Lenin said that if he were in Britain, he’d vote Labour. Not because he agrees with them, but to show the British people that yes, moving leftwards does make improvements and no, Labour is not doing enough. To show them that a further-left Socialist party is needed.

Accelerationism is a … choice. It’s easier, in my view, to push further left under ineffective neoliberalism than it is under right-wing authoritarianism. What you may view as a chance to get your ideal from the ashes, the fascists view as their chance to put you down for good.

I’m fortunate to live in a state with ranked-choice, where I can literally make a gradient of my preferences for nearly every contested election I vote in.

What I see most frequently is uncontested elections. Vote for the one registered candidate, or write someone in. Most of those have an R next to their name, and dollars to doughnuts a red armband in their closet.

I am in the top 2% of citizens in my state for voter participation (they include that state with our registration, I didn’t seek it out). I vote as far left as I can in basically every primary and election. I don’t have faith in accelerationism because at this point I truly have no idea what would wake up the American populace to what is happening to them. They all bitch about the same problems but continue to choose the people who create them

I vote for progress in primaries and damage control in generals.

I just also do other things when I’m not voting. If voting was actually as useless as many seem to think it is I don’t think we’d see such a concerted effort by those in charge to sequester “good” votes and manage elections. They’re trying to make it irrelevant because right now it still is relevant.

I’m incredibly jaded about voting. I think these mid-terms and the next general election are elections of which I will not bother with. And it isn’t even because of what’s being done with voters rights or the intimidating corruption from the republicans/trump.

It is stemming more from me realizing that there has to be more done than just simply voting someone end. That there has to be more done with getting society straightened up more to be aware as to how badly they’re getting fucked with. There just simply has to be more there to be done and I think voting isn’t enough.

I’ve voted in past mid-terms and general elections, I felt I tried my part in being with those who tried to vote against and vote out corruption in anyway I can. But, I’m having difficulty in seeing how much voting can do in these chaotic times.

I vote in a swing state.

I vote for ballot initiatives and then use the DSA’s voter guide for local elections. For president it’s always PSL. Voting for a DSA member isn’t getting an ML revolution, but it is sewer socialism at a local level. Sewer socialism is powerful in a country where the little infrastructure that does work still drives a 20th century society. Americans are radicalised into fascism twice a day on their commute.

Would you ever vote for someone like Trump just to make things intentionally worse in the hopes of sparking off a revolution?

Accelerationism falls into the same wishful thinking category as adventurism. Not wanting blood on my hands is why I don’t vote for democrats. If I throw a chaotic evil boomerang by voting for a fascist, that’s just voting for a democrat and hoping it blows back on enough people to do something before hitting me. The closest thing I’ve found to a good ML path is what the Black Panthers were doing in the 1960-70s. Electoralism and existing power structures might have been cynically engaged, like funding the mutual aid initiatives or electing a politician who might give them breathing room, but power came from organising in their communities and building up dual structures that linked intersectionally with other orgs. Revolution was putting up a stop sign where the city wouldn’t so that the residents watching learned that they had power. It was feeding hungry kids while their parents were engaged in discussions about their issues. Those things can’t be trusted to electoralism because politicians are temporary and usually replaced by their opposite.

Vote for the most left with one hand, throw your Molotov’s with the other. The right is hitting every avenue, so we do too. But fuck voting in America is always so ass in so many ways. Democracy should be easy, and its fucken impossible to even find information on local election candidates in your area when the time comes. Like how am I supposed to know the details about every candidate running for mayor in my city when theres millions of people, searching their info online doesnt bring anything up, and the pamphlets kind of read more like propaganda fliers than statements and info on the candidates. The entire fucken things needs to be reworked.

Voting every election I knew about where I lived since 2000 (Nader for president!) Always Green party except for Obama in 2008 (we need reparations, but that was closest thing). Voted Kamala, because it was what it was. I was really excited about Andrew Yang, because UBI is brilliant. Now… I’m learning español. 🙁

I do vote, I would consider voting for Social Democrat candidates, I’m probably not to the left of them and I’m not anti-capitalist (though I am anticorporatist).

I’ve never heard of PSL.

I would never vote for someone like our current President, for any office; accelerationism I find ethically repugnant.

Please vote. Even submitting an empty ballot is better than not voting.

The Greens are not anti-capitalist, no. I vote Green for all the offices they run for in my local elections.

I vote PSL where I can, but I live in a relatively “Small-Town” area and so I’m not necessarily opposed to voting for good local Dems for city, county etc. elections.

I think a lot of Internet MLs use ideology as a way to justify not being politically literate wrt local politics because “they’re all just the same”. That’s largely true at the Congressional level, sure, but chances are there are good people running as Democrats (or Independents) in your locality who probably won’t be truly revolutionary but don’t really need to be.

The city council of Yuriev-Polsky didn’t need to be full of Bolsheviks for the Russian Revolution to succeed. I think at the local level it’s most important to fight corruption and outright Bourgeois power-grabbing and to elect representatives who roughly represent the people they govern (to do otherwise would be a form of Ultra-Leftism).

I was born and raised in Akron, Ohio. There are some Democrats - Mayor Malik, Congresswoman Emilia Sykes, Fiscal Officer Kristen Scalise, etc. - who are corrupt, Zionist pieces of shit who I will never vote for. There are other Democrats, like Donofrio and Shmidt on the county council, or Fran Wilson on the city council, who I quite like and would vote for easily.

I always vote, local, state, and federal. I would never vote for candidates who specifically are out to destroy things, or do austerity measures. I also don’t vote by party, but by values.

Because few people vote in my area, my votes have enormous impacts on society at large, which feels uniquely powerful.

I love the woods a lot, so I voted for a candidate that wanted to preserve them. My singular vote alone counted as 2% of the entire state, and the pro-Muir candidate won. And that was me alone, I also talked to friends and family about voting, which they did.

I live in Boise, Idaho, a blue city in a deep red state. I always vote knowing that our federal reps and state executives will end up Republican, but locally my vote makes a huge difference. MAGA has made a push to get their people in school boards, library boards, highway districts- all the elections most voters overlook and have low turnout. We’re also a state that has seen mass immigration of blue state MAGA treating this place like it’s a white nationalist haven, so even in the city, districts that used to be reliably blue could flip in the state legislature and it’s more important than ever to not lose what little we have. We have a reasonably progressive mayor/city council that is constantly under attack from the state AG and legislature because the Republicans really fucking hate that the state Capitol, their seat of power, is one of the only places that routinely defies their authority. When the state legislature made a move to ban Pride flags from government buildings the city of Boise made it their city flag. When the AG “won” the city took down the flag and painted the flagpoles Pride colors. They’re quite skilled at malicious compliance.

I do vote, but mostly car only for local ballot measures. Nothing else matters really and the local stuff barley does.

I’d prefer to vote with a brick if I wasn’t disabled and could run without passing out.

I vote, and I’m not going to stop but I’m also drowned out living in TN where everything is stacked to keep a Republican super majority.

My most powerful vote is often in the primaries where I can vote for the least evil Republican.

I vote in every election. I will always vote for the candidate most aligned with my values. I do not vote by party lines (though frankly with the direction of the one major party has moved it sure looks like I do).

Always vote. Especially in your local elections. They matter and very few people participate.