Is it Time to Deny White Men the Franchise?

[bshole]

This is an article that argues for taking the power of the vote from white men.

Some of the biggest blows to the progressive cause in the past year have often been due to the votes of white men. If white men were not allowed to vote, it is unlikely that the United Kingdom would be leaving the European Union, it is unlikely that Donald Trump would now be the President of the United States, and it is unlikely that the Democratic Alliance would now be governing four of South Africa's biggest cities.

If white men no longer had the vote, the progressive cause would be strengthened. It would not be necessary to deny white men indefinitely – the denial of the vote to white men for 20 years (just less than a generation) would go some way to seeing a decline in the influence of reactionary and neo-liberal ideology in the world. The influence of reckless white males were one of the primary reasons that led to the Great Recession which began in 2008. This would also strike a blow against toxic white masculinity, one that is long needed.

Since we live in a post democratic society where cash purchases political action and not votes, I recognize that having the vote doesn't mean nearly as much as it did 40 years ago..... even so as a white man I would still appreciate having the franchise.

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/she...e-to-deny-white-men-the-franchise_a_22036640/

 

[theeedude]

Considering that they've voted to destroy their own middle class prosperity over the last 40 years, they should seriously consider relinquishing it voluntarily.

 

[bshole]

Considering that they've voted to destroy their own middle class prosperity over the last 40 years, they should seriously consider relinquishing it voluntarily.

Since we live in a post democratic society where cash purchases political action and not votes, I recognize that having the vote doesn't mean nearly as much as it did 40 years ago..... even so as a white man I would still appreciate having the franchise.

 

[theeedude]

OK, but the net result of White men voting Republican and mostly winning is this:

So vote responsibly, it can be dangerous for your health.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Considering that they've voted to destroy their own middle class prosperity over the last 40 years, they should seriously consider relinquishing it voluntarily.

Even better, how about an annual hunting season on people? One buck and doe by firearm, one each by bow, and unlimited by bladed weapons.

 

[sandorski]

No

 

[theeedude]

Even better, how about an annual hunting season on people? One buck and doe by firearm, one each by bow, and unlimited by bladed weapons.

That would be humane compared to what white Americans did to themselves at the voting booth. You do the math, it's about 30,000 white men per year more dying at 45-54 than would have died if they just kept up with US Hispanics. That's not a hunt, that's a slaughter.

 

[desura]

LOL. This is like the penultimate creation of the university.

"Shelly" Garland "herself" would also lose out on the vote here...because from the photo it looks like she has XY chromosomes.

 

[shortylickens]

We let a black man in the oval office.

He didn't solve any problems and made smart-ass remarks the whole time.
Fun.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Let's talk about not taxing white men first, see how that goes over.

No taxation without representation.

 

[boomerang]

Even better, how about an annual hunting season on people? One buck and doe by firearm, one each by bow, and unlimited by bladed weapons.

After disarming the white men first, right?

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

After disarming the white men first, right?

Oh no, this is completely without discrimination. Gays can slice Chinese, Blacks, straight, White, Hispanic, whatever as can everyone else. Absolutely no qualifications. Naturally no one is forced to participate either.

Festival!

 

[interchange]

Since it is rather buried in the article and your quote, I will make sure everyone understands:
This article is on the South Africa edition of HuffPo and is talking about South Africa.

I hope there are other ways to address their race and class divides. I'm not knowledgeable enough to say for sure and can only comment in abstract.

But I do know that I would not really apply those thoughts to the US. South Africa is a nation with significantly more recent and systematized racial segregation, class and cultural divide, in a less stable nation situated in an unstable continent rife with volatile extremists in power (etc.).

 

[Commodus]

The short answer: no.

The long answer: no, but I can understand why the writer would argue this way, especially in South Africa. Many white men have this bad habit of voting for leaders and policies that they know will hurt women and minorities. Either it's intentional (due to bigotry or an FYGM attitude), or they're willing to overlook those hurtful policies to get the ones they want.

I wish the article hadn't been written. Not because I don't think it has some valid points, but because the hyperbolic premise is going to feed into the wet dream fantasies of every white guy who pretends he's oppressed simply because he's no longer the center of the cultural universe.

 

[KMFJD]

This is an article that argues for taking the power of the vote from white men.



Since we live in a post democratic society where cash purchases political action and not votes, I recognize that having the vote doesn't mean nearly as much as it did 40 years ago..... even so as a white man I would still appreciate having the franchise.

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/she...e-to-deny-white-men-the-franchise_a_22036640/

Yeah Nah

 

[quikah]

Why not just deny votes to all and install a "progressive" dictator as leader.

 

[KMFJD]

The short answer: no.

The long answer: no, but I can understand why the writer would argue this way, especially in South Africa. Many white men have this bad habit of voting for leaders and policies that they know will hurt women and minorities. Either it's intentional (due to bigotry or an FYGM attitude), or they're willing to overlook those hurtful policies to get the ones they want.

I wish the article hadn't been written. Not because I don't think it has some valid points, but because the hyperbolic premise is going to feed into the wet dream fantasies of every white guy who pretends he's oppressed simply because he's no longer the center of the cultural universe.

Yeah i'm gonna say bullshit to that, people always vote with what they believe is best in their self interest, skin colour or sex doesn't matter much.

 

[Sunburn74]

We let a black man in the oval office.

He didn't solve any problems and made smart-ass remarks the whole time.
Fun.

Statistically speaking Obama won despite the white vote, not because of it. Whites as a collective largely voted against him. And naturally in midterms and subsequently the trump election, when ethnic and minority support collapsed, their ire was felt. In fact, the best correlator of whether someone voted Trump or not this past election was not income or region but race.

This is an article that argues for taking the power of the vote from white men.
Since we live in a post democratic society where cash purchases political action and not votes, I recognize that having the vote doesn't mean nearly as much as it did 40 years ago..... even so as a white man I would still appreciate having the franchise.
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/she...e-to-deny-white-men-the-franchise_a_22036640/

This may be a weird thing to say, but honestly when you think about the worst humanitarian atrocities the world has faced in the last 500 years, the all-star team in this regard is being led by one race. There is a book I read a while ago which spoke about basically western european culture having an ethos of conqueror kings and subjugation ("ie the earth is mine to subjugate") derived from judeo-christian principles (particularly the adam and eve philos and god's mandate to man) which has led to a lot of fairly horrific things being done to not just each other but even to the planet itself. This ethos affects even our sense of economics, ethics, privacy, even how we look for mating partners. The very concept of how western war vs war on other continents was fought shows these harsh principles. Other places fought war to prove a point (once the point was proven, everyone became buddy-buddy and went back to life as usual) whilst westerners fought wars to exterminate each other. This sort of brutality was shocking to eastern cultures and native american cultures that came into contact with explorers and they quickly had to catch up. But again it all goes back to the central ethos that the world is mine to conquer and subjugate has been around a long time and is pervasive to how the west does things.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

This may be a weird thing to say, but honestly when you think about the worst humanitarian atrocities the world has faced in the last 500 years, the all-star team in this regard is being led by one race.

It doesn't help that this also happens to be the same race that primarily did recordkeeping, and didn't shy away from destroying the records of those they conquered. This has skewed things significantly. If we had more data on the intra-tribal relationships from north/central/south america and africa, as well as prior to one of any of the major data destruction events that have taken place (library of alexandria, inquisition, etc) the numbers might look much different.

 

[Moonbeam]

Yeah i'm gonna say bullshit to that, people always vote with what they believe is best in their self interest, skin colour or sex doesn't matter much.

Please remember when you make generalized statements like this that you are really projecting what you do to everybody else. I often and intentionally vote against my own interests, my own personal monetary interests, for progressive causes like school, transportation or other infrastructure bonds or measures etc. because I believe they create a better community for others who use them even if I never will. I vote in what I think are the best interests of humanity because I know something that you don't, that ours and my real self interest isn't what you think it is.

So you see that while it is true that I vote in my own self interest, we need to understand that self interest means different things. Self interest does not have to be selfish interest. Also I am not alone in voting like this. Millions of people understand that real happiness and the consideration of the welfare of others go hand and hand.

 

[Commodus]

Yeah i'm gonna say bullshit to that, people always vote with what they believe is best in their self interest, skin colour or sex doesn't matter much.

But what do they believe is in their self interest? Not every self-interested motivation is the same.

Take people voting for Trump. Many of them knew his policies basically amounted to "kick out the brown people and scale back freedoms for women and LGBT people," but they voted for him anyway. Either they explicitly believed that this hatred was in their self interest, or they didn't think it was enough of a showstopper to choose a different candidate.

Do you see many women in the US calling for restrictions on men's reproductive freedom? No, you don't. Do you see non-white Americans calling for bans on immigration based on a person's religion? No, you don't. Do you see those same people acting as if removing all illegal immigrants will magically solve employment issues? No, you don't... you get the idea.

For women and minorities, self interest typically means expanding rights and opportunities, not taking them away. To act as if they'd do the same thing (that is, screw everyone else) if the demographics were reversed is ludicrous -- at least in the US, those groups know what actual oppression is like and why it's important not to go back.

 

[Moonbeam]

As to whether it's time to deny white men the franchise, who would the agents of such a determination be. Who would put it into effect?

Isn't the target of such a proposal holders of power who pass laws that preserve and promote the wealth and position such power grants? In the US, isn't there a war going on between liberal progressive white men and wealthy white men who have bought the liberal and conservative parties? How would taking their vote for the common good solve anything?

I think it's fine to talk about what is wrong with society and to identify who stands in the way of progress, but to identify the source of that problem by skin color or gender is a bad mistake. It will be among the skin color and gender of those very power holders that a powerful counter-force will and has always arisen.

What causes the powerful to hang on to power. Isn't it because life sucks for the poor, because it is terrible to be or to feel helpless?

In addition to the facts of life's uncertainties, there are the facts that the competitive system of capitalism creates winners and losers automatically and forces all of mankind, women children, people of every manner of intellectual gift to compete in a game that is best won by having your blood full of testosterone hostility.. That is a tragedy for the human race. Why blame men who will always be better at that game. Why not focus on changing the game, changing the system. Who will be the losers if the game is to improve the lives of everybody, to eliminate the fear that drives selfish interests, to create a world that supports the development of emotional well being.

And furthermore, we create what we fear and since the powerful fear the loss of power, they will destroy themselves. It is a psychological fact that can't be escaped. You can participate in the destruction of white males in your sleep as a reaction to them by joining some imbecilic cause, or watch them do it to themselves as they continue to act in ways that will generate that imbecilic response mechanically.

 

[Genx87]

Statistically speaking Obama won despite the white vote, not because of it. Whites as a collective largely voted against him. And naturally in midterms and subsequently the trump election, when ethnic and minority support collapsed, their ire was felt. In fact, the best correlator of whether someone voted Trump or not this past election was not income or region but race.



This may be a weird thing to say, but honestly when you think about the worst humanitarian atrocities the world has faced in the last 500 years, the all-star team in this regard is being led by one race. There is a book I read a while ago which spoke about basically western european culture having an ethos of conqueror kings and subjugation ("ie the earth is mine to subjugate") derived from judeo-christian principles (particularly the adam and eve philos and god's mandate to man) which has led to a lot of fairly horrific things being done to not just each other but even to the planet itself. This ethos affects even our sense of economics, ethics, privacy, even how we look for mating partners. The very concept of how western war vs war on other continents was fought shows these harsh principles. Other places fought war to prove a point (once the point was proven, everyone became buddy-buddy and went back to life as usual) whilst westerners fought wars to exterminate each other. This sort of brutality was shocking to eastern cultures and native american cultures that came into contact with explorers and they quickly had to catch up. But again it all goes back to the central ethos that the world is mine to conquer and subjugate has been around a long time and is pervasive to how the west does things.

Mao, Pol Pot, Kim Jung, idi amin, the Imperial Japan, genocide in rwanda, sierre leone. And these are just in the last 100 years. The history of genocide and human atrocity transcends skin color.

 

[Indus]

The problem is not someone's ethnicity or skin color , but rather the very thought that someone's skin color or ethnicity is reason for disliking or worse.

 

[Moonbeam]

Since it is rather buried in the article and your quote, I will make sure everyone understands:
This article is on the South Africa edition of HuffPo and is talking about South Africa.

I hope there are other ways to address their race and class divides. I'm not knowledgeable enough to say for sure and can only comment in abstract.

But I do know that I would not really apply those thoughts to the US. South Africa is a nation with significantly more recent and systematized racial segregation, class and cultural divide, in a less stable nation situated in an unstable continent rife with volatile extremists in power (etc.).

Hehe, I was reading the posts without looking to see who wrote them and nearly fell over when I read, "I'm not knowledgeable enough to say for sure.....". Holy, fuck I thought, what kind of freak do we have here? Turns out it was just an old rarity I'd already run into, one who doesn't post often enough, in my also perhaps uninformed opinion.