Saying “maybe people are the problem” is reductive and unhelpful. But I agree with you broadly, religion is just a system or a tool, it can be used for good or evil.

To judge if religion is a good system or a bad one, we can use a cost benefit analysis. This is what we have been attempting to do in this thread.

But when it comes to sensitive subjects like religion, many people have a tendency to avoid, overlook, and deny the associated costs.

Anti-science, misogyny, etc may be bad independently of religion, but they aren’t independent of religion. Religion is a source of these problems.

You can imagine a hypothetical religion that is simply a “social club” or whatever, but here in the real world religion comes with baggage.

Religion is why my cousin’s children have never seen a doctor in their life. Religion is why my gay friend in high school tried to kill himself. Religious indoctrination has led to lifelong shame and trauma in many of my friends.

And this was just from a “moderate” sect of Christianity- the millions living under fundamentalist religion have it even worse.

What you said is all true, but you are ignoring the negative aspects of religion.

Religious influence, both on their followers and on government, is anti-science, misogynistic, and anti-LGBT.

Religions are funded like pyramid schemes, with the most desperate and vulnerable as their victims.

Religious indoctrination is child abuse.

This asshole destroyed the public option, then a few years later my life was destroyed by medical bankruptcy.

It is sad that he got to live a full life surrounded by loved ones. He deserved so much worse.

Rest in piss, you wont be missed.

We can’t afford to wait until November.

Can’t escalate a genocide if they’re already dead.

Biden is going to lose if he continues his genocidal policy in Gaza.

People like me put pressure on the Biden admin to change course. By engaging in good faith criticism, I am trying to get Biden elected.

People who refuse to criticize Biden enable him to continue on this losing path. Enabling the worst of the Biden administration’s policies is helping to elect Trump.

Orange man is so bad that you’ll actively support a genocide, very enlightened, great job.

Or maybe people have a legitimate moral concern when their country is aiding and abetting an ongoing genocide?

Can I ask, what evidence would you need to see to conclude there is a bias at WaPo?

If AMZN wanted to buy a propaganda operation, they wouldn’t kill every anti-Amazon story. That would ruin WaPo’s credibility and thus waste their investment. Instead they would kill only the handful of most damaging stories, while also frequently posting tepid criticism of AMZN, which would give us the “evenly split” result you use as evidence.

“Dont even bother trying to educate those idiots” seems like a horrible strategy, both for electoral politics and for society in general.

You’re right that there are some cultists who are irredeemable, but there are many more on the fringes who can be helped.

I would start with MLK, collected essays, no one writes about protest more eloquently.

A Peoples History of the United States by Howard Zinn gives a great broad overview.

Death in the Haymarket by James Green is a great history of the first decades of the labor movement.

Doris Kearns Goodwin’s Leadership in Turbulent Times goes in depth on LBJ and the civil rights movement.

On the Duty of Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau for the classic philosopher’s take.

We’ve Got People by Ryan Grim details the successes and failures of the movement in the last decade.

You should educate yourself on the history of protest. The media has always been a serious impediment. There was never an “entire population” uniting or a “simple goal that others could get behind”. It was always extremely difficult. It often looked hopeless. Many people were killed in the streets, and others were brave enough to replace them.

Overall I think feeling helpless in the face of monumental challenges is normal. But closing your eyes and telling yourself “nothing can ever change, so why bother” is self-soothing and pathetic.

Things can change, and you can be a part of that positive change if you put in real effort.

What are we gonna do, vote?

“If voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal” - Emma Goldman

In the last 100 years, protest movements have given us women’s suffrage, workers rights including the weekend and overtime pay, gay rights, civil rights, etc. History shows us that we can have positive change, but it’s not as easy as just voting.

We can see right now how protest movements are moderating the Democrat’s support of Israeli war crimes.

But don’t you feel a responsibility to the rest of the world?

Say if, for example, your tax dollars were funding an ongoing genocide and starvation campaign, wouldnt you feel a bit responsible to change that?

…destroy everything that supports Hamas. Everything.

This is called “genocide”. People with a sense of ethics oppose genocide.

Comparing innocent Palestinian children to 18th century slaveholders is a gross attempt at justifying genocide.

Well it sounds like we agree on most things then, except on how to communicate to voters. I have found that being honest with voters about things like the corruption of the DNC and the serious flaws of the ACA actually helps to win them over.

Try to do a door knocking campaign and act like the Democratic Party is perfect, most voters will smell the bullshit.

It only takes a few seconds to say “yes most Democrats are corporate lackeys, but not this candidate, and here’s why…” Acknowledging the flaws of the party does not suppress turnout. It is the flaws themselves that do the suppression.

My original intention here was to try to convince people to think critically when hearing a politician’s stump speech, which I believe is adding value to the discourse.

I surely didn’t have lofty goals to “improve the country or the Democratic Party” when I opened Lemmy today lol.

And I do believe the DNC and the donor class are a bunch of corporate goons who have little to offer, and almost all Democratic politicians are subservient to this superstructure.

Let me ask you, how do you suggest we overcome the institutional hurdles when running a progressive primary challenge? The last 2 progressive primary challengers I volunteered for had extreme problems finding vendors to supply them with the basic supplies that they need to run a campaign. This is because the DNC has a policy of blacklisting any vendors that work with a progressive primary challenger.

We can agree that Republicans are horrible and make everything worse, but how is that applicable in the case of the ACA?

The ACA got exactly 0 Republican votes. There was no reason to negotiate or even listen to Republicans in this case. It was Democrats doing it to themselves. And as I have already established, yes the ACA is a right wing bill.

As for advocating for progressive ideals, I am doing that when I call out the hypocrisy and corruption of the corporate Dems. It’s becoming very difficult to tell the difference between a modern corporate Dem and a 90s-00s Republican, and that scares me.

I think it’s a good thing to say “Democrats bad” when they are in fact bad. Whatever demons lurk on the other side of the aisle does not change this. Putting your fingers in your ears and yelling “vote blue no matter who” is not a solution.

Yes that is exactly my point, Dems had full control and they still passed a right wing healthcare plan.

In that 70 days they abandoned a public option and quickly adopted Romneycare. Then they added even more corporate subsidies and giveaways for health insurance companies.

I’m not sure about bots, but this is politics@world, Lemmy’s home for BlueMAGA.

I wear my downvotes from here with pride.