An entire institution is rarely justified by simply setting up an illusion for the average person to fall for. The US duopoly is a good example for this.
There is a very material incentive for the bourgeoisie to have precisely two parties alternating, that is, the importance of donors.
If the blue team were to lose only a small amount of donors, they would inevitably lose to the red team, and vice versa. If there were more major parties, losing donors could be a calculated decision to not alienate a part of the electorate, because the donations would go to one of the major parties. But in a duopoly situation, the donor’s money go straight to the other party, doubling the relative loss. On the contrary, a monopoly situation is not ideal because the importance of donors is diminished since the campaign is less important therefore money matters less.
This system therefore ensures maximum control over political parties by the bourgeoisie, because it optimises the bargain that donors have over party politicies
This is why I get annoyed when people try to tell me that voting in big elections matter. It doesn’t and it hasn’t for a long time.
this is a topic i really hate arguing about because, in the short term, voting does matter. If you are part of a vulnerable demographic, say you are trans, you have a lot at stake and i won’t blame you for picking the best of two neoliberal parasites.
Of course we understand that not voting is beneficial in the long term because it will eventually delegitimize the system. But i say that from the privileged position of a young, white, cishet male - there are a lot of people who would not survive this kind of approach.
I’m all for the “end justifies the means/sacrifices must be made” type of reasoning, but it is ultimately a choice we can’t force onto the marginalized people that WILL suffer consequences if we “let go” of politics and let the overton windows slide to the right until it collapses.
My suggestion is to just avoid this topic. You have nothing to gain by arguing with someone who wants to vote. It’s like being vegan and arguing with a normal person. Yeah, maybe you can get them to recognize that we eat too much meat - but sure as hell they won’t stop doing so, and you just wasted your time
Good point. Another reason is that they can blame each other – both for not implementing popular policies while elected (“we can’t do X because the Republicans/Democrats have a majority in Congress”) and for atrocities committed under a president from the other party
Rememeber what Parenti wrote in the “Democracy for the Few”, that entire system is puprosefully constructed so that laws and issues can be plausibly delayed ad inifinitum or outright scrapped with an explanation that is belivable, yet such system have no trouble whasoever in acting fast and effectively when it does benefit the bourgeoisie.
