https://bsky.app/profile/erininthemorning.com/post/3mynwzsux7k2u
Josh Turek of Iowa, Democrat, comes out with one of the worst anti-trans ads yet.
Not only is it an anti-sports ad, it proposes a ban on federal funding for gender affirming care. That would hit all medicaid and medicare patients, and any ACA federally-subsidized plans as well.
Horrific.
We have to vote for them or it’s going to be so much worse
No. It’ll get much worse if you do vote for genocidal fucks like this, because they’ll make the rest of the Democrats more like them.
It’s two fold. When you elect a Democrat, you aren’t just sending a representative to the Legislature. You’re sending a party representative to the DNC, who will do their best to lobby the party itself to support what they were elected to do.
Then Democrats in other states look at candidates like this winning and think “I gotta adopt some of their policy ideas to appeal to right-leaning voters.” This, in turn, shifts the whole party structure to the right.
I’m in Iowa and I won’t vote for my own genocide.
The only thing more dangerous than an enemy is a traitor.
A transphobic republican will do what they can when their party is in power. A transphobic democrat will undermine the opposition to transphobia, and will make hurting trans people a bipartisan policy. That is much much worse.
I hate I have to say this, but iff you’re reading this, and there’s a race on your ballot where you have no choice but to vote for a transphobe, pick the republican. We need to keep these traitors out of office.
I would suggest leaving it blank or writing someone in, to avoid sending a mixed signal (“people liked the Republican’s platform, so maybe we just need to move farther right”), however, I will admit that I’ll be cheering if Turek eats shit so I do understand where you’re coming from.
No you just don’t vote for that race. You don’t vote for the Republican cuz that just tells the Democrats that you support the Republican cause. That would make them chase Republican ideals even more.
If you find a Democratic candidate so completely abhorrent and you cannot vote for them, then vote for neither. Or vote third party if one of them exists on the ballot and it lines with your values cuz that’ll be much more helpful than anything else.
Now normally I wouldn’t council any of that mind you, but this does seem like it’s pretty dire in this case.
If you vote for the Republican they’ll just assume that Josh Turek didn’t go far enough to the right.
It’s better to write in the Dem runner up from the primary, which is what I’m doing.
Thats also a good option assuming you can do write ins there.
Iowa allows them, yeah. I think only three states restrict them.
Well where I live you can only choose “declared” write ins. Which admittedly does cut down on misspellings invalidating the name. Which when I voted the other day was nice since I had the write ins name down as her nickname and they listed the official spelling there.
Good to hear about Iowa though. That seems like the optimal strategy assuming there isn’t another 3rd party that works.
Fuck off with that nonsense. There is absolutely no scenario where voting for a Republican is a better choice, unless you are an accelerationist or MAGA.
I am trans. This effects me. I care about my trans siblings and their safety. A vote for a republican in this specific race is the least harmful choice for my community.
Clean up your own party before insulting others.
Sure, because a Republican would be more-trans friendly. What fantasy world is this? A Republican candidate will be objectively worse for any category you can measure.
Have you seen the UK recently? Labor is doing more harm to trans people than their conservatives, because labor is the current government. That is what will happen if democrats become transphobic. Transphobia in the democrats needs to be stopped even at the cost of seats.
Things rarely get done in the federal government unless they are bipartisan. Making transphobia bipartisan is the worst possible outcome.
What’s the difference between Hispanics voting for Trump and trans people voting for this guy? Aren’t they both doing the same thing? I mean this guy wants to exterminate trans people. Is a really fair to ask any trans person to vote for them? Don’t you feel that’s unreasonable? No matter what your other politics are you can’t expect people to respond to that argument.
And the Republican candidate for this seat has said what exactly re: trans right? Do you seriously think the GOP would be a better alternative?
You are missing the point.
It is simply immoral to ask someone to vote for their own destruction for your material benefit. To ask someone to vote away their human rights. To look at them and tell them that you do not care about them and their survival but that they should value yours. Thats what you are advocating.
You can justify sacrificing the lives of Trans people if you like. However asking them to sacrifice themselves for you is simply wrong.
Please get outta blahaj zone with ts 😭
Do not vote R under ANY circumstance I don’t care. Go vote third party at least, better a “thrown away” vote than one that helps republicans
There’s a reason I am only saying this in this very specific circumstance. Iff, with two fs is shorthand for if and only if. Obviously under no other circumstances should anyone vote republican.
First past the post is a terrible voting system where unfortunately the optimal choice is often voting against what you want to avoid, and this is one of those cases. A candidate who will make the opposition party turn against us is far more of a threat than a giving a single seat to the party that is already against us. A vote against him is the most effective way to keep him out of office.
I genuinely believe its safest for us in the very specific races where the only viable candidates are transphobes. A transphobic democrat is far more dangerous than a transophobic republican.
I’m not reading all that, sorry. I really don’t have the same level of care about this 😭
I already voted anyway lmao
You can’t manage three short paragraphs? Your attention span is that completely shot? If Tick Tock has warped your brain to that level perhaps you shouldn’t be giving voting advice to anybody.
I mean I can, I really just don’t care enough to yk? Like why read your bs when there are other much better things out there. Time prioritization and shit
That wasn’t me. As a fellow blahaj user I value your opinion, which is why I replied to you outlining my views in detail. I respect your choice to not discuss further.
Take care <3
Fuck off. Don’t insult my sibling.
Right back at you Republican.
Really who are you voting for and who do you think will win?
Do you think your life and those in Iowa, the US and around the world will be better or worse overall if he wins or his republican opponent does?
Do you honestly think the republican winning is better?
You can honestly say more lives will be ruined by him than his opponent?
The time to vote for a better dem was the primaries
Now you are stuck with bad and horrible options
I know my life will be worse if Josh Turek succeeds in pushing the rest of the Democrats to the right on trans rights; a vote for Josh Turek is a vote for Democrats to adopt anti-trans rhetoric and policies. The Party will be changed by his victory, but if he loses they’ll think twice about nominating someone like him and that has an effect in 2028. Better to lose one seat than to potentially elect even more anti-trans Democrats in the future by giving them more of a foothold in the party.
The Democrats you vote for are the Democratic Party you are voting for, and when you elect bad Democrats you get a bad party.
Oh, forgot to say who I’m voting for: I’m writing in Zach Wahls, the pro-trans runner up in this primary. That gets recorded by the Party, just like wins and losses do, and they take it into account for future campaigns when they try to figure out what went wrong.
Delusional ml user, who probably doesn’t even live in the US trying to convince people not to vote D (and even worse, says to vote R in Iowa). What complete nonsense.
Guess what? With more Democrats in the House and Senate, the majority leadership switches, and the more comfortable the lead, the more the DSA folks in Congress can push.
With more transphobic Democrats in the House and Senate they won’t work with the DSA to do fucking anything, they’ll reach across the isle to work with Republicans to kill me.
You think this guy is DSA?
deleted by creator
I’m like 100% sure they were talking about Turek.
I may have misread.
🥰
Part of the reason I’m a “Delusional ml user” is because they would do something like this.
Not who I’m referring to.
Sorry, my bad.
Where did I say that? He’s absolutely not DSA and his anti-trans rhetoric is terrible.
Then why on earth would you think this guy, who is against everything the DSA stands for, would increase the DSA’s power?
Do you understand how majority vs minority parties and leadership work in Congress? As much of an asshole as this guy is, he’s STILL better than a Republican in the same position.
You don’t think him losing to someone even further right won’t push the party more right chasing those voters? That’s how is played out for decades
You are okay with him losing? You didn’t answer my other questions
I see a whole bunch of DSA and DSA-adjacent candidates winning recently because of right-wing victories.
You honestly think having the republican win will be better for you?
Honestly now?
I get that they are a shit person to have to vote for, but the other option is even worse, and guess what, wants to hurt even more people.
Sadly your choices are terrible and instead of progress vs hatred you have hate and evil to vote for as your options.
But don’t let evil win. That’s 4 years of even worse treatment. Spend those 4 changing his mind about Trans rights instead of letting someone win who cares even less about your life or others.
I think having a Republican win:
Tells Democrats that Josh Turek was the wrong choice, so they don’t try to emulate his campaign in other races.
Ensures that Josh Turek’s influence on the Democratic Party is limited-to-nonexistent, so he can’t embed his beliefs into the party and pull it to the right.
Gives progressives an easier chance in the next primaries, because there’s no incumbent to unseat.
The Democrats we vote for are the Democratic Party we are voting for - when we vote for Josh Turek or John Fetterman and types like them, we are making the party more like them. If Josh Turek wins this election, we’ll have more Josh Tureks to vote for in 2028.
So you are good with even more suffering for 4 years when the republican wins instead. And also all the suffering Trans people will have from them as well. And gay people and everyone else non straight whites?
Because you think them losing will push the party left, even though the winner is farther and farther right each election and still winning that way.
I’ve watched the parties go farther right for decades and 3rd party voting never works. The dems losing by a few percent pushes them to the right who voted more than the left who didn’t or went 3rd party.
So you wish for another John Fetterman.
Votes with Democrats over 80% of the time. Yes, this is still better than a Republican.
No, I wish we could just snap our fingers and do everything at once, it’s not how the world works though. You win battles, you lose them, but the war continues.
Worse than what? Protesters being executed in the streets? People with melanin dying in filthy concentration camps? A kleptocracy robbing the public blind? An unelected technocracy surveiling and censoring literally everything and everyone?
A fucking MEASELS epidemic?