#voting is harm reduction

[snarksandkisses]

[fiercynn]

wait you mean this part of voting is not harm reduction: an indigenous perspective???

We don’t dismiss the reality that, on the scale of U.S. settler colonial violence, even the slightest degree of harm can mean life or death for those most vulnerable. What we assert here is that the entire notion of “voting as harm reduction” obscures and perpetuates settler-colonial violence, there is nothing “less harmful” about it, and there are more effective ways to intervene in its violences. [x]

wow way to cherry-pick a single line and ignore the ENTIRE FUCKING POINT

[archiephd]

So long as the political and economic system remains intact, voter enfranchisement, though perhaps resisted by overt white supremacists, is still welcomed so long as nothing about the overall political arrangement fundamentally changes. The facade of political equality can occur under violent occupation, but liberation cannot be found in the occupier’s ballot box. In the context of settler colonialism voting is the “civic duty” of maintaining our own oppression. It is intrinsically bound to a strategy of extinguishing our cultural identities and autonomy.

[...]

Since we cannot expect those selected to rule in this system to make decisions that benefit our lands and peoples, we have to do it ourselves. Direct action, or the unmediated expression of individual or collective desire, has always been the most effective means by which we change the conditions of our communities. What do we get out of voting that we cannot directly provide for ourselves and our people? What ways can we organize and make decisions that are in harmony with our diverse lifeways? What ways can the immense amount of material resources and energy focused on persuading people to vote be redirected into services and support that we actually need? What ways can we direct our energy, individually and collectively, into efforts that have immediate impact in our lives and the lives of those around us? This is not only a moral but a practical position and so we embrace our contradictions. We’re not rallying for a perfect prescription for “decolonization” or a multitude of Indigenous Nationalisms, but for a great undoing of the settler colonial project that comprises the United States of America so that we may restore healthy and just relations with Mother Earth and all her beings. Our tendency is towards autonomous anti-colonial struggles that intervene and attack the critical infrastructure that the U.S. and its institutions rest on. Interestingly enough, these are the areas of our homelands under greatest threat by resource colonialism. This is where the system is most prone to rupture, it’s the fragility of colonial power. Our enemies are only as powerful as the infrastructure that sustains them. The brutal result of forced assimilation is that we know our enemies better than they know themselves. What strategies and actions can we devise to make it impossible for this system to govern on stolen land? We aren’t advocating for a state-based solution, redwashed European politic, or some other colonial fantasy of “utopia.” In our rejection of the abstraction of settler colonialism, we don’t aim to seize colonial state power but to abolish it. We seek nothing but total liberation.

Voting Is Not Harm Reduction - An Indigenous Perspective

[mayonnaisetoffees]

The why don't you let the cat/lettuce run your country jokes are funny don't get me wrong but they do ignore the most frustrating part of this:

We have no say!! They aren't calling a general election!! Unless you're a member of the Conservative party you have absolutely Zero say in the matter at all!!

So reminder that if you have any kind of election coming up, any chance to vote, be it the US midterms or a presidential vote or local council elections or whatever, PLEASE go and vote. Have your say.

[grilledcheeseandgravityfalls]

"I refuse to choose the lesser of two evils!! It shouldn't be this way!!"

Well, it is. And unless you can come up with and implement a realistic plan to fix that before the end of this year (you can't), you need to accept that there isn't always a perfect choice that will allow you to keep your sense of moral high ground and limit damage to human lives. Which one is more important?? Think this through for five seconds and remember that your choices affect people other than yourself.

[masseffectdoctor]

Something that I think people need to understand and remember about Henry Kissinger is the fact that he was a Man in a position of relatively little personal power, in comparison to something like say a president.

However this absolute bastard war criminal is probably responsible personally for more death heartache and pain than just about any other single human being that's ever existed.

So as we crab rave and piss on his grave, I want you all to think about and remember the positions of power we see now. Especially so in the US. Because the decisions we make do affect the lives, happiness, and well-being of people all across the world.

So I'm gonna co-opt his death for a brief second to just remind you that he didn't happen in a vacuum. His destructive and monsterous existence was not born of thin air. People helped make him. People helped give him power.

Lets not be those people again. Let's do better than the people who put these war criminals in power.

[laurelindebear]

Hey there, US voters! Do you or anyone you know use birth control for contraception or to treat medical conditions? Then please vote to keep people who want to ban it - all of it - out of office, and make your the people in your circle know about this stuff too.

Combine the push for Comstock (which will also impact all other kinds of 'adult' or 'obscene' things, like art which includes nudity, sex toys and aides, and ofc anything queer) with the push to end no-fault divorce and the already-existing breaches of reproductive freedom, and a Republican-led future looks bleak.

[icarusxxrising]

https://www.indigenousaction.org/voting-is-not-harm-reduction-an-indigenous-perspective/?fbclid=PAAaYRHDxmLzEba3MPO15pShoSoVfl0ePxhbxuk9LjEDccP8Ru8uYupG36j8I

Probably gonna print and put these in a local library!

[catshinji]

Link

[suncaptor]

like you got to stop seeing people being anti-Biden or their Democratic representatives as stupid or dangerous because you're not going to convince people who don't want to currently campaign for people who are complicit in genocide and would rather, as their regular voting block that they rely on, threaten to not support them to try to influence policy. even if it's just tiny increments to save a tiny bit of face. how is that not another form of harm reduction.

[deepseacityunderground]

beginning to see american "if you dont vote for the blue warmongerers then you are personally responsible for the red warmongerers getting into power"

[byler-alarmist]

HERE IS THE LIST OF PRIMARY ELECTION DAYS FOR ALL US STATES AND TERRITORIES

For several states, you must submit your ballot BY TODAY (March 5th) (Alabama, American Samoa Democratic presidential caucuses, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Iowa Democratic caucus mail vote, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Utah Democratic presidential primary and Republican presidential caucuses, Vermont, and Virginia)

Here is where you can find the deadlines to cast a ballot (local times)

Vote down the ballot with special attention paid to your local offices and ballot measures!

IT'S SUPER TUESDAY; GO MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD!!!!!

[fiercynn]

strongly urge any of the "voting is harm reduction" people to read this piece

from the intro:

At some point the left in the so-called U.S. realized that convincing people to rally behind a “lesser evil” was a losing strategy. The term “harm reduction” was appropriated to reframe efforts to justify their participation and coerce others to engage in the theater of what is called “democracy” in the U.S. Harm reduction was established in the 1980s as a public health strategy for people dealing with substance use issues who struggle with abstinence. According to the Harm Reduction Coalition (HRC) the principles of harm reduction establish that the identified behavior is “part of life” so they “choose not to ignore or condemn but to minimize harmful effects” and work towards breaking social stigmas towards “safer use.” The HRC also states that, “there is no universal definition of or formula for implementing harm reduction.” Overall, harm reduction focuses on reducing adverse impacts associated with harmful behaviors. The proposition of “harm reduction” in the context of voting means something entirely different from those organizing to address substance use issues. The assertion is that “since this political system isn’t going away, we’ll support politicians and laws that may do less harm.” The idea of a ballot being capable of reducing the harm in a system rooted in colonial domination and exploitation, white supremacy, hetero-patriarchy, and capitalism is an extraordinary exaggeration. There is no person whose lives aren’t impacted everyday by these systems of oppression, but instead of coded reformism and coercive “get out the vote” campaigns towards a “safer” form of settler colonialism, we’re asking “what is the real and tragic harm and danger associated with perpetuating colonial power and what can be done to end it?” [x]

(thanks to @mousieta for introducing me to this piece!)

[eagle-writes]

Election Day special for the US-ians:

I voted

Ink: Pilot blue cartridge that comes with most of their pens.

I know that elections can be an “all the options suck” situation. And, yeah, elections often won’t solve all the problems. But elections are harm reduction. We can get officials who want to kill just a few people, not literally all of my friends.

Especially since this is an off year, everything on your ballots will be local, and local elections can have a larger impact on you, personally. Local elections affect what is taught in schools, how your libraries are funded, how districts get selected (and how much gerrymandering happens), local minimum wage, and so many other things that the big national elections just don’t ever affect.

Please, if you are legally allowed to vote, do so.

[thenixkat]

It's wild that the Vote Blue no matter Who fuckheads really don't seem to think that it's a bad idea to tell every US politician that genocide is not a dealbreaker for them and they can do whatever the fuck they want in office so long as they do enough fear-mongering. Granted what can you expect from selfish fucks who don't care about anyone but themselves

[lezzian]

harm reduction was such a refreshing and amazing radical approach specifically designed for health care and addiction care and now libs have managed to reduce its revolutionary potential to "vote for liberals" - most of whom don't even actually support a harm reduction approach to public health. that's depressing.

anyway, you should know that most homeless shelters don't allow alcohol consumption, let alone opioid use, leaving many addicts with their only option being to sleep on the streets, cold or overheating, at a higher risk of robbery and violence. keep in mind that detoxing from alcohol and opioids can be dangerous, even fatal.

harm reduction approaches keeps addicts as safe as they can be. providing free clean needles, allowing alcoholic beverages at shelters, drug testing kits, methadone clinics, carrying naloxone - in other words: helping people use safely instead of stopping them from using all together - that is harm reduction.

keep that in mind the next time you use the term harm reduction; that it is rooted in enabling habits that we tend to demonise, habits that we ascribe to people when we want to justify hurting them and taking away their autonomy, but that are actually morally neutral and often rooted in deeper societal issues. societal issues which liberals tend not to want to solve.