One thing I’ve learned this election cycle is how few people have any knowledge of utilitarianism. Genocide is better than genocide+1. Not acting is a moral choice, and frequently a cowardly one.
Utilitarianism isn’t a great framework for decision making. It can be used to justify any number of atrocities. For example, if there is a minority which comprises 0.1% of the population, and 10% of the rest of the population hates that minority, and they would be happier if the minority had fewer rights, utilitarianism could be used to justify oppression of that minority, since the suffering of 0.1% of a group is eclipsed by the happiness of the 10%.
That depends on how you define utilitarianism though.
That minority also factors into a utilitarian’s assessment of what will maximize happiness. If 10% of the population hates the 0.1% minority, but oppressing that minority would also harm them, then you have to factor in the relative harm caused to them as well, not just in raw %'s, but also in terms of if the value given to the 10% from their oppression would outweigh the harm done to those being oppressed.
Furthermore, I’d argue most utilitarians would argue that the very hate towards that minority in the first place is what causes harm, not the minority themselves. The best utilitarian action to take would be to reduce the hate for that minority, and increase their acceptableness, rather than oppress that minority to satisfy the 10%. Especially considering we know this tends to not just be a one-time thing, and that hate will likely continue, leading to further oppression over time, and harm not only to the minority, but also to the mental well-being of the 10%. Thus, the best course of action would be to eliminate the hate, not the minority.
Of course, utilitarians aren’t a monolith, but that’s at least how I would interpret the situation.
You people should be less worried about leftists who despise both parties and more worried about the huge amount of people who just don’t want to vote. Now it would be easier to convince people to get out and vote for an actual candidate rather than an artifact of campaign financing but hey, that’s your problem to solve. Tell the Democrats to do better next time.
Shaming and blaming is so much harder than reaching unaffiliated/disaffected voters and winning them over.
So much easier to denounce Ralph Nader for a 450 vote margin in Florida than to tap the 4M people who didn’t turn out in one of the lowest turnout elections in recent history.
So much easier to claim the election was rigged in 2020 and kick off a riot than to get more people registered and in line to vote in Michigan or Pennsylvania or Georgia.
The way I see it is, if one side wins, the Left will not only have to worry about the Palestinians, but suddenly they’ll have to choose between protesting about all those other things AND it’ll be with a hostile government that will curtail civil rights and probably start committing abuses against US citizens.
If the other side wins, all those other issues become less of a danger and the Left can focus on keeping up the pressure on Democratic leadership to stop supporting Israel. It’s still not guaranteed, but it’s a much better chance than in the alternative world where out and out fascism takes over. Focus on what’s important, don’t needlessly add more problems on to the pile.
If you only feel safe if you enable a genocide, you’re a fascist in denial.
Removed by mod
At least I’m not a Nazi. Hope you’re never going to claim asylum when the genocide turns against you like it always does.
Democrats could nominate hitler reincarnated but you people would people would be defending them because republicans would have hitler reincarnated but who also hates animals. “Other guy worse” as a defense only means things continue getting worse because there will always be something worse. When can things actually get better for a change?
Voting isn’t an avenue for that kind of change. There are other avenues for more real change, but they require a lot more work and in some cases personal risk.
That doesn’t mean voting isn’t important, but it is a tool that’s very limited in the breadth of what it can do. Atleast in the US.
We have some very bad people; we have some sick people, radical-left lunatics. And it should be very easily handled, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military, because they can’t let that happen.
- Donald Trump
“Oh, but I don’t actually go outside - so he doesn’t mean me,” he said communistly.
Honestly, I wonder how much of our disagreements do ultimately come down to moral philosophy. I see a lot of people making this comparison and I’d be happy to put aside the present political situation and step back to discuss a higher level of disagreement.
I am a consequentialist, and I would agree, in principle, that the correct decision in the trolley problem is to pull the lever. But that should always come with an extreme amount of disclaimers. There are no shortage of people throughout history who have made justifications for their actions on the basis of “the ends justify the means,” but often, they turned out to be wrong. To use an example, torture under the Bush administration was claimed to be justified on the basis of getting useful intelligence in order to save lives. But no such intelligence was ever extracted. Really, it was more motivated by revenge, or a desire to be the sort of cool antihero who does the stuff nobody else will that needs to be done, but “the ends justify the means” served as a rationalization. Another example like that (though perhaps more controversial) is the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The problem with applying the trolley problem to real life is that we are mere human beings of flesh and blood. We have a whole host of cognitive biases that mislead us even when we have the best of intentions. If we give our minds a way to justify things that we know are bad, it gives it an out that allows us to rationalize the irrational and justify the unjustifiable.
There are two practices that are necessary to apply in order to counteract these biases. First, it is necessary to adopt a set of strong moral guidelines based on past experience and historical evidence. Second, it is necessary to regularly practice some form of introspection or meditation in order to better understand where your thoughts and feelings arise from, and how they flow through your mind. Said guidelines do not have to be rigorously adhered to 100% of the time, but they should be respected, and only deviated from after clear, careful consideration, understanding why the guideline exists and why deviation from them is almost always bad.
“Base” consequentialism, where you recognize that pulling the lever in the trolley problem is the correct decision, but simply accept that as a guiding principle, is a terrible moral philosophy, worse than deontology and possibly worse than having completely unexamined moral views. Some of the worst atrocities in history are the result of that sort of “ends justify the means” approach, detached from a set of moral guidelines and detached from humility and self-reflection. I would even say, speaking as a communist, that many of the bad things communists have done in history are a result of that kind of mentality. Following moral rules blindly is preferable to breaking moral rules without first doing the necessary work to be trusted with breaking them.
There’s plenty more I could say on the topic but people always complain about my long posts so I’d better cut myself off there.
Just reply to yourself with additional information. People like me can read through them all, and everyone else can skip them.
I found your post useful myself.
I was going to make this, but put Palestine before the fork. And then put the person away from the lever refusing to participate when pulling the lever would move it to a track with nobody on it. Or pulling a different lever that does nothing (labeled Jill Stein).
Palestine is and will continue to get run over regardless who wins the presidency, so they aren’t exactly relevant to the choice. It’s not a real trolley problem because it’s not a trade for different people. It’s just “let the trolley run over Ukrainians, lgbtq+ people, minorities, and immigrants” or… don’t. And then refusing to touch the lever because it somehow makes you “love genocide” to have anything to do with the trolley, even if to mitigate the damage.
I think a good representation would be to put the trolley already running over Palestine and then having to choose between keeping things as they are or adding the others + speeding up the train.
Or, changing the premise a little further, show the person as choosing between continuation, upgrade and using his own body to derail the trolley.
Please also put someone on the trolley with control over the brake and label them: Israeli leaders, military, and citizens. Since the trolley doesn’t actually need to go anywhere, regardless of whether the US track-switching money/arms are sent.
Perfect, except there wouldn’t be anyone on the lower track. But definitely gets the point across.
Here you go:
Please do make it! Just wait a day or so maybe?
A Trump defeat could have been guarantee long ago by Biden by simply not sending Weapons and Ammo to Israel.
This tram has already been running over Palestinians and Lebanese for over a year and it’s Biden to keeps sending it down that line branch.
Both the framing of this as a false dichotomy and the claim that the power to switch the line is in the hands of common people - all of which are the core of Democrat Propaganda at the moment - have always been lies.
We don’t know that. Remember that Lemmy is one hell of an echo chamber. Everyone doe6s think the same way as people on here.
This is literally true but also irrelevant. I’m pissed that democrats are sacrificing our democracy for a ethnostate’s expansion and genocide.
But that doesn’t negate the fact that we have the power to keep literal fascists that are threatening violence if we don’t vote for them out of office. We have genocide on the one hand vs many genocides plus project 2025 plus an even worse Supreme Court plus a vengeful Trump with a new expansive presidential immunity on the other plus more Ukrainians dying plus Taiwan being handed over to China plus Trump selling our country to the highest bidder legally since the Supreme Court said that was a Ok, etc.
I picked genocide in Palestine (Harris will hopefully actually threaten Israel is in power) rather than the other choice. It sucks ass. But Trump getting power is just so much fucking worse.
Please do, I’d love to be able to just slap that image down whenever “bUt tHe gEnOcIdE!” comes up around here.
The anti-genocide group sees both main parties as driving the trolley. They would like them to just maybe hit the brake, noone needs to be run over. They see the lever as irrelevant because again just please stop the trolley.
Unfortunately, that argument doesn’t fit with one of the primary aspects of The Trolley Problem - it involves a runaway trolley. The obviously-preferred solution to “stop the trolley” isn’t an option, because stopping the trolley isn’t possible.
Edit: Can’t tell what about this comment deserved so many downvotes? I imagine we all agree that “stopping” the Trolley would be best, but the real life “Trolley” (ie the current genocide) is just as unstoppable (between now and election day) as the metaphorical one. It’s horrible, I agree, but protest-voting third party (or arguing to just “stop the Trolley”) isn’t a solution.
Okay, but it does fit the primary aspects of politics in america.
that argument doesn’t fit with one of the primary aspects of The Trolley Problem - it involves a runaway trolley. The obviously-preferred solution to “stop the trolley” isn’t an option, because stopping the trolley isn’t possible.
hold my blunt while I butcher this metaphor:
from Wikipedia
Reversing the points under a moving train will almost always derail the train.
Of course, but how can we “reverse the points under” the current election and derail the “genocide train”? Voting third party isn’t going to cut it.
I get that this is not the hill to die on in this meme, but the tracks should really be reversed.
This implies “doing nothing” will only sacrifice Palestine, while “pulling the lever” (i.e. voting) will sacrifice Palestine+all other at risk groups.
Otherwise, this really is a classic trolly dilemma. We can’t stop the train and someone is going to get killed.
Yeah, but that would require an understanding of the trolley problem as a philosophical dilemma, and how are you gonna use that to yell at people you hate?
Hasn’t everyone watched the Good Place?
We can’t stop the train and someone is going to get killed.
We really fucking can, it just requires more people to care enough to be willing to do more than the bare fucking minimum of participating in this theatre those profiting from war have set out for us, and look outside of the system you have indoctrinated to believe isn’t only the default, but the best (and if this doesn’t demonstrate that fact to you, I honestly think you’re beyond help).
I fully believe the system we live in is broken, and is nowhere near “the best”. But the system does have many people who are indoctrinated, and many who benefit from it too greatly to make me believe we have sufficient time to derail it before some of the death implied in this meme comes.
But if you have a plan more tangible then telling people “wake up sheeple!”, then I’m ready to hear it. And if it’s actually convincing, then I’m ready to help.
But randomly telling people they have been indoctrinated, declaring it to be self evident, and then accusing them of being beyond help if they don’t see it, is nothing more than pointless moral masturbation. Maybe it makes you feel better, but it’s not helping nor convincing anyone.
Let me know what your plan is when you have it figured out. In the mean time, I’m going to go back to helping who I can.
This meme also implies that the current US strategy is not to fund Ukraine just enough to take Russia to Hell with it. It also implies the Democrats don’t rely on anti-LGBTQ votes because one single comment made by Waltz. This meme also implies Democrat are pushing laws to combat police brutality (at least fix this at local or state levels in cities where they hold the majority).
The Democrats here now have worse arguments than the tankies.
Kamala literally used to fight for sexual assault victims and such
Walz used to fight for his school kids
Trump bragged on Howard Stern about perving on young girls and is a convicted rapist
You do realize there is both a house and Senate right, and unless they have control of both, they can’t necessarily just push laws. That’s what politics is
And in the past few years, the Republicans have only been interested in sabotage it seems (if Trump loses this election, there is a better chance they will be more willing to work when Democrats)
They’re not relying on this shit. The most commonly cited reason even by Republicans voting for Harris is that Trump is a dictator that wants to ruin the country
Right, and one of the main, basic ways in which one can consider the trolley problem is that, regardless of the difference in outcomes, pulling the lever makes you morally responsible for what happens.
Also not pulling the lever makes you morally responsible if you “stand by and do nothing”
Unless the lever is in another country and you’re just paying the guy pulling the lever, then “there’s nothing I can do”.
That’s another way of looking at it
Decisions have consequences, doing nothing is a decision.
“doing nothing is a decision” is a legitimate position you can argue for, but it is not some kind of settled moral fact that you can just assert without any justification.
It’s less a moral fact and more a fact of life. If you don’t pay bills you get late fees then stop getting the service. If you don’t study you don’t do as well as studying a little or a lot. If you don’t make a move on the girl you like someone else will and/or she’ll move on. If you don’t stop facism…
“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
In politics the don’t vote and vote third party are essentially the same of doing nothing until ftfp is fixed.
That’s literally the point
That’s hotly debated by moral philosophers and ethicists.
Yes that’s my point exactly, people love to dogpile on anyone who doesn’t jump at the easy consequentialist solution, but there are other valid interpretations
These are all sort of parody to begin with but the purpose of the trolley dilemma isn’t about the results of the lever switch, it’s about approaching complicity and participation in a system that creates this kind of immoral choice.
But if you have a choice between lots of violence and less violence isn’t it immoral not to try and at least minimize the violence that you have to no power to stop?
I mean that’s why I referred to this as a parody: the point is with the trolley dilemma is that you’re being forced to participate in an immoral choice (the lever), not just that the lever applies or absolves the user from a moral liability.
A major part of the exercise is that the choice seems simple to flip the switch as plain harm reduction, but that people change their calculus the moment the single victim has a personal connection: (it is their parent, spouse, child being killed instead of the other 5 strangers.)
The forced immoral act (killing) ceases to be the moral quandry and instead harm reduction is the level of personal connection and culpability that people begin to weigh.
Since these memes tend to portray the trolley effectively running down both tracks with one outcome, the whole premise is kind of defeated.
It depends if you have to participate in the violence to minimize it.
For example, take a public shooter who disabled a police responder. Does a nearby citizen have an obligation to seize the cops gun and attempt to stop the shooter? Should they be shamed if they do nothing and hide? Is that choosing to allow violence or choosing not to be a part in it?
Natural disasters happen, accidents happen, and people regularly stop and help. I would be surprised if someone didnt in those situations.
There’s the additional risk of being shot in your example, so I’d reckon that less people would try to take the gun in this case compared to the trolley problem.
Theres also risk that you would get hurt helping in the other examples I gave.
Also a random by stander would have no idea what flipping a switch would do, it could derail the train and kill more than are on either track.
The situation in the trolley problem isnt realistic, and it definitely isnt simple or settled. Its an interesting thought experiment though.
The trolley problem implies that the bystander knows what flipping the switch would do though? Same as the US election, since I doubt that Democrats would start actively oppressing trans people or women (unless they start compromising on issues).
(unless they start compromising on issues).
Something Democratic politicians are completely unknown to do.
Right.
Right?
Right?!
anybody on the left withholding their vote at this point fundamentally disbelieves in a system with exactly two discrete options, so this type of post doesn’t persuade anybody
fundamentally disbelieves in a system with exactly two discrete options
except the polls are exactly about two discrete options. “not believing” in it is like not believing in gravity. it doesn’t make you philosopher, it makes you dumb moron.
which is what people said before biden was replaced
Anyone who doesn’t “believe” that we have the system we have is beyond reaching
Yeah I don’t “believe” our system best serves the common good. But I sure as hell will vote for Kamala because it’s very clear that is my best course of action to serve the common good. Voting for a third party won’t lead to a system where more parties have a voice, it will help Trump get into power, where only a single party has a voice, and any other voice will be silenced
Voting for a third party won’t lead to a system where more parties have a voice…
Yes it will. If a 3rd party gets 5% of the national vote they qualify for federal election funding which would make them more viable next time around.
which is what people said before biden was replaced
Tbf, the Democratic party nomination process is not a 2-party system. They did say that back then, and they were wrong to do so - hoping that people wouldn’t notice that difference.
But now we are talking about the real deal, the thing that they were trying to falsely tie an equivalence to, the actual vote for the actual presidency. Democracy in the USA may not last the decade regardless, but voting one way is for ditching it in favor of Project 2025 and among other things, ironically enough even moar-er support for genocide, while the other is a vote for hopefully a little better than the current status quo.
Both offer short term pain and long term destruction… but not equally so.
they’re not suggesting a third party candidate can win
they’re suggesting that the democratic platform can shift
How though? And more importantly, why? Like, what “leeway” does Kamala have to say anything different than she already has, which she could shift to?
Maybe after she wins yes, but at this point the choices are Trump vs. not-Trump, so I don’t see how a vote for a third-party would help in this case. At one point, with Bernie Sanders vs. Hillary Clinton there were different thoughts about how a vote for Bernie would cause Hillary to shift more towards the left - but most of that again gets back to the nomination process, not the final show-down between the two parties, and after that was a disastrous example of how voting for the 3rd-party candidate didn’t help the democratic party shift, except in the sense that it handed literally hundreds and hundreds of judicial nominees to the Republican party that, among other things, ended the protections of Roe v. Wade.
Two months ago the situation with Biden was VERY DIFFERENT than the situation now faced, with Kamala. Back then we could - and yay, did! - shift and pivot to adjust to the harsh realities that he was not capable of running again. We very likely would have lost if he had. But that was then, and this is now.
Anyway I think that I’m preaching to the converted here, so maybe I just misunderstood something that you said. Tbh, I don’t agree with your take on the OP - I think it really does show voting not for a 3rd party but voting for the other side b/c “bOtH sIdEs ArE tHe SaMe” (the title of the post), specifically wrt genocide. I think that b/c there are only 2 tracks shown… Also, the genocide being mentioned implicitly in the graphic (“but worse…”) shows how its focus is on short-term effects immediately after the election, not long-term ones about telling the Democratic party how the American populace would very much enjoy it if it would become more liberal if they would please and thank you very much.
Like, what “leeway” does Kamala have to say anything different than she already has, which she could shift to?
a significant enough chunk of her voter base credibly withholding a vote based on a desired policy change would force a shift toward that desired policy change
i’d say biden’s platform in 2020 was significantly more left-wing than clinton’s in 2016
But that was then, and this is now.
this is the same “it’s too late” or “it’s too unprecedented” or whatever you want to pick that was exactly the justification for biden being kept in as long as he was
I think it really does show voting not for a 3rd party but voting for the other side b/c “bOtH sIdEs ArE tHe SaMe” (the title of the post), specifically wrt genocide.
people the post targets aren’t voting red. they’re just not voting at all, or voting third party. it’s an argument to a position held by an insignificant fraction of the left-anti-harris crowd.
it doesn’t address the core issue they have. they’d say that continuing to vote for the least-bad party is the reason both parties are bad, and that at a certain point you have to attempt to force a more radical change.
Months ago was the time to make changes. Yeah, that’s what they said then too, except it was wrong then, as proven by the fact that the changes did happen.
Even if the words sound similar, now really is different than then. Voting has already begun - the fight to pick candidacies is long over and done. It is now long past time to pick a side.
If you want to vote 3rd party then go ahead - nobody is stopping you. Aside from all the news about some 3rd-party candidates receiving money from and having demonstrated ties to Russia (look it up if you haven’t heard), the Democrats do not seem to be taking such rhetoric as a credible “threat” though, for whatever reason. Probably bc they really are the best hope for the Palestinian people, as the latter recently confirmed by putting out a statement saying why they finally chose to endorse Kamala Harris’s campaign. You can ofc accuse the Dems of being very naive and disconnected from their voting base - that would be extremely difficult to argue against - and yet facts are facts.
See e.g. this article: https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/17919598.
You misread, try it again.
Sorry what do you think they meant then?
Believing in something and believing something exists or is a certain state are two very different things.
You can believe that this despotic duopoly exists in such a way that there are only two outcomes, without believing such a system will ever function.
I keep trying to explain this to people, maybe this graphic will work.
The philosophical position is that if they pull the lever, they become personally responsible for the resulting deaths. If they don’t pull the lever, that’s sad so many people die, but it’s the responsibility of the people running the train and who tied all those groups to the tracks. They have no personal blame in that case.
It’s not an intuitive position to many of us, but philosophers take it seriously.
According to the comments here it didn’t work.
Immigrants used to be on top rail, but after four years, they have been placed on both rails, just like the Palestinians. There is no guarantee that the groups placed on the top rail will not be shifted to the bottom rail as well in four years.
Voting for Democrats is always advertised as the lesser of two evils, but it sure seems like the lesser evil is just trying to kill the same groups the greater evil. If they want people to vote for them, the Democrats should start working to save and prevent people from being tied to trolley tracks.
Or at least lie about it.
Didn’t Kamala already refuse to protect Trans rights? The Dems will put everyone on the tracks if it gets them votes/donations
Plus we have Democrat-run cities implementing AI to spot homeless people, so add that to both rails as well
“Democrat-run cities”
Ya’ll just can’t help yourselves and I love it.
It’s almost as if they have a list of talking points and are told how to phrase simple things to make them further their agenda…
You mean like memes such as this one that deliberately leave out all sorts of context and misrepresent a political issue by oversimplifying it?
Wtf. I’ve never seen so many people annoyed that their fellows are protesting genocide. How do you take a situation like this and make it a fucking trolley meme.
I don’t think people are saying you shouldn’t protest the genocide. You should! But it’s stupid to not vote for Harris over it because letting Trump win doesn’t just throw women, LGBTQ people, etc. under the bus, it also makes the genocide of Palestinians even worse.
What I have seen with my eyes in the last 12 months is so horrifying that I cannot imagine how it could be worse.
Unfortunately I think Bibi has a better imagination than you
He’s been doing unlimited slaughter on gaza for 12 months it couldn’t possibly get worse than that theyre not gonna nuke Palestine the fallout would hit all of israel
“It couldn’t possibly get worse” so frequently comes right before it gets so, so much worse.
How
Maybe actual Holocaust style death camps, medical experimentation, elevating the death toll ten-fold. There are always ways things can get worse.
But it’s stupid to not vote for Harris
It’s stupid to vote for someone supporting a genocide
It’s stupid letting trump win.
Yes. Luckily life isn’t a meme and you are offered infinite possibilities so you can fight off trump without having to support criminals.
Lol
The government is spending billions in propaganda, half the people here are brainwashed and sockpuppets of their government
The Kremlin is spending even more, making people sockpuppets of them.
Edit: here they come!
The Biden/Harris admin is literally doing genocide to appease a foreign lobbying group (AIPAC)
Not true actually, the country that spend more money in war and in propaganda is USA.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_with_highest_military_expenditures
Russia cyberwar capabilities look weak compared to what the US has
Imagine you’re strapped to an operating table, incapacitated. There are two other people in the room strapped to tables with you.
In walk two psychopaths, let’s call them Al and Bob. They explain to you that they’ve decided to let the three of you choose your fate: Al wants to chop off your right hand, Bob wants to chop off all four of your limbs. They give you five minutes to decide, and then they’ll come back to take a vote, majority decides whether Al or Bob gets their way. If you refuse to vote they’ll flip a coin.
Immediately one of the other victims starts saying how terrible Al is and how horrible it is to chop off someone’s right hand. Non-stop protesting the inhumanity of Al, how important it is to deny Al the opportunity to take your right hand.
For whatever reason they seem oddly quiet on the fact that Bob also wants to take your right hand, and arm, and the left, and both legs. Whenever you try to interject with that fact, they accuse you of being pro-handchopping and how could you even suggest voting for Al the evil handchopper. And now the other victim seems to be taking this anti-Al rhetoric quite seriously.
Would you find that annoying?
imagine you’ve been abducted by 2 psychopaths
This is America
How do you take a situation like this and make it a fucking trolley meme.
You have to be a bigot who is happy to sacrifice others for your own comfort.
The original argument was “Both sides are evil/bad and we need to get rid of both.” These Democrats are trolling non-stop. Hopefully, they’ll be gone in a few weeks.
Too many reports. Locking this down.
