It’s rarely used phonetically the same as xylophone. Usually it makes the [ks] sound, it only ever makes the [z] sound at the beginning of words. X-ray is actually much more in line with the typical phonetic representation in English.

Fair, these self-destructive leftist types get my blood boiling.

Do whatever stupid political moves you think work, just do it silently so you don’t drag others down with you. Your false equivalences are either ignorant or monstrous. I’m not wasting any more time with your callousness.

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You really don’t get it. This is just politics to you. Find. Just please, for the love of God, stop trying to drag others down with you. That’s all I have to say.

I dunno what to tell you. My heart aches, aches for Palestine. More than you know. But I’m not a politician, I don’t have tangible power to improve things for them directly. And none of the politicians seem particularly bothered. They’re focused on their campaigns, maintaining the status quo, all of it. Like you said, complicit. It would be great if any of your strategies, or the strategies of the protesters, if anything helped. Actually made a difference. It might assuage some of the dread implicit to our daily lives as profoundly privileged and comfortable citizens of the West.

But it’s resoundingly obvious that’s it’s just another minor calculation that gets rolled into the other calculations to win elections. People are dying. Innocent people. It eats me alive. But I’m a privileged , comfortable westerner. My ethical inclinations don’t mean shit at best, and soothe me into thinking my compassion is valuable in and of itself at worst.

But I know what backwards looks like. And backwards is bad for everyone, Palestine included. Ukraine too. All the disenfranchised minorities in this country too. I can’t just revel in my irrelevance, exercise my privilege by tapping out because no one on the ballot has the perfect platform. I’m afforded the opportunity to slow the backslide. And maybe slowing the backslide isn’t enough for you.

But it’s something tangible, and I’m going to do it. I’m going to vote lesser evil. Not like my life depends on it, because for all my troubles it’s been a blessed life compared to others. If I die tomorrow, I’ve had a better go than most. I’m voting lesser evil to slow the backslide to mitigate damage for others, because that’s what I can do.

I don’t live in a clear blue state. Lots of other people don’t live in clear blue states. Lots of them identify as leftist. Many of them are here. I’m begging you, don’t project your exceptional privilege as a clear blue citizen as universal. This is serious, backsliding is bad for everyone. Carelessly fomenting apathy in people who could actually help is horrific. This isn’t just Internet arguments. Innocent people are dying. Stop this. The Dems are garbage neo-libs, but the opposition is tangible evil. Enabling genocide is horrific, but it’s marginally better than acceleration of genocide. The opposition is worse. Anything I, and the millions in swing states, can do to mitigate that horror is better than apathy.

I don’t oppose the death penalty because I don’t think some crimes are heinous enough to deserve it, I oppose the death penalty because I don’t trust the justice system to not make mistakes.

Of poll respondents. There’s a large overlap between people who don’t care, and people who don’t answer polls. And oh yeah, Harris has been calling for a ceasefire

And disregarding AIPAC is stupid. Picking up the single issue voters by overtly pissing off AIPAC during the election will unleash a multimillion dollar ad campaign. Look at what happened to the squad.

There’s no good reason to do that now. A smart candidate would stay relatively quiet until the election, and then go full bore on the offensive. Especially since, y’know, the vice president doesn’t even have authority here so it’s stupid to blame it on her. Especially when the other candidate is actively sabotaging ceasefire negotiations.

There’s just no logic here.

Specifically what I said was that individual choice separates humans from violent, animalistic, and selfish impulses. I said that societal structure introduces friction to disincentivize those impulses for those who would submit to them.

They must have a very comfortable margin if they can ignore the majority of Americans

Unfortunately, I don’t think that’s the majority. I think the majority either support Israel without really thinking about it, or don’t care.

you can safely ignore my vote and my voice

Your vote I can ignore, your voice muddying the water for other impressionable voters I cannot

Maybe relatively small societies, but there has always been violence in any society of consistent size.

That’s a nice thought, and I certainly won’t completely disregard our capacity for, but our extensive history of war and brutality proves that this absolutely universal. I’m not saying that every human is violent, but it’s silly to suggest that there aren’t violent humans at every stage of history.

My issue with this notion is the implication that the modern world is uniquely tortuous and exploitative. Humans are violent, greedy, opportunistic apex predators. Our nobility and justice are individual and aspirational. The whole point of the complex web is to introduce friction and disincentives to that violence.

Should we try to minimize that violence? Absolutely! But our institutions are our attempt to crawl out of the jungle. Without police we’d have other violent gangs with even less oversight.

A party with a comfortable margin can embrace less centrist policies when their voters ask for them (write to your representatives everyone). A party with an uncertain margin has to calculate their platform to target the largest demographics. Using your vote + using your voice = representation.

How, precisely, does a promise that you won’t vote for them unless they alienate a larger demographic entice them into anything?

I’ll base my decision not on the promises they make, but the ones they have already fulfilled.

Not sure what promises the Harris administration have fulfilled, since it hasn’t existed yet.

how much time you’re wasting trying to convince a disillusioned old anarchist

That might be a point if I was trying to convince a disillusioned old anarchist. What I’m actually doing is publicly debunking your public nonsense so that impressionable onlookers in swing states don’t try to emulate that nonsense.

Make up your mind, is it “democratic” or does everyone’s vote not count?

Votes count. Non-votes don’t. There is no conflict in logic here.

Democrats will keep triangulating towards the right to pick up the mythical “moderate” and become the new right-wing party while some new group starts to pick up the pieces on the Left. Probably the greens.

All the more reason to entice them further left now so that the future landscape, in the good timeline, rests further left. I’m all for that future, and want it to start off as far left as possible.

It actually is a common occurrence, since the U.S. Flag Code specifies that burning is the preferred method of disposing of flags that are no longer fit to display.

I don’t feel the need to vote in support of a corrupt system.

Do you… do you think that if enough people don’t vote that the government will say “Shucks, guess we have to redo the election with better candidates”? If only one person in the whole country votes, they decide the winner. You gain absolutely nothing by not voting, all you’re doing is shifting power to those who disagree with you the most. This is just plain idiotic.

If they need our votes, they should start acting like they’re trying to earn them.

They need enough votes. If they think pandering to your demographic will cost them other demographics, they will not pander to you. Despite your claims, America is a democratic republic, granted with it’s own peculiarities in determining electoral votes. The candidate who wins the most votes wins the state. You will be left in the dust as irrelevant noise in the flood of people who know how to use their vote, and you will get zero representation. Congratulations.

It’s perfectly logical, you just don’t like the conclusion that the logic points towards, because it betrays the party leadership as being self-interested, cynical, and willing to aid and abet genocide to preserve their bloody campaign funding.

Nope, there is no logic. It’s based on nonsense feelings with no correspondence to the functional mechanism of our elections. Abstinence has no effect, and in fact will probably push the party farther right to scoop moderates because they actually vote. Congratulations.

That’s the way I’ve always heard/told it.

Totally irrational. It’s not about who represents you most, they aren’t on the ballot. It’s about which of the two represents you more than the other. What incentive does the party have to sabotage their races (AIPAC influence is real) to court an uninformed bloc that’s unlikely to vote in the first place? Your abstinence is not incentive, no logic whatsoever.

AirBnB is great for large groups, when all the hidden fees and cleaning duties can be split up between a dozen people. It actually works out to cheaper than a hotel, and it’s much more intimate to be together in one place with big private common areas. Plus, those big 6+ bedroom AirBnBs aren’t exactly hurting homebuyers by being off-market.

But for just a few people? Hotels all the way.