spoil the bunch. They will also probably try their best to use their positions of power to make life hell for Muslims and Palestinians too.
And this is especially bad because america, as the imperialist world superpower, is the number 1 blood vessel to its cancerous zionist military base. Therefore, any action to disrupt and prevent this in america will be even more effective than anywhere else. And now mamdani has gone ahead and said he will put exactly the type of fascist crooks who don’t want the genocide to end into positions of power.
Also don’t you think its a bit fucked up to say you’d vote for a guy who said he will have genocidal maniacs in his administration, in a country currently committing the genocide they support, just because he promises to support the working class? Wasn’t that kinda like the nazi party’s whole thing?
Tbh we don’t even need to go back to the nazis because for fucks sake there is a genocide against the Palestinian people at the moment that needs to desperately be stopped. Lives are being cruelly destroyed en masse by the zionist entity and its western backers (primarily america) as you are reading this. Why would you ever want to vote for someone who says that he will have fascist scum in his administration who are currently aiding and abetting this fucking demonic act of genocide, just because he pinky promises to help the working class of NYC? I mean come the fuck on, really? Is this where we are at?
You should read the other comment left under the comment you replied to *by queermunist. Really sums everything up well.
I agree with queermunist and her comment, and I also agree with Carl’s reply to her. I’d much rather talk about it in real time on a faster medium than hb comments since this is a lot, but I’ll do my best responding:
Fair point, I don’t get the impression that that’s necessarily what happened but that’s my own read.
It’s a big mistep imo but I doubt that he thinks allowing Zionists to work in sanitation per this example will put the oppressed or human life in danger. His campaign is really focused on local issues and local politics and pretty much just that, so while this is a big blind spot, it would be a false equivalence to assume he doesn’t care about the marginalized when the marginalized are the people his campaign is most focused on protecting. Just locally. Which again, I don’t agree with.
Similar to my point before, I think he can take a principled stance on other issues and particularly those where he has power because that seems to be he’s been doing. The big exception to this is softening his stance on the NYPD which I think is a tactical one but also disappoints me to see.
Again similar, which I think it kinda hinting at the source of our misunderstanding. I said I think she cares, I also said that caring isn’t enough. You can care about someone and still not do right by them. Humans are flawed. We fuck up, we we betray those we care for, we lose hope and revolutionary optimism, and in many cases just have a flawed understanding.
Keeping Libraries well funded, increasing healthcare availability and affordability, protecting gender affirming care, expanding childcare, funding education, etc. All of these would help a lot. If you want an actual revolution, you’re gonna need literate and reasonably healthy comrades.
I agree with Carl in the comment above here, this is just accelerationism. I do believe the US left would be in a much better place today if Bernie had been elected despite all his flaws. And I’ll happily drop every vote for a socdem the second that PSL has alternatives in these races. Until them, I know what I need to do, and 99.99% of the year that involves organizing, and the other 0.01% I’d vote for Mamdani if I had the option.
This one hurts because it’s true. But the alternatives are far from better and if anything worse as they will probably have zionists in much higher positions of power than Mamdani and are actually zionists themselves.
Yes this whole situation and country is fucked up. But that wasn’t the Nazi party’s whole thing. Their whole thing was being the genocidal maniacs. This would be more like voting for the SPD IF the KPD didn’t exist at all, though it’s far from a perfect analogy.
I don’t believe he is fine with genocide, the Nazis didn’t actually care about the German worker (actually reading this again wtf??? I’m actually mad at this characterization), and there is no candidate who will keep all Zionists out of public positions but I do hope Mamdani will keep them out of positions where they have a chance to act on their deranged ideology.
Sadly yes, this is where we’re at. Hopefully you understand why I said what I said better now.
i don’t even see him as a harm reduction candidate. they use that phrase to position somebody running against republicans who has nothing good to offer so they fall on “well at least we’re not those other guys”. Mamdani, for all his embarrassment and self-own, is still promising something positive for new yorkers rather than running on not being Silwa or not being Cuomo the way e.g. Biden ran on not being Trump.
You’re right if that’s what harm reduction means. I was thinking about it in the context of the situation nationally getting so much worse that Mamdani’s otherwise helpful policies will mostly be working at shielding NYC from some or hopefully most of that harm.