And some fools will always believe it.

If you're a white dude. Then you might be voting your interests. SMH

I wish I'd realized this was not first person and recced it sooner. Please, everybody - if you can't find anything to vote for, you can always find something to vote against. Or something to vote for just for the hoped side effects.

if I agree about not voting though. But, it's her call.

no time to agitate. Might or might not have been planned, but that's the effect.

Especially with the visibility this issue has taken in recent months. Any progress that the #BLM movement has made will be squandered if enough of their supporters decide voting doesn't matter and Republicans run the whole show for a few years.

Judicial appointments and legislation is at stake here. Even one election cycle going to today's Republicans could set back the potential for real progress for a generation.

I truly hope she reconsiders.

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I took a Women in Politics course taught by a Rutgers-Eagleton doctor.


The co-option of the black vote, especially of the female black vote falls into the goals of the conservatives. Since black women are the highest voters, per demographic to vote... this is a win for the conservative cause. There will be a lot of money spent to dissuade black women and men, latinas and latinos from voting. People must be attuned to this.


While there is frustration that over the past 150+ years women and especially black women have been pandered to, manipulated, and co-opted from much of the political progress, will is change if the black voters sit this one out and allow people who are knowing against their positions to gain office?


Sure, this sucks that the Democrat party does not step up more, but much of this country is run by white evangelicals. The evangelical women of all races, tend to vote conservative. Liberal and urban bastions, cannot hold the pressures of many conservative areas. Phyllis Schlafly proved this when she lead the defeat of the ERA. 45% of women vote against modern feminist agendas.



This is the time to rise in power, not withhold a vote that will bestow further repercussions. Do what Shirley Chisholm, my favorite politician did... become "Unbought and Unbossed." Run for as many offices as you can, not just the local ones, but state offices and don't take no for an answer.


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Thanks TheBlackAdder. I think you're spot on! I also love Shirley Chisholm.

Here's the trailer for that great documentary Unbought & Unbossed. I love that movie so much I've seen it twice.

but I have never understood this argument about not voting. It's not like it costs money or something. Might as well vote and see what happens even if you're pessimistic. The idea that not voting is somehow a protest of the system doesn't make sense. Most people didn't vote in 2014 and what did that accomplish? Her idea that "to vote means to uphold a system that is rotten at its core" does not make logical sense.

Are being hindered.

None of the candidates are willing to be vocal for people who look like me and risk harming their white supporters. By that I mean starting to dismantle things such as institutional racism and privilege.

I'll definitely be voting but there is no excitement for any Dem candidates right now.

First, it is foolish to not vote in an election if you have the right to vote. Second, it is foolish to not vote in an election for the reasons she listed. Even when it come to Bernie Sanders she says she is considering not voting for him because she believes he has not done enough for black people and his has not responded to Black Lives Matter in the way she would like. She then goes on to say that she is also considering not voting for Bernie Sanders because she does not like the attitudes of his white supporters. Not voting for a person based on that person supporters is one of the stupidest, if not, the stupidest reason to not vote for someone.

At the end of the article she states, "Voting for an anti-black system will not save my black life. Ironically, voting just might jeopardize it." Voting will not jeopardize her life, or the life of any other black person. She has things completely wrong. Not voting can and most likely will jeopardize black progress.

I went through a similar phase in college, but I grew out of it pretty fast...

from where she sits and what she wants out of an election.

This is true for me of most of the elections in my life, yet I voted.

There is nothing about her reasoning that is stupid, but you might consider that she is writing this to get the attention of the candidates ignoring her concerns and the concerns of the people like her. The threat of not voting might get the Democratic candidates attention.

Former Governor Martin O’Malley oversaw rampant militarization of Maryland’s police forces. His racial justice platform calls for body cameras, a stance I am ardently opposed to as these devices — when in the hands of the police — amount to government surveillance, a lack of transparency or accountability, and obscene profit for companies at the taxpayer’s expense. This added to his current non-factor status leads to my disinterest in his candidacy.

Former Senator and First Lady Hillary Clinton represents dynastic politics, and her close ties to the neoliberal financial sector is less than commendable. She is complicit in fueling the war on drugs. In a series of unjust and anti-black schemes, she helped bolster the prison industrial complex, further corrupted the criminal justice system, and intensified cyclical poverty.

Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) the breakout star of the left, is most aligned with my political value system, but his recent fumbles with Black Lives Matter have caused me great pause. Senator Sanders seems ambiguous in his commitment to black lives, and his hesitancy in making racial justice the centerpiece of his campaign is a strategic error that may account for an electoral loss. His colorblind appeal to “economic reform” is significant, but police do not ask for our net worth when they shoot us dead.

Another stumbling block are his supporters, who are embedded in a white savior ethos that discounts black thought leadership as unintelligent and unworthy. I question his candidacy if these are the people he attracts.

their are too many teahadist, creepublicans and libertarians flocking to his banner for me to take him seriously as someone who gives a damn, really about POC, 2015, not talking 1960....but you know what that BS is all about. I counsel all to vote. Yeah, I have deep reservations...but we got Obama in whether he has done good in anyone's book or not. We must hope to have a candidate who will search out a Thurgood Marshall for our SCOTUS appointment(s) that will probably arise. Plus local politics is where the action will be in this next generation. Please vote. Too many of us died to gain the right to vote.

I currently have some deep damn reservations about all of these people running too. And for very different reasons.

But I will still be voting. Hopefully the young woman in the OP will as well.

The OP got me pondering ...

What is better, the person that listens and gets it wrong; or, the person that does what they think is best?

G.W Bush was the kind of president that didn't listen to the general public, but just "did what he thought was best"

Hell, I'd give less than a rat's ass if she was a conservative...

But black.folks.need.to.vote...End of story

too many of us were hung, shot, burned and castrated trying to gain the right to vote in the then white man's political system. We added a lot of color and change to that jaundiced system, with a hell of a long way still to go. Local politics will/do matter still. SCOTUS appointments cannot be left in the hands of the racist RW. Look what daddybush and boybush brought us.... PLEASE VOTE!!!!!

Voting has a branding problem--it doesn't seem sexy or revolutionary. It feels like coffee in styrofoam cups and shuffling in lines. We need a Hunger Games-type image makeover to show people how awesome voting is, and how hard people fought for it, and the power it represents. (And that Angela ran for Vice-President! )

I hope some opinion makers will do Rock the Vote type tv and radio spots. Our GOTV and registrations have to be vigorous.

My parents tried to make me religious. They neither made a good argument nor set a very good example. (Regarding church attendance, not regarding being good people.) Didn't take.

I was raised to believe that voting is a moral obligation. My parents made a good argument and always voted. Did take.

Times were different, but there was very much a prevailing feeling that there would be little difference no matter if Bush or Gore were president.

People blame a lot of things on that election, but Gore deserves a lot of blame for running such a conservative campaign. Didn't ever take much of a stance on anything, and distanced himself from Bill Clinton to avoid the controversy surrounding him.

I was young and many of my friends at the time didn't vote. I somewhat agreed with them, but I did cast a ballot. Gore won my state anyway.

However, the results of that election should be a huge lesson as to why it's importance not to abstain from voting. The world would be a much better place had Bush never been elected.

As if the President is some sort of powerless bystander as our Civil Rights rights are eroded and abused.

She sits around for 2 terms and doesn't ask President Obama or Attorneys General Holder or Lynch to help our Black asses out? FOH.

Also another diss of Sen. Bernie Sanders who has literally incorporated Racial Justice into his platform and stump speeches, as well as HIRE a Black Lives Matter activist to be a press spokesperson. So the candidate most in sync with her views isn't worth her vote because he didn't acknowledge BLM as quickly and smoothly and convincingly as she would like? And then she casts aspersions on his supporters? FOH.

MLK and Malcolm X and all those feminist icons she admires didn't wait for some goddamned election and hope to place their bet on the right candidate to save the day. They got in the faces of the EXISTING power structure and demanded change TODAY. Not Inauguration Day of 2017.