In commemoration of the upcoming Transgender Day of Visibility (TDOV), President Joe Biden issued a statement praising trans people’s contributions to society and describing actions his administration has taken to counter transphobic bullying and extremism. Additionally, many members of Biden’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) also issued their own statements affirming that community health depends on supporting trans people too.

“Transgender Americans are part of the fabric of our Nation,” Biden wrote in his statement. “Whether serving their communities or in the military, raising families or running businesses, they help America thrive. They deserve, and are entitled to, the same rights and freedoms as every other American, including the most fundamental freedom to be their true selves.”

  • whoreticulture@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    26
    arrow-down
    103
    ·
    edit-2
    8 months ago

    I’m a trans person and I don’t appreciate my identity being used to justify voting for someone who literally TODAY sent more weapons to Israel to bomb Palestinians with.

      • TheKMAP@lemmynsfw.com
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        8
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        8 months ago

        When can we start voting for someone good instead of merely less bad? How do we get to that point?

          • undercrust
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            4
            ·
            8 months ago

            See: improvements in Alaska (of all places) for details

        • VoterFrog@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          5
          ·
          8 months ago

          I would think it would take 4 back to back presidential election wins by the Democratic party. Maybe 3 if it included wipeouts of Republicans in Congress and at the state level. No party can survive being out of power for that long without changing and shifting towards were voters are and that leaves the Democrats room to shift left to solidify that flank.

          We’ve already had 1. We’re on the cusp of a possible second. That means we could be 4 years from a complete collapse of the Republican party, if people were actually serious about creating a real leftist movement in this country. That’s because winning is how you affect change. A loss just tells politicians that they need to be more like the winner.

          • Cryophilia@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            4
            ·
            8 months ago

            The California model. Render Republicans impotent, then you can start enacting real positive changes.

          • TheKMAP@lemmynsfw.com
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            3
            ·
            8 months ago

            That’s a good start, I think. The tricky bit is I think you need thirty years straight of good decisions so that the next generation is fully done “correctly”. Will be harder to abuse the system after that.

            “Be more like the winner” is interesting. Trump is a populist and he was more worried about Bernie than Clinton.

        • Cryophilia@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          8 months ago

          Gotta get rid of First Past the Post voting. And increase the size of the House. Even then, there can be only one President, so he necessarily won’t be someone you perfectly agree with, he will represent the broader coalition that your party is part of in government. But I think that’s as close as we could get in a Democracy.

        • Grant_M
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          8 months ago

          Elevate and popularize someone who is better. If Biden gets in, there’s four years to make it happen – if trump gets in, there’s no more democracy.

        • I’m only voting for him because the other option and inaction are death sentences. I don’t like the guy at all and would vote for someone else given the option.

          That said, for all his centrist tendencies he does seem to occasionally cave in to pressure. It just takes time.

          • Cryophilia@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            6
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            8 months ago

            That moment when doing what your constituents want you to do is “caving to pressure” ugh

            This is a Democracy. Biden was elected to enact the will of the people. If all of a sudden America became fascinated with the color yellow, I would expect him to start wearing yellow pins. If the American people change their minds, our elected leaders should also change their minds, because they work for us.

            • Grant_M
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              2
              ·
              8 months ago

              This time the vote is literally for an opportunity to vote again in the future.

            • Cryophilia@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              3
              arrow-down
              4
              ·
              8 months ago

              we will only continue to get the “lesser evil” guaranteeing that we will eventually get the greater evil anyways

              How does that follow?

              If you keep voting hard enough for the lesser evil every time, you make things less evil. That’s how democracy works.

              Or are you one of those silly people who never votes in the primaries?

              • eldavi@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                4
                arrow-down
                2
                ·
                8 months ago

                here’s your strawman-esque argument with another one: lesser evil and evil work towards the same goal; it’s only difference at the speed at which its executed so voting for the lesser evil means that we’ll get there no matter what.

                • Cryophilia@lemmy.world
                  link
                  fedilink
                  arrow-up
                  4
                  arrow-down
                  5
                  ·
                  8 months ago

                  Ah, so you’re one of the tinfoil hat Joe Rogan types.

                  Voting for the lesser evil brought us expanded healthcare that saved thousands of lives. It brought us legal recognition of gay marriage. It brought us all the social progress that you’re completely ignoring.

                  "Both sides"ism brought us the end of abortion protections.

                  There is no grand conspiracy to make your life horrible. It’s just one evil party, one good party, and you in the middle refusing to pick because you’re scared of having any agency in your life.

          • hark@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            2
            arrow-down
            4
            ·
            8 months ago

            Unfortunately, you’re going to be voting for “not the other option” for the rest of your life since democrats will see that this is the perfect strategy they can use to never have to actually change the status quo.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        4
        arrow-down
        33
        ·
        8 months ago

        condemn anyone who won’t vote to stop a fascist dictator

        Finally standing up to Benjamin Netanyahu and all those Americans who keep voting for him

      • whoreticulture@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        9
        arrow-down
        93
        ·
        8 months ago

        Yeah you’re cool with voting in the fascist killing Palestinians, and shitting on people for caring about genocide. Very cool.

          • webadict@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            21
            arrow-down
            5
            ·
            8 months ago

            It’s a 10 day old account, they are 100% a bad faith actor, and you know this because they don’t acknowledge any of the ways to push for better treatment of Palestinian civilians. They are using them as a prop to tell people to not vote for Joe Biden (which is its own brand of fucked up privileged), even though Joe Biden is pretty famous for being bullied into better positions. Voting against fascists is, indeed, the right move, and Joe Biden might be a centrist liberal, but he isn’t a fucking fascist.

              • Sylver@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                13
                arrow-down
                2
                ·
                8 months ago

                And you are acting in bad faith. You set up a straw man argument so you can bash people for whatever their choice is. If you really meant to have actual discussion, you would. Instead you spout right-wing bullshit about “Biden bad boohoo”

                You say he is the genocidal one, while he is actively being pushed to change his ways and taking responsibility while correcting the behavior. Slowly but surely. As opposed to the other side, which literally just wants to drop a nuke on the situation.

                When people call you a bad-faith actor, it’s because you’re acting in bad faith.

                • whoreticulture@lemmy.world
                  link
                  fedilink
                  arrow-up
                  2
                  arrow-down
                  10
                  ·
                  8 months ago

                  He literally sent more weapons to Israel yesterday. You’re dumb as hell if you think he’s going to push back against the mainstream Democratic opinion that is in support of Israel. Only way to convince Democrats to change is to stop voting for them.

          • whoreticulture@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            3
            arrow-down
            56
            ·
            8 months ago

            I’m sure you’ve heard all the arguments, if you are curious about my thoughts you can dig through my comment history or do some googling and guess at what they could be.

        • webadict@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          23
          arrow-down
          3
          ·
          8 months ago

          Please list the descriptors that show Joe Biden is a fascist, because I’m looking at Umberto Eco’s and I see… maybe 1, if you reach a bit: “appeal to the middle class”

          You probably fall under at least 4 though.

          • whoreticulture@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            5
            arrow-down
            16
            ·
            edit-2
            8 months ago

            he’s funding a genocide, is the leader of a country that has one of the proportionally largest prison populations in the world that are used as slaves, the U.S. is a police state who spies on its own citizens and regularly just bombs/assassinates activist movements. Any president not acting to dismantle that is fascist.

            shocking that you’re just learning this now, but the United States are the bad guys

            • webadict@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              12
              arrow-down
              2
              ·
              8 months ago

              That’s not really a good answer though. Those are policies put in place long before Biden became president, but not only that, you haven’t proposed an alternative. Your current solution is “Don’t vote for Biden” but the outcome is that you either get Biden, a continuation of the status quo at worst, or you get Trump, a continuation of the status quo AT BEST. You can pretend you live in a world where you get a third party candidate, but you don’t.

              Which leaves you in an unfortinate bind, since that makes you a fascist by your own definition. You are trying to push a solution that would make the situation at best the same, and at worst, much, much worse. As you said:

              Any president not acting to dismantle that is fascist

              I assume you would never take an action that would support a fascist. So, how can you argue that in a First-Past-The-Post voting system (and one that defaults to state legislatures if no majority is made), voting for a third party is a viable solution?

              I think you can’t if you are against fascism. You can post links to antifascist movements, organizations, or steps to take, but the American election system is too fucked to argue against the two big parties unless you are ever the optimist, but I don’t think you are if you argue both parties are fascist.

              • hark@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                2
                arrow-down
                4
                ·
                8 months ago

                You’re forgetting that biden spent almost his entire career in the senate. He’s part of the political machine that put those policies into place. Things are only getting worse, which is how assholes like trump rise to start with. If things were going great, then a candidate like trump wouldn’t have found a foothold.

              • whoreticulture@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                3
                arrow-down
                13
                ·
                8 months ago

                If the Dems lose elections or nearly lose elections because 10% of voters choose a leftist third party, the party will move left to capture those voters. If we keep voting them in as-is, they will have no incentive to change. I am an optimist, actually, because I believe in the capacity for change. The results from the primary elections prove to me that this strategy is viable.

                • assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world
                  link
                  fedilink
                  arrow-up
                  5
                  arrow-down
                  1
                  ·
                  8 months ago

                  You’re forgetting that Democrats losing means Republicans winning. And when Republicans win elections, it pushes the entire country to the right. It happened with Reagan, the Tea Party, and Trump.

                  This approach only spirals us further into far right extremism.

              • whoreticulture@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                2
                arrow-down
                3
                ·
                8 months ago

                Idk why your definition of fascism doesn’t include labor camps, war-mongering, and a militarized policing of our own people.

                • assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world
                  link
                  fedilink
                  arrow-up
                  2
                  ·
                  8 months ago

                  Because that’s not fascism. Fascism is hypernationalism and tacit acceptance of political violence to support your goals. Everything you’ve mentioned is usually there with fascist regimes, but it isn’t what makes the regime fascist.

                  • whoreticulture@lemmy.world
                    link
                    fedilink
                    arrow-up
                    1
                    arrow-down
                    1
                    ·
                    edit-2
                    8 months ago

                    There are many definitions of fascism, but, the United States absolutely fits the definition you just gave.

                    Not every country has their flags flying constantly. Not every country has a pledge of allegiance to a flag in their schools. And the United States has bombed, imprisoned, and assassinated domestic political threats.

    • TheKMAP@lemmynsfw.com
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      6
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      8 months ago

      I think it’s sad that your idea can’t stand on its own, and that you have to say you’re trans to not get down voted.

      • whoreticulture@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        4
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        8 months ago

        oh cool I’m sure The Israel Times is a great resource. Of course Israel is using them lawfully. Nevermind all the actual reports coming out of Palestine of hospitals being bombed.