[idontwantthis]

Polarization in America: One side invaded the capital building in a violent attempt to overthrow democracy, and the other side wants to make voting for whoever you want as easy as possible.

Guess which pole I’m at and tell me how I should meet the other pole in the middle.

[insickness]

You inadvertently provide an excellent example of what is causing polarization in America: Highlight the worst possible examples from the side you oppose while assigning the most charitable intentions to the side you support.

[idontwantthis]

Where is a single Democratic politician fighting to close polling places and restrict Republican populations from voting? Where is a single Republican politician fighting to give greater access to the vote?

Where was a single Democrat who stormed the Virginia capital when Republicans won the Governorship?

2 Republicans in Congress voted for an investigation of the insurrections, so there you go: charity.

[Clubber]

While you focus on the other party, you are probably ignoring the detrimental things the party you support does. This is by design. The GOP supporters do the same thing and can list all the horrible things the Democratic Party does with equal fervor.

Did you know the GOP doesn't have superdelegates like the Democrats do? Superdelegates are certainly an example of manipulating the will of the people.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superdelegate

[pjc50]

Superdelegates are a matter of internal party organisation. The party still has to go through a real election, whoever's chosen.

(It is very weird that the internal politics and internal elections of US political parties seem to be a public matter; open primaries are unheard of in most of the rest of the world.)

[Clubber]

It's a lot more important with a 2 party system. If one party's administration gets almost 20% of the total primary votes, that's a pretty heavy thumb on the scale. We typically only get 2 real choices: red or blue.

[idontwantthis]

Ah yes, superdelegates. One of many gripes with the Democratic Party that are famously equivalent to armed insurrection supported by sitting members of Congress.

[Clubber]

Can you name 5 horrible things the Democratic Party has done in say the last 30 years? If not, you've been brainwashed.

[cool_dude85]

Take a look at primary elections in Democrat strongholds like NY to see the same kind of voting restrictions you're railing against, designed of course to ensure that current party power brokers are difficult to challenge.

[theword_]

Totally dishonest to compare primaries to general elections.

[archagon]

As far as I’m concerned, “attempted coup” is a burned bridge that will never be rebuilt. I’m not a member of the Democratic party, but there is nothing the Republican party can do to make me ever vote for them in the future. I hope that the party withers and dies, and that any remaining sensible people go and form a new party.

Some offenses are simply unforgivable.

[totony]

I think "attempted coup" definition has already been discussed hell and back. It's a very disingenuous description of what happened. Also, it is very disingenuous to blacklist one of your only two parties because of what a (small) subset of their voters did.

N.B.: Not american

[DarylZero]

Trump tried to overturn the election result for _months_. It wasn't just one day and it certainly wasn't just "voters."

Even the people in the GOP who refused to back his coup attempt did not sever ties with Trump.

[totony]

Overthrowing a vote which was manipulated is not a coup. What Trump did is he challenged the rightfulness of the vote for months in court. That's a far cry from what you're describing.

Now, you may disagree (as the courts) that it was manipulated. Being wrong does not make what he did a coup.

[archagon]

https://twitter.com/hugolowell/status/1468989737490911232

If this doesn't look like some uncontrovertibly fascist shit to you, then we live in entirely different realities.

[DarylZero]

It's a classic modern coup, to tell lies about the election and discard it.

[edmcnulty101]

People aren't saying it was republicans. People are saying it was Trump and his people. The normal republicans weren't involved.

[commandlinefan]

> Highlight the worst possible examples

... and then exaggerate those on top of it.

[TomSwirly]

Well, I'm not an American, and yet I think they're entirely right.

Also, we note you don't provide any actual rebuttal. :-)

[xboxnolifes]

I'll provide a rebuttal in a similar format to the original to serve as an example of why it is completely unhelpful and unreasonable.

One side violently took to the streets in multiples cities, destroying many small businesses, and causing significant civil unrest.

The other attempted to protect the citizens being attacked in those events and discourage further violence.

One may say that these events weren't strictly Dem vs Rep events, but current hostilities and ideas would suggest that each side was dominantly one or the other.

[Clubber]

There's nothing to rebut. The point is he's only looking at his adversarial party's ills and totally ignoring his own party's ills, or full willing to justify them. That's how it works, that's the divide and conquer. No matter what his party does, he will never vote for the other party and vice versa. That's the main way the system protects itself.

[Brendinooo]

Your characterization is comically uncharitable.

That said, don't think of it as meeting the other pole in the middle. Realize that there are lots of other people between your pole and their pole, and the pole you despise is representative of a lot less people than you think.

[rmbyrro]

That's how bad the situation is...

To be fair, though, the left also has been associated with violent and anti-democratic behaviors.

[idontwantthis]

“To be fair” nothing approaching the same ballpark has been committed by the left and the any “violent and anti democratic behaviors” you can give examples of have not been championed by the left establishment.

One side wants to seize power for all time, and the other side wants democracy. If anyone on the left isn’t polarized by that fact then they aren’t paying attention.

[tlear]

Let me help you expand your knowledge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congressional_baseball_shootin...

[idontwantthis]

Uh yeah let’s equate that to an armed insurrection that killed 3 people and would have overturned a presidential election if not successfully repelled, and that has been defended or denied by Republicans en masse.

He was condemned by both parties, and was not part of the mainstream liberal movement.

[Manuel_D]

> Uh yeah let’s equate that to an armed insurrection that killed 3 people

The only person that was killed during the capitol riot was one of the rioters shot by capitol security. Justified, to be clear, but it wasn't violence perpetrated by the rioters. Brian Sicknick died of natural causes [1][2][3].

1. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/brian-sic...

2. https://www.npr.org/2021/04/19/988876722/capitol-police-offi...

3. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-56810371

[h2odragon]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_United_States_Senate_bomb...

> Six members of the radical far-left Resistance Conspiracy were arrested in May 1988 and charged with the bombing, as well as related bombings

just one, commonly cited counterpoint.

[idontwantthis]

This game is fun, can I play?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haymarket_affair

> In the internationally publicized legal proceedings that followed, eight anarchists were convicted of conspiracy

[snovv_crash]

> and the other side wants democracy

No they don't. They just happened to find a group of people who were likely to vote for them but couldn't. If they were likely to vote GOP (or Green, or Libertarian), they wouldn't be fighting this fight at all.

If you really want to see what someone believes, look at what they do when it isn't in their best interests.

[edmcnulty101]

Just to make you aware, these views are extremist.

[idontwantthis]

I was quite aware already.

[mrkentutbabi]

I wasn't a Trump supporter, and cheered when Biden won presidency.

Fast forward now, not so much anymore. Now I want Trump to be back in the office.

[supreme_loquat]

> One side invaded the capital building in a violent attempt to overthrow democracy

Okay so lumping together half the country in with a few extremists would probably be the first step to answering your question. Yes there were probably plenty of people at home cheering them on but if you really believe it was half the country then you need to get outside your bubble.

> the other side wants to make voting for whoever you want as easy as possible

I have a tough time believing this at least from a party perspective. Sure, the democratic party loves to say this, and they even manage to back it up with their actions sometimes when it's convenient for them, but they still only want you voting for their party approved puppets. If that weren't the case then I simply don't see how it is defensible for democrats to not have enacted a better voting system yet in places where they have clear majorities (eg California would be near the top of that list, and yet here we are stuck with a democratic governor who vetoed the legislation which would have allowed general law cities to use alternative voting systems). Note that I find it entirely likely that plenty of democratic voters would like to fix our voting, I'm specifically talking about the party leadership here, although on that note there are also plenty of republicans who would like to fix our voting, so that's another step you could take to meet them in the middle.

First past the post voting is probably the biggest thing preventing people from "voting for whoever they want", but democrats have done very little for that even though it is blindingly obvious how terrible of a system it is. Well, I can see why the democrats (and republicans) would like it, because that's a large part of how they stay in power, but from a "voting for whoever you want" perspective it's just about as bad as it gets and the democrats just don't seem to care about it.

Now that it's becoming clear that more voters care about this reform, many places are turning to RCV/IRV as the solution when there are much better methods out there. It's hard to tell if it's just being ignorant about the problems with IRV (eg doesn't elect condorcet winner, ignores lots of ballot preferences, non-monotonic, etc) or if they are intentionally aiming for a method which appeases the voters while also being one that will help keep them in power. Approval and STAR are significantly better and are gaining momentum in the US and any condorcet method would also be reasonable, but so far support for these other options is pretty grassroots and I'm unaware of any big name republians or democrats actually talking about those other methods.

Fixing the voting would also help people like you distinguish just how much support eg Trump has compared to others. There was a lot of vote splitting happening in the Republican primaries which Trump benefited from and with a proper method I believe it's entirely possible he wouldn't have even been nominated in the first place. There are plenty of Republicans who did not like him but didn't feel they had an alternative in the general election because of how distasteful they found Clinton/Biden to be.

[DarylZero]

> eg California would be near the top of that list, and yet here we are stuck with a democratic governor who vetoed the legislation which would have allowed general law cities to use alternative voting systems

So a Democratic majority state legislature _passed_ this legislation?

And the veto proves that it's not what Democrats _really_ want?

[supreme_loquat]

I don't think I wrote that all democrats didn't want to fix this, it was simply an illustration that there are plenty of democrats that don't want to fix it or don't care enough to do so. You have to consider that CA could have passed this long ago, it's not like this was their first chance. The fact that it took them so long in the first place to even consider it doesn't speak great things about them. There's also the recall election, they could have run someone better if this was what they were really prioritizing but that clearly isn't the case. There's also plenty of charter cities that could adopt better methods that are likely democrat strongholds and they've also sat around for the most part (although there's obviously exceptions like the SF area, where interestingly enough Newsom also tried to stop it but failed).

edit: although really I hope all you took away isn't just that I don't like democrats. I don't like anyone against fixing the voting methods be they democrat, republican, green, libertarian, independent, or any other category I failed to mention. I just pointed out democrats because supposedly they are the majority in CA and like to claim that they support a healthy democracy. In the same way, I'm happy to work with (just about) anyone who wants to fix the voting system and hope they will make their voice heard. I think it is perhaps the most important thing we need to fix right now, and is one of the main criteria I personally look at when voting for officials.

[DarylZero]

> an illustration that there are plenty of democrats that don't want to fix it or don't care enough to do so

I think you could make an even stronger statement: the majority of Democrats probably aren't even aware of the issue.

It's not a popular issue, and not the kind of thing that Democratic politicians can use to inspire people to vote.

[supreme_loquat]

Not sure I'm convinced. They'd have to have their heads totally buried in the sand to not know it's a problem, and as the saying goes, it is difficult to get someone to understand something when their salary depends upon not understanding it. If it makes it potentially harder for a democrat to get elected, why would they want to support it? That's one of the reasons I consider voting reform so important since it shows a critically severe character flaw if they aren't willing to risk losing their power.

It's not like Newsom is some outlier, just a year ago in San Diego there was an initiative to try and put IRV on the ballot so that the people of San Diego could vote on whether they wanted it or not. The initiative to put it on the ballot failed, only 2/6 democrats in the city council voted in favor of it. 1/2 republicans were in favor and the independent was in favor.

My personal theory is that if there's a strong majority, then the party on top would not be in favor of it. Hopefully we can break the cycle but it's a hard problem when the people most incentivized to vote for it are already the most marginalized.

[idontwantthis]

60% of Republicans believe that Biden did not win the election.

If you believe the presidency has been stolen by a conspiracy then violence is the only recourse remaining.

This is not a handful of extremists. This is the predominant view.

[eej71]

Here's a fun polarizing stat for "the other side". "More than half of democrats believed Bush knew about 9/11".

https://www.politico.com/blogs/ben-smith/2011/04/more-than-h...

Of all the people I know across the spectrum, I don't know of anyone (registered or otherwise) who believes either nonsense.

[stolenmerch]

And about the same number of Democrats believe the widely debunked conspiracy theory that Trump colluded with the Russians to interfere with the 2016 election or that members of congress were paid Russian assets. That's the thing about polarization. It's easy to see the crazy when it's your political enemy doing it.

[epakai]

Except it's not debunked. Bipartisan committee concluded Russia interfered. Multiple people in the Trump admin were acting as foreign agents. We still have no indication what was actually discussed in the Trump tower meetings, but we know they lied about it. Go read the Mueller report summaries.

I'm tired of seeing this lie spouted to dismiss all this as a " Russia hoax". It is clear there is a conflict of interest within that admin. They went to bat to remove sanctions against Russia. They blackmailed Ukraine to attack a political opponent.

[pjc50]

https://web.archive.org/web/20171121144509/https://www.nytim...

A number of other people went to jail among the "Russiagate" investigation. It is true that none of this has ever quite reached Trump himself.

[DarylZero]

No, it's only one "side." Democratic Party isn't going in for false conspiracy theories. Republican Party is.

Just look at how the DOJ treated these two different "conspiracy theories":

1. DOJ denied any factual basis existed for Trump's election claims.

2. DOJ investigated and convicted numerous people on the basis of the Russia collusion investigation.

[ridiculous_leke]

What's the source of that stat?

[germinalphrase]

In May, the pollster Frank Luntz reported that "more than two-thirds of Republicans believe that the election was stolen”.

[lordloki]

Yes, you seem to define the problem well.

[ridiculous_leke]

Did all conservatives and right-wing people storm the capital?

[epakai]

No, their defacto leader pushed false rhetoric that all but ensured such an event would happen and they didn't reject him or even condemn his actions. This is what condemns the group.

[edmcnulty101]

I don't think Arabic people need to dignify terrorism with any response or condemnation at all....it's not Arabic people commiting the crimes, it's fanatics.

Just like republicans don't need to dignify this Jan 6th protest with any response at all, it's not republicans, it's fanatics.

I believe you may be looking for reasons to condemn republicans.

[epakai]

Republicans in congress and in the executive were the ones pushing the conspiracy theories that our democracy was at stake and the election was stolen. Even after their lies had been disproven they continued the farce.

It's disgusting that you try to excuse this by saying it's just fanatics. These fanatics continue to hold power within the party.

Shame on you for the gaslighting. I reject your belief, and you would do well not to try to ascribe other's motivations for their actions.

[edmcnulty101]

To me, the demonization of one group by another group or person for a political agenda, is the worst form of gaslighting possible.